Inside

The AMD Ryzen 7 9700X and NVIDIA GeForce RTX 5090 pairing delivers extraordinary performance in Inside, a 2016 puzzle platformer that is far more demanding at high refresh rates than its minimalist art style suggests. The data shows a combination capable of pushing frame rates well beyond the limits of most displays, with the benchmark results revealing a system where the GPU is the primary scaling factor across resolutions, while the CPU provides a robust foundation that never becomes a bottleneck in this specific title.

CPU Role — cores, clocks, and how they relate to this game's results

The AMD Ryzen 7 9700X is an 8-core, 16-thread processor based on the Zen 5 architecture, code-named Granite Ridge. It operates on a 4nm process from TSMC and features a base clock of 3.80 GHz with a boost clock of 5.50 GHz. The CPU’s 65W TDP is notably efficient for its performance class, and its cache hierarchy includes 80 KB of L1 per core, 1 MB of L2 per core, and a 32 MB shared L3 cache. For a game like Inside, which is a side-scrolling puzzle platformer with relatively simple physics and AI routines, the processor’s single-thread performance is more critical than its multi-thread capabilities.

Benchmark data for the 9700X shows a single-thread Geekbench score of 3353 and a 3DMark single-thread score of 1280. These figures indicate strong per-core efficiency, which directly translates to how quickly the game’s main logic loop can be processed. The multi-thread scores, such as the Cinebench R23 multi-core result of 31588, suggest that the CPU can handle any background tasks or streaming workloads without interfering with frame pacing. The processor’s average benchmark score of 36029 places it in the 89th percentile of all CPUs, with its nearest rival being the Intel Core i5-14500HX, which scores 35940, a mere 0.2% difference. This proximity in synthetic benchmarks, however, does not directly predict in-game performance, as Inside relies heavily on raw single-thread speed and memory latency, both of which the 9700X’s 5.50 GHz boost clock and dual-channel DDR5 support (with 89.6 GB/s of bandwidth) serve well. The data shows that the CPU’s role here is to provide a high-frequency, low-latency platform that allows the GeForce RTX 5090 to operate at its full potential without waiting on processor calculations.

GPU Role — VRAM, clocks, and how they relate to this game's results

The NVIDIA GeForce RTX 5090 is the dominant component in this pairing, built on the Blackwell 2.0 architecture with a GB202 chip fabricated on a 5nm process. It features a massive 32 GB of GDDR7 memory on a 512-bit bus, delivering 1.79 TB/s of bandwidth. The GPU’s base clock is 2017 MHz with a boost clock of 2407 MHz, and its memory operates at 1750 MHz (28 Gbps effective). With 21,760 shading units, 680 TMUs, and 176 ROPs, the RTX 5090 is designed for brute-force rendering, and its 104.8 TFLOPS of FP32 performance is more than sufficient for a game from 2016.

In Inside, the GPU’s role is to render the game’s atmospheric lighting, soft shadows, and subtle particle effects, which are deceptively heavy on fill rate and pixel throughput. The card’s pixel rate of 423.6 GPixel/s and texture rate of 1,636.8 GTexel/s ensure that even at 4K resolution, the game’s visual effects are processed without delay. The GPU’s 94th percentile ranking versus all GPUs, with an average benchmark score of 84306, is nearly tied with its nearest rivals, including the NVIDIA GeForce RTX 5090 D (84241, 0.1% delta) and the RTX 5050 Mobile (84171, 0.2% delta). This consistency in synthetic tests suggests that the RTX 5090’s real-world advantage lies in its enormous VRAM buffer and raw compute, which allows it to maintain high frame rates even when the game’s settings are pushed to Ultra. For Inside, the GPU is clearly the limiting factor at higher resolutions, as the frame rate scales inversely with resolution and settings, a sign that the card is working near its capacity to maintain the visual fidelity demanded by the renderer.

Resolution Scaling — how FPS drops from 1080p to 4K and what it says about the limiting component

The measured FPS data reveals a clear pattern of performance scaling across resolutions. At 1080p with Low settings, the system achieves 424.1 FPS, but at 4K with Ultra settings, it drops to 142.5 FPS. This represents a 66.4% reduction in frame rate from the lowest stress scenario to the highest. The scaling between resolutions at the same settings is particularly informative. For High settings, the average FPS drops from 330.7 at 1080p to 242.5 at 1440p, a 26.7% decrease, and then further to 154.7 at 4K, a 53.2% decrease from 1080p. This indicates that as resolution increases, the GPU becomes the primary bottleneck, which is expected given the RTX 5090’s immense processing power.

Conversely, the CPU’s influence is visible in the 1080p results, where the frame rates are exceptionally high. At 1080p Low, the 424.1 FPS figure is likely near the upper limit of what the game engine can render, suggesting that the CPU is keeping up with the GPU’s output. The difference between 1080p Medium (392.1 FPS) and 1080p Low (424.1 FPS) is only 7.5%, while the difference between 4K Medium (244.2 FPS) and 4K Low (305.5 FPS) is 20.1%. This wider gap at 4K confirms that the GPU is handling the increased pixel count and graphical load, while at 1080p, the system is more balanced, with the CPU providing enough headroom to avoid limiting the frame rate. The data implies that this combo is GPU-bound at 1440p and 4K, but at 1080p, it approaches a CPU-bound state, where the 9700X’s single-thread performance becomes the key enabler for achieving those extremely high frame rates.

Measured FPS Breakdown — resolution by resolution, settings by settings, exact numbers

At 1920x1080, the system produces an average of 424.1 FPS on Low settings, 392.1 FPS on Medium, 330.7 FPS on High, and 319.8 FPS on Ultra. The jump from Low to Medium is 32 FPS, while the jump from Medium to High is 61.4 FPS, and from High to Ultra is 10.9 FPS. This suggests that the High preset is where the GPU starts to work significantly harder, but the Ultra preset adds only a marginal load, likely due to effects that are not resolution-dependent.

Moving to 2560x1440, the averages are 379.4 FPS on Low, 350 FPS on Medium, 242.5 FPS on High, and 230.3 FPS on Ultra. The drop from Low to Medium is 29.4 FPS, but the drop from Medium to High is a substantial 107.5 FPS, indicating that the High preset at 1440p introduces a heavy graphical load that the GPU must process. The difference between High and Ultra is only 12.2 FPS, suggesting that Ultra is more of a refinement than a major performance hit at this resolution.

At 3840x2160, the averages are 305.5 FPS on Low, 244.2 FPS on Medium, 154.7 FPS on High, and 142.5 FPS on Ultra. The scaling here is more linear, with a 61.3 FPS drop from Low to Medium, an 89.5 FPS drop from Medium to High, and a 12.2 FPS drop from High to Ultra. This pattern shows that at 4K, the GPU is under significant stress, and each settings increase has a more pronounced effect on performance, with the High preset being a notable step up in rendering complexity.

How This Combo Ranks — use comboRankInGame vs other tested combos

This specific combination of the AMD Ryzen 7 9700X and NVIDIA GeForce RTX 5090 ranks 6th out of 1671 tested combos for Inside. This ranking is remarkably high, placing the system in the top 0.4% of all configurations tested. The data shows that this pairing is nearly optimal for this game, with only five other combinations achieving higher average frame rates across the tested scenarios. The rank suggests that the 9700X’s high single-thread performance complements the RTX 5090’s raw power exceptionally well, avoiding any significant bottleneck that could drag the score down. The fact that it is not the number one combo implies that there may be a CPU with even higher single-thread clock speeds or a GPU configuration with slightly better thermal headroom, but for practical purposes, this system is at the pinnacle of performance for Inside. The rank also indicates that the game is not heavily multithreaded, as otherwise, the 9700X’s 16 threads would likely push it higher, but the 6th place finish confirms the efficiency of the Zen 5 architecture in this context.

Settings Recommendations — which preset gives the best experience per the measured rows

Based on the measured FPS data, the optimal settings depend on the user’s display refresh rate. For a 60 Hz display, the 4K Ultra preset at 142.5 FPS provides a flawless experience, as it is well above the refresh rate and offers the highest visual quality. For a 144 Hz display, the 4K High preset at 154.7 FPS is the better choice, as it maintains a frame rate above the refresh threshold while sacrificing only 11.6% of the performance compared to Ultra. For a 240 Hz display, the 1440p High preset at 242.5 FPS is ideal, as it barely exceeds the refresh rate and provides a sharp image. For 360 Hz displays, the 1080p High preset at 330.7 FPS is the best option, as it offers a high frame rate that is close to the refresh ceiling, but the 1080p Medium preset at 392.1 FPS could be used if the user prefers a lower visual load for competitive reasons. The data shows that the High preset is generally the sweet spot, as the performance gap between High and Ultra is consistently small (ranging from 8% at 1080p to 10.9% at 4K), while the visual difference is often imperceptible in a game with Inside’s minimalist aesthetic. Therefore, for most users, selecting the High preset at their native resolution will yield the best balance of smoothness and fidelity.

FAQ

*Q: What is the highest average frame rate this combo achieves in Inside?*

A: The highest measured average frame rate is 424.1 FPS, achieved at 1920x1080 resolution with Low settings.

Q: How does the RTX 5090 compare to its closest rival in synthetic benchmarks?

A: The RTX 5090’s average benchmark score is 84306, which is 0.1% higher than the NVIDIA GeForce RTX 5090 D (84241) and 0.2% higher than the NVIDIA GeForce RTX 5050 Mobile (84171).

Q: What is the performance difference between 1080p and 4K at High settings?

A: At High settings, the average FPS drops from 330.7 at 1080p to 242.5 at 1440p and then to 154.7 at 4K, representing a 53.2% decrease from 1080p to 4K.

Q: Is the CPU or GPU the limiting factor at 4K resolution?

A: The data indicates the GPU is the limiting factor at 4K. The frame rate drops significantly with each settings increase at 4K (e.g., from 305.5 FPS on Low to 244.2 FPS on Medium), which is a characteristic of GPU-bound scenarios.

*Q: What is the rank of this combo among all tested systems for Inside?*

A: This combo ranks 6th out of 1671 tested combinations, placing it in the top 0.4% of all systems.

Q: What is the boost clock of the AMD Ryzen 7 9700X?

A: The boost clock is 5.50 GHz, which is the maximum frequency the CPU can achieve under load, providing the high single-thread performance that Inside benefits from.