Inside

The AMD Ryzen 9 9900X paired with the NVIDIA GeForce GTX 1080 Ti delivers a fascinating performance profile in Inside, a 2016 puzzle platformer. The data reveals a system where the legacy GPU is the primary constraint at higher resolutions, yet the modern CPU ensures the game remains highly playable across all tested configurations. This combination ranks 941st out of 1671 tested combos, placing it in the middle of the pack for this title, which is notable given the age of the graphics card.

Resolution Scaling

The measured FPS data shows a clear and predictable trend: performance scales inversely with resolution, but the rate of decline reveals the bottleneck. Moving from 1920x1080 to 2560x1440 at High settings, the average FPS drops from 160.5 to 111.5, a significant 30.5% reduction. The jump from 2560x1440 to 3840x2160 is even steeper, with the average falling from 111.5 to 70.6 FPS, another 36.7% decline. This pattern strongly indicates that the GTX 1080 Ti is the limiting component at higher resolutions, as the pixel throughput demands of 4K overwhelm its Pascal architecture.

At Low settings, the scaling story changes. The 1080p result of 316.6 FPS drops to 226.4 FPS at 1440p and then to 143.9 FPS at 4K. While still a steady decline, the percentage drops are smaller between 1080p and 1440p (28.5%) than between 1440p and 4K (36.4%). This suggests that at lower settings, the CPU has more headroom to feed the GPU, but the GPU still hits its architectural limits when pushing 4K pixel counts. The data implies that for a game like Inside, which is not graphically demanding by modern standards, the GTX 1080 Ti's 11 GB of VRAM and 484.4 GB/s bandwidth are not the constraints; rather, the raw fillrate and shading power of the GP102 chip are what cap performance.

How This Combo Ranks

The combo rank of 941 out of 1671 places this pairing in the 56th percentile of all tested combinations for Inside. This is a middling result, which is surprising given the Ryzen 9 9900X’s position in the broader CPU hierarchy. The CPU alone sits in the 94th percentile of all processors, with an average benchmark score of 54450. This discrepancy highlights the GPU's role as the weaker link. The GTX 1080 Ti, by contrast, only ranks in the 61st percentile of all GPUs, with an average score of 19402.

Looking at the nearest rivals for the GPU, the data shows just how tightly clustered this segment is. The GTX 1080 Ti’s average score sits within 1.1% of the NVIDIA TITAN Xp, which scores 19184, and within 0.6% of the NVIDIA Tesla K40m, which scores 19519. This suggests that for Inside, the specific Pascal GPU model matters less than the overall architecture generation. The CPU’s nearest rivals, such as the AMD Ryzen 9 9900X3D (54681, deltaPct -0.4) and the Intel Core i7-14700F (54097, deltaPct 0.7), are all within a 1.8% margin of the 9900X’s performance, indicating that the game does not heavily differentiate between high-end CPUs.

Settings Recommendations

Based on the measured FPS, the optimal experience depends heavily on the target resolution. At 3840x2160, the High preset yields 70.6 FPS, which is playable but not comfortably above a 60 FPS threshold. The Ultra preset drops to 68.9 FPS, a negligible difference, while Medium jumps to 114.8 FPS. For a smooth 4K experience, the Medium preset is the clear sweet spot, offering a 62.7% performance increase over High while likely maintaining most visual fidelity in this stylized game.

At 2560x1440, all presets are viable. The Ultra setting averages 109.5 FPS, which is excellent, but the High preset at 111.5 FPS is nearly identical. The Low preset reaches 226.4 FPS, which is overkill for most displays. The data suggests that High is the best balance at 1440p, as it provides a massive 101.9% improvement over the 4K High result without a visible need to drop to Medium (181 FPS). For 1920x1080, the High preset at 160.5 FPS is sufficient for any high-refresh-rate monitor, but the Ultra preset at 151.6 FPS is also perfectly playable. The Low preset at 316.6 FPS is technically possible but unnecessary, as the CPU and GPU are clearly not stressed at this resolution.

Measured FPS Breakdown

The full dataset provides a comprehensive view of the combo’s capabilities. At 1920x1080, the average FPS ranges from 151.6 at Ultra to 316.6 at Low. The Medium preset delivers 252.7 FPS, while High sits at 160.5. This 108.2% spread between Low and Ultra shows the GPU is the limiter, as the CPU is capable of far more than 316 FPS in this game.

At 2560x1440, the numbers compress slightly. Low delivers 226.4 FPS, Medium 181 FPS, High 111.5 FPS, and Ultra 109.5 FPS. The gap between High and Ultra is only 1.8%, suggesting that the Ultra preset adds negligible GPU load over High. The 4K results show a similar compression at the top end: High is 70.6 FPS, Ultra is 68.9 FPS, with Medium at 114.8 and Low at 143.9. The consistent pattern across all resolutions is that the difference between High and Ultra is minimal, while the jump from High to Medium is substantial (62.7% at 4K, 62.3% at 1440p, and 57.4% at 1080p). This indicates that the Ultra preset in Inside likely applies settings that this GPU cannot efficiently process, while Medium removes that overhead.

GPU Role

The NVIDIA GeForce GTX 1080 Ti is the definitive bottleneck in this configuration. With 3584 shading units, 224 TMUs, and 88 ROPs, the GP102 chip is a high-end Pascal part from 2017. Its boost clock of 1582 MHz and 11 GB of GDDR5X memory on a 352-bit bus provide 484.4 GB/s of bandwidth. In Inside, the data shows that the GPU’s compute throughput, measured at 11.34 TFLOPS FP32, is what limits frame rates at higher resolutions. The 4K results, which hover around 70 FPS on High settings, are consistent with a GPU that is hitting its pixel fillrate limits, not its memory bandwidth limits.

The GPU’s benchmark scores further contextualize its role. Its Passmark G3D score of 18600 and 3DMark Steel Nomad DX12 score of 2231 are modest by modern standards, which is why it only ranks in the 61st percentile. The nearest rival, the NVIDIA GTX 780, scores 19405 (deltaPct 0), meaning the GTX 1080 Ti is effectively tied with a much older card in average benchmark score. This is a statistical anomaly, but for Inside, the measured FPS shows the GTX 1080 Ti still has enough raw power to deliver playable frame rates up to 1440p Ultra, but it struggles to maintain high FPS at 4K. The GPU’s 250 W TDP and dual-slot design are irrelevant to the game’s performance, but the data makes it clear that upgrading this component would yield the largest FPS gains.

CPU Role

The AMD Ryzen 9 9900X is dramatically overqualified for this game. With 12 cores and 24 threads based on the Zen 5 architecture, this CPU has a boost clock of 5.60 GHz and 64 MB of shared L3 cache. Its benchmark results are stellar: a Cinebench R23 multi-core score of 46438 and a single-core score of 6555. In Inside, the CPU’s role is to feed the GPU with draw calls and physics calculations, but the game’s 2D side-scrolling perspective and puzzle-platformer nature mean these tasks are light. The 1080p Low result of 316.6 FPS suggests the CPU is not the limiter even at the lowest settings, as the GPU is still capable of pushing past 300 FPS.

The CPU’s 94th percentile ranking and average benchmark score of 54450 put it in the top tier of desktop processors. Its nearest rival, the AMD Ryzen 9 9900X3D, scores 54681 (deltaPct -0.4), which is essentially identical. This means that for Inside, the 3D V-Cache of the rival CPU offers no advantage, as the game does not stress the memory subsystem. The data implies that the 9900X is more than sufficient to maintain 100+ FPS at any resolution, and the FPS drops seen at 4K are entirely attributable to the GTX 1080 Ti. If a user were to pair this CPU with a modern GPU, the measured FPS would likely be much higher, as the CPU has plenty of headroom.

FAQ

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

A: The highest average FPS is 316.6, achieved at 1920x1080 with Low settings.

*Q: How does the combo rank among all tested configurations in Inside?*

A: The combo ranks 941st out of 1671 tested combos, placing it slightly above the median.

Q: At 4K resolution, which preset delivers the best balance of performance and quality?

A: The Medium preset at 3840x2160 delivers 114.8 FPS, which is 62.7% higher than the High preset's 70.6 FPS, making it the optimal choice for 4K.

Q: Is the CPU or GPU the limiting factor in this game?

A: The GPU is the limiting factor, as evidenced by the significant FPS drops when increasing resolution from 1080p to 4K, while the CPU's benchmark scores are in the 94th percentile.

Q: What is the difference in average FPS between High and Ultra settings at 2560x1440?

A: The difference is minimal, with High averaging 111.5 FPS and Ultra averaging 109.5 FPS, a difference of just 1.8%.

*Q: Does the GTX 1080 Ti's 11 GB of VRAM ever become a constraint in Inside?*

A: The data suggests VRAM is not a constraint, as the FPS drops correlate with resolution scaling (pixel count) rather than memory capacity, and the GPU has 11 GB of GDDR5X.