Counter-Strike 2

Counter-Strike 2 presents a unique scaling challenge for the AMD Ryzen 5 8400F and NVIDIA GeForce RTX 4080 SUPER combination. The data shows a dramatic shift in system behavior as resolution increases, moving from a CPU-bound scenario at 1080p to a more balanced GPU-bound workload at 4K. At 1920x1080 with Low settings, the combo produces 671 FPS, while the same settings at 3840x2160 yield 248 FPS—a 63% reduction. This steep drop indicates that the RTX 4080 SUPER’s raw throughput becomes the primary constraint at higher pixel counts, whereas at 1080p, the Ryzen 5 8400F’s single-thread performance limits the frame rate ceiling.

Resolution Scaling

The measured FPS values across resolutions reveal a clear scaling pattern that highlights the bottleneck shift. At 1080p Low, the system achieves 671 FPS, a figure that suggests the CPU is nearing its maximum output for this engine. Moving to 1440p Low drops the average to 444 FPS, a 34% reduction, while 4K Low produces 248 FPS, another 44% decline. This progression indicates that the GPU’s rendering load is scaling nearly linearly with pixel count, but the CPU is no longer the limiting factor beyond 1080p.

High settings demonstrate a similar trend but with lower absolute numbers: 416 FPS at 1080p, 275 FPS at 1440p, and 154 FPS at 4K. The percentage drops between resolutions—34% from 1080p to 1440p and 44% from 1440p to 4K—are consistent with the Low preset, suggesting that the resolution scaling behavior is independent of the quality preset. This consistency implies that the RTX 4080 SUPER’s architecture handles the increased pixel workload uniformly, without hitting memory bandwidth or cache bottlenecks.

The 4K Medium preset shows 206 FPS average with a minimum of 175 FPS and maximum of 237 FPS, providing a 31% reduction from 1440p Medium’s 369 FPS. This narrower spread between min and max at 4K suggests that frame pacing becomes more stable as the GPU becomes the dominant constraint, reducing CPU-induced hitches. At 1080p Medium, the min-max range of 474 to 641 FPS around a 557 average shows more variance, indicating that CPU thread scheduling and memory latency contribute to frame time fluctuations when the GPU is underutilized.

Ultra settings amplify the GPU dependency. The 4K Ultra average of 120 FPS is exactly half the 1080p Ultra figure of 323 FPS, a perfect linear scaling that strongly suggests the RTX 4080 SUPER’s fill rate and shader throughput are the sole determinants. The 1440p Ultra result of 214 FPS fits this pattern, showing a 34% drop from 1080p, matching the High preset’s scaling ratio. This consistent scaling across all presets confirms that Counter-Strike 2’s engine does not introduce any resolution-specific inefficiencies for this hardware combination.

FAQ

Q: What is the maximum measured average FPS for this combo?

A: The highest recorded average is 671 FPS at 1920x1080 with Low settings.

Q: How does the 4K Ultra performance compare to 1080p Low?

A: The 4K Ultra average of 120 FPS is 82% lower than the 1080p Low average of 671 FPS, demonstrating the massive GPU workload increase at 4K with maximum quality.

Q: Is the Ryzen 5 8400F a bottleneck at any resolution?

A: At 1080p Low, the 671 FPS result suggests CPU limitation, as the GPU is unlikely to be the constraint at such high frame rates. At 1440p and 4K, the GPU becomes the primary bottleneck, as evidenced by the consistent scaling pattern.

Q: What is the frame time variance at 1440p Medium?

A: The 1440p Medium preset shows a minimum of 313 FPS and maximum of 424 FPS, creating a 111 FPS spread around the 369 average, indicating moderate frame pacing variability.

Q: Does the RTX 4080 SUPER’s 16 GB VRAM affect these results?

A: The data shows no VRAM-related performance cliffs at any resolution or preset, suggesting 16 GB is sufficient for Counter-Strike 2’s maximum settings at 4K.

Q: How does the combo rank among all tested configurations?

A: This combination ranks 301st out of 3719 tested combos, placing it in the top 8.1% of all configurations in the database.

GPU Role

The NVIDIA GeForce RTX 4080 SUPER’s specifications directly explain its performance characteristics in Counter-Strike 2. The GPU features 10240 shading units and 112 ROPs, with a boost clock of 2550 MHz, producing a pixel rate of 285.6 GPixel/s and texture rate of 816.0 GTexel/s. These figures indicate substantial fill-rate capacity, which translates to the observed 4K performance where the GPU is the limiting component. The 52.22 TFLOPS FP32 throughput provides ample compute headroom for the game’s lighting and particle effects, even at Ultra settings.

The 16 GB GDDR6X memory on a 256-bit bus delivers 736.3 GB/s bandwidth. This memory subsystem proves adequate for Counter-Strike 2, as evidenced by the absence of performance cliffs when moving from Medium to Ultra at 4K—the average drops from 206 to 120 FPS, but this is consistent with increased shader complexity rather than memory exhaustion. The 1438 MHz memory clock (23 Gbps effective) allows the GPU to maintain texture streaming rates without stuttering, as the 4K Medium min FPS of 175 suggests stable frame delivery.

The RTX 4080 SUPER’s Ada Lovelace architecture includes 80 RT cores and 320 tensor cores, though Counter-Strike 2’s primarily rasterized rendering means these units see limited utilization. The GPU’s 320 W TDP and triple-slot cooler design indicate a high-power design that sustains boost clocks under sustained gaming loads. The 700 W suggested PSU requirement shows this is a power-hungry component, but the benchmark results justify this for 4K gaming. At 1080p, however, the GPU’s capabilities are largely wasted, as the 671 FPS Low result is constrained by CPU performance rather than GPU throughput.

Settings Recommendations

The measured data provides clear guidance for optimizing the balance between visual quality and frame rate. For competitive play at 1920x1080, the Low preset’s 671 FPS average offers the highest refresh rate headroom, though the Medium preset at 557 FPS still exceeds any current display’s refresh rate. The Ultra preset at 323 FPS at 1080p provides a significant visual upgrade with only a 48% reduction from Low, making it viable for players prioritizing image quality on high-refresh monitors.

At 2560x1440, the Medium preset delivers 369 FPS, which remains above 360 Hz display capabilities, while High at 275 FPS suits 240 Hz panels. The Ultra preset at 214 FPS still provides excellent smoothness for 144 Hz displays, meaning all presets are playable at this resolution. The 1440p Medium min FPS of 313 ensures that even the most demanding scenes maintain high frame rates, making it the recommended starting point for most users.

For 3840x2160, the data shows a different landscape. The Medium preset’s 206 FPS average with a 175 FPS minimum provides the best balance for 144 Hz 4K displays, as it exceeds the refresh rate threshold while maintaining visual fidelity. High at 154 FPS is suitable for 120 Hz displays, while Ultra at 120 FPS exactly matches 120 Hz panels but leaves no headroom for frame drops. Low at 248 FPS is overkill for current 4K displays and sacrifices too much visual quality. The Medium preset at 4K emerges as the optimal choice, offering the best combination of smoothness and detail.

Measured FPS Breakdown

The complete dataset shows a consistent hierarchy across all resolutions. At 1920x1080, Low leads with 671 FPS, followed by Medium at 557 FPS (with a min of 474 and max of 641), High at 416 FPS, and Ultra at 323 FPS. The 144 FPS gap between Medium and High represents the largest single-step jump, suggesting that High preset introduces heavier shading effects. The 93 FPS difference between High and Ultra is smaller, indicating diminishing returns from the highest quality tier.

At 2560x1440, the order remains identical: Low at 444 FPS, Medium at 369 FPS (min 313, max 424), High at 275 FPS, and Ultra at 214 FPS. The percentage reductions from 1080p are consistent across presets, with Low dropping 34%, Medium 34%, High 34%, and Ultra 34%. This uniform scaling confirms that the GPU’s pixel throughput is the limiting factor, as the relative performance between presets remains unchanged when resolution increases.

The 3840x2160 results show: Low at 248 FPS, Medium at 206 FPS (min 175, max 237), High at 154 FPS, and Ultra at 120 FPS. The 4K Medium result’s min-max spread of 62 FPS is narrower than the 1440p Medium’s 111 FPS spread, indicating more consistent frame pacing at higher resolution. The 4K Ultra’s 120 FPS exactly matches the 120 Hz refresh rate common on 4K displays, but the lack of headroom means any scene complexity increase could cause visible stutter.

CPU Role

The AMD Ryzen 5 8400F’s specifications provide context for its performance in Counter-Strike 2. This 6-core, 12-thread processor based on Zen 4 architecture runs at a 4.20 GHz base clock and 4.70 GHz boost clock. Its 16 MB shared L3 cache and 64 KB L1 per core support the game’s need for rapid data access during intense combat scenarios. The 3DMark single-thread score of 951 and Cinebench R23 single-core score of 2943 indicate strong single-thread performance, which is critical for Counter-Strike 2’s main game thread.

The CPU’s multi-threaded capabilities, shown by Cinebench R23 multicore score of 20851, are less relevant for this game, which typically scales across only a few threads. The PassMark single-thread score of 3685 and multithread score of 24389 confirm this processor’s balanced design. The 83.2 GB/s memory bandwidth from dual-channel DDR5 support ensures the CPU can feed data to the GPU without becoming a bottleneck, particularly at lower resolutions where frame rates exceed 400 FPS.

The 8400F’s 65 W TDP and 4 nm process node from TSMC allow it to maintain boost clocks without thermal throttling, which is essential for sustained high frame rates. Its percentile ranking of 77 among all CPUs and average benchmark score of 25005 place it slightly above the Ryzen 5 7500F (deltaPct 0.2) and Intel Core i7-11850H (deltaPct 0.3). This positioning suggests the 8400F provides adequate processing power for Counter-Strike 2, but the 1080p Low result of 671 FPS indicates it is the limiting factor at that resolution, as the RTX 4080 SUPER would likely deliver higher frame rates if paired with a stronger CPU.

How This Combo Ranks

The combination of Ryzen 5 8400F and RTX 4080 SUPER achieves a rank of 301 out of 3719 tested combos in Counter-Strike 2, placing it in the top 8.1% of all configurations. This ranking reflects the strong overall performance, driven primarily by the GPU’s exceptional 4K capabilities, but also shows the CPU’s limitations at competitive settings. The GPU’s percentile of 86 among all GPUs and average benchmark score of 54209, which is within 0.1% of the RTX 4080 (deltaPct -0.1), indicates the SUPER variant offers marginal gains over its predecessor.

The CPU’s rank of 301 out of 3719 combos positions this system among high-end configurations, but the 77th percentile CPU score suggests there is room for improvement. Systems with faster CPUs like the AMD EPYC 9474F, which scores 25103 on average (deltaPct -0.4 relative to the 8400F), would likely achieve higher frame rates at 1080p. However, the 8400F’s performance is sufficient to keep the GPU well-fed at 1440p and 4K, as evidenced by the consistent scaling patterns.

In the broader context, this combo outperforms 90% of tested configurations, with only 300 combos achieving higher frame rates. The ranking reflects the balance between a mid-range CPU and high-end GPU, where the GPU dominates at higher resolutions and the CPU becomes a secondary factor. For users prioritizing 4K gaming, this combo is exceptionally well-suited, but for esports-focused players seeking maximum 1080p frame rates, a stronger CPU would be necessary to fully utilize the RTX 4080 SUPER’s capabilities.