Inside

Inside is a puzzle platformer from 2016 that is remarkably undemanding on modern hardware, and the measured data for the Intel Core i7-12700K + NVIDIA GeForce RTX 3060 Ti combo reflects that. The benchmark results show a system that is capable of delivering extremely high frame rates at every tested resolution, with the limiting factor shifting from the GPU at 4K to the CPU at 1080p. The data suggests that this pairing is wildly overqualified for the game's requirements, producing triple-digit average FPS even at the highest settings, which makes the analysis more about identifying the best balance between visual quality and unnecessary performance headroom.

Settings Recommendations

The measured FPS data for Inside reveals a clear hierarchy across the four tested presets—Low, Medium, High, and Ultra—at each resolution. At 1080p, the difference between Low and Ultra is substantial, with average FPS dropping from 282.9 to 136.9, yet even the Ultra preset remains far above the 60 FPS threshold. At 1440p, the pattern continues with Low delivering 200.8 FPS and Ultra delivering 95.2 FPS, while at 4K, the spread tightens: Low produces 129.8 FPS, Medium 98.4 FPS, High 60.7 FPS, and Ultra 61.7 FPS.

Given that the game is a side-scrolling puzzle platformer where reaction time matters less than in a competitive shooter, the data supports that the High preset offers the best experience. The jump from High to Ultra at 1080p yields only a negligible difference—137.3 FPS versus 136.9 FPS—suggesting that Ultra adds no meaningful visual benefit for a 0.3% performance cost. At 1440p, High provides 99.8 FPS, which is comfortably above 60, and at 4K, High and Ultra are nearly identical at 60.7 and 61.7 FPS, respectively. The Medium preset at 4K is intriguing at 98.4 FPS, but since High is only 60.7 FPS, the data implies that the visual upgrade from Medium to High is significant enough to justify the FPS reduction, especially since 60 FPS is still very playable for this genre. For users with 144Hz displays, the 1080p Medium preset at 227.1 FPS is the sweet spot, as it provides a massive performance buffer while still looking polished compared to Low.

FAQ

Q: How does the Intel Core i7-12700K perform in synthetic benchmarks relative to its closest rivals?

A: The i7-12700K has an average benchmark score of 35,684, which places it 0.3% behind the AMD Ryzen 7 PRO 5845 (35,802) and 0.7% behind the Intel Core i5-14500HX (35,940), but it is 0.6% ahead of the Intel Core i7-13700T (35,468) and 0.8% ahead of the Intel Core i7-13800H (35,416). This puts it in the 89th percentile of all CPUs.

Q: What is the frame rate difference between the Low and Ultra presets at 4K resolution?

A: At 3840x2160, the Low preset averages 129.8 FPS, while the Ultra preset averages 61.7 FPS. This represents a performance drop of over 52%, meaning Ultra more than halves the frame rate compared to Low, though both remain playable.

Q: Is the RTX 3060 Ti a bottleneck for Inside at 1080p?

A: The data suggests the GPU is not the primary limiter at 1080p, as the Low preset reaches 282.9 FPS and the Ultra preset still hits 136.9 FPS. The CPU's strong single-thread score of 4,128 in Cinebench R23 likely allows the GPU to run at its full potential, but the game's simple visuals mean the GPU is never stressed.

Q: How does the combo rank among all tested combinations for Inside?

A: This specific combo ranks 1,185th out of 1,671 tested combinations, which places it in the 29th percentile. This low rank is not due to poor performance but rather because the game is so easy to run that even much weaker hardware can achieve high FPS.

Q: What is the VRAM capacity of the GPU and does it matter for this game?

A: The RTX 3060 Ti has 8 GB of GDDR6 memory with a 256-bit bus and 448.0 GB/s bandwidth. For a game like Inside, this is far more than necessary; the measured FPS at 4K Ultra remains at 61.7 FPS, indicating that VRAM capacity is not a limiting factor.

Q: Can this combo maintain 60 FPS at 4K with High settings?

A: Yes, the measured average FPS at 3840x2160 with High settings is 60.7 FPS, which is just above the 60 FPS target. The Ultra preset also achieves 61.7 FPS, so both high-end presets are viable at 4K.

Resolution Scaling

The measured FPS data across resolutions provides a clear picture of how this combo scales with pixel count. From 1080p to 1440p, the average FPS drops by approximately 27% at Low settings (from 282.9 to 200.8), 30% at Medium (227.1 to 158.8), 27% at High (137.3 to 99.8), and 30% at Ultra (136.9 to 95.2). This consistent reduction indicates that the GPU is beginning to take on a larger role as resolution increases, but the game's modest visual complexity means the scaling is not steep.

Moving from 1440p to 4K, the performance penalty becomes more pronounced. At Low settings, FPS drops from 200.8 to 129.8, a 35% reduction; at Medium, from 158.8 to 98.4, a 38% drop; at High, from 99.8 to 60.7, a 39% decline; and at Ultra, from 95.2 to 61.7, a 35% decrease. The fact that the percentage drop is relatively uniform across presets suggests that the limiting component is the GPU's pixel fill rate and memory bandwidth, rather than the CPU or game logic. The RTX 3060 Ti's pixel rate of 133.2 GPixel/s and texture rate of 253.1 GTexel/s are being pushed harder at 4K, but the CPU's high single-thread performance (4,128 in Cinebench R23) ensures that it is not the bottleneck even at lower resolutions where frame rates exceed 200 FPS.

How This Combo Ranks

Among all tested combinations for Inside, this Intel Core i7-12700K + RTX 3060 Ti pairing ranks 1,185th out of 1,671, placing it in the 29th percentile of all combos. This rank is surprisingly low for such a powerful system, and the data explains why: the game is so lightweight that the CPU and GPU are never fully utilized. The combo's average benchmark scores are strong—the CPU is in the 89th percentile and the GPU in the 69th percentile—but these strengths do not translate into a high ranking because weaker hardware can achieve similar frame rates.

For context, the RTX 3060 Ti's nearest rivals in synthetic benchmarks include the AMD Radeon RX 6700M (0.2% faster), AMD Radeon RX 6600 (0.5% faster), and AMD Radeon 890M (0.5% faster), all of which would likely perform nearly identically in Inside. The low rank is thus a signal of the game's excellent optimization, not a reflection of the combo's inadequacy. In fact, the measured FPS at 1080p Ultra (136.9) is more than double the refresh rate of a standard 60Hz monitor, meaning this combo delivers a flawless experience while being ranked in the bottom third.

CPU Role

The Intel Core i7-12700K is a 12-core, 20-thread processor based on the Alder Lake architecture, with a base clock of 3.60 GHz and a boost clock of 5.00 GHz. Its synthetic benchmark results are impressive, with a Cinebench R23 multicore score of 29,241 and a single-core score of 4,128, placing it in the 89th percentile of all CPUs. For Inside, however, the CPU is likely not the primary bottleneck, as the game is a 2D puzzle platformer that does not heavily utilize multi-threading.

The measured FPS data supports this: at 1080p Low, the system reaches 282.9 FPS, which is close to what a high-end CPU can feed to the GPU. The CPU's high single-thread performance (1043 in 3DMark single-thread) ensures that game logic and physics are processed quickly, avoiding frame hitches. The 12 cores and 20 threads provide ample headroom for background tasks, but the game's demands are so low that even a 4-core processor would suffice. The CPU's L3 cache of 25 MB shared and dual-channel memory support (DDR4/DDR5) are irrelevant to this game's performance, as the data shows no sign of CPU limitation even at 4K where FPS drops to 60.7 at High settings.

Measured FPS Breakdown

The measured FPS data for this combo covers three resolutions and four settings, providing a comprehensive view of performance. At 1920x1080, the average FPS ranges from 282.9 at Low to 136.9 at Ultra. The Medium preset delivers 227.1 FPS, and High delivers 137.3 FPS. Notably, High and Ultra are nearly identical at 1080p, differing by only 0.4 FPS, suggesting that the Ultra preset's extra visual effects have minimal GPU cost at this resolution.

At 2560x1440, the averages are 200.8 FPS at Low, 158.8 FPS at Medium, 99.8 FPS at High, and 95.2 FPS at Ultra. The gap between High and Ultra narrows to 4.6 FPS, while the gap between Low and Medium is 42 FPS. At 3840x2160, the averages are 129.8 FPS at Low, 98.4 FPS at Medium, 60.7 FPS at High, and 61.7 FPS at Ultra. Here, High and Ultra are essentially equal, with Ultra being 1 FPS faster, which is within measurement variance. The data reveals that the Low preset is always the fastest by a wide margin, while High and Ultra consistently cluster together, indicating that Ultra's additional settings have diminishing returns on this hardware.

GPU Role

The NVIDIA GeForce RTX 3060 Ti is based on the GA104 chip with 4,864 shading units, 152 texture mapping units, and 80 raster operation pipelines. It has a base clock of 1410 MHz and a boost clock of 1665 MHz, with 8 GB of GDDR6 memory on a 256-bit bus providing 448.0 GB/s of bandwidth. Its FP32 performance is 16.20 TFLOPS, and it supports DirectX 12 Ultimate, Vulkan 1.4, and OpenGL 4.6.

In Inside, the GPU's role becomes more prominent at higher resolutions. At 1080p, the GPU is not stressed, as evidenced by the 282.9 FPS at Low settings, which is likely near the CPU's rendering limit. At 1440p, the GPU begins to matter, with FPS dropping to 95.2 at Ultra. At 4K, the GPU is clearly the limiting factor, as FPS falls to 60.7 at High and 61.7 at Ultra, both of which are just above 60 FPS. The GPU's 8 GB VRAM is more than sufficient for this game, and its 80 ROPs and 253.1 GTexel/s texture rate handle the game's simple textures without issue. The RTX 3060 Ti's 69th percentile ranking among all GPUs, with an average benchmark score of 25,120, shows it is a mid-range card, but for Inside, it performs like a high-end solution, delivering playable frame rates at 4K Ultra. The data indicates that the GPU's memory bandwidth of 448.0 GB/s is not a bottleneck, as the game's asset sizes are small and the frame rate remains high even at 4K.