Outriders

The AMD Ryzen 9 9900X3D paired with the NVIDIA GeForce RTX 4090 delivers a high-refresh-rate experience in Outriders, but the data reveals a significant performance ceiling at 4K. This combination ranks 37th out of 2913 tested combos, placing it in the top 1.3% of systems. The measured frames per second (FPS) show a clear narrative: the RTX 4090 is the dominant force at lower resolutions, while the transition to 4K exposes a bottleneck that even this flagship GPU cannot fully overcome. The following analysis breaks down the resolution scaling, settings impact, and component roles based solely on the measured data.

Resolution Scaling

The FPS drop from 1080p to 4K is steep and reveals where the system's limits lie. At High settings, the average FPS falls from 229 at 1920x1080 to 165 at 2560x1440, and then plummets to 86 at 3840x2160. This represents a 28% reduction from 1080p to 1440p, followed by a 48% reduction from 1440p to 4K. The scaling from 1440p to 4K is particularly harsh, indicating that pixel throughput becomes the primary constraint.

The same pattern holds across all settings presets. With Low settings, the system produces 287 FPS at 1080p, 246 FPS at 1440p, and 158 FPS at 4K. The percentage drops are 14% and 36% respectively. Medium settings see 255 FPS at 1080p, 219 FPS at 1440p, and 115 FPS at 4K—a 14% drop followed by a 47% drop. Ultra settings follow suit with 188 FPS at 1080p, 119 FPS at 1440p, and 62 FPS at 4K, representing a 37% and 48% reduction at each step.

The data suggests that at 1080p and 1440p, the CPU is doing substantial work to feed the GPU, as the frame rates are exceptionally high. However, at 4K, the GPU's rendering load increases quadratically, and the average FPS drops below the 100 FPS threshold across all presets except Low. The fact that the 4K Ultra setting yields only 62 FPS indicates that the RTX 4090's 24 GB of GDDR6X memory and 1.01 TB/s bandwidth are being saturated by the game's asset streaming and shading requirements at this resolution. The scaling is not linear, which points to a combination of memory bandwidth and shader workload limits rather than a pure CPU bottleneck.

Interestingly, the gap between Low and Ultra settings widens as resolution increases. At 1080p, the difference between Low and Ultra is 99 FPS (287 vs 188). At 1440p, it narrows to 127 FPS (246 vs 119). At 4K, the gap is 96 FPS (158 vs 62). This non-uniform scaling suggests that the GPU is the limiting factor at 4K, as raising settings from Low to Ultra has a proportionally larger impact on frame rate at higher resolutions. The 4K Low result of 158 FPS versus the 4K Ultra result of 62 FPS shows a 61% performance penalty for maxing out visuals, which is a massive cost for the visual fidelity gain.

Settings Recommendations

Based on the measured rows, the optimal settings depend heavily on the target resolution and refresh rate. For 4K displays, the data shows that High settings provide 86 FPS, which is playable for a looter shooter but not ideal for competitive play. Medium settings at 4K offer 115 FPS, which is a substantial improvement and likely the sweet spot for balancing visual quality and smoothness. The Ultra preset at 4K drops to 62 FPS, which is below the 60 FPS minimum for many players and not recommended for action-heavy encounters. Low settings at 4K push the frame rate to 158 FPS, but the visual compromise is significant.

For 1440p, the situation is more comfortable. High settings deliver 165 FPS, which is excellent for high-refresh-rate monitors. Medium settings provide 219 FPS, and Low settings reach 246 FPS. Ultra settings at 1440p yield 119 FPS, which is still smooth but represents a 28% performance hit compared to High. Given that High settings at 1440p produce 165 FPS, this is the recommended preset for most users with 144Hz or 165Hz displays. The jump from High to Medium adds 54 FPS (165 to 219), which could be worthwhile for 240Hz panels, but the visual fidelity loss may be noticeable.

At 1080p, the system is capable of pushing extremely high frame rates. Ultra settings deliver 188 FPS, which is sufficient for most high-refresh-rate monitors. High settings reach 229 FPS, and Medium hits 255 FPS. Low settings achieve 287 FPS, which is near the theoretical limit for many 300Hz panels. For esports-style play where frame rate is paramount, Medium settings at 1080p provide 255 FPS with minimal visual compromise. However, for a single-player looter shooter like Outriders, Ultra settings at 1080p with 188 FPS offer the best visual experience without sacrificing playability.

The data shows that Medium settings consistently provide the highest frame rates with a reasonable visual quality baseline. At 4K Medium, the 115 FPS average with a minimum of 97 FPS and maximum of 132 FPS indicates a stable performance window. The minimum FPS of 97 at 4K Medium is notably higher than the 4K High average of 86 FPS, suggesting that Medium is the most reliable preset for avoiding frame drops in demanding scenes. For players prioritizing consistency, Medium is the recommended preset across all resolutions.

GPU Role

The NVIDIA GeForce RTX 4090 plays a central role in this system's Outriders performance, and its specifications directly explain the measured results. The GPU features 16,384 shading units, 512 texture mapping units, and 176 render output units, which are substantial resources for handling the game's particle effects and lighting. The 128 ray tracing cores and 512 tensor cores are present but the measured data does not specify whether ray tracing is enabled, so their impact cannot be assessed from the FPS numbers alone.

The GPU's clock speeds are notable: a base clock of 2235 MHz and a boost clock of 2520 MHz. These high clocks contribute to the strong performance at 1080p and 1440p, where the GPU is not fully saturated. The memory configuration is a key factor: 24 GB of GDDR6X on a 384-bit bus with 1.01 TB/s bandwidth. This massive memory capacity and bandwidth are crucial for 4K gaming, where texture data and frame buffers demand significant throughput. The fact that 4K Ultra yields only 62 FPS suggests that even with 24 GB of VRAM, the game's Ultra preset at 4K is pushing the GPU's limits.

The GPU's benchmark scores provide context for its performance. In 3DMark Steel Nomad DX12, the RTX 4090 scores 9223. In Geekbench OpenCL and Vulkan, it scores 255416 and 271631 respectively. The Passmark G3D score is 38194, with a GPU Compute score of 26613. These synthetic benchmarks align with the GPU's real-world performance in Outriders, showing that it is a top-tier part. However, the percentileVsAllGpus of 88 indicates that while it is in the top 12% of all GPUs, it is not the absolute highest performer in this database's ranking.

The GPU's role becomes more critical as resolution increases. At 1080p, the CPU can feed the GPU efficiently, resulting in frame rates above 250 FPS on Low and Medium settings. At 4K, the GPU becomes the bottleneck, and the frame rates drop significantly. The 4K results show that the RTX 4090 is capable of handling the game at playable frame rates, but the Ultra preset is too demanding. The data indicates that the GPU's 82.58 TFLOPS FP32 performance is not sufficient to maintain 60 FPS at 4K Ultra, which is a demanding workload for any single GPU.

Measured FPS Breakdown

The complete dataset of measured FPS provides a granular view of performance across resolutions and settings. At 3840x2160, the average FPS ranges from 62 at Ultra to 158 at Low. The Medium preset at 4K shows an average of 115 FPS, with a minimum of 97 and maximum of 132, indicating a stable frame time distribution. The High preset at 4K averages 86 FPS, which is a significant drop from Medium. The Ultra preset at 4K drops to 62 FPS, which is the lowest measured value in the entire dataset.

At 2560x1440, the performance improves substantially. Low settings yield 246 FPS, Medium delivers 219 FPS (with a minimum of 186 and maximum of 251), High produces 165 FPS, and Ultra achieves 119 FPS. The spread from Low to Ultra at 1440p is 127 FPS, showing that the settings have a significant impact on performance. The Medium preset at 1440p has a minimum FPS of 186, which is higher than the 4K High average, demonstrating that resolution is a more critical factor than settings for maintaining smooth frame rates.

At 1920x1080, the system reaches its peak performance. Low settings produce 287 FPS, Medium delivers 255 FPS (with a minimum of 217 and maximum of 293), High achieves 229 FPS, and Ultra yields 188 FPS. The difference between Low and Ultra at 1080p is 99 FPS, which is smaller than the 127 FPS difference at 1440p. This suggests that at 1080p, the CPU is becoming more of a limiting factor, as the GPU has enough headroom to render frames faster than the CPU can process them.

The data reveals that the Medium preset is the only one with min/max FPS measurements across all resolutions. At 1080p Medium, the minimum is 217 FPS and maximum is 293 FPS, giving a range of 76 FPS. At 1440p Medium, the range is 65 FPS (186 to 251). At 4K Medium, the range is 35 FPS (97 to 132). The narrowing range at higher resolutions indicates more consistent frame pacing, likely because the GPU is the bottleneck and maintains a steadier workload. At lower resolutions, the CPU's variable workload causes more frame time variance.

How This Combo Ranks

The combination of the AMD Ryzen 9 9900X3D and NVIDIA GeForce RTX 4090 ranks 37th out of 2913 tested combos in Outriders, placing it in the top 1.3% of all systems tested. This is an exceptional ranking, but it is not the absolute top. The rank reflects the measured FPS across all settings and resolutions, and the data shows that this combo is capable of delivering high frame rates in most scenarios.

The CPU's individual performance contributes to this ranking. The Ryzen 9 9900X3D has an average benchmark score of 54762, placing it in the 91st percentile of all CPUs. Its nearest rivals in the database are the Intel Core Ultra 5 245KF (average score 55093, 0.6% higher), the Intel Core Ultra 5 245K (54053, 1.3% lower), the Intel Xeon 6505P (53701, 2% lower), and the Intel Core i7-14700F (53620, 2.1% lower). This CPU is competitive with these parts, showing that it is not a bottleneck in most gaming scenarios.

The GPU's performance is also strong but not dominant. The RTX 4090 has an average benchmark score of 60347, placing it in the 88th percentile of all GPUs. Its nearest rivals in the database are the Intel Arc Pro A60 (60326, 0% difference), the AMD Radeon Pro Vega 48 (60140, 0.3% lower), the AMD Radeon Pro W6600M (61896, 2.5% higher), and the AMD Radeon PRO V710 (58657, 2.9% lower). The GPU's ranking is lower than the CPU's, which suggests that the GPU may be the limiting factor in this combo's overall ranking.

The 37th rank out of 2913 combos indicates that there are 36 other system configurations that perform better in Outriders. Given that the RTX 4090 is a top-tier GPU, the combinations that beat this one likely feature newer or more optimized GPUs, or they may use CPUs with higher single-thread performance. The data shows that this combo is excellent but not the absolute best, and the 4K Ultra result of 62 FPS is likely what holds it back from a higher rank. The combo's strength is in its high frame rates at 1080p and 1440p, where it can push well above 200 FPS on medium settings.

FAQ

*Q: What is the maximum average FPS this combo can achieve in Outriders?*

A: The highest measured average FPS is 287, achieved at 1920x1080 with Low settings. This is the peak performance, while the lowest measured average is 62 FPS at 3840x2160 with Ultra settings.

*Q: Is this combo capable of 4K 60 FPS gaming in Outriders?*

A: Yes, but only with the right settings. At 4K, the High preset averages 86 FPS and Medium averages 115 FPS. However, the Ultra preset drops to 62 FPS, which is barely above the 60 FPS threshold and may not be stable in all scenes.

Q: How does the RTX 4090's memory configuration impact 4K performance?

A: The RTX 4090 has 24 GB of GDDR6X memory on a 384-bit bus with 1.01 TB/s bandwidth. This configuration is sufficient for 4K gaming, as evidenced by the 158 FPS at Low settings, but the Ultra preset at 4K still results in 62 FPS, showing that memory bandwidth is not the sole limiting factor.

Q: What is the best settings preset for a 1440p 165Hz monitor?

A: The High preset at 2560x1440 delivers 165 FPS, which exactly matches a 165Hz refresh rate. The Medium preset offers 219 FPS, which is better for higher refresh rates, but High provides the best balance of visual quality and frame rate for this specific monitor.

Q: How does this combo's ranking compare to other tested systems?

A: This combo ranks 37th out of 2913 tested combos, putting it in the top 1.3% of systems. The CPU ranks in the 91st percentile of all CPUs, while the GPU ranks in the 88th percentile of all GPUs.

Q: Does the data show any stability issues at specific settings?

A: The Medium preset is the only one with min and max FPS measurements. At 4K Medium, the minimum is 97 FPS and maximum is 132 FPS, showing a stable range. At 1440p Medium, the range is 186 to 251 FPS, and at 1080p Medium, it is 217 to 293 FPS. The data indicates that Medium settings provide the most consistent frame pacing across all resolutions.