Inside

Inside is a 2016 puzzle platformer that, on the surface, does not appear to be a demanding title for modern hardware. However, the measured FPS data for the AMD Ryzen 7 9850X3D and NVIDIA GeForce RTX 4070 SUPER combination reveals a complex performance profile that scales dramatically with both resolution and graphics settings. The data shows a system capable of delivering hundreds of frames per second, yet the drop from 1080p to 4K is steep enough to halve performance in certain configurations, indicating a shift in the bottleneck as resolution increases.

Resolution Scaling

The most striking pattern in the measured data is the relationship between resolution and average frame rate. At 1080p, the system produces remarkably high numbers, with Low settings reaching 433 FPS and Medium settings at 399 FPS. Even the most demanding Ultra preset at this resolution nets 244 FPS. This indicates that at 1080p, the game is heavily CPU-limited; the Ryzen 7 9850X3D, with its 8 cores and 16 threads boosting up to 5.60 GHz, is feeding frames to the GPU faster than it can process them in many cases.

Moving to 1440p, the frame rates remain exceptionally high but show a clear correction. The High preset drops from 256 FPS at 1080p to 184 FPS at 1440p, a 28% reduction. Low settings similarly fall from 433 FPS to 368 FPS, and Medium from 399 FPS to 294 FPS. This scaling is consistent with the GPU beginning to take on a more significant workload, though the absolute numbers still suggest the CPU retains a substantial role. The Ultra preset at 1440p yields 175 FPS, which is a 28% drop from its 1080p counterpart of 244 FPS.

The transition to 4K (3840x2160) is where the bottleneck shifts decisively to the GPU. The High preset falls to 116 FPS, a 37% drop from the 1440p result and a 55% drop from the 1080p result. Medium settings also take a significant hit, dropping to 185 FPS from 294 FPS at 1440p. The Low preset, which was at 368 FPS at 1440p, drops to 231 FPS at 4K. This pattern is classic GPU-bound behavior: as pixel count quadruples, the fill-rate requirements of the RTX 4070 SUPER's 80 ROPs and 198.0 GPixel/s pixel rate become the limiting factor.

Comparing the scaling efficiency, the gap between Low and Ultra settings widens at higher resolutions. At 1080p, the difference between Low (433 FPS) and Ultra (244 FPS) is 189 FPS. At 4K, this gap narrows to 121 FPS (231 FPS vs 110 FPS). This narrowing suggests that at lower resolutions, the CPU's performance ceiling is the primary constraint, while at 4K, the GPU's rendering workload dominates, making the settings adjustment less impactful in absolute terms but still significant in relative terms. The data shows that 4K Ultra is the only configuration where the system dips to 110 FPS, still far above the 60 FPS threshold but representing a substantial 75% reduction from the 1080p Low result.

CPU Role

The AMD Ryzen 7 9850X3D is a Zen 5 architecture processor built on the 4 nm process, featuring 8 cores and 16 threads. Its base clock of 4.70 GHz and boost clock of 5.60 GHz place it among the highest-clocked desktop CPUs. The processor also includes a large 96 MB shared L3 cache, which is particularly beneficial for gaming workloads that rely on data locality. In the context of Inside, which is a side-scrolling game with a relatively simple physics engine, the CPU's role is primarily to maintain a high frame ceiling and ensure consistent frame pacing.

Benchmark data for the CPU shows a Cinebench R23 multicore score of 22807 and a single-core score of 2228. The PassMark single-thread score is 4704, and the multithread score is 41318. These figures indicate strong per-core performance, which is critical for games that have a primary rendering thread. The CPU's 92nd percentile ranking against all CPUs further confirms its position as a top-tier processor.

In the measured FPS data, the CPU's influence is most apparent at 1080p Low, where the 433 FPS average suggests the game's logic and draw call submission are keeping up with the GPU's output. The fact that the 1080p Medium preset (399 FPS) is significantly higher than the 1080p Ultra preset (244 FPS) indicates that the CPU is not the sole bottleneck at lower resolutions; rather, the GPU's shading workload at Ultra settings starts to impose a limit. However, the jump from 1080p to 1440p at the same settings shows a predictable degradation, which points to the GPU becoming more involved.

The CPU's 120W TDP and unlocked multiplier suggest it can sustain high clocks under load, which is supported by the consistent 4.70 GHz base clock. For a game like Inside, which does not heavily utilize multi-threading, the 16 threads are more than sufficient, and the 96 MB L3 cache helps to reduce memory latency, ensuring that the game's data is quickly accessible to the cores. The data shows that this CPU does not limit the system at 4K, as the frame rates there are clearly dictated by GPU performance.

GPU Role

The NVIDIA GeForce RTX 4070 SUPER is built on the Ada Lovelace architecture using a 5 nm process. It features 7168 shading units, 224 texture mapping units, and 80 raster output units. The GPU's boost clock is 2475 MHz, and it comes with 12 GB of GDDR6X memory on a 192-bit bus, providing a bandwidth of 504.2 GB/s. This memory configuration is adequate for 4K gaming in a title like Inside, which does not require large texture pools.

The GPU's PassMark G3D score is 29995, and its 3DMark Steel Nomad DX12 score is 4627. The Geekbench OpenCL score is 172795, and the Vulkan score is 205624. These benchmarks place the RTX 4070 SUPER in the 83rd percentile of all GPUs. Its nearest rival, the NVIDIA Quadro M6000 24 GB, has an average score of 43262, which is only 0.1% higher, indicating that the RTX 4070 SUPER is positioned at a performance tier where minor differences in synthetic tests do not translate into meaningful in-game variance.

In the game data, the GPU's role becomes evident when examining the 4K results. At 4K High, the average FPS is 116, which is a significant drop from the 1440p High result of 184 FPS. This 37% reduction is consistent with the GPU's fill-rate limits. The 4K Ultra preset, which likely enables additional shading effects and higher texture filtering, pushes the average down to 110 FPS. The GPU's 35.48 TFLOPS of FP32 performance is the theoretical ceiling for its compute capability, and the measured results show that it is being fully utilized at 4K.

The Medium preset at 4K shows an average of 185 FPS with a minimum of 157 FPS and a maximum of 213 FPS. This is a more playable range, but the variance of 56 FPS between min and max indicates that the GPU is working hard to maintain frame consistency. At 1080p, the GPU's role is less demanding, as evidenced by the 256 FPS average at High settings. The data suggests that the RTX 4070 SUPER is never the limiting factor at 1080p or 1440p for this game, but at 4K, it becomes the primary constraint, especially with the Ultra preset.

FAQ

Q: What is the maximum average FPS achievable with this CPU and GPU combination in Inside?

A: The highest measured average FPS is 433, achieved at 1920x1080 resolution with Low settings.

Q: How does the system perform at 4K Ultra settings?

A: At 3840x2160 with Ultra settings, the average FPS is 110, which is the lowest measured result across all configurations.

Q: Is the CPU or GPU the main bottleneck at 1080p?

A: At 1080p, the CPU is likely the main bottleneck, as the frame rates (e.g., 433 FPS on Low) are extremely high and suggest that the GPU is not fully saturated. The 8-core, 16-thread CPU with a 5.60 GHz boost clock is capable of feeding frames faster than the GPU can render them at this resolution.

Q: What is the frame rate difference between Medium and Ultra settings at 1440p?

A: At 2560x1440, the Medium preset yields an average of 294 FPS, while the Ultra preset yields 175 FPS. This represents a 119 FPS difference, indicating that the Ultra settings place a significantly higher load on the GPU.

Q: Does the system maintain consistent frame times at 4K Medium settings?

A: At 4K Medium, the average FPS is 185, with a minimum of 157 FPS and a maximum of 213 FPS. The 56 FPS spread suggests some variance in frame times, but the minimum is still well above the standard 60 FPS threshold.

Q: How does this system's performance in Inside compare to other tested combinations?

A: This combination ranks 201st out of 2887 tested combos, placing it in the top 7% of all systems tested for this game.

How This Combo Ranks

The AMD Ryzen 7 9850X3D and NVIDIA GeForce RTX 4070 SUPER combination holds a combo rank of 201 out of 2887 tested systems in Inside. This places it in the 93rd percentile of all combinations, meaning it outperforms 93% of the systems in the database for this specific game. The rank is a reflection of the system's ability to maintain high frame rates across all resolutions, but particularly at 1080p and 1440p where the CPU's strong single-threaded performance and the GPU's ample bandwidth shine.

The high rank is attributable to the synergy between the two components. The CPU's 96 MB L3 cache helps reduce latency in game logic, while the GPU's 12 GB of VRAM and 504.2 GB/s bandwidth ensure that texture streaming is not a bottleneck. Compared to other combos, this system is clearly optimized for high-refresh-rate gaming at 1440p, where it achieves over 175 FPS on any preset. Even at 4K, the system remains competitive, with the absolute lowest average FPS being 110 on Ultra, which is still high enough for most displays.

The rank of 201 out of 2887 also implies that there are 200 combinations that achieve higher performance. These are likely to include more powerful GPUs such as the RTX 4090 or higher-tier CPUs. However, for its price-to-performance positioning, this combo delivers exceptional results in a game that is not typically used as a benchmark title. The data shows that the system is not bottlenecked by any single component at the tested settings, which confirms its balanced design.

Measured FPS Breakdown

The measured FPS data provides a comprehensive view of performance across three resolutions and four settings presets. At 1920x1080, the system delivers an average of 433 FPS on Low, 399 FPS on Medium (with a minimum of 339 and maximum of 459), 256 FPS on High, and 244 FPS on Ultra. These numbers indicate that the system is capable of driving 240Hz displays even at the highest settings, though the jump from High to Ultra costs only 12 FPS, suggesting that the Ultra preset is not significantly more demanding than High at this resolution.

At 2560x1440, the performance scales down but remains robust. Low settings yield 368 FPS, Medium yields 294 FPS (with a minimum of 250 and maximum of 338), High yields 184 FPS, and Ultra yields 175 FPS. The gap between Medium and High is 110 FPS, which is a substantial drop, indicating that the High preset introduces effects that are more GPU-intensive. The drop from High to Ultra is only 9 FPS, which suggests that the Ultra preset at 1440p is not much more demanding than High.

At 3840x2160, the system's performance is more moderate. Low settings average 231 FPS, Medium averages 185 FPS (with a minimum of 157 and maximum of 213), High averages 116 FPS, and Ultra averages 110 FPS. The most significant drop occurs between Medium and High, where the frame rate falls by 69 FPS. This indicates that the High preset at 4K includes rendering features that substantially increase the GPU load. The Ultra preset is only 6 FPS lower than High, suggesting that the Ultra preset's additional features are not as impactful as the transition from Medium to High.

The data also shows the impact of resolution on the Medium preset specifically. At 1080p, the Medium average is 399 FPS, which drops to 294 FPS at 1440p (a 26% reduction) and then to 185 FPS at 4K (a 37% reduction from 1440p). This scaling is consistent with a GPU that is becoming increasingly saturated as pixel count grows. The minimum FPS values recorded for Medium settings also follow this trend, with 339 FPS at 1080p, 250 FPS at 1440p, and 157 FPS at 4K, showing that even the lowest frame times remain high.

Settings Recommendations

Based on the measured FPS data, the optimal settings depend on the target refresh rate and resolution. For 1080p displays, the Ultra preset is the clear recommendation, as it delivers 244 FPS on average, which is more than sufficient for any high-refresh-rate monitor. The difference between High and Ultra is minimal at 12 FPS, so enabling Ultra does not incur a significant performance penalty.

For 1440p displays, the High preset offers a strong balance, delivering 184 FPS on average. This is well above the 144Hz refresh rate common on 1440p monitors. The Ultra preset at 175 FPS is also viable, but the 9 FPS difference does not justify the potential visual improvements for most users. The Medium preset at 294 FPS would be suitable for users with 240Hz displays, but the visual quality reduction may be noticeable.

For 4K displays, the Medium preset is the best choice for a smooth experience, as it averages 185 FPS and has a minimum of 157 FPS. This ensures that frame times remain consistent and well above the 60 FPS threshold. The High preset at 116 FPS is still playable on a 120Hz display, but the 69 FPS drop from Medium makes it a less stable option. The Ultra preset at 110 FPS is only marginally lower than High, so if a user can tolerate the High preset, they might as well enable Ultra for the slight visual upgrade.

For users prioritizing maximum visual fidelity on a 60Hz display, the Ultra preset at any resolution is recommended, as even the lowest measured average (110 FPS at 4K) is above 60 FPS. However, for competitive play or high-refresh-rate gaming, the Medium preset at 1440p or 4K provides the best combination of frame rate and visual quality. The data shows that the system is versatile, but the Medium preset offers the most headroom for maintaining high frame rates across different resolutions.