Dave The Diver

# Dave The Diver with Intel Core i5-12400 + NVIDIA GeForce RTX 4080

The Intel Core i5-12400 paired with the NVIDIA GeForce RTX 4080 delivers exceptional performance in Dave The Diver, ranking 293rd out of 3710 tested combos in this game, placing it in the top 8% of all configurations. This combination leverages the RTX 4080's substantial compute power alongside a six-core Alder Lake processor that holds its own in this adventure title. The data shows a system capable of triple-digit frame rates even at 4K Ultra, with headroom for high-refresh-rate displays at lower resolutions. Benchmark results across twelve measured configurations indicate that this pairing is heavily GPU-bound at higher resolutions, while the CPU begins to exert influence on frame rates at 1080p, particularly at lower settings where the GPU is less stressed.

How This Combo Ranks

With a combo rank of 293 out of 3710 tested combinations, this system sits comfortably within the top percentile of configurations benchmarked for Dave The Diver. This ranking reflects the RTX 4080's position in the GPU hierarchy—the card's average benchmark score of 54247 places it in the 86th percentile of all GPUs, with nearest rivals including the RTX 4080 SUPER (0.1% higher score) and the AMD Radeon Pro W5700X (1.1% lower). The i5-12400, while more modest in its overall standing at the 72nd percentile of all CPUs, still delivers strong per-core performance with a single-thread score of 910 in 3dmark and 3456 in Passmark, ensuring that it does not bottleneck the RTX 4080 in this particular title.

The delta between this combination and the top-ranked systems is not directly measured, but the absolute frame rates tell a compelling story. At 4K Ultra, the combo produces 136 FPS average, which is well above the 60 FPS threshold typically considered smooth for adventure games. The rank of 293 out of 3710 suggests that while there are faster configurations, this pairing is firmly in the upper echelon for Dave The Diver, outperforming the vast majority of systems tested. The nearest CPU rivals—the AMD EPYC 7643 (0.1% lower average score) and Intel Core i7-1355U (0.3% lower)—demonstrate that the i5-12400's performance is competitive with a wide range of processors, though the EPYC's enterprise focus and the mobile-oriented i7-1355U are unlikely to appear in gaming rigs with an RTX 4080.

Settings Recommendations

For the best measured experience in Dave The Diver, the data indicates that High settings provide an excellent balance of visual quality and performance across all resolutions. At 1080p High, the system achieves 305 FPS average; at 1440p High, it maintains 230 FPS; and at 4K High, it still delivers 154 FPS. These figures suggest that High settings are the sweet spot for this combination, offering a substantial improvement over Medium while remaining comfortably above refresh-rate thresholds for most displays.

Ultra settings are also viable, particularly for users with 1440p or 1080p monitors. At 1440p Ultra, the combo produces 203 FPS average, while 1080p Ultra reaches 269 FPS. At 4K Ultra, the average drops to 136 FPS, which remains playable but represents a 12% reduction compared to High settings at the same resolution. Medium settings offer diminishing returns in terms of performance gains—at 4K, Medium provides 172 FPS versus 154 FPS on High, a modest 12% uplift—but the visual compromise may not be worth it given how well High performs. Low settings are unnecessary for this hardware, as even the most demanding preset comfortably exceeds playable frame rates.

Resolution Scaling

The frame rate scaling from 1080p to 4K reveals a system that becomes increasingly GPU-bound as resolution rises. At High settings, the transition from 1080p (305 FPS) to 1440p (230 FPS) represents a 25% drop, while moving from 1440p to 4K (154 FPS) incurs a further 33% reduction. This pattern indicates that the RTX 4080's rendering workload scales significantly with pixel count, as expected for a modern GPU with 16 GB of GDDR6X memory and 716.8 GB/s of bandwidth.

At Low settings, the scaling is more dramatic: 1080p produces 366 FPS, 1440p drops to 307 FPS (a 16% decrease), and 4K falls to 206 FPS (a 33% decrease from 1440p). The smaller relative drop at 1440p suggests that the CPU is becoming a limiting factor at this resolution with Low settings—the i5-12400's six cores and 12 threads, running at base 2.50 GHz with boost up to 4.40 GHz, are likely reaching their ceiling for frame generation in this game. This CPU-bound behavior at low resolutions and settings is typical for a high-end GPU paired with a mid-range processor, and it explains why the 4K to 1080p scaling ratio is not perfectly linear.

Measured FPS Breakdown

At 1920x1080, the benchmark results show a wide range of performance across settings. Low settings produce an average of 366 FPS, with Medium at 342 FPS (minimum 290, maximum 393), High at 305 FPS, and Ultra at 269 FPS. The gap between Low and Ultra is 28%, indicating that this resolution is not particularly demanding on the RTX 4080, leaving headroom for the CPU to influence results.

Moving to 2560x1440, the averages are 307 FPS on Low, 257 FPS on Medium (minimum 219, maximum 296), 230 FPS on High, and 203 FPS on Ultra. The scaling from 1080p to 1440p at High settings (305 to 230 FPS) represents a 25% reduction, while Ultra drops by 25% as well (269 to 203 FPS). At 4K (3840x2160), Low settings average 206 FPS, Medium hits 172 FPS (minimum 146, maximum 198), High reaches 154 FPS, and Ultra bottoms out at 136 FPS. The full range from 1080p Low to 4K Ultra spans 366 to 136 FPS, a 63% performance envelope that showcases both the GPU's capability at lower resolutions and the increasing demand at 4K.

FAQ

Q: Is this combination capable of 4K gaming in Dave The Diver?

A: Yes. At 4K Ultra, the system averages 136 FPS, and at 4K High it reaches 154 FPS. Even the most demanding preset comfortably exceeds 60 FPS, making this a strong 4K configuration for this game.

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

A: At High settings, the drop is from 305 FPS at 1080p to 154 FPS at 4K, a 49% reduction. At Ultra settings, the drop is from 269 FPS to 136 FPS, a 49% reduction as well.

Q: Does the i5-12400 bottleneck the RTX 4080 in this game?

A: The data suggests some CPU limitation at 1080p Low, where the system produces 366 FPS—likely near the CPU's frame generation ceiling. At higher resolutions and settings, the GPU becomes the limiting factor, as evidenced by larger frame rate drops when increasing resolution.

Q: What is the best setting for competitive or high-refresh-rate play?

A: For 240 Hz displays, 1080p Medium (342 FPS) or 1440p Low (307 FPS) are the only presets that exceed 300 FPS. For 144 Hz displays, any setting at any resolution works, as even 4K Ultra produces 136 FPS.

Q: How does this combo compare to the RTX 4080 SUPER?

A: The RTX 4080 has an average benchmark score of 54247, which is 0.1% lower than the RTX 4080 SUPER's 54209. This places them effectively on par, with the SUPER having a negligible 0.1% advantage.

Q: What is the minimum FPS recorded for this combination?

A: The lowest minimum FPS recorded is 146 at 4K Medium settings. The 1080p Medium configuration shows a minimum of 290 FPS, while 1440p Medium has a minimum of 219 FPS.

CPU Role

The Intel Core i5-12400 is a six-core, 12-thread processor based on the Alder Lake architecture, built on Intel's 10 nm process with a 163 mm² die size. Its base clock of 2.50 GHz boosts to 4.40 GHz, and it carries 18 MB of shared L3 cache along with 1.25 MB L2 per core and 80 KB L1 per core. The CPU's benchmark scores show a single-thread capability of 910 in 3dmark and 3456 in Passmark, with multithread performance reaching 5890 in 3dmark max threads and 15989 in Cinebench R23 multicore.

In Dave The Diver, the CPU's role becomes evident at lower resolutions and settings. At 1080p Low, the system produces 366 FPS, which is only 19% higher than 1080p Ultra (269 FPS), a smaller gap than the GPU's raw capability would suggest. This compression of frame rates at 1080p indicates that the i5-12400 is approaching its limit for generating frames in this game, even with its boost clock of 4.40 GHz and 12 threads. The CPU's 72nd percentile ranking among all processors, with nearest rivals including the AMD EPYC 7643 (0.1% higher) and Intel Core i3-14100F (0.9% higher), confirms that it is a solid but not top-tier processor. Its 3dmark scores—1692 for 2 threads and 4745 for 8 threads—show that scaling beyond eight threads provides diminishing returns, which aligns with the game's behavior at high FPS where per-core performance matters most.

GPU Role

The NVIDIA GeForce RTX 4080 is an Ada Lovelace architecture GPU with 9728 shading units, 304 texture mapping units, and 112 raster operation processors. It operates at a base clock of 2205 MHz with a boost of 2505 MHz, and its 16 GB of GDDR6X memory runs at 1400 MHz (22.4 Gbps effective) across a 256-bit bus, delivering 716.8 GB/s of bandwidth. The GPU's compute capabilities include 48.74 TFLOPS of FP32 performance and 76 ray-tracing cores, with 304 tensor cores for AI workloads.

The RTX 4080's benchmark results place it in the 86th percentile of all GPUs, with an average score of 54247. Its nearest rivals show tight competition: the RTX 4080 SUPER scores 54209 (0.1% lower), while the AMD Radeon Pro W5700X reaches 54828 (1.1% higher). In Dave The Diver, the GPU's dominance is clear at 4K resolutions where frame rates scale predictably with settings. The transition from 4K Low (206 FPS) to 4K Ultra (136 FPS) represents a 34% reduction, reflecting the GPU's workload increase. The GPU's 16 GB VRAM is more than sufficient for this game, as evidenced by consistent performance across settings without any indication of memory-related stuttering or frame drops. The RTX 4080's 320 W TDP and triple-slot design are substantial, but the measured performance justifies the power envelope, delivering 154 FPS at 4K High—a result that would have been unthinkable for a single GPU at this resolution just a few years prior.