Outriders

# Outriders with AMD Ryzen 5 2600 + NVIDIA GeForce RTX 3070

The AMD Ryzen 5 2600 paired with the NVIDIA GeForce RTX 3070 delivers a solid Outriders experience across most settings, with the sweet spot clearly at Medium or High presets depending on your resolution. At 1080p, this combo produces 110 FPS on High and 123 FPS on Medium, while pushing to 4K drops High to 50 FPS and Medium to 67 FPS. The measured data shows a clear pattern: this pairing is capable of smooth gameplay at 1440p with High settings (95 FPS), but 4K Ultra is a stretch at 36 FPS. For most players, Medium at 4K or High at 1440p offers the best balance of visual quality and frame rate, with the 1080p Medium row (123 FPS average, 104 FPS minimum) being the most consistent performer for high-refresh monitors.

Settings Recommendations

The measured rows show that Medium is the most reliable preset across all three resolutions, with the only complete min/max data available in the entire dataset. At 1080p Medium, the combo achieves 123 FPS average with a 104 FPS minimum and 141 FPS maximum, indicating stable frame pacing. At 1440p Medium, the average drops to 105 FPS with a 89 FPS minimum, still comfortably above 60 FPS. At 4K Medium, the average falls to 67 FPS with a 57 FPS minimum — playable but with occasional dips near the 60 FPS threshold.

High settings are viable at 1080p (110 FPS) and 1440p (95 FPS), but at 4K High the average drops to 50 FPS, which is below the 60 FPS target most players prefer. Low settings provide the highest frame rates at every resolution — 138 FPS at 1080p, 118 FPS at 1440p, and 92 FPS at 4K — but the visual sacrifice is significant for a looter shooter where environmental detail matters. Ultra settings are the worst choice here: 98 FPS at 1080p, 69 FPS at 1440p, and only 36 FPS at 4K. The 1080p Ultra figure is particularly telling, as it is only 12 FPS higher than 4K Medium despite the massive resolution difference.

The data suggests that Medium is the default recommendation for this combo, with High being a reasonable alternative at 1080p or 1440p if you prefer visual fidelity. At 4K, Medium is the only sensible choice among the measured presets. The 57 FPS minimum at 4K Medium means you will occasionally dip below 60, but the average of 67 FPS keeps gameplay mostly smooth.

CPU Role

The AMD Ryzen 5 2600 brings 6 cores and 12 threads with a base clock of 3.40 GHz and boost clock of 3.90 GHz. This is a Zen architecture chip on the 12 nm process from GlobalFoundries, with 16 MB of shared L3 cache and 96 KB of L1 cache per core. The CPU's benchmark scores suggest it is a mid-range performer — its PassMark multithread score of 13160 and Geekbench multicore of 5648 place it in the 75th percentile of all CPUs tested.

In Outriders, the CPU's role becomes more apparent at lower resolutions where the GPU has less work to do. The gap between 1080p Medium (123 FPS) and 1080p Low (138 FPS) is 15 FPS, while the same settings gap at 4K is 25 FPS (67 to 92). This suggests that at 1080p, the CPU is starting to become a limiting factor, though not severely — the Ryzen 5 2600's 6-core/12-thread configuration is still adequate for this game's requirements.

The CPU's nearest rivals in overall benchmark scores include the Intel Core Ultra 5 228V (0.2% ahead), Intel Core i9-11900H (0.5% ahead), and Intel Xeon D-1746TER (0.7% behind). These deltas are tiny, indicating that the Ryzen 5 2600 sits in a crowded performance band. For Outriders specifically, the CPU's single-thread performance (PassMark single-thread score of 2239) is more relevant than its multicore muscle, as most game logic threads are single-threaded. The 3.90 GHz boost clock helps here, but the Zen architecture's older design means it trails more modern CPUs in per-core efficiency.

GPU Role

The NVIDIA GeForce RTX 3070 is the dominant component in this pairing. Its GA104 chip on Samsung's 8 nm process packs 17,400 million transistors into a 392 mm² die, with 5888 shading units, 184 texture mapping units, and 96 raster output units. The GPU operates at a 1500 MHz base clock and 1725 MHz boost clock, with 8 GB of GDDR6 memory on a 256-bit bus delivering 448.0 GB/s of bandwidth.

The RTX 3070's benchmark scores reinforce its position as a strong 1440p-class card. Its PassMark G3D score of 22214 and 3DMark Steel Nomad DX12 score of 3162 place it in the 61st percentile of all GPUs. The GPU's nearest rivals in average benchmark score include the AMD Radeon RX 7600 XT (0.7% ahead), NVIDIA GeForce GTX 690 (1.0% ahead), and AMD Radeon HD 7970M (1.1% ahead) — all within a narrow margin, though the RTX 3070's modern feature set (including ray tracing cores and DLSS support) gives it capabilities beyond raw rasterization that these older cards lack.

In Outriders, the GPU's role is clearly the primary performance driver. At 4K, the frame rate scales almost linearly with preset quality: 36 FPS on Ultra, 50 FPS on High, 67 FPS on Medium, and 92 FPS on Low. This pattern indicates the GPU is fully saturated at this resolution. The RTX 3070's 8 GB VRAM is sufficient for the game's needs at the measured settings, and the 448.0 GB/s memory bandwidth supports the high-resolution textures without causing a bottleneck.

How This Combo Ranks

This specific combination of AMD Ryzen 5 2600 and NVIDIA GeForce RTX 3070 ranks 2408 out of 3710 tested combos in Outriders, placing it in the 35th percentile of all system configurations. This ranking reflects the CPU's age — the Ryzen 5 2600 was released in 2018, while the RTX 3070 came in 2020 — creating a pairing where the GPU is significantly more capable than the CPU.

The combo's rank is somewhat lower than what the GPU alone might suggest, given that the RTX 3070 sits in the 61st percentile of all GPUs. The CPU, at the 75th percentile of all CPUs, is not a weak component, but in Outriders the pairing does not achieve the top-tier performance that a newer CPU with the same GPU would likely deliver. The 1080p Medium result of 123 FPS is respectable but not exceptional for this GPU class, and the 4K Ultra result of 36 FPS is a clear sign that this combo is not optimized for maximum settings at high resolution.

Resolution Scaling

The measured FPS data reveals how this combo scales across resolutions. Moving from 1080p to 1440p on Medium settings drops the average from 123 FPS to 105 FPS, an 18 FPS reduction (about 15%). Moving from 1440p to 4K on Medium drops the average from 105 FPS to 67 FPS, a 38 FPS reduction (about 36%). This non-linear scaling indicates that the GPU becomes progressively more saturated as resolution increases.

On High settings, the scaling is even more dramatic: 110 FPS at 1080p, 95 FPS at 1440p, and 50 FPS at 4K. The 4K High result is less than half the 1080p High result, showing a steep drop-off. On Low settings, the scaling is flatter: 138 FPS at 1080p, 118 FPS at 1440p, and 92 FPS at 4K. The 4K Low result being 92 FPS suggests that even at low settings, the GPU is still the primary limiting factor at this resolution.

The resolution scaling pattern strongly indicates that the RTX 3070 is the limiting component at 4K across all presets, while at 1080p the CPU begins to assert its influence — particularly on Low settings where the GPU has spare capacity. The 1080p Low result of 138 FPS is only 20 FPS higher than the 1440p Low result of 118 FPS, suggesting that the CPU is holding the system back from achieving even higher frame rates at 1080p.

FAQ

Q: What is the best settings preset for this combo at 1440p?

A: High settings at 1440p deliver 95 FPS average, which is the best balance of visual quality and performance. Medium at 1440p offers 105 FPS average with a 89 FPS minimum, but High provides noticeably better image quality for only a 10 FPS cost.

Q: Can this system handle 4K gaming in Outriders?

A: Yes, but only at Medium settings, which produce a 67 FPS average with a 57 FPS minimum. High settings at 4K drop to 50 FPS, and Ultra falls to 36 FPS, both below comfortable playable thresholds.

Q: Is the CPU or GPU the bottleneck in this pairing?

A: At 4K, the GPU is clearly the limiting component, as shown by the sharp FPS drop across all presets. At 1080p on Low settings, the CPU becomes more influential — the 138 FPS result is only 20 FPS higher than 1440p Low, suggesting the Ryzen 5 2600's single-thread performance (2239 PassMark score) is capping frame rates.

Q: How does this combo rank compared to other tested systems in Outriders?

A: This combo ranks 2408 out of 3710 tested combinations, placing it in the middle-lower tier of systems. The rank reflects the CPU's age relative to the GPU, as the RTX 3070 alone sits in the 61st percentile of all GPUs.

Q: What is the difference between Ultra and High settings at 1080p?

A: Ultra at 1080p delivers 98 FPS average, while High at 1080p delivers 110 FPS — a 12 FPS advantage for High. Given the minimal visual difference between these presets in most games, High appears to be the more efficient choice for this combo.

Q: Does the RTX 3070's 8 GB VRAM cause any issues at 4K in Outriders?

A: The measured data shows no VRAM-related problems. The 8 GB GDDR6 memory on a 256-bit bus with 448.0 GB/s bandwidth is sufficient for the game's demands, as evidenced by the playable 67 FPS average at 4K Medium.