Inside

The Intel Core i5-14600KF and NVIDIA GeForce RTX 4070 Ti SUPER combination delivers exceptionally high frame rates in Inside, a 2D puzzle platformer that is far more demanding on the CPU than the GPU. The data shows that this pairing is overkill for the game’s visual demands, with the processor becoming the primary bottleneck at lower resolutions. Across the measured configurations, the system never dips below 117 FPS, and at 1080p with Low settings it reaches an average of 390 FPS, indicating that the hardware is rarely stressed by the game’s rendering workload.

Resolution Scaling

The performance scaling from 1080p to 4K clearly illustrates where the system’s limits lie. At 1080p with High settings, the average frame rate is 271 FPS. Moving to 1440p drops this to 195 FPS, a reduction of 28%, and at 4K it falls further to 123 FPS, a 55% decrease from the 1080p figure. This pattern of steep declines with resolution is typical of a GPU-bound scenario, but the absolute numbers remain so high that the game is never unplayable. The transition from 1440p to 4K at High settings results in a 37% performance hit, from 195 FPS down to 123 FPS, which shows that the RTX 4070 Ti SUPER’s rendering capabilities are the limiting factor at the highest resolution.

The scaling behavior changes dramatically when looking at Low settings. At 1080p Low, the system produces 390 FPS, but at 1440p Low it drops to 349 FPS, a modest 11% reduction. The jump to 4K Low yields 245 FPS, which is 37% lower than the 1440p result. This non-linear scaling suggests that at lower presets, the CPU begins to play a larger role. The fact that 1080p Low (390 FPS) is only 12% faster than 1440p Low (349 FPS) indicates that the i5-14600KF’s single-thread performance is starting to cap the frame rate, as the GPU has plenty of headroom to render more frames at the lower resolution.

At Medium settings, the resolution scaling is more uniform. The system achieves 360 FPS at 1080p, 312 FPS at 1440p, and 196 FPS at 4K. This represents a 13% drop from 1080p to 1440p and a 37% drop from 1440p to 4K. The 4K Medium result of 196 FPS is particularly notable because it is still far above the 60 FPS threshold, and the minimum FPS of 167 at this setting shows that even the worst-case frame times are smooth. The Ultra preset shows the smallest absolute differences, with 258 FPS at 1080p, 186 FPS at 1440p, and 117 FPS at 4K, reinforcing that the game’s visual effects are not taxing the GPU’s 44.10 TFLOPS of FP32 compute power.

The overall trend suggests that for this hardware, the GPU is the primary bottleneck only at 4K Ultra, where the frame rate drops to 117 FPS. At every other resolution and preset combination, the CPU’s performance is what keeps the system from reaching even higher frame rates. The data shows that the RTX 4070 Ti SUPER is not being fully utilized below 4K, as the frame rate scaling from 1080p to 1440p is not proportional to the pixel count increase (2.25x pixels but only 1.4x frame rate drop at High). This indicates a CPU limit that prevents the GPU from reaching its full potential at lower resolutions.

Settings Recommendations

The measured data strongly favors the Medium preset as the optimal balance between visual quality and performance for this system. At 1080p Medium, the average frame rate is 360 FPS, which is only 8% lower than the Low preset’s 390 FPS but offers significantly improved visual fidelity. The Medium preset also provides the only complete min/max data in the pack, with a minimum of 306 FPS and maximum of 414 FPS at 1080p, showing excellent frame pacing consistency. At 1440p Medium, the system still delivers 312 FPS with a minimum of 265 FPS, which is well above any display refresh rate.

The High preset is a viable alternative for users who prioritize visual quality over raw frame rates. At 1440p High, the average FPS is 195, which is still comfortable for high-refresh-rate displays, and at 4K High it maintains 123 FPS. However, the step from Medium to High at 1440p costs 37% of the performance (312 FPS down to 195 FPS), which is a substantial hit for what is likely a minor visual improvement in a game with Inside’s minimalist art style. The Ultra preset offers the worst value, with only marginal gains over High but a further performance reduction, dropping from 195 FPS to 186 FPS at 1440p.

For competitive or high-refresh-rate gaming, the Low preset at 1440p is the standout choice, delivering 349 FPS. This is the highest frame rate achievable at a resolution above 1080p in the measured data, and it comes with the benefit of reduced GPU load, which could lower power consumption. The 4K Medium preset at 196 FPS is the best 4K option, as it provides a 60% improvement over 4K High (123 FPS) while still maintaining visual quality that is likely indistinguishable from High in this game’s art style. The data suggests that users should avoid the Ultra preset entirely, as the performance drop from High to Ultra (from 271 to 258 FPS at 1080p, a 5% reduction) does not justify the negligible visual gains.

FAQ

*Q: What is the highest average FPS this system can achieve in Inside?*

A: The highest measured average FPS is 390, achieved at 1920x1080 resolution with Low settings.

Q: Does the system maintain 60 FPS at 4K with all settings maxed?

A: Yes, the 4K Ultra preset produces an average FPS of 117, which is well above the 60 FPS threshold, and the 4K High preset reaches 123 FPS.

Q: Is the CPU or GPU the main bottleneck for this game?

A: The data indicates the CPU is the bottleneck at lower resolutions. At 1080p Low, the system hits 390 FPS, but the frame rate only increases to 349 FPS at 1440p Low, suggesting the Intel Core i5-14600KF’s single-thread performance limits the frame rate more than the GPU’s rendering power.

Q: What is the best preset for 1440p gaming?

A: The Medium preset at 2560x1440 delivers an average FPS of 312 with a minimum of 265 FPS, which is the best combination of high frame rates and visual quality. The Low preset offers 349 FPS if maximum performance is preferred.

Q: How much performance is lost when going from 1080p to 4K at High settings?

A: At High settings, the average FPS drops from 271 at 1080p to 123 at 4K, a 55% reduction in performance.

Q: Are there any frame rate drops below 60 FPS in the measured data?

A: No. The lowest average FPS recorded is 117 at 4K Ultra, and the lowest minimum FPS is 167 at 4K Medium, so the system never drops below 60 FPS in any configuration.

Measured FPS Breakdown

At 1920x1080 resolution, the system delivers its highest frame rates. The Low preset achieves an average of 390 FPS, which is the peak performance in the entire dataset. The Medium preset produces 360 FPS with a minimum of 306 FPS and a maximum of 414 FPS, showing a tight frame time distribution. High settings yield 271 FPS, while Ultra settings drop to 258 FPS, a 5% reduction from High. The difference between Low and Ultra at 1080p is 132 FPS (390 vs 258), representing a 34% performance spread across presets.

At 2560x1440 resolution, the performance scales down but remains exceptionally high. Low settings achieve 349 FPS, which is only 11% lower than the 1080p Low result, indicating a CPU limit. Medium settings produce 312 FPS with a minimum of 265 FPS and a maximum of 359 FPS. High settings deliver 195 FPS, and Ultra settings reach 186 FPS. The spread between Low and Ultra at 1440p is 163 FPS (349 vs 186), which is a 47% difference, showing that the GPU becomes more of a factor at this resolution.

At 3840x2160 resolution, the GPU load becomes more significant. Low settings still manage an average of 245 FPS, which is 30% lower than the 1440p Low result. Medium settings achieve 196 FPS with a minimum of 167 FPS and a maximum of 226 FPS, making it the most consistent 4K preset in terms of frame pacing. High settings drop to 123 FPS, and Ultra settings fall to 117 FPS, the lowest average in the dataset. The difference between Low and Ultra at 4K is 128 FPS (245 vs 117), a 52% reduction, which demonstrates that the RTX 4070 Ti SUPER’s rendering capabilities are the limiting factor at this resolution.

GPU Role

The NVIDIA GeForce RTX 4070 Ti SUPER is a high-end graphics card with 16 GB of GDDR6X memory on a 256-bit bus, providing 672.3 GB/s of memory bandwidth. The card’s boost clock of 2610 MHz and its 8448 shading units contribute to its 44.10 TFLOPS of FP32 compute performance. In Inside, this GPU is never pushed to its limits, as evidenced by the fact that even the most demanding preset (4K Ultra) only produces an average FPS of 117, which is far from the card’s maximum capability. The GPU’s performance percentile of 76 against all GPUs in the benchmark database places it well above average, and its average benchmark score of 31087 is within 1.9% of the NVIDIA TITAN RTX, its closest rival.

The GPU’s 16 GB VRAM is more than sufficient for Inside, a game that does not feature large texture sets or complex geometry. The data shows that the card’s memory bandwidth of 672.3 GB/s is not a limiting factor, as the frame rate scaling from 1440p to 4K is not proportional to the memory bandwidth requirements. The GPU’s Ada Lovelace architecture, built on a 5 nm process at TSMC, includes 66 RT cores and 264 tensor cores, though these features are unlikely to be utilized in a 2D puzzle platformer. The card’s 96 ROPs and 264 TMUs handle the game’s rendering efficiently, but the benchmark results indicate that the GPU is often idle, waiting for the CPU to feed it data.

The RTX 4070 Ti SUPER’s performance relative to its nearest rivals shows that it is a capable card, but not the absolute top tier. Its average benchmark score of 31087 is 0.4% lower than the NVIDIA Quadro M5000 and 1.4% lower than the NVIDIA RTX PRO 4500 Blackwell, though these are professional-grade cards. The GPU’s 3DMark Steel Nomad DX12 score of 5569 and Geekbench OpenCL score of 199267 highlight its compute capabilities, but in Inside, these strengths do not translate into a significant advantage, as the game’s frame rates are largely capped by the CPU at lower resolutions.

CPU Role

The Intel Core i5-14600KF is a 14-core, 20-thread processor with a base clock of 3.50 GHz and a boost clock of 5.30 GHz, built on Intel’s 10 nm process. Its benchmark results show strong single-thread performance, with a Cinebench R23 single-core score of 4594 and a Geekbench single-core score of 2445. This single-thread prowess is crucial for Inside, which appears to rely heavily on CPU performance based on the frame rate scaling data. At 1080p Low, the system achieves 390 FPS, but the fact that this only drops to 349 FPS at 1440p Low (an 11% reduction for 2.25x the pixels) suggests that the CPU is the primary bottleneck, not the GPU.

The processor’s multi-core performance is also robust, with a Cinebench R23 multi-core score of 32544 and a Passmark multithread score of 38697. However, Inside likely does not utilize all 20 threads effectively, as the frame rate ceiling at lower resolutions points to single-thread limitations. The i5-14600KF’s average benchmark score of 49394 places it in the 90th percentile of all CPUs, and it is within 0.3% of the AMD Ryzen 9 7900’s score of 49228, making it a top-tier performer. The CPU’s 24 MB of shared L3 cache and 2 MB per-core L2 cache help reduce memory latency, which is beneficial for game logic and physics calculations.

The data shows that the CPU’s boost clock of 5.30 GHz is a key factor in the high frame rates observed. The fact that the system can achieve 390 FPS at 1080p Low indicates that the CPU can process game logic at an extremely high rate, far beyond what most displays can show. The processor’s TDP of 125 W and support for both DDR4 and DDR5 memory give it flexibility, but the benchmark results in Inside are more indicative of its raw processing power. The i5-14600KF’s performance relative to its rivals—such as being 0.8% ahead of the Intel Core Ultra 5 245 and 0.8% behind the AMD Ryzen AI Max+ 388—shows that it is one of the fastest desktop CPUs available, which is why it can drive frame rates well beyond 200 FPS in this game.