Hitman 2

The Intel Core i7-13700K paired with the AMD Radeon RX 9060 produces a clear pattern in Hitman 2: performance is heavily dictated by resolution, with the GPU becoming the primary constraint as pixel count rises. At 1920x1080, the combo delivers 159 FPS on Low settings, which represents the ceiling of the measured data. Moving to 2560x1440 on the same Low preset drops the average to 102 FPS, a reduction of 57 frames. Stepping up to 3840x2160 Low yields 54 FPS, showing a further 48-frame decline. The pattern holds across all settings: the gap between 1080p and 1440p is substantial, but the drop from 1440p to 4K is more severe, indicating that the RX 9060’s memory bandwidth and compute resources are being saturated at higher resolutions.

The scaling from High settings illustrates this clearly. At 1080p High, the system produces 90 FPS, which is smooth for a stealth title. At 1440p High, that figure falls to 58 FPS, a 35.6% reduction. At 4K High, the average collapses to 31 FPS, which is below the threshold for comfortable play. This steep decline suggests that the CPU has ample headroom at lower resolutions, but the GPU cannot maintain the same throughput as pixel count increases. The 4K Ultra result of 23 FPS reinforces this: it is the lowest measured score in the entire dataset, and the gap between 4K High and 4K Ultra (31 to 23 FPS) is proportionally larger than the gap between 1080p High and 1080p Ultra (90 to 66 FPS). The data indicates that at 4K, the limiting component is unambiguously the graphics card, not the processor.

Resolution Scaling

The measured FPS across the three resolutions reveals a consistent pattern of diminishing returns as settings increase. At Low settings, the system goes from 159 FPS at 1080p to 102 FPS at 1440p and 54 FPS at 4K. This represents a 35.8% drop from 1080p to 1440p, and a 47.1% drop from 1440p to 4K. At Medium settings, the progression is 119 FPS at 1080p, 76 FPS at 1440p, and 41 FPS at 4K. The percentage declines are similar: 36.1% and 46.1% respectively. At High settings, the drops are more pronounced in absolute terms: 90 to 58 to 31 FPS, corresponding to 35.6% and 46.6% reductions. At Ultra, the values are 66, 43, and 23 FPS, with declines of 34.8% and 46.5%.

The uniformity of these percentage drops—roughly 35% from 1080p to 1440p and 46-47% from 1440p to 4K—indicates that the scaling is driven by pixel count rather than by any specific setting. The 1440p to 4K transition involves a 2.25x increase in pixels, which aligns with the observed performance penalty. The 1080p to 1440p transition is a 1.78x increase in pixels, yet the performance drop is smaller in percentage terms. This suggests that at 1080p, the system is partially CPU-limited, meaning the GPU is not fully utilized. As resolution increases, the GPU becomes the bottleneck, and the scaling becomes more linear with pixel count. The data shows that 1080p is the only resolution where the combo consistently exceeds 60 FPS across all settings except Ultra, while 1440p only achieves that on Low and Medium. At 4K, no setting breaks 60 FPS, and only Low reaches the playable threshold of 54 FPS.

GPU Role

The AMD Radeon RX 9060 is built on the RDNA 4.0 architecture with the Navi 44 chip, fabricated on a 4 nm process by TSMC. Its memory configuration is 8 GB of GDDR6 on a 128-bit bus, providing 288.0 GB/s of bandwidth. The GPU has a base clock of 1700 MHz, a game clock of 2400 MHz, and a boost clock of 2990 MHz. These clocks are relatively high for the segment, but the memory bandwidth is modest. The 128-bit bus width is a limiting factor at higher resolutions, as the 4K tests require more data to be fetched from VRAM. The VRAM capacity of 8 GB is sufficient for Hitman 2 at 1080p and 1440p, but at 4K Ultra, the game may approach the limit, though the measured data does not specify any texture thrashing.

The GPU’s benchmark scores place it in a specific tier. Its passmark_g3d score is 17631, and its avgBenchmarkScore is 16014. This puts it at the 59th percentile among all GPUs. Its nearest rival is the NVIDIA GeForce RTX 3060 Ti, which has an avgScore of 16129, a delta of -0.7%. This means the RX 9060 is essentially tied with the RTX 3060 Ti in synthetic benchmarks. However, in Hitman 2, the measured results show that the combination of the RX 9060 and the i7-13700K produces 31 FPS at 4K High and 23 FPS at 4K Ultra. These are low scores, suggesting that the GPU’s 288.0 GB/s bandwidth is insufficient for 4K gaming in this title. The textureRate of 334.9 GTexel/s and pixelRate of 191.4 GPixel/s are respectable, but they do not compensate for the memory constraints. The FP32 performance of 21.43 TFLOPS is competitive, yet the game’s engine appears to be bandwidth-sensitive, as evidenced by the steep drops at higher resolutions.

CPU Role

The Intel Core i7-13700K is a 16-core, 24-thread processor based on the Raptor Lake architecture, manufactured on a 10 nm process. Its base clock is 3.40 GHz, and it boosts to 5.40 GHz. The cache hierarchy includes 80 KB of L1 per core, 2 MB of L2 per core, and 30 MB of shared L3. This is a high-end desktop CPU, and its benchmark scores confirm its strength. The cinebench_r23_multicore score is 30745, and the passmark_multithread score is 45887. Its avgBenchmarkScore is 46881, placing it at the 89th percentile among all CPUs. Its nearest rival is the AMD Ryzen 9 5900, with an avgScore of 46971 and a delta of -0.2%, meaning the i7-13700K is effectively tied with that chip in synthetic tests.

In Hitman 2, the CPU’s role is more subtle. At 1080p Low, the system produces 159 FPS, which is likely near the engine’s frame rate cap or the CPU’s single-thread limit. The 3dmark_single_thread score of 1136 and passmark_single_thread score of 4333 indicate strong single-core performance, which is crucial for game logic. However, the game does not appear to be CPU-bound at higher resolutions. The fact that FPS drops from 159 to 54 when moving from 1080p Low to 4K Low—while the CPU workload remains the same—proves that the GPU is the limiting factor in those scenarios. At 1080p, the CPU has enough headroom to feed the GPU, but the GPU’s bandwidth constraints cap performance. The 16 cores and 24 threads are unlikely to be fully utilized by Hitman 2, as the game is not known for heavy multithreading. The CPU’s 89th percentile ranking suggests it is more than adequate for this title, and the data shows no evidence of CPU-induced stuttering or frame drops, as the min FPS values for Medium settings (101 at 1080p, 65 at 1440p, 35 at 4K) are consistent with the averages.

FAQ

Q: What is the highest average FPS recorded for this combo in Hitman 2?

A: The highest average FPS is 159, achieved at 1920x1080 resolution with Low settings.

Q: Does the Intel Core i7-13700K bottleneck the AMD Radeon RX 9060 in this game?

A: No. At 1080p, the combo reaches 159 FPS on Low, and the FPS scales down uniformly as resolution increases (102 at 1440p, 54 at 4K), indicating the GPU becomes the limiting factor at higher resolutions, not the CPU.

Q: What is the lowest average FPS recorded for this combo in Hitman 2?

A: The lowest average FPS is 23, recorded at 3840x2160 resolution with Ultra settings.

Q: How does this combo’s CPU compare to its nearest rival in synthetic benchmarks?

A: The Intel Core i7-13700K has an avgBenchmarkScore of 46881, which is 0.2% lower than the AMD Ryzen 9 5900’s 46971, making them statistically equivalent.

Q: How does this combo’s GPU compare to its nearest rival in synthetic benchmarks?

A: The AMD Radeon RX 9060 has an avgBenchmarkScore of 16014, which is 0.7% lower than the NVIDIA GeForce RTX 3060 Ti’s 16129, showing near-identical synthetic performance.

Q: What is the frame rate difference between 1080p Ultra and 4K Ultra?

A: At 1080p Ultra, the combo averages 66 FPS. At 4K Ultra, it averages 23 FPS, representing a 65.2% reduction in performance.

Settings Recommendations

Based on the measured FPS values, the optimal settings depend on the target resolution and desired frame rate. For 1920x1080, the High preset provides 90 FPS, which is smooth and visually detailed. The Ultra preset drops to 66 FPS, which is still playable but shows a significant performance cost for a marginal visual improvement. The Medium preset at 119 FPS is the best balance for competitive or fast-paced play, though Hitman 2 is a stealth game where visual fidelity may be preferred. For 2560x1440, the Medium preset delivers 76 FPS with a min of 65 FPS, which is the only setting above 60 FPS at this resolution. High at 58 FPS is playable but not ideal for a smooth experience. For 3840x2160, the Low preset is the only viable option at 54 FPS, as Medium drops to 41 FPS and High to 31 FPS. The data suggests that 4K gaming with this combo requires significant compromises; the Low preset at 4K provides a similar frame rate to the High preset at 1440p (54 vs 58 FPS), but with reduced visual quality. The best overall experience, balancing frame rate and visual fidelity, is 1080p High (90 FPS) or 1440p Medium (76 FPS). For users prioritizing frame rate, 1080p Medium at 119 FPS is the recommended choice.

Measured FPS Breakdown

At 1920x1080, the combo produces the following average FPS: Low 159, Medium 119 (min 101, max 137), High 90, and Ultra 66. The Medium setting has the only recorded min/max values, showing a range of 101 to 137 FPS, indicating consistent performance. At 2560x1440, the averages are: Low 102, Medium 76 (min 65, max 88), High 58, and Ultra 43. The Medium setting’s range of 65 to 88 FPS shows slightly more variance than at 1080p, likely due to increased GPU load. At 3840x2160, the averages are: Low 54, Medium 41 (min 35, max 47), High 31, and Ultra 23. The Medium setting’s min of 35 FPS is below the typical playability threshold, indicating that even mid-range settings at 4K can result in noticeable frame drops. The data shows a clear hierarchy: each resolution step down (from 4K to 1440p to 1080p) roughly doubles the frame rate at equivalent settings, except at Ultra where the gains are smaller due to the GPU’s absolute limits. For example, 4K Low is 54 FPS, 1440p Low is 102 FPS, and 1080p Low is 159 FPS. This linear scaling pattern confirms that the GPU is the dominant factor in determining performance across all measured configurations.

How This Combo Ranks

In the database of tested combinations for Hitman 2, this pairing of the Intel Core i7-13700K and AMD Radeon RX 9060 ranks 1739 out of 3001 combos. This places it in the lower-middle portion of the ranking, at approximately the 58th percentile. The rank is determined by the measured FPS across all resolutions and settings, and the data shows that this combo struggles at higher resolutions. The CPU is a high-end part (89th percentile), while the GPU is mid-range (59th percentile), and the game’s performance is heavily weighted toward the GPU. The combo’s rank of 1739 reflects the GPU’s limitations, particularly at 4K where the average FPS never exceeds 54 (on Low). In comparison to other combos, the i7-13700K’s synthetic scores are competitive with the Ryzen 9 5900 (delta of -0.2%) and Ryzen 9 7845HX (delta of 0.5%), but the RX 9060’s scores are nearly identical to the RTX 3060 Ti (delta of -0.7%). This suggests that swapping the GPU for a higher-tier card would significantly improve the combo’s rank, while the CPU is not a limiting factor. The rank of 1739 out of 3001 indicates that there are many combinations that perform better, primarily due to more powerful GPUs, but there are also 1262 combos that rank lower. The data shows that this combo is best suited for 1080p or 1440p gaming, where it can achieve respectable frame rates, but it is not competitive at 4K.