Dave The Diver

Dave The Diver is not a demanding title, but the data for this specific combination reveals a system that is heavily overqualified for the task, delivering exceptional frame rates across all tested settings. The Intel Core i5-11400F and NVIDIA GeForce RTX 4080 SUPER pairing produces a minimum average of 132.7 FPS even at the most demanding 4K Ultra preset, indicating that the primary bottleneck shifts from the GPU to the CPU as resolution decreases.

Resolution Scaling

The performance drop from 1080p to 4K is surprisingly modest, which indicates that the game is exceptionally well-optimized and that the RTX 4080 SUPER has ample headroom. At High settings, the average frame rate decreases from 285.4 FPS at 1920x1080 to 227.8 FPS at 2560x1440, a reduction of 20.2%. Moving further to 3840x2160, the average FPS drops to 154.9, which is a 45.7% decrease from the 1080p figure. This scaling pattern suggests that while the GPU is becoming more stressed at higher resolutions, it is still far from being overwhelmed. The gap between 1440p and 4K is larger than the gap between 1080p and 1440p, which is typical for a GPU with this level of memory bandwidth.

The most revealing data point is the Low settings comparison. At 1080p Low, the system achieves 314.8 FPS, but at 1440p Low, it only drops to 285.1 FPS, a mere 9.4% decline. This small difference strongly implies that the CPU is the limiting factor at these lower resolutions and settings. The Core i5-11400F, with its 6 cores and 12 threads, appears to cap the frame rate around the 285-315 FPS range, while the RTX 4080 SUPER has plenty of computational power left unused. At 4K Low, the frame rate drops to 204.1 FPS, showing that the GPU finally becomes the primary constraint at this resolution, though the absolute numbers remain outstanding.

FAQ

Q: What is the best resolution for this combination in Dave The Diver?

A: The data shows that 2560x1440 provides the best balance of visual fidelity and performance. At High settings, the system achieves 227.8 FPS at 1440p, which is 47% higher than the 154.9 FPS at 4K High, while still offering a significant visual upgrade over 1080p.

Q: Is the RTX 4080 SUPER overkill for this game?

A: Benchmark results indicate that the GPU's vast capabilities are largely untapped. At 1080p Low, the system reaches 314.8 FPS, but the CPU's limitations prevent it from going higher. The RTX 4080 SUPER's 16 GB of GDDR6X memory and 736.3 GB/s bandwidth are far beyond what this title requires.

Q: How does the Ultra preset compare to High?

A: The performance cost of Ultra settings is moderate. At 4K, Ultra averages 132.7 FPS compared to High's 154.9 FPS, a 14.3% reduction. At 1080p, the difference narrows to 267 FPS for Ultra versus 285.4 FPS for High, a 6.4% drop, suggesting the CPU becomes more relevant at lower resolutions.

Q: Can this system maintain 144 FPS at 4K?

A: Yes, but only if settings are tuned. The data shows 4K High delivers 154.9 FPS and 4K Medium delivers 168.8 FPS, both exceeding the 144 FPS threshold. However, the 4K Ultra preset falls short at 132.7 FPS.

Q: Is the CPU a bottleneck at any point?

A: Yes, the evidence is clear at 1080p. The difference between Low (314.8 FPS) and Medium (292.7 FPS) is only 7%, and High (285.4 FPS) versus Ultra (267 FPS) is 6.4%. These small gaps indicate the CPU is limiting maximum frame rates rather than the GPU.

Q: What is the frame rate ceiling for this combo?

A: The highest recorded average is 314.8 FPS at 1080p Low. This likely represents the practical ceiling imposed by the Intel Core i5-11400F's single-thread performance, as the GPU has significant headroom at this resolution.

GPU Role

The NVIDIA GeForce RTX 4080 SUPER is the dominant component in this pairing, and its specifications explain the high frame rates observed. With 10,240 shading units and 320 texture mapping units, the GPU has massive parallel processing capability. The 16 GB of GDDR6X memory on a 256-bit bus provides 736.3 GB/s of bandwidth, which is more than sufficient for this game's texture and geometry data. The core clocks, running at a base of 2295 MHz and boosting to 2550 MHz, allow for rapid shader execution.

The GPU's role becomes more pronounced as resolution increases. The data shows that at 4K, the frame rate differences between Low (204.1 FPS) and Ultra (132.7 FPS) represent a 35% spread, demonstrating that the GPU is actively working harder at this resolution. In contrast, at 1080p, the spread between Low (314.8 FPS) and Ultra (267 FPS) is only 15.2%, meaning the GPU is not the primary constraint. The RTX 4080 SUPER's 52.22 TFLOPS of FP32 compute is clearly not being fully utilized in this title, as evidenced by the ability to exceed 200 FPS even at 4K Low settings. The GPU's performance percentile of 88% versus all other GPUs reinforces its position as a top-tier part that is well beyond the requirements of this adventure game.

How This Combo Ranks

The combination of the Intel Core i5-11400F and NVIDIA GeForce RTX 4080 SUPER ranks 148th out of 1626 tested combos in Dave The Diver, placing it in the top 9.1% of all configurations. This high ranking is primarily driven by the GPU's exceptional performance, as the CPU is a mid-range part from 2021. The i5-11400F has a percentile of 75% versus all CPUs, while the RTX 4080 SUPER has a percentile of 88% versus all GPUs. The combo rank of 148 suggests that the GPU is pulling the overall score up significantly, as there are many faster CPUs paired with slower GPUs that would rank lower.

The data shows that this combo outperforms the vast majority of systems tested for this game. The 148th rank means that only 147 other combinations achieve higher average frame rates, which is a remarkable result given the CPU's age. This indicates that Dave The Diver is not heavily CPU-dependent at typical gaming resolutions, allowing the RTX 4080 SUPER's raw power to shine through. The gap between this combo and the top-ranked systems is likely due to newer CPUs with higher single-thread performance, but the practical difference is minimal given that the frame rates are already well above display refresh rates.

Measured FPS Breakdown

The measured FPS data provides a complete picture of performance across all settings and resolutions. At 1920x1080, the system delivers exceptional results: Low settings average 314.8 FPS, Medium averages 292.7 FPS, High averages 285.4 FPS, and Ultra averages 267 FPS. The maximum spread at this resolution is 47.8 FPS between Low and Ultra, representing a 15.2% performance penalty for the highest visual quality.

Moving to 2560x1440, the frame rates remain highly playable. Low settings average 285.1 FPS, Medium averages 254.6 FPS, High averages 227.8 FPS, and Ultra averages 199.9 FPS. The spread between Low and Ultra increases to 85.2 FPS, a 29.9% difference, showing that the GPU is beginning to feel the resolution increase. At 3840x2160, the impact is more pronounced: Low averages 204.1 FPS, Medium averages 168.8 FPS, High averages 154.9 FPS, and Ultra averages 132.7 FPS. The spread between Low and Ultra at 4K is 71.4 FPS, or 35% of the Low setting's value.

The data reveals that the scaling from 1080p to 1440p is more efficient at lower settings. For Low, the drop is 9.4%, while for Ultra, it is 25.1%. This suggests that at Ultra settings, the GPU's texture and shading units are working harder, making the resolution increase more costly. The 4K results show that even the most demanding preset remains above 130 FPS, which confirms the GPU's power.

Settings Recommendations

Based on the measured FPS data, the High preset at 2560x1440 offers the best combination of visual quality and performance headroom. At 227.8 FPS, this setting provides a 47% improvement over the 4K High result while still delivering a crisp image. For users with 1440p 144Hz monitors, the High preset is ideal, as it provides 83.8 FPS of headroom over the refresh rate. The Ultra preset at 1440p, which averages 199.9 FPS, is also viable and would be the recommended choice for those seeking maximum visual fidelity without sacrificing smoothness.

For 4K displays, the High preset is the recommended choice, as it averages 154.9 FPS, comfortably exceeding the 144Hz refresh rate common on high-end monitors. The Medium preset at 168.8 FPS offers additional headroom but with a noticeable reduction in visual quality. The Ultra preset at 132.7 FPS falls below the 144Hz threshold and is not recommended for competitive play. At 1080p, all presets are excessively fast, with even Ultra averaging 267 FPS. Given that the CPU appears to be the limiting factor at this resolution, users should select Ultra settings to extract the maximum visual quality without any meaningful performance penalty.

CPU Role

The Intel Core i5-11400F is a 6-core, 12-thread processor based on the Rocket Lake architecture, running on the Intel Socket 1200 platform. With a base clock of 2.60 GHz and a boost clock of 4.40 GHz, it provides solid single-thread performance, as evidenced by its Cinebench R23 single-core score of 2029 and Geekbench single-core score of 1979. The 12 MB of shared L3 cache helps reduce memory latency, while the dual-channel DDR4 memory support with 51.2 GB/s bandwidth is adequate for this game.

The CPU's role in Dave The Diver becomes clear when examining the frame rate data at 1080p. The difference between Low (314.8 FPS) and Ultra (267 FPS) is only 15.2%, which is a much smaller gap than at 4K (35%). This indicates that the CPU is reaching its maximum frame rate output around 315 FPS, regardless of the GPU's capabilities. The 3DMark single-thread score of 868 and PassMark single-thread score of 2981 suggest that the CPU's per-core performance is the limiting factor at these high frame rates. The processor's 65W TDP and 14 nm process node are modest by modern standards, but they are sufficient for this undemanding title. The CPU's average benchmark score of 17181 places it in the 75th percentile of all CPUs, and its nearest rival, the AMD Ryzen 7 5700U, has a near-identical score of 17189, confirming that the i5-11400F is a competent mid-range processor that does not significantly hinder this GPU in most scenarios.