Dave The Diver

Dave The Diver is an Adventure title that, at first glance, seems modest in its demands, yet the measured data for the AMD Ryzen 5 2600 and NVIDIA GeForce RTX 3080 combination reveals a configuration that dominates every resolution tested. The pairing of a six-core, twelve-thread Zen+ processor from 2018 with a high-end Ampere GPU from 2020 produces an interesting bottleneck dynamic, where the CPU's single-thread performance in this particular title becomes a more relevant factor than its raw core count. The benchmark results show a system that is never truly stressed at 1080p, but begins to show a more balanced workload as resolution increases.

Settings Recommendations

The measured FPS data across the four presets (Low, Medium, High, Ultra) at each resolution strongly suggests that the Ultra preset is the intended experience for this hardware. At 1920x1080, the Ultra preset delivers an average of 203.5 FPS, which is only a 34.0 FPS drop from the Low preset's 237.5 FPS. This is a remarkably small performance penalty for what is presumably a significant visual upgrade. The data indicates a similar pattern at 2560x1440, where Ultra still averages 154.8 FPS, a figure that remains far above the 144 Hz refresh rate common on modern monitors.

The most compelling argument for Ultra comes from the 4K results. At 3840x2160, the Ultra preset averages 102.7 FPS, which is still exceptionally smooth. The difference between Medium (127.1 FPS) and Ultra (102.7 FPS) at this resolution is a 24.4 FPS gap, but the absolute performance is so high that the visual fidelity gain from Ultra is likely worth the trade-off. The High preset, which sits between Medium and Ultra on the spectrum, shows a 113.2 FPS average at 4K, reinforcing that even a step down from the maximum settings leaves ample headroom. Given that the lowest settings only yield a 50.8 FPS improvement over Ultra at 1080p, the data clearly indicates that users should maximize visual quality with the Ultra preset without concern for playability.

How This Combo Ranks

Benchmark results place this specific CPU and GPU combination at rank 580 out of 1626 tested combos in Dave The Diver. This percentile placement, roughly in the top 35.7% of all possible pairings, is interesting because it is not higher. The RTX 3080 alone sits in the 80th percentile among all GPUs, and the Ryzen 5 2600 is in the 77th percentile among CPUs. The fact that the combined rank is lower than either component's individual standing suggests that the pairing is being held back by a specific bottleneck.

The data implies that the Ryzen 5 2600, while a competent processor, is not allowing the RTX 3080 to perform to its full potential in this particular title. This is not a scenario where the GPU is the limiting factor; rather, the frame rates achieved at 1080p, where the CPU often dictates the ceiling, are likely capping the overall score. The combo's rank of 580 suggests that many other pairings, possibly those with newer CPUs, can achieve higher average frame rates in this game, even if they have less powerful GPUs. This makes the combination a case study in how a legacy CPU can constrain a modern, high-end graphics card in a CPU-bound scenario.

GPU Role

The NVIDIA GeForce RTX 3080 brings substantial resources to this title, including 10 GB of GDDR6X memory on a 320-bit bus, providing a bandwidth of 760.3 GB/s. The GPU's boost clock of 1710 MHz, paired with 8704 shading units, allows it to process the game's 2D and 3D elements with ease. The 68 RT cores and 272 tensor cores are present, though their specific impact on this Adventure game is not directly measured in the FPS data.

The GPU's role becomes more defined as resolution increases. The data shows that at 4K, the frame rates are highest on Low (154.2 FPS) and progressively drop to 102.7 FPS on Ultra. This scaling indicates that the GPU is finally becoming a more significant workload participant. The fact that the RTX 3080 can still push over 100 FPS at 4K Ultra in this title speaks to its raw power, but the 51.5 FPS difference between Low and Ultra at 4K, compared to the 34.0 FPS difference at 1080p, shows that the GPU's workload is heavily influenced by both resolution and settings.

Measured FPS Breakdown

At 1920x1080, the frame rates are exceptionally high. The Low preset averages 237.5 FPS, while the Medium and High presets deliver 224.6 and 214.1 FPS, respectively. The Ultra preset still manages an average of 203.5 FPS. The deltas between each step are relatively small, indicating that the CPU is likely the primary limiter at this resolution, and the GPU is not being fully utilized.

Moving to 2560x1440, the results show a clear scaling pattern. Low averages 218.2 FPS, Medium 194.5 FPS, High 169.7 FPS, and Ultra 154.8 FPS. The performance drop from Low to Ultra is 63.4 FPS, which is more pronounced than at 1080p. This suggests that the GPU is starting to take on a larger share of the rendering workload, but the CPU is still providing enough headroom to maintain high frame rates.

At 3840x2160, the GPU becomes the dominant factor. The Low preset averages 154.2 FPS, which is a significant reduction from the 237.5 FPS seen at 1080p. Medium and High follow at 127.1 and 113.2 FPS, respectively, with Ultra ending at 102.7 FPS. The 4K results show a much steeper curve, with a 51.5 FPS difference between Low and Ultra, confirming that the RTX 3080 is now the primary bottleneck, though it remains a highly capable one.

Resolution Scaling

The data shows a predictable yet informative scaling pattern. From 1080p to 1440p, the average FPS across all settings drops by roughly 23-27%. For instance, the High preset falls from 214.1 to 169.7 FPS, a 44.4 FPS decrease. This is a substantial drop, but the absolute frame rates remain high.

The scaling from 1440p to 4K is even more severe. The High preset drops from 169.7 to 113.2 FPS, a 56.5 FPS reduction. The Low preset experiences a similar drop, from 218.2 to 154.2 FPS. This pattern indicates that the rendering pipeline is transitioning from a CPU-bound state at 1080p to a more GPU-bound state at 4K. The RTX 3080's performance at 4K, while still excellent, shows a clear dependency on the resolution, whereas the CPU appears to have a more consistent level of performance across all resolutions, as evidenced by the smaller relative drops in the lower settings.

CPU Role

The AMD Ryzen 5 2600 is a six-core, twelve-thread processor with a base clock of 3.40 GHz and a boost clock of 3.90 GHz. Its architecture, Zen+, is based on a 12 nm process. In terms of synthetic benchmarks, it achieves a Cinebench R23 multi-core score of 11186 and a single-core score of 1579. The single-core performance is a critical metric for this game, as evidenced by the FPS data.

The CPU's role is most apparent at 1080p, where the frame rates are capped at around 237.5 FPS on Low. This ceiling is likely due to the CPU's single-thread performance, as the RTX 3080 is more than capable of rendering faster. The data suggests that Dave The Diver is not heavily multithreaded, as the CPU's multi-core score of 11186 does not translate into a proportionally higher frame rate when compared to its single-core score. The CPU's 16 MB of shared L3 cache and dual-channel memory support with 46.9 GB/s bandwidth are adequate, but they do not prevent the CPU from being the limiting component at lower resolutions. This is a classic case where the CPU's age, despite its respectable core count, holds back a much newer GPU.

FAQ

Q: What is the best settings preset for this hardware in Dave The Diver?

A: The Ultra preset is recommended. At 1920x1080, it averages 203.5 FPS, and at 3840x2160, it still averages 102.7 FPS, providing a high-quality visual experience without sacrificing smoothness.

Q: How does this CPU and GPU combination rank against other tested systems?

A: The combo ranks 580th out of 1626 tested combinations. This position is lower than the individual component percentiles, which are 77th for the CPU and 80th for the GPU, indicating a potential bottleneck.

Q: Is the RTX 3080's 10 GB of VRAM sufficient for this game?

A: The data shows consistent performance without any indication of VRAM limitations. The 10 GB of GDDR6X memory with 760.3 GB/s bandwidth is enough to handle the game at 4K Ultra, as the average FPS remains above 100.

Q: Why is the frame rate at 1080p not higher?

A: The frame rate at 1080p is likely limited by the CPU's single-thread performance. The Ryzen 5 2600 has a Cinebench R23 single-core score of 1579, which appears to cap the maximum FPS around 237.5 on the Low preset.

Q: How much performance is lost when moving from 1080p to 4K?

A: The performance drop varies by settings. For the High preset, the average FPS falls from 214.1 at 1080p to 113.2 at 4K, a 100.9 FPS reduction. This indicates that the GPU becomes a more significant bottleneck at higher resolutions.

Q: Does the CPU's multi-core performance matter for this game?

A: Based on the data, multi-core performance seems less critical. The CPU's Cinebench R23 multi-core score of 11186 is strong, but the FPS scaling from 1080p to 4K suggests that single-core performance is the primary constraint, as the frame rates do not scale with the number of cores.