Hitman 2

The Intel Core Ultra 7 265K paired with the NVIDIA GeForce RTX 5090 delivers a performance profile in Hitman 2 that is defined by massive GPU headroom at lower resolutions and a decisive shift toward the graphics card at 4K. The data shows a combination that is exceptionally fast, but its ranking among 1,795 tested combos is determined by how the CPU’s 20 cores and the GPU’s sheer throughput interact with the game’s engine at each setting tier.

CPU Role

The Intel Core Ultra 7 265K is a 20-core, 20-thread desktop processor based on the Arrow Lake architecture, built on a 3 nm process by TSMC. It operates with a base clock of 3.90 GHz and a boost clock of 5.50 GHz, with 30 MB of shared L3 cache. In Hitman 2, a stealth title from 2018, the game’s engine is far more sensitive to single-thread performance than to the CPU’s multi-threaded capabilities, and the benchmark results reflect this.

The processor’s Cinebench R23 single-core score of 7,060 points is strong, but its multi-core score of 50,009 points is a more dominant figure. However, Hitman 2 does not scale linearly with core counts. The data shows that at 1080p Low settings, the combo reaches 346.1 FPS, which is a figure that is almost certainly CPU-bound, as the RTX 5090 is far from saturated at that frame rate. This indicates that the 265K’s high boost clock is sufficient to feed the GPU in less demanding scenes, but the game’s engine still imposes a ceiling.

Relative to its nearest rivals, the 265K’s average benchmark score of 79,102 is only 0.2% lower than the Intel Core Ultra 7 265KF (79,240) and the Intel Core i9-14900KF (79,245). It sits 0.9% behind the Intel Core i9-14900K (79,824) and 1.2% behind the AMD EPYC 7413 (80,041). These deltaPct values are negligible in gaming terms, meaning the CPU is not the differentiator in this combo’s ranking. The processor’s 97th percentile ranking against all CPUs confirms it is a top-tier part, but the game’s reliance on clock speed rather than core count means the 265K’s 20 cores are underutilized, making the RTX 5090 the primary driver of frame rates.

FAQ

Q: Does the Intel Core Ultra 7 265K bottleneck the RTX 5090 in Hitman 2?

A: The data suggests minimal bottlenecking. At 1080p Low, the combo produces 346.1 FPS, which is a very high frame rate, indicating the CPU can keep up with the GPU’s requests. However, the performance delta from Low to Ultra settings at the same resolution (346.1 FPS to 148 FPS) shows that the GPU becomes more involved as graphical load increases, but the CPU still holds a significant share of the workload.

Q: How does the CPU’s multi-threaded performance compare to its single-threaded performance in this game?

A: The 265K’s Cinebench R23 multi-core score is 50,009 points, which is roughly 7 times higher than its single-core score of 7,060 points. In Hitman 2, the frame rate scaling from Low to Ultra at 1440p (221 FPS to 93.2 FPS) indicates that the game is not fully utilizing all 20 threads, as the performance drop is more attributable to GPU load than to CPU thread saturation.

Q: What is the difference in performance between the 265K and the 265KF?

A: The nearestRivals data shows the 265K has an average score of 79,102, which is 0.2% lower than the 265KF’s 79,240. This is a negligible difference, and in gaming benchmarks like Hitman 2, this would translate to less than 1 FPS at most settings, making them effectively identical in gameplay.

Q: Is the RTX 5090’s 32 GB of memory relevant for Hitman 2?

A: The GPU’s 32 GB of GDDR7 memory on a 512-bit bus with 1.79 TB/s bandwidth is overkill for a 2018 title. The measured FPS data shows that even at 4K Ultra, the combo averages 48.3 FPS, which is more limited by the GPU’s compute throughput than by memory capacity or bandwidth.

Q: How does the combo’s ranking change with resolution?

A: The combo holds a rank of 9 out of 1,795 tested combos overall. The FPS data shows that at 1080p, the combo is often CPU-limited (e.g., 346.1 FPS at Low), but at 4K, the GPU becomes the limiter (e.g., 48.3 FPS at Ultra), meaning the ranking likely improves at higher resolutions where the RTX 5090’s raw power is more decisive.

Q: What does the 97th percentile for the CPU and 94th percentile for the GPU signify?

A: The CPU’s 97th percentile means it outperforms 97% of all tested CPUs in general benchmarks, while the GPU’s 94th percentile indicates similar dominance among GPUs. In Hitman 2, this pairing is near the top of the hierarchy, but the game’s age means the CPU’s multi-core advantages are less impactful than its single-core speed.

Resolution Scaling

The FPS data reveals a clear pattern of scaling from 1080p to 4K that defines the limiting component at each step. At 1080p Low, the combo achieves 346.1 FPS, which drops to 221 FPS at 1440p Low (a 36% reduction) and then to 118 FPS at 4K Low (a 47% reduction from 1440p). This steep decline as resolution increases indicates that the RTX 5090 is the dominant factor at higher resolutions, while the CPU maintains a more consistent workload.

At 1080p High, the combo hits 199 FPS, which falls to 126.8 FPS at 1440p High (a 36% drop) and then to 65.3 FPS at 4K High (a 49% drop from 1440p). The consistent percentage drops across settings suggest that the GPU’s fill rate and shading power are the primary constraints at 4K. The RTX 5090’s 104.8 TFLOPS of FP32 performance and 1,636.8 GTexel/s texture rate are being taxed heavily, while the 265K’s boost clock of 5.50 GHz is sufficient to avoid being the bottleneck.

The most telling data point is the 4K Ultra result of 48.3 FPS. This is a substantial drop from 4K High (65.3 FPS), indicating that Ultra settings impose a significant additional load on the GPU. The scaling from 1080p Ultra (148 FPS) to 1440p Ultra (93.2 FPS) to 4K Ultra (48.3 FPS) shows a 37% and 48% reduction, respectively, which aligns with the pixel count increase (2.25x from 1080p to 1440p, 2.25x from 1440p to 4K). This suggests the game is purely GPU-bound at Ultra settings, with the CPU playing a minimal role.

Measured FPS Breakdown

The measured FPS data provides a comprehensive view of the combo’s performance across twelve configurations. At 1920x1080, the combo delivers its highest frame rates. With Low settings, it averages 346.1 FPS, which is a figure that exceeds the refresh rate of most high-end monitors. Medium settings reduce this to 261.6 FPS, High settings to 199 FPS, and Ultra settings to 148 FPS. The drop from Low to Ultra is 198.1 FPS (57%), demonstrating how graphical fidelity impacts the GPU workload even at lower resolutions.

Moving to 2560x1440, the combo maintains high frame rates. Low settings produce 221 FPS, which is a 36% reduction from 1080p Low. Medium settings yield 168 FPS, High settings 126.8 FPS, and Ultra settings 93.2 FPS. The scaling from Low to Ultra at 1440p shows a 127.8 FPS drop (58%), indicating that the RTX 5090’s performance is increasingly taxed as settings increase.

At 3840x2160, the combo’s frame rates become more moderate. Low settings average 118 FPS, which is still smooth for most displays. Medium settings drop to 89 FPS, High settings to 65.3 FPS, and Ultra settings to 48.3 FPS. The 4K Ultra result is the lowest in the entire dataset, and it is the only configuration that falls below 50 FPS, suggesting that this is the most demanding scenario for the combo. The difference between 4K Low (118 FPS) and 4K Ultra (48.3 FPS) is 69.7 FPS (59%), which is a significant performance penalty that underscores the GPU’s role as the limiting factor.

How This Combo Ranks

The combo ranks 9th out of 1,795 tested combinations in Hitman 2, placing it in the top 0.5% of all configurations. This high ranking is expected given the RTX 5090’s position as a top-tier GPU, but it is not the absolute best combo, indicating that other CPUs may extract slightly higher frame rates in this specific game.

The data shows that the 265K’s performance is nearly identical to its closest rivals, with a 0.2% delta to the 265KF and i9-14900KF. This suggests that the ranking is less about CPU choice and more about the GPU’s ability to sustain high frame rates. The RTX 5090’s nearestRivals include the RTX 5090 D (0.1% higher score) and the RTX 5050 Mobile (0.2% higher score), but these are synthetic benchmark scores, not gaming results.

In Hitman 2, the combo’s 1080p Low result of 346.1 FPS is a strong indicator of CPU capability, but the 4K Ultra result of 48.3 FPS is more indicative of the GPU’s limits. The rank of 9 suggests that there are 8 combos that achieve higher overall performance, likely due to CPUs with even higher single-thread scores or configurations that are less CPU-bound at lower resolutions. However, for a 2018 game, this combo’s performance is exceptional, with the 265K’s 20 cores providing ample headroom for future titles even if they are underutilized here. The combination of a 97th percentile CPU and a 94th percentile GPU results in a system that is well-balanced for this game, with the GPU taking over as the primary performance driver as resolution and settings increase.