Hitman 2

FAQ

Q: What is the Intel Core Ultra 7 265HX's position among all CPUs tested?

A: The processor sits in the 93rd percentile of all CPUs, with an average benchmark score of 63,173. Its nearest rival, the Intel Core i7-13790F, scores 63,080, placing it a mere 0.1% behind, while the AMD Ryzen AI 7 450G is 0.2% ahead with a score of 63,331.

Q: How does the NVIDIA GeForce RTX 5070 compare to its closest competitors?

A: The GPU holds the 82nd percentile among all GPUs with an average score of 40,377. It is virtually tied with the AMD Radeon Pro 580 (40,318, 0.1% higher), while the NVIDIA RTX A500 Mobile trails by 2% with a score of 39,568.

Q: What is the best playable setting at 1920x1080 for this combo?

A: Medium settings yield an average of 127 FPS with a minimum of 108 and maximum of 146. High settings drop to 96 FPS average, while Low hits 169 FPS, and Ultra manages 70 FPS—making Medium the balanced choice for smooth play without sacrificing visual quality.

Q: Can this system handle 4K gaming in Hitman 2?

A: At 3840x2160, only Low settings reach a playable 57 FPS average. Medium averages 43 FPS (37 min, 50 max), High drops to 33 FPS, and Ultra falls to 24 FPS—so 4K is viable only at lower presets for consistent performance.

Q: What is the combo's rank among all tested CPU-GPU pairs?

A: This specific pairing ranks 1,635 out of 3,001 tested combinations in Hitman 2, placing it in the upper-middle tier of the database rather than the top percentile.

Q: Which resolution offers the best balance of performance and quality?

A: At 2560x1440, High settings deliver 61 FPS average, while Medium provides 81 FPS (69 min, 93 max). This resolution offers a substantial visual upgrade over 1080p while maintaining fluid frame rates, making it the sweet spot for this hardware.

CPU Role

The Intel Core Ultra 7 265HX is a 20-core, 20-thread mobile processor based on the Arrow Lake-HX architecture, fabricated on a 3 nm process by TSMC. Its base clock runs at 2.60 GHz with a boost clock reaching 5.30 GHz, and it draws a 55 W TDP. The chip includes 192 KB of L1 cache per core, 3 MB of L2 per core, and a shared 30 MB L3 cache, with dual-channel DDR5 memory support providing 102.4 GB/s of bandwidth.

In synthetic workloads, this CPU demonstrates formidable multi-threaded capability. Its Cinebench R23 multi-core score of 40,642 reflects strong scaling across the 20 cores, while the single-core score of 5,737 indicates robust per-thread performance. The PassMark multi-thread score of 47,985 and single-thread score of 4,500 further corroborate its balanced architecture. The data compression score of 511,817 and integer math score of 126,954 highlight its throughput in computationally intensive tasks.

For Hitman 2, a stealth title that relies on CPU-bound AI and crowd simulation in sprawling maps, these scores translate to solid frame pacing. The 93rd percentile ranking places it above the vast majority of CPUs, with its nearest rival—the Intel Core i7-13790F—scoring within 0.1%, effectively a statistical tie. The AMD Ryzen AI 7 450G edges it out by just 0.2%, meaning real-world gaming differences between these parts are negligible.

The 20-thread count is notable for a mobile chip, as Hitman 2 can leverage multiple cores for background simulation while keeping foreground rendering smooth. The 30 MB shared L3 cache helps reduce memory latency during level transitions, a common bottleneck in open-ended stealth sandboxes. With a boost clock of 5.30 GHz, single-threaded tasks like game logic and physics queries receive ample responsiveness, which is reflected in the 61 FPS average at 2560x1440 High settings.

The CPU's 17,800 million transistors on a 243 mm² die indicate a dense, efficient design that balances power against performance. The 3 nm process node contributes to thermal headroom, allowing sustained boost clocks during prolonged gaming sessions—a factor that matters in Hitman 2's long, uninterrupted mission runs. The unlocked multiplier also permits overclocking, though the mobile platform's cooling constraints typically limit gains.

GPU Role

The NVIDIA GeForce RTX 5070 is a Blackwell 2.0 architecture GPU built on a 5 nm process by TSMC, featuring 31,100 million transistors across a 263 mm² die. It operates at a base clock of 2325 MHz with a boost clock of 2512 MHz, and its 12 GB of GDDR7 memory runs at 1750 MHz with an effective 28 Gbps speed across a 192-bit bus, yielding 672.0 GB/s of bandwidth. The GPU houses 6,144 shading units, 192 TMUs, 80 ROPs, 48 RT cores, and 192 tensor cores, with a pixel rate of 201.0 GPixel/s and texture rate of 482.3 GTexel/s.

The RTX 5070's FP32 throughput of 30.87 TFLOPS positions it as a high-midrange part, and its PassMark G3D score of 29,137 reflects strong rasterization performance. The 3DMark Steel Nomad DX12 score of 5,077 indicates capable DirectX 12 utilization, which is relevant since Hitman 2 runs on a DX12 renderer. The Geekbench OpenCL score of 172,660 and Vulkan score of 178,923 show consistent cross-API performance.

In the context of this game, the GPU's 12 GB VRAM is ample for 1080p and 1440p, but the 3840x2160 results show the memory bandwidth and compute limits. At 4K Ultra, the card manages only 24 FPS average, while at 1080p Low it reaches 169 FPS—demonstrating that the GPU scales predictably with resolution. The 82nd percentile ranking places it above most GPUs, though its nearest rivals—the AMD Radeon Pro 580 (0.1% higher) and Radeon Pro WX 7100 (0.8% higher)—are workstation parts, indicating this consumer GPU is competitive but not class-leading.

The 672.0 GB/s memory bandwidth proves sufficient for 1440p Medium, where the combo achieves 81 FPS average. However, the 192-bit bus becomes a limiting factor at 4K, where pixel fill rates and texture bandwidth cause the frame rate to halve from Low to Ultra. The GPU's 80 ROPs handle pixel output at 201.0 GPixel/s, but Hitman 2's complex lighting and shadow systems at Ultra push this to its limits.

The RTX 5070's support for DirectX 12 Ultimate, Vulkan 1.4, and OpenGL 4.6 ensures compatibility with modern rendering paths, while the 48 RT cores provide hardware ray tracing that Hitman 2 can optionally utilize. The 5 nm process node balances power efficiency against the 250 W TDP, requiring a 600 W suggested PSU—a reasonable ask for mobile workstations and compact desktops.

How This Combo Ranks

The pairing of the Intel Core Ultra 7 265HX with the NVIDIA GeForce RTX 5070 achieves a rank of 1,635 out of 3,001 tested combos in Hitman 2, placing it in the 54th percentile of all configurations. This mid-tier ranking is somewhat surprising given the individual components' strong positions (CPU at 93rd percentile, GPU at 82nd), suggesting that the game's specific engine optimizations favor other hardware combinations.

The CPU's nearest rival, the Intel Core i7-13790F, scores within 0.1%, meaning any rank difference between combos using these chips is likely driven by GPU or memory configurations rather than the processor itself. Similarly, the GPU's closest competitor, the AMD Radeon Pro 580, is only 0.1% ahead, so the combo's placement likely reflects how Hitman 2 scales with other system components.

The rank of 1,635 indicates that this combo outperforms roughly 45% of all tested systems while trailing 55%. This places it in a competitive but not dominant position—capable of smooth 1080p and 1440p play, but not optimized for 4K ultra settings. The data suggests that users seeking top-tier performance in this title might benefit from pairing a higher-end GPU, while those prioritizing CPU-heavy tasks will find this processor sufficient.

Interestingly, the combo's rank is not reflected in the measured FPS at lower resolutions, where 1080p Medium at 127 FPS and 1440p Medium at 81 FPS are strong results. The discrepancy between percentile scores and in-game rank highlights that Hitman 2 is a title where GPU memory bandwidth and rasterization throughput weigh more heavily than raw compute scores.

Settings Recommendations

For an optimal experience in Hitman 2, the data suggests prioritizing 2560x1440 with Medium settings. This configuration yields an 81 FPS average with a minimum of 69 and maximum of 93, providing a smooth, consistent frame rate that remains above the 60 FPS threshold for most of the test. The visual upgrade from 1080p is substantial, and the frame pacing remains stable enough for a stealth game where precision timing matters.

At 1920x1080, Medium settings are also the sweet spot, delivering 127 FPS average (108 min, 146 max). This is ideal for high-refresh-rate monitors, though the extra headroom over 1440p Medium is marginal in practical terms. High settings at 1080p drop to 96 FPS, which is still playable but introduces more variance that could affect responsiveness.

For users prioritizing maximum visual fidelity, 2560x1440 High at 61 FPS is the ceiling for smooth play, while Ultra at 45 FPS is borderline—playable for slower, methodical playthroughs but risky for action-heavy sequences. At 4K, only Low settings (57 FPS) meet the 60 FPS target, making Medium (43 FPS) acceptable for cinematic pacing but not ideal for competitive play.

The measured data shows a clear scaling curve: dropping from Ultra to Low at 1080p increases frame rates from 70 to 169 FPS (a 2.4x improvement), while at 1440p the range is 45 to 108 FPS (2.4x), and at 4K it is 24 to 57 FPS (2.4x). This consistent ratio suggests that the settings presets scale uniformly across resolutions, with Medium providing the best balance of fidelity and performance at every resolution tested.

Measured FPS Breakdown

At 1920x1080, the combo delivers its highest frame rates. Low settings produce an average of 169 FPS, Medium hits 127 FPS (108 min, 146 max), High averages 96 FPS, and Ultra drops to 70 FPS. These numbers indicate that the RTX 5070 is not the bottleneck at this resolution; the CPU's 20 cores and 30 MB L3 cache provide ample headroom for the game's simulation layer.

Moving to 2560x1440, the frame rates scale predictably. Low settings average 108 FPS, Medium achieves 81 FPS (69 min, 93 max), High settles at 61 FPS, and Ultra falls to 45 FPS. The transition from 1080p to 1440p represents roughly a 36% reduction in frame rate across all settings, which aligns with the 78% increase in pixel count—indicating that the GPU's memory bandwidth (672.0 GB/s) is the limiting factor at this resolution.

At 3840x2160, performance degrades significantly. Low settings average 57 FPS—just below the 60 FPS target—while Medium drops to 43 FPS (37 min, 50 max), High averages 33 FPS, and Ultra bottoms out at 24 FPS. The step from 1440p to 4K reduces frame rates by approximately 47%, consistent with the 2.25x pixel increase, confirming that the 12 GB VRAM and 192-bit bus are insufficient for high-fidelity 4K gaming.

The Medium settings data is the only preset with complete min/max values across all resolutions, providing insight into frame consistency. At 1080p, the 108-146 FPS range shows a 35% variance, while at 1440p the 69-93 FPS range shows a similar 35% spread, and at 4K the 37-50 FPS range shows a 35% variance. This consistent variance suggests that Hitman 2's frame pacing is stable regardless of resolution, with the CPU and GPU maintaining proportional frame delivery.

Notably, the Ultra preset at 1080p (70 FPS) outperforms the High preset at 1440p (61 FPS), indicating that resolution has a more significant impact on performance than settings level. Similarly, Low at 1440p (108 FPS) exceeds High at 1080p (96 FPS), reinforcing that this combo favors lower resolutions for maximum frame rates. For users with 1080p monitors, Ultra settings at 70 FPS provide the best visual experience without sacrificing playability, while 1440p users should stick to Medium or High depending on their refresh rate.