Inside

Inside is a 2016 puzzle platformer that places minimal demands on modern hardware, yet the measured data for the Intel Core Ultra 9 290K Plus paired with the NVIDIA GeForce RTX 3080 Ti reveals a configuration that is overwhelmingly GPU-bound at higher resolutions and settings, while at 1080p the CPU’s exceptional single-thread performance pushes frame rates to levels that exceed the refresh rates of nearly all displays. The dataset contains 12 measured FPS rows across four quality presets and three resolutions, all derived from actual testing rather than estimates, and the combination ranks 537th out of 3,716 tested combos in this game, placing it in the top 14.5% of all configurations tested. This analysis will break down the FAQ, the roles of the GPU and CPU, the measured FPS data, the combo’s standing among rivals, settings recommendations, and resolution scaling behavior.

FAQ

Q: What is the average FPS at 1080p with High settings for this combo?

A: The measured average FPS at 1920x1080 with High settings is 228 frames per second, which is well above the 165 FPS medium preset at the same resolution and close to the 218 FPS Ultra preset.

Q: How does the RTX 3080 Ti’s benchmark score compare to its nearest rival, the RTX 5070?

A: The RTX 3080 Ti has an average benchmark score of 41,187, while the NVIDIA GeForce RTX 5070 scores 40,377, meaning the 3080 Ti is 2% higher per the deltaPct value. The 3080 Ti also leads the AMD Radeon Pro 5300 (40,870) by 0.8%, but trails the NVIDIA Tesla M40 24 GB (41,707) by 1.2%.

Q: What is the minimum FPS recorded in the entire dataset?

A: The only rows with minFps values are the Medium preset: at 3840x2160 the min is 140 FPS, at 2560x1440 it is 223 FPS, and at 1920x1080 it is 311 FPS. All other settings and resolutions have null minFps, so no lower bound is reported.

Q: What is the combo’s rank among all tested combinations in Inside?

A: The comboRankInGame is 537 out of 3,716 total combos, meaning it outperforms roughly 85.5% of all tested configurations. This percentile is consistent with the CPU’s 96th percentile among all CPUs and the GPU’s 83rd percentile among all GPUs.

Q: Does the CPU have more cores than threads?

A: Yes, the Intel Core Ultra 9 290K Plus has 24 cores and 24 threads, indicating no hyperthreading. Its base clock is 3.70 GHz and boost clock is 5.80 GHz, with a TDP of 125 W.

Q: What is the memory configuration of the GPU?

A: The NVIDIA GeForce RTX 3080 Ti has 12 GB of GDDR6X memory on a 384-bit bus, yielding a bandwidth of 912.4 GB/s. Its memory clock is 1188 MHz, which translates to 19 Gbps effective.

GPU Role

The NVIDIA GeForce RTX 3080 Ti is an Ampere-architecture GPU built on Samsung’s 8 nm process, with a die size of 628 mm² and 28,300 million transistors. Its 12 GB of GDDR6X memory operates at 19 Gbps effective, delivering 912.4 GB/s of bandwidth across a 384-bit interface. The GPU’s base clock is 1365 MHz with a boost clock of 1665 MHz, and it contains 10,240 shading units, 320 texture mapping units, and 112 ROPs. Compute throughput is rated at 34.10 TFLOPS for FP32, while the pixel rate is 186.5 GPixel/s and texture rate is 532.8 GTexel/s. These specifications place the 3080 Ti in the 83rd percentile of all GPUs, with an average benchmark score of 41,187.

In the context of Inside, the GPU’s role becomes dominant as resolution increases. At 4K (3840x2160), the gap between Low and Ultra settings is substantial: the Low preset achieves 206 FPS average, Medium drops to 165 FPS (with a min of 140 and max of 190), High falls to 103 FPS, and Ultra bottoms out at 98 FPS. The difference between Low and Ultra at 4K is 108 FPS, a 52% reduction, which indicates that the GPU’s fill rate and memory bandwidth are being taxed by higher-quality rendering features. The 12 GB VRAM is more than sufficient for a game from 2016, as even at 4K Ultra the GPU does not appear to be memory-limited; the bottleneck is raw shader and ROP throughput.

The RTX 3080 Ti’s nearest rivals in the benchmark database are the AMD Radeon Pro 5300 (0.8% lower), the NVIDIA Tesla M40 24 GB (1.2% higher), the NVIDIA Tesla M40 (1.7% higher), and the NVIDIA GeForce RTX 5070 (2% lower). These deltas are all within 2%, meaning the 3080 Ti sits in a tightly clustered performance band. However, the measured FPS in Inside shows the 3080 Ti delivering playable frame rates even at 4K Ultra (98 FPS), which is far beyond what the game requires. The GPU’s 350 W TDP and dual-slot design are not relevant to the game’s performance, but the PCIe 4.0 x16 interface ensures no bandwidth bottleneck when transferring geometry and textures.

At 1440p, the GPU still dictates performance. The Low preset produces 329 FPS, Medium 263 FPS (min 223, max 302), High 164 FPS, and Ultra 156 FPS. The pattern mirrors 4K but with higher absolute numbers, confirming that the GPU is the primary limiter above 1080p. The fact that High and Ultra are only 8 FPS apart at 1440p (164 vs 156) suggests that Ultra adds settings that are not particularly demanding on the 3080 Ti, whereas the jump from Medium to High (263 to 164) is a 99 FPS drop, indicating a significant increase in pixel shading or post-processing load.

CPU Role

The Intel Core Ultra 9 290K Plus is a 24-core, 24-thread processor from the Core Ultra Series 2, based on the Arrow Lake Refresh codename and built on TSMC’s 3 nm process. It has a base clock of 3.70 GHz and a boost clock of 5.80 GHz, with a TDP of 125 W. The cache hierarchy includes 192 KB L1 per core, 3 MB L2 per core, and 36 MB of shared L3. Memory support is DDR5 with dual-channel configuration and a bandwidth of 115.2 GB/s, and the CPU offers PCIe Gen 5 with 20 lanes. Its benchmark scores are impressive: Cinebench R23 multi-core reaches 51,731, single-core 7,303; PassMark multi-thread is 60,860 and single-thread 4,823. The CPU’s percentile vs all CPUs is 96, with an average benchmark score of 84,003.

In Inside, the CPU’s role is most apparent at 1080p, where frame rates are so high that the GPU is no longer the sole bottleneck. At 1920x1080, the Low preset delivers 442 FPS average, Medium 366 FPS (min 311, max 420), High 228 FPS, and Ultra 218 FPS. The jump from Low to Medium is 76 FPS, while Medium to High is 138 FPS — a larger drop than at higher resolutions, which suggests that the CPU is capable of feeding the GPU at Low settings but becomes less relevant as settings increase. The single-core performance of 7,303 in Cinebench R23 and 4,823 in PassMark single-thread are critical for a game like Inside, which relies on a single main thread for game logic and physics. With a boost clock of 5.80 GHz, the CPU can process draw calls and update the game world quickly enough to avoid limiting the GPU at 1080p Low, where the 442 FPS result is likely near the engine’s internal cap.

The nearest rivals for the CPU are the Intel Core Ultra 9 285K (0.2% higher average score), AMD EPYC 4584PX (1.1% higher), AMD EPYC 9135 (1.2% higher), and AMD EPYC 7F72 (1.3% lower). These deltas are small, indicating that the 290K Plus is performance-competitive with the previous flagship and server-class parts. However, for Inside, the CPU’s 24 cores are less relevant than its high boost clock, as the game does not scale well beyond a few threads. The measured FPS at 1080p High (228 FPS) is still far above any display refresh rate, so the CPU is not a practical bottleneck in real-world usage. The 36 MB L3 cache helps with data locality, but the game’s small asset sizes mean this is unlikely to be a factor.

Measured FPS Breakdown

The dataset provides 12 measured FPS rows, each with an average FPS and, for Medium presets only, minimum and maximum values. At 1920x1080, the Low preset achieves 442 FPS average, Medium 366 FPS (min 311, max 420), High 228 FPS, and Ultra 218 FPS. The delta between Low and Ultra is 224 FPS, meaning Ultra delivers less than half the frame rate of Low. The Medium preset’s min-max range (311-420) shows a 109 FPS spread, indicating variability in scene complexity.

At 2560x1440, the numbers are lower but still high: Low averages 329 FPS, Medium 263 FPS (min 223, max 302), High 164 FPS, and Ultra 156 FPS. The drop from 1080p to 1440p is consistent across settings: Low falls by 113 FPS (25.6%), Medium by 103 FPS (28.1%), High by 64 FPS (28.1%), and Ultra by 62 FPS (28.4%). This near-uniform percentage drop suggests that the GPU is scaling predictably with pixel count, and the CPU is not introducing additional bottlenecks at 1440p.

At 3840x2160, the results are: Low 206 FPS, Medium 165 FPS (min 140, max 190), High 103 FPS, and Ultra 98 FPS. The 1440p to 4K transition shows larger percentage drops: Low falls by 123 FPS (37.4%), Medium by 98 FPS (37.3%), High by 61 FPS (37.2%), and Ultra by 58 FPS (37.2%). Again, the uniform drop (around 37%) indicates that the GPU is the sole limiter at 4K, as the CPU’s contribution is negligible. The Medium preset’s min FPS of 140 at 4K is still above 60 FPS, so the game is playable even in the worst measured frame times.

Notably, the High and Ultra presets at each resolution are very close: at 1080p they are 10 FPS apart (228 vs 218), at 1440p 8 FPS apart (164 vs 156), and at 4K 5 FPS apart (103 vs 98). This suggests that Ultra adds minimal extra load over High, likely just a few post-processing effects that the RTX 3080 Ti handles with ease. In contrast, the gap between Low and Medium is larger (76 FPS at 1080p, 66 FPS at 1440p, 41 FPS at 4K), indicating that Medium introduces more significant rendering features like dynamic shadows or ambient occlusion.

How This Combo Ranks

The combo of Intel Core Ultra 9 290K Plus and NVIDIA GeForce RTX 3080 Ti ranks 537th out of 3,716 tested combos in Inside, placing it in the top 14.5% of all configurations. This rank is surprisingly high given that the game is from 2016 and not demanding, but it reflects the raw performance of both components. The CPU’s 96th percentile among all CPUs and the GPU’s 83rd percentile among all GPUs combine to put this system well above the median. The rank of 537 means there are 536 combos that perform better, but those likely include newer GPUs like the RTX 40-series or RTX 50-series with higher raw throughput.

The CPU’s nearest rival, the Intel Core Ultra 9 285K, has an average score only 0.2% higher, so the 290K Plus is essentially tied with the previous generation’s flagship in synthetic benchmarks. The AMD EPYC 4584PX and EPYC 9135 are 1.1% and 1.2% higher, respectively, but those are server processors with different price points and power characteristics. The EPYC 7F72 is 1.3% lower, showing that the 290K Plus outperforms at least one older EPYC part. For the GPU, the RTX 3080 Ti’s nearest rival, the Tesla M40 24 GB, is 1.2% higher in average score, but that is a compute-focused card without modern game features like DirectX 12 Ultimate or Vulkan 1.4 support. The RTX 5070 is 2% lower, which is notable because it suggests the older 3080 Ti still holds its own against a newer mainstream GPU in synthetic benchmarks.

Given the combo’s rank, the data indicates that this configuration is overkill for Inside. The game’s engine is likely capped at 442 FPS (the highest measured value), and the CPU’s single-thread performance is sufficient to reach that cap at 1080p Low. The GPU’s 12 GB VRAM and 912.4 GB/s bandwidth are far beyond the game’s requirements, so the rank is more a reflection of raw component strength than of optimized performance for this specific title.

Settings Recommendations

Based on the measured FPS rows, the optimal settings depend on the target frame rate and resolution. At 1080p, even Ultra (218 FPS) exceeds 200 FPS, so any preset is viable. However, the Medium preset offers 366 FPS average with a minimum of 311 FPS, which is overkill for any display. The High preset at 228 FPS provides a better visual quality-to-performance ratio than Ultra (218 FPS), since the 10 FPS difference is negligible. For 1440p, Medium (263 FPS) and High (164 FPS) are both excellent, but High delivers significantly better visual fidelity at a cost of 99 FPS. If the display is 144 Hz, High at 1440p is the best choice, as it stays above 144 FPS on average.

At 4K, the situation changes. Low (206 FPS) is far above any 4K display’s refresh rate (typically 60-144 Hz), so Medium (165 FPS) is reasonable, but High (103 FPS) and Ultra (98 FPS) are the only presets that stress the GPU meaningfully. For a 4K 120 Hz display, High at 103 FPS is close to the target, and Ultra at 98 FPS is only 5 FPS lower, so Ultra may be preferred for maximum quality. The Medium preset at 4K (165 FPS) offers a min FPS of 140, which is still above 120 FPS, so it is safe for high-refresh 4K monitors. The data shows no preset drops below 98 FPS average, so all settings are playable, but the recommendation is to use High at 1080p and 1440p for balance, and High or Ultra at 4K depending on the display’s refresh rate.

Resolution Scaling

The FPS scaling from 1080p to 1440p to 4K reveals the limiting component at each step. From 1080p to 1440p, the average FPS drops by approximately 28% across all settings (Low: 442 to 329, Medium: 366 to 263, High: 228 to 164, Ultra: 218 to 156). This is close to the theoretical pixel count increase of 77% (1920x1080 = 2.07M pixels, 2560x1440 = 3.69M pixels), but the FPS drop is much less, indicating that the GPU is not fully saturated at 1080p. The CPU is likely limiting at 1080p Low (442 FPS), so the 28% drop when moving to 1440p is a combination of increased GPU load and the CPU no longer being the bottleneck.

From 1440p to 4K, the FPS drops by 37% across all settings (e.g., Low: 329 to 206, Medium: 263 to 165, High: 164 to 103, Ultra: 156 to 98). The pixel count increase from 1440p (3.69M) to 4K (8.29M) is 125%, but the FPS drop is only 37%, which means the GPU is not scaling linearly with pixel count. This is typical for a game like Inside, where fill rate and memory bandwidth are sufficient, but shader complexity does not double with resolution. The uniform 37% drop at 4K confirms that the GPU is the sole limiter, as the CPU’s performance is unchanged and the game’s logic is resolution-independent.

The scaling behavior suggests that at 1080p, the system is CPU-limited to some degree, especially at Low settings where 442 FPS is likely near the engine’s cap. At 1440p and 4K, the GPU becomes the bottleneck, as evidenced by the consistent percentage drops. The RTX 3080 Ti’s 912.4 GB/s bandwidth is sufficient for 4K, as the frame rates remain high, but the 37% drop from 1440p to 4K indicates that memory bandwidth or ROP throughput is the limiting factor. The CPU’s 24 cores and 5.80 GHz boost clock are never the primary constraint above 1080p, which is expected for a game that uses only a few threads. Overall, the data shows a balanced system where the CPU excels at low-resolution high-FPS scenarios, while the GPU dominates at higher resolutions, making this combo versatile across all settings in Inside.