Counter-Strike 2

# Counter-Strike 2 with Intel Core i5-13400F + NVIDIA GeForce RTX 5090 D

The combination of Intel Core i5-13400F and NVIDIA GeForce RTX 5090 D delivers an overwhelmingly GPU-bound experience in Counter-Strike 2 at lower resolutions, but the data reveals a surprising shift: at 4K Ultra, the frame rate collapses to 145 FPS, indicating that even this flagship GPU is challenged by the game's highest settings. The measured results show this pairing ranks 36th out of 3,719 tested combos, placing it in the top 1% of all configurations, though the CPU's mid-range positioning creates notable bottlenecks at 1080p where the RTX 5090 D's raw power is left underutilized. This analysis examines the resolution scaling, component roles, and exact performance metrics from the measured data.

Resolution Scaling

The frame rate progression from 1080p to 4K reveals a clear pattern of GPU dependency, with the most dramatic drops occurring at the highest settings. At Low settings, the average FPS falls from 727 at 1920x1080 to 301 at 3840x2160, a reduction of 426 FPS or roughly 59% of the 1080p performance. This steep decline at low settings indicates that the RTX 5090 D is being pushed to its limits by the sheer pixel count at 4K, even when graphical fidelity is minimized.

Moving to Medium settings, the scaling shows a similar trajectory: 676 FPS at 1080p drops to 448 FPS at 1440p, then further to 250 FPS at 4K. The 1440p result retains 66% of the 1080p frame rate, while 4K retains only 37%. This suggests that the GPU's rendering workload scales superlinearly with resolution, particularly when additional effects and textures are enabled at Medium settings. The minimum FPS at Medium settings also demonstrates this pressure: 575 at 1080p, 380 at 1440p, and 213 at 4K, showing that frame time consistency degrades alongside average performance.

High settings present an interesting anomaly: the drop from 1080p to 1440p is relatively modest (505 to 334 FPS, a 34% reduction), but the plunge to 4K is severe (334 to 187 FPS, a 44% reduction from 1440p). This non-linear scaling at High settings suggests that certain rendering features enabled at this tier disproportionately impact higher resolutions. The 4K High result of 187 FPS is still highly playable for competitive esports, but it represents a significant departure from the triple-digit headroom seen at lower resolutions.

Ultra settings produce the most dramatic resolution penalty. The 1080p Ultra average of 392 FPS drops to 260 FPS at 1440p, then collapses to 145 FPS at 4K. This final result is particularly telling: the difference between 4K High (187 FPS) and 4K Ultra (145 FPS) shows that the Ultra preset's additional effects cost 42 FPS, or 22% of the High preset's performance. The data indicates that at 4K Ultra, the RTX 5090 D is the definitive limiting component, as the CPU has ample headroom at this resolution given the lower absolute frame rates.

How This Combo Ranks

The combination of Intel Core i5-13400F and NVIDIA GeForce RTX 5090 D achieves a rank of 36 out of 3,719 tested combos in Counter-Strike 2, placing it in the 99th percentile of all configurations. This top-tier ranking is primarily driven by the GPU's exceptional performance, as the RTX 5090 D sits in the 92nd percentile among all GPUs with an average benchmark score of 77,712. The CPU, by contrast, ranks in the 77th percentile among all processors with an average score of 25,292, suggesting that the combo's high placement is largely attributable to the graphics card's dominance.

Examining the CPU's nearest rivals provides context for its contribution to this ranking. The Intel Core i5-13400F posts an average benchmark score of 25,292, which is nearly identical to the AMD Ryzen 9 6900HS (25,284, 0% delta), the Intel Core 5 120 (25,362, -0.3% delta), and the AMD Ryzen 5 5600X3D (25,365, -0.3% delta). The AMD Ryzen 7 6800H trails slightly at 25,201 (0.4% delta favorable to the i5). This tight clustering — all within 0.4% of each other — indicates that the i5-13400F's processing power is squarely in the mid-range tier, neither significantly boosting nor holding back the RTX 5090 D in this game.

The GPU's nearest rivals further contextualize its standing. The RTX 5090 D's average score of 77,712 compares closely to the AMD Radeon RX 6650M XT (76,904, 1.1% delta), the AMD Radeon RX 6850M XT (78,940, -1.6% delta), and the NVIDIA Tesla P100 PCIe variants (79,396 and 79,605, -2.1% and -2.4% deltas respectively). These small percentage differences suggest that the RTX 5090 D is competitively positioned among high-end GPUs, though it does not dominate its peers as decisively as its 92nd percentile ranking might imply. In the context of Counter-Strike 2 specifically, the combo's 36th place ranking out of 3,719 demonstrates that a handful of other pairings — likely featuring stronger CPUs — achieve higher frame rates, particularly at lower resolutions where CPU headroom matters more.

CPU Role

The Intel Core i5-13400F brings 10 cores and 16 threads to this pairing, with a base clock of 2.50 GHz and a boost clock of 4.60 GHz. Its Raptor Lake architecture, built on Intel's 10 nm process, provides a 20 MB shared L3 cache and 1.25 MB L2 cache per core. The CPU's benchmark results show a strong multi-threaded capability: a Cinebench R23 multi-core score of 22,604 and a 3DMark max-thread score of 7,307, alongside a single-thread score of 960 in 3DMark and 3,191 in Cinebench R23. These figures place the i5-13400F in the 77th percentile among all CPUs, indicating solid but not elite processing power.

In Counter-Strike 2, the CPU's role becomes increasingly critical as resolution decreases. At 1080p Low, the combo achieves 727 FPS, a figure that far exceeds what the GPU alone could render if the CPU were limiting. The fact that the frame rate drops to 539 FPS at 1440p Low and 301 FPS at 4K Low demonstrates that the GPU is the primary constraint at these settings. However, the 1080p Low result of 727 FPS suggests the CPU is capable of feeding the GPU at very high frame rates, as this is among the highest measured across all settings and resolutions.

The CPU's single-thread performance is particularly relevant for Counter-Strike 2, a game known for its reliance on core-bound rendering. The i5-13400F's 3DMark single-thread score of 960 and Geekbench single-core score of 1,996 indicate strong per-core throughput, which likely contributes to the high frame rates observed at 1080p. The Cinebench R23 single-core score of 3,191 further confirms this capability. With a boost clock of 4.60 GHz across 10 cores, the CPU can allocate sufficient processing power to the game's primary thread while managing ancillary tasks across the remaining cores.

At higher resolutions, the CPU's workload diminishes relative to the GPU's. The 4K Ultra result of 145 FPS represents a scenario where the GPU is heavily loaded, and the CPU's 10 cores have ample headroom to maintain frame pacing. The lack of minimum FPS data for most settings prevents a full analysis of frame-time consistency, but the Medium settings results show minimums of 575 FPS at 1080p, 380 FPS at 1440p, and 213 FPS at 4K, suggesting that the CPU maintains stable frame delivery even under GPU stress. The i5-13400F's 65W TDP and 16 threads provide a balanced platform for this game, though the data indicates that a higher-percentile CPU could extract additional performance at 1080p where the GPU is underutilized.

Measured FPS Breakdown

At 1920x1080, the combo delivers its highest frame rates across all settings. Low settings produce an average of 727 FPS, the maximum measured in this dataset, followed by Medium at 676 FPS (with a minimum of 575 and maximum of 778), High at 505 FPS, and Ultra at 392 FPS. The spread from Low to Ultra at 1080p is 335 FPS, demonstrating that graphical settings have a substantial impact even at this resolution. The Medium setting's minimum of 575 FPS indicates that even the lowest frame rates at 1080p remain exceptionally high, far exceeding the refresh rates of typical gaming monitors.

At 2560x1440, performance scales down predictably but retains high playability. Low settings average 539 FPS, Medium averages 448 FPS (minimum 380, maximum 515), High averages 334 FPS, and Ultra averages 260 FPS. The reduction from 1080p to 1440p ranges from 26% at Low (727 to 539 FPS) to 34% at High (505 to 334 FPS), with Medium showing a 34% drop (676 to 448 FPS) and Ultra a 34% drop (392 to 260 FPS). The Medium minimum of 380 FPS confirms that frame rates remain consistently high at 1440p, even under demanding scenes.

At 3840x2160, the performance envelope tightens considerably. Low settings average 301 FPS, Medium averages 250 FPS (minimum 213, maximum 288), High averages 187 FPS, and Ultra averages 145 FPS. The drop from 1440p to 4K is severe across all settings: 44% at Low (539 to 301 FPS), 44% at Medium (448 to 250 FPS), 44% at High (334 to 187 FPS), and 44% at Ultra (260 to 145 FPS). This consistent 44% reduction across settings indicates that the resolution increase alone — not the graphical preset — is the dominant factor in the 4K performance penalty. The Medium minimum of 213 FPS at 4K shows that even under load, the combo remains above the 144 Hz threshold commonly used in competitive gaming.

GPU Role

The NVIDIA GeForce RTX 5090 D is the dominant component in this pairing, and the data confirms its central role in Counter-Strike 2 performance. Built on the Blackwell 2.0 architecture with a 5 nm process, the GPU features 32 GB of GDDR7 memory on a 512-bit bus, delivering 1.79 TB/s of bandwidth. Its 21,760 shading units, 680 texture mapping units, and 176 render output units provide substantial raw compute, with a base clock of 2017 MHz and boost clock of 2407 MHz. The memory clock runs at 1750 MHz, effective 28 Gbps. The GPU's benchmark scores include a 3DMark Steel Nomad DX12 score of 14,326, a Geekbench Vulkan score of 376,915, and a Passmark G3D score of 44,065, placing it in the 92nd percentile among all GPUs.

In Counter-Strike 2, the GPU's performance scaling across resolutions reveals its capabilities and limitations. The RTX 5090 D's 32 GB VRAM is far more than this game requires, as Counter-Strike 2 is not memory-intensive at these settings. The 1.79 TB/s bandwidth ensures that texture streaming and memory access are never bottlenecks, allowing the GPU's compute units to operate at full capacity. The 104.8 TFLOPS FP32 performance provides ample pixel and texture throughput, as evidenced by the 423.6 GPixel/s pixel rate and 1,636.8 GTexel/s texture rate.

The GPU's role becomes most apparent at 4K Ultra, where the 145 FPS average represents the lowest measured result. This is a scenario where the RTX 5090 D's raw compute is fully utilized, and the frame rate is constrained by the GPU's ability to process the game's rendering pipeline at this resolution and settings combination. The fact that 4K Low achieves 301 FPS while 4K Ultra drops to 145 FPS — a 52% reduction — demonstrates that the Ultra preset's additional effects (likely including advanced shadows, reflections, and post-processing) place a heavy load on the GPU's shading units and ROPs. The Medium setting's minimum of 213 FPS at 4K indicates that the GPU maintains reasonable frame pacing even when stressed, though the gap between average and minimum (250 vs 213 FPS) suggests occasional frame-time spikes.

The GPU's nearest rivals, as measured by average benchmark scores, include the AMD Radeon RX 6650M XT (76,904, 1.1% delta), AMD Radeon RX 6850M XT (78,940, -1.6% delta), and NVIDIA Tesla P100 variants (79,396 and 79,605, -2.1% and -2.4% deltas). These comparisons show the RTX 5090 D is not dramatically faster in synthetic benchmarks than some mobile and datacenter GPUs, yet in Counter-Strike 2's measured FPS, the combination's 36th rank out of 3,719 indicates that real-world gaming performance is exceptional. The GPU's 575W TDP and dual-slot design suggest it is a power-hungry flagship, but the benchmark data shows that this power translates directly into high frame rates across all tested configurations.

FAQ

Q: What is the highest average FPS achieved by this combo in Counter-Strike 2?

A: The highest measured average FPS is 727, achieved at 1920x1080 resolution with Low settings. This is the maximum frame rate recorded across all resolution and settings combinations in the dataset.

Q: How does the combo rank among all tested configurations in Counter-Strike 2?

A: The Intel Core i5-13400F + NVIDIA GeForce RTX 5090 D combination ranks 36th out of 3,719 tested combos, placing it in the top 1% of all configurations. The GPU's 92nd percentile ranking among all GPUs is the primary driver of this high placement.

Q: What is the lowest average FPS recorded, and under what conditions?

A: The lowest average FPS is 145, achieved at 3840x2160 resolution with Ultra settings. This represents the most demanding configuration tested, where the GPU is fully saturated and the frame rate drops below 150 FPS.

Q: How does the i5-13400F's CPU performance compare to its nearest rivals?

A: The i5-13400F has an average benchmark score of 25,292, which is essentially tied with the AMD Ryzen 9 6900HS (25,284, 0% delta) and AMD Ryzen 5 5600X3D (25,365, -0.3% delta). It slightly outperforms the AMD Ryzen 7 6800H (25,201, 0.4% delta) and slightly trails the Intel Core 5 120 (25,362, -0.3% delta).

Q: At which resolution does the CPU become the limiting factor?

A: The data indicates the CPU is most likely to limit performance at 1920x1080 with Low settings, where the 727 FPS average approaches the CPU's maximum frame delivery capability. At higher resolutions such as 3840x2160, the GPU becomes the clear bottleneck, as evidenced by the 145-301 FPS range.

Q: What is the GPU's VRAM capacity and memory bandwidth?

A: The RTX 5090 D features 32 GB of GDDR7 memory on a 512-bit bus, providing 1.79 TB/s of memory bandwidth. This is far in excess of Counter-Strike 2's requirements, ensuring that memory capacity and bandwidth never constrain performance in this game.