Hitman 2

The Intel Core i5-11400F paired with the AMD Radeon RX 9070 is a combination that targets high-refresh 1080p and solid 1440p play in Hitman 2, but its 4K performance is limited by the GPU in a way that the data makes very clear. For a stealth game where frame pacing matters more than raw competitive edge, this combo delivers strong results at lower resolutions, yet the step to Ultra settings at 2160p reveals a hard ceiling that users should respect. The following analysis draws solely from measured FPS data and the hardware specifications of both components.

Resolution Scaling

The measured FPS numbers for this combo show a predictable but steep decline as resolution increases, which points directly to the GPU becoming the primary limiter at higher pixel counts. At 1920x1080 with Low settings, the average frame rate is 223 FPS, which is an enormous headroom figure for a game like Hitman 2. Moving to 2560x1440 at Low, the average drops to 143 FPS, a reduction of roughly 36% from the 1080p result. At 3840x2160 with Low settings, the average falls to 76 FPS, which is a 66% drop from the 1080p Low figure. This pattern is textbook GPU-bound scaling: as the pixel count quadruples from 1080p to 4K, the frame rate does not halve proportionally, but the trend is steep enough to show that the RX 9070 is doing the heavy lifting.

The High settings data reinforces this. At 1080p High, the combo averages 126 FPS. At 1440p High, that falls to 81 FPS, a 36% reduction. At 4K High, the average is 43 FPS, which is a 66% drop from 1080p High. The consistency of the percentage drops across Low and High settings suggests that the scaling is stable and not affected by CPU bottlenecks at lower resolutions. If the i5-11400F were holding things back, the 1080p numbers would plateau or show less scaling between Low and High, but they do not.

The Ultra settings data reveals the most critical limitation. At 1080p Ultra, the average is 93 FPS, which is still very playable. At 1440p Ultra, the average drops to 60 FPS, which is exactly at the threshold for many displays. At 4K Ultra, the average falls to 32 FPS, which is below the 30 FPS minimum for comfortable play in a stealth title where smooth camera movement is essential. The gap between 1440p Ultra at 60 FPS and 4K Ultra at 32 FPS is a 47% reduction, showing that the final resolution step is the most punishing. This indicates that the RX 9070’s 16 GB of VRAM is not the issue—the raw compute throughput is the constraint at 4K Ultra.

Comparing Medium settings, which have the only complete min/max data in the pack, shows a similar pattern. At 1080p Medium, the average is 167 FPS with a min of 142 and a max of 192. At 1440p Medium, the average is 107 FPS with a min of 91 and max of 123. At 4K Medium, the average is 57 FPS with a min of 48 and max of 66. The min-to-max spread narrows as resolution increases, which is typical for GPU-bound scenarios where frame time variance is dominated by rendering load rather than CPU draw calls. The 4K Medium min of 48 FPS is still above the 43 FPS average at 4K High, indicating that lowering settings from High to Medium provides a meaningful 14 FPS average uplift at the same resolution.

The overall story is that this combo is optimized for 1080p and 1440p, with 4K only viable at Low or Medium settings. The 1080p Low result of 223 FPS shows that the CPU is not a limiting factor at that resolution, because such a high frame rate would be impossible if the i5-11400F were saturating. Instead, the data suggests that the RX 9070 scales well with resolution until the 4K Ultra load becomes too heavy.

How This Combo Ranks

In Hitman 2 specifically, this combo ranks 1136 out of 3711 tested combinations. That places it in the top 31% of all combos in the database for this game. The percentile ranking is meaningful because Hitman 2 is a game that rewards both high average frame rates and consistent minimums, and the combo’s 1080p and 1440p results are strong enough to push it above most mid-range pairings. However, the 4K Ultra result of 32 FPS drags the overall ranking down, as many combos with weaker GPUs but better CPU-GPU balance at lower resolutions might achieve similar or better 4K performance.

The combo’s rank of 1136 out of 3711 is not a top-tier placement, but it is far from bottom-tier. For context, the i5-11400F alone holds a 71st percentile ranking against all CPUs, while the RX 9070 holds a 69th percentile against all GPUs. In Hitman 2, the combo does not exceed either component’s individual percentile, which suggests that the pairing is balanced but not synergistic. The GPU’s 69th percentile is slightly below the CPU’s 71st, so in this specific game the GPU is the weaker link at higher resolutions, which matches the resolution scaling analysis.

Comparing to the nearest rivals from the FACT PACK, the i5-11400F’s average benchmark score is 17177, which is nearly identical to the AMD EPYC 7H12 at 17120 (a 0.3% difference) and the Intel Core Ultra 7 164U at 17074 (a 0.6% difference). The i5-11400F is slightly behind the Intel Core i5-12450H at 17239 (a -0.4% difference) and the AMD Ryzen 3 PRO 8300G at 17278 (a -0.6% difference). These deltas are all within 1%, meaning that in synthetic benchmarks, the i5-11400F is essentially equivalent to those CPUs. In Hitman 2, this means the CPU is not a differentiator; any of those rivals would likely produce similar frame rates in CPU-bound scenarios.

For the RX 9070, the average benchmark score is 23877, with the nearest rival being the NVIDIA GeForce GTX TITAN Z at 23736 (a 0.6% difference) and the AMD Radeon RX 6800S at 24063 (a -0.8% difference). The RX 9070 also sits close to the NVIDIA GeForce RTX 3080 Mobile at 23628 (a 1.1% difference) and the RTX 2080 SUPER at 24170 (a -1.2% difference). Again, these deltas are small, so the GPU’s performance in Hitman 2 is representative of that class. The fact that the combo ranks 1136 out of 3711 despite having a CPU and GPU that are both near the 70th percentile suggests that Hitman 2 is not particularly favorable to this pairing, likely due to the 4K Ultra penalty.

FAQ

Q: What is the best resolution to use with this combo in Hitman 2?

A: The data shows that 1440p High is the sweet spot, with an average of 81 FPS. At 1080p High, the average is 126 FPS, which is excellent for high-refresh monitors. For 4K, only Low (76 FPS) or Medium (57 FPS) settings are viable.

Q: How does this combo perform at 4K Ultra settings?

A: The average frame rate at 3840x2160 Ultra is 32 FPS, which is below the 30 FPS threshold for smooth play. This is the weakest result in the measured data, and it indicates that the RX 9070 is not sufficient for 4K Ultra in this title.

Q: Is the Intel Core i5-11400F a bottleneck at 1080p?

A: No, the data shows 223 FPS at 1080p Low and 126 FPS at 1080p High. These high frame rates indicate that the CPU is not limiting performance at 1080p, as the RX 9070 is capable of pushing beyond 200 FPS in lighter settings.

Q: How much difference does the Medium settings preset make compared to High?

A: At 1440p, Medium averages 107 FPS versus 81 FPS on High, a 26 FPS difference. At 4K, Medium averages 57 FPS versus 43 FPS on High, a 14 FPS difference. The Medium preset also has min/max data: at 1080p it ranges from 142 to 192 FPS, at 1440p from 91 to 123 FPS, and at 4K from 48 to 66 FPS.

Q: What is the combo’s ranking compared to other tested combinations in Hitman 2?

A: This combo ranks 1136 out of 3711 tested combos, placing it in the top 31% for this game. The CPU holds a 71st percentile against all CPUs, and the GPU holds a 69th percentile against all GPUs.

Q: Does the RX 9070’s 16 GB VRAM help at 4K?

A: The 4K Medium result of 57 FPS and the 4K Low result of 76 FPS show that the VRAM capacity is not the limiting factor. The performance drop to 32 FPS at 4K Ultra is more likely due to compute load, as the card’s memory bandwidth is 644.6 GB/s, which is sufficient for the game’s assets.

Measured FPS Breakdown

The full measured FPS dataset provides a clear picture of performance across all twelve configurations. At 1920x1080, the combo delivers 223 FPS on Low, 167 FPS on Medium, 126 FPS on High, and 93 FPS on Ultra. The Medium setting has a min of 142 and a max of 192, showing that even the lowest frame rate remains above 140 FPS. The jump from Low to Medium is 56 FPS, which is a 25% reduction, while the jump from High to Ultra is 33 FPS, a 26% reduction. This consistency indicates that the GPU scales predictably with settings changes at 1080p.

At 2560x1440, the numbers are 143 FPS on Low, 107 FPS on Medium, 81 FPS on High, and 60 FPS on Ultra. The Medium setting has a min of 91 and a max of 123, which is a tighter range than at 1080p, suggesting that the GPU is more consistently loaded. The drop from Low to Medium is 36 FPS, and from High to Ultra is 21 FPS. The Ultra result of 60 FPS is exactly at the standard refresh rate, making it a usable setting for many players, but any frame rate dips below 60 would be noticeable in a stealth game.

At 3840x2160, the results are 76 FPS on Low, 57 FPS on Medium, 43 FPS on High, and 32 FPS on Ultra. The Medium setting has a min of 48 and a max of 66, with the min still above the High average of 43 FPS. This is a critical insight: if a player wants to play at 4K, selecting Medium over High provides a 14 FPS average improvement and a minimum that is 5 FPS higher than the High average. The 4K Low result of 76 FPS is the only 4K configuration that approaches the 1440p High result of 81 FPS, meaning that dropping both resolution and settings is the only way to maintain high frame rates.

The measured FPS data also shows diminishing returns from settings changes at higher resolutions. At 1080p, going from Low to Ultra reduces the average from 223 to 93 FPS, a 130 FPS difference. At 1440p, the same settings change reduces from 143 to 60 FPS, an 83 FPS difference. At 4K, the reduction is from 76 to 32 FPS, a 44 FPS difference. This pattern is typical of GPU-bound scenarios where the absolute performance headroom shrinks as resolution increases.

GPU Role

The AMD Radeon RX 9070 is the dominant component in this combo for Hitman 2, and its specifications directly explain the measured FPS results. The GPU has 16 GB of GDDR6 memory on a 256-bit bus, yielding a bandwidth of 644.6 GB/s. For a 2018 game like Hitman 2, this memory capacity is far beyond what the game requires, as evidenced by the fact that the 4K Low and Medium settings do not show any VRAM-related stutter in the min FPS data. The 4K Medium min of 48 FPS is respectable, and the 4K Low average of 76 FPS is high, indicating that the memory subsystem is not a bottleneck.

The clock speeds of the RX 9070 are also relevant. The base clock is 1330 MHz, the game clock is 2070 MHz, and the boost clock is 2520 MHz. The boost clock is 89% higher than the base clock, which suggests that the GPU is designed to run at high frequencies under load. In Hitman 2, which is not a particularly demanding game by modern standards, the GPU is likely sustaining near-boost clocks at 1080p and 1440p, which explains the strong performance at those resolutions. At 4K Ultra, the GPU’s compute resources are saturated, and the boost clock may drop, contributing to the 32 FPS average.

The GPU’s architecture is RDNA 4.0 on a 4 nm process, with 3584 shading units, 224 texture mapping units, and 128 raster output units. The pixel rate is 322.6 GPixel/s, and the texture rate is 564.5 GTexel/s. These figures are high enough to handle Hitman 2’s rendering at 1440p easily, but the 4K Ultra load requires more pixel and texture throughput than the card can sustain. The FP32 performance is 36.13 TFLOPS, which is a measure of raw compute that correlates with the 4K scaling limitations seen in the data.

The GPU’s benchmark scores align with its in-game performance. The PassMark G3D score is 25381, and the 3DMark Steel Nomad DX12 score is 6290. The Geekbench OpenCL score is 131539, and the Vulkan score is 58705. These scores place the GPU at the 69th percentile against all GPUs, and its nearest rivals in synthetic tests are the GTX TITAN Z, RX 6800S, RTX 3080 Mobile, and RTX 2080 SUPER, all within a 1.2% delta. In Hitman 2, the GPU’s performance is consistent with that class, meaning that any of those rival GPUs would likely produce similar frame rates at the same settings.

CPU Role

The Intel Core i5-11400F plays a supporting role in this combo, and its specifications show why it does not bottleneck the RX 9070 at most settings. The CPU has 6 cores and 12 threads, with a base clock of 2.60 GHz and a boost clock of 4.40 GHz. The 65W TDP is modest, and the Rocket Lake architecture on a 14 nm process is older than the GPU’s RDNA 4.0, but for Hitman 2, the CPU’s single-thread performance is what matters most. The 3DMark single-thread score is 868, and the Geekbench single-core score is 1777. The Cinebench R23 single-core score is 2024, which is a strong result for a 6-core part.

The CPU’s multi-threaded performance is also sufficient. The Cinebench R23 multi-core score is 14340, and the Geekbench multi-core score is 7737. The 3DMark max threads score is 5652, which shows that the CPU can handle 12 threads without significant scaling issues. In Hitman 2, which is not heavily multi-threaded, the 6 cores and 12 threads are more than enough to feed the GPU at 1080p, as evidenced by the 223 FPS Low result. The CPU’s average benchmark score is 17177, placing it at the 71st percentile, and its nearest rivals are all within 0.6% in average score.

The CPU’s cache configuration includes 80 KB of L1 per core, 512 KB of L2 per core, and 12 MB of shared L3 cache. For a game like Hitman 2, which has large open environments with many NPCs, the 12 MB L3 cache is adequate to keep frequently accessed data close to the cores. The memory support is DDR4 with dual-channel bandwidth of 51.2 GB/s, which is a potential bottleneck for some modern games, but the measured FPS data does not show any signs of memory bandwidth limiting performance at 1080p or 1440p. The 4K results are clearly GPU-bound, so the CPU and memory are not the primary constraints.

The i5-11400F’s PCIe Gen 4 support with 20 lanes is another factor. The RX 9070 uses a PCIe 5.0 x16 interface, but it is backward compatible with PCIe 4.0, so the CPU’s Gen 4 lanes provide sufficient bandwidth for the GPU. The data does not show any performance penalty from using PCIe 4.0 instead of 5.0, as the 1080p and 1440p results are high. The CPU’s lack of integrated graphics is irrelevant for this combo since the RX 9070 handles display output.

In synthetic tests, the i5-11400F’s PassMark multi-thread score is 16908, and its single-thread score is 2981. The Cinebench R20 multi-core score is 6022, and the single-core score is 850. These numbers indicate a balanced CPU that is neither a weak link nor a standout performer. The fact that the combo ranks 1136 out of 3711 in Hitman 2, while the CPU is at the 71st percentile, suggests that the game is more GPU-dependent, and the CPU’s role is to avoid causing frame drops, which it does successfully based on the min FPS data.