Inside

Inside is a 2016 puzzle platformer that, on paper, should be trivial for a modern high-end system. Yet the benchmark data for the Intel Core i5-9400 and NVIDIA GeForce RTX 4070 Ti SUPER reveals a fascinating scaling curve that exposes where the bottleneck truly lies. The measured results show that this combo is capable of exceptionally high frame rates, but the relationship between resolution, settings, and performance tells a story about engine limits and component headroom that goes beyond simple rasterization power.

Resolution Scaling

The frame rate drop from 1080p to 4K is surprisingly modest, which immediately signals that the GPU is not the primary constraint at lower resolutions. At High settings, the average FPS moves from 168.7 at 1920x1080 to 153.7 at 2560x1440, and finally to 122.1 at 3840x2160. That represents only a 27.6% reduction in performance when moving from Full HD to 4K, a span that typically halves frame rates on GPU-bound systems. This unusual resilience suggests that the game engine itself has a performance ceiling that the CPU or game logic hits well before the RTX 4070 Ti SUPER's rendering capabilities are exhausted.

The gap between Low and Ultra settings at each resolution further clarifies the situation. At 1080p, the spread from Low (220.4 FPS) to Ultra (170.6 FPS) is only 22.6%, while at 4K, the same settings spread from 172.3 FPS down to 113.9 FPS, a 33.9% difference. The fact that 4K Low still achieves 172.3 FPS—nearly identical to the 1080p High result of 168.7 FPS—indicates that the GPU is only lightly stressed even at the highest pixel counts. The data implies that the limiting component shifts from being partially CPU-bound at 1080p to a more balanced, but still GPU-unburdened, state at 4K. In essence, this game is so lightweight that the RTX 4070 Ti SUPER is never pushed anywhere near its compute limits; the 44.10 TFLOPS of FP32 performance and 672.3 GB/s of memory bandwidth are vast overkill for this title.

FAQ

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

A: The highest measured average FPS is 220.4, achieved at 1920x1080 resolution with Low settings.

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

A: At Ultra settings, the average FPS drops from 170.6 at 1920x1080 to 113.9 at 3840x2160, a reduction of 56.7 FPS or roughly 33.2%.

Q: Does the RTX 4070 Ti SUPER's 16 GB VRAM become a limiting factor at any tested setting?

A: No, the data shows no indication of VRAM-related stutters or frame drops. The game's relatively simple visuals do not appear to challenge the 16 GB GDDR6X memory pool in any resolution or preset combination.

Q: Is the Intel Core i5-9400 holding back the RTX 4070 Ti SUPER in this game?

A: The data suggests some CPU limitation at 1080p, where the gap between Low and High settings is smaller than at 4K. The 6-core, 6-thread processor with a 2.90 GHz base and 4.10 GHz boost clock appears to be the primary constraint at lower resolutions, as the GPU has ample headroom.

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

A: At 2560x1440, Medium settings produce 181.7 FPS, while High settings yield 153.7 FPS. This 28 FPS difference indicates that High settings introduce a noticeable but not dramatic additional load.

Q: How does the combo rank among all tested configurations for this game?

A: The i5-9400 and RTX 4070 Ti SUPER combination ranks 849th out of 1671 tested combos in Inside, placing it in the middle of the pack despite delivering very high absolute frame rates.

CPU Role

The Intel Core i5-9400 is a Coffee Lake Refresh part with 6 cores and 6 threads, a configuration that lacks Hyper-Threading. Its 2.90 GHz base clock can boost to 4.10 GHz, and the 9 MB shared L3 cache is a modest allocation by modern standards. In synthetic benchmarks, this CPU scores 3346 in Cinebench R20 multi-core and 472 in single-core, placing it at the 50th percentile of all CPUs. These numbers are not impressive, but for Inside, they appear to be sufficient at 4K, where the GPU takes on more of the workload.

The resolution scaling data strongly implicates the CPU as a bottleneck at 1080p. At Low settings, the frame rate only improves from 172.3 FPS at 4K to 220.4 FPS at 1080p, a 27.9% gain. If the GPU were the sole constraint, this jump would be much larger, often exceeding 50% on typical hardware. The 4.10 GHz boost clock helps, but the lack of additional threads means the game's main thread can become a limiting factor. This pattern is classic for older titles with a single primary simulation thread. The CPU's 42.7 GB/s memory bandwidth and dual-channel DDR4 support are adequate, but the data shows that the i5-9400 is the component that prevents the system from reaching even higher frame rates at lower resolutions.

How This Combo Ranks

With a rank of 849 out of 1671 tested combos, this pairing sits almost exactly in the middle of the database for Inside. This is a surprising result given that the RTX 4070 Ti SUPER alone ranks in the 86th percentile of all GPUs, with an average benchmark score of 48704. The CPU is far less distinguished, sitting at the 50th percentile with an average score of 2305. The combination's mid-pack ranking suggests that the CPU drags down the overall system performance, despite the GPU's obvious capabilities.

The nearest rivals for the GPU provide context: the NVIDIA CMP 50HX scores 49071 (0.7% higher), while the RTX A2000 scores 47915 (1.6% lower). These are different classes of cards, yet the RTX 4070 Ti SUPER's dominance in raw compute does not translate into a high rank here because the game's frame rates are already so high that other factors matter more. The combo's rank indicates that many other CPU-GPU pairings can achieve similar or better FPS in this specific title, likely due to stronger single-threaded CPU performance. The data implies that for a game this lightweight, the GPU choice matters far less than the CPU's ability to feed it frames.

Measured FPS Breakdown

At 1920x1080, the average FPS ranges from 220.4 on Low to 170.6 on Ultra. Medium settings deliver 206.7 FPS, while High produces 168.7 FPS. Interestingly, the jump from High to Ultra only costs 1.9 FPS, suggesting that the Ultra preset's additional effects are nearly free at this resolution. The spread of 49.8 FPS between Low and Ultra is the smallest of all resolutions, reinforcing the CPU-bound nature of 1080p gameplay.

Moving to 2560x1440, the frame rates compress slightly: Low hits 197.5 FPS, Medium 181.7 FPS, High 153.7 FPS, and Ultra 150.2 FPS. The gap between Low and Ultra narrows to 47.3 FPS, but the relative drop from 1080p is more pronounced at each setting. At 3840x2160, the numbers fall further: Low 172.3 FPS, Medium 159.1 FPS, High 122.1 FPS, and Ultra 113.9 FPS. The Low-to-Ultra spread here is 58.4 FPS, the largest of any resolution, indicating that the GPU is finally beginning to feel the load as pixel count increases.

Settings Recommendations

For players with a high refresh rate monitor at 1080p, the Low preset is the clear choice, delivering 220.4 FPS. However, the difference between Low and Medium is only 13.7 FPS, so Medium at 206.7 FPS offers a better balance of visual quality and performance without any meaningful sacrifice. The High and Ultra presets at 168.7 and 170.6 FPS respectively are nearly identical in performance, making Ultra the better option if visual fidelity is prioritized, as the cost is negligible.

At 2560x1440, Medium at 181.7 FPS is the sweet spot, providing a significant step up in quality from Low (197.5 FPS) while remaining well above 144 Hz. For 4K gaming, the data suggests that High at 122.1 FPS is the most sensible preset, as it delivers a solid experience above 120 FPS. The Ultra preset at 113.9 FPS is also viable, but the 8.2 FPS penalty from High to Ultra does not justify the marginal visual gains for most users. The Low preset at 4K (172.3 FPS) is only recommended for competitive play where maximum frame rates are paramount.

GPU Role

The RTX 4070 Ti SUPER is built on TSMC's 5 nm process with an AD103 chip containing 45,900 million transistors. Its 8448 shading units and 264 texture mapping units provide immense raw throughput, with a boost clock of 2610 MHz. The 16 GB of GDDR6X memory on a 256-bit bus delivers 672.3 GB/s of bandwidth, and the card's 285 W TDP is substantial. In Inside, however, these specifications are largely underutilized. The game's visual complexity does not require the card's 66 ray tracing cores or 264 tensor cores, and the 44.10 TFLOPS of FP32 performance is far more than needed for a puzzle platformer.

The GPU's Passmark G3D score of 31811 and 3DMark Steel Nomad DX12 score of 5569 demonstrate its general capability, but the measured FPS in this title show that the card is never the limiting factor until 4K Ultra. Even at that extreme setting, the 113.9 FPS result is still exceptionally smooth. The closest GPU rivals, such as the RTX A2000 with a 1.6% lower average score, would likely perform nearly identically in this game, confirming that the RTX 4070 Ti SUPER's extra power is wasted here. The data paints a clear picture: the GPU's role in Inside is to provide headroom that the game rarely asks for, making it a case of massive overprovisioning for the task at hand.