Outriders

# Outriders with Intel Core i5-10400F + NVIDIA GeForce RTX 4080 SUPER

The data set for Outriders with the Intel Core i5-10400F and NVIDIA GeForce RTX 4080 SUPER covers twelve measured configurations across three resolutions and four quality presets. The combination ranks 750th out of 1693 tested combos for this game, placing it in the upper-middle tier of all possible pairings. The overall pattern reveals a system where the GPU handles the graphical load competently, but the CPU's six-core, twelve-thread Comet Lake architecture becomes a limiting factor at lower resolutions and higher frame rates.

Resolution Scaling

The measured frame rates show a clear progression as resolution decreases, but the scaling from 4K to 1080p is not uniform across all settings. At High settings, the average FPS moves from 76.4 at 3840x2160 to 107.0 at 2560x1440, then to 126.5 at 1920x1080. That represents a 40.1% improvement when dropping from 4K to 1440p, and an additional 18.2% when moving to 1080p. The 4K to 1080p gap at High settings is 65.6% higher frame rate, indicating that the GPU is the primary constraint at 4K but that the CPU begins to assert itself as resolution drops.

The Low preset tells a more revealing story. At 4K Low, the system produces 107.5 FPS, which jumps to 131.5 at 1440p and then to 158.8 at 1080p. The scaling from 4K to 1440p is 22.3%, and from 1440p to 1080p it is 20.8%. This relatively modest scaling suggests that at Low settings, even 4K is not fully GPU-bound — the CPU is already limiting performance. If the GPU were the sole bottleneck, the 1080p result would be substantially higher relative to 4K, given that pixel count drops by roughly 75% between those resolutions. The data shows only a 47.7% gain from 4K to 1080p at Low, confirming a strong CPU limitation at lower graphical loads.

Ultra settings show the opposite behavior. The 4K Ultra result is 58.8 FPS, rising to 95.7 at 1440p and 110.3 at 1080p. The 4K to 1440p improvement is 62.8%, while the 1440p to 1080p gain is only 15.3%. This pattern indicates that the GPU is heavily loaded at 4K Ultra, and the CPU headroom only becomes relevant once the GPU workload is reduced. The 1080p Ultra result of 110.3 FPS is close to the 4K Low result of 107.5 FPS, which suggests that the CPU's ceiling in this game is somewhere in that vicinity regardless of how much graphical load is removed.

CPU Role

The Intel Core i5-10400F is a 6-core, 12-thread processor based on Comet Lake architecture, built on a 14 nm process with a base clock of 2.90 GHz and a boost clock of 4.30 GHz. Its 12 MB of shared L3 cache and dual-channel DDR4 memory support with 42.7 GB/s bandwidth are typical for this generation. The CPU's benchmark scores place it in the 73rd percentile of all CPUs, with an average benchmark score of 14168. Its nearest rivals include the AMD EPYC 7552 at 14115 (0.4% faster), the AMD Ryzen 3 7320C at 14277 (0.8% slower), the Intel Core i5-8500 at 14332 (1.1% slower), and the AMD Ryzen Embedded V2546 at 14336 (1.2% slower). This positions the i5-10400F as a solid mid-range performer, but not a high-end part.

In Outriders, the CPU's influence is most visible at Low settings across all resolutions. The fact that 4K Low (107.5 FPS) is only modestly below 1080p Low (158.8 FPS) indicates that the CPU is the limiting component once the GPU workload is reduced. The 3DMark single-thread score of 688 and the Cinebench R23 single-core score of 1453 suggest that per-core performance is adequate but not exceptional for this game. The multi-threaded results — Cinebench R23 multi-core at 10297 and Geekbench multi-core at 5783 — show that the CPU can handle concurrent workloads, but Outriders appears to scale primarily with frequency and IPC rather than raw core count.

The passmark single-thread score of 2541 and the passmark physics score of 696 both point to a processor that can sustain moderate frame rates but will cap performance in CPU-bound scenarios. The 1080p Ultra result of 110.3 FPS versus the 1080p Low result of 158.8 FPS represents a 30.5% spread, which is relatively narrow compared to what a fully GPU-bound system would show. This narrow spread across settings at 1080p is the clearest indicator that the i5-10400F is the bottleneck at this resolution, particularly when graphical settings are lowered.

GPU Role

The NVIDIA GeForce RTX 4080 SUPER is a high-end Ada Lovelace GPU built on a 5 nm process at TSMC, with 45,900 million transistors on a 379 mm² die. It features 16 GB of GDDR6X memory on a 256-bit bus, delivering 736.3 GB/s of bandwidth. The GPU has 10240 shading units, 320 TMUs, and 112 ROPs, with 80 RT cores and 320 tensor cores. Its boost clock is 2550 MHz, and the memory runs at 1438 MHz with 23 Gbps effective speed. The GPU's benchmark scores place it in the 88th percentile of all GPUs, with an average score of 53610. Its nearest rivals include the AMD Radeon RX 6900 XT at 53489 (0.2% slower), the AMD Radeon Pro W6600M at 53414 (0.4% slower), the AMD Radeon RX 7700S at 52505 (2.1% slower), and the NVIDIA GeForce RTX 5070 Ti at 52086 (2.9% slower). This places the RTX 4080 SUPER at the top of its immediate competitive group.

In Outriders, the GPU's dominance is most apparent at 4K Ultra, where it produces 58.8 FPS — the lowest result in the entire data set. At 4K High, the GPU handles the workload well enough to reach 76.4 FPS, and at 4K Medium it achieves 95.3 FPS. The 4K Low result of 107.5 FPS shows that even when the GPU is given minimal work, the frame rate cannot exceed what the CPU allows. The GPU's 52.22 TFLOPS of FP32 throughput and 816.0 GTexel/s texture rate are more than sufficient for this game at any settings; the data shows that the GPU is only fully utilized at 4K Ultra and, to a lesser extent, 4K High.

The 16 GB VRAM capacity is ample for Outriders at any resolution, and the 736.3 GB/s bandwidth ensures that texture streaming and memory-intensive scenes do not become a constraint. The GPU's passmark G3D score of 34245 and 3DMark Steel Nomad DX12 score of 6600 indicate strong raw performance, but the measured FPS in this game are consistently below what the GPU alone could deliver in a CPU-unconstrained scenario. The 1080p Ultra result of 110.3 FPS versus the 1440p Ultra result of 95.7 FPS shows only a 15.3% gain, which is far less than the pixel-count difference would suggest if the GPU were the sole bottleneck.

FAQ

Q: Why does the frame rate not scale linearly with resolution at Low settings?

A: At Low settings, the GPU workload is minimal, so the CPU becomes the limiting factor. The 4K Low result of 107.5 FPS is only 47.7% lower than the 1080p Low result of 158.8 FPS, despite the 4K resolution having roughly four times the pixels. This indicates the Intel Core i5-10400F caps performance before the GPU can demonstrate its full capabilities.

Q: Is the RTX 4080 SUPER the bottleneck in this game?

A: The GPU is only the bottleneck at 4K Ultra, where it produces 58.8 FPS. At 4K High (76.4 FPS) and below, the CPU's influence becomes increasingly apparent. The 1080p Ultra result of 110.3 FPS is nearly identical to the 4K Low result of 107.5 FPS, which suggests the CPU ceiling is around that range regardless of resolution when settings are lowered.

Q: How does this CPU compare to its nearest rivals?

A: The i5-10400F has an average benchmark score of 14168. It is 0.4% slower than the AMD EPYC 7552 (14115), 0.8% faster than the AMD Ryzen 3 7320C (14277), 1.1% faster than the Intel Core i5-8500 (14332), and 1.2% faster than the AMD Ryzen Embedded V2546 (14336). These are all very small deltas, indicating that the i5-10400F sits in a tightly competitive mid-range cluster.

Q: What is the best preset to use at 1440p?

A: At 2560x1440, the High preset delivers 107.0 FPS, which is a 12.3% improvement over the Ultra preset's 95.7 FPS. The Medium preset achieves 122.1 FPS, and Low reaches 131.5 FPS. The High preset offers the best balance for visual quality while maintaining a frame rate above 100 FPS.

Q: Does the 16 GB VRAM make a difference in this game?

A: The 16 GB GDDR6X memory with 736.3 GB/s bandwidth is more than sufficient for Outriders at any resolution and settings combination measured. The data does not show any VRAM-related performance drops, indicating that memory capacity is not a limiting factor for this combination.

Q: Why is the 1080p Ultra result lower than the 1440p High result?

A: The 1080p Ultra result is 110.3 FPS, while the 1440p High result is 107.0 FPS. The Ultra preset at 1080p imposes a heavier graphical load than High at 1440p, but the difference is only 3.0%. This suggests that the CPU is beginning to limit performance at 1080p Ultra, preventing the GPU from fully utilizing its headroom.

Settings Recommendations

Based on the measured data, the High preset at 2560x1440 provides the best overall experience for this combination. It delivers 107.0 FPS, which is above the 100 FPS threshold for smooth gameplay, while maintaining a higher visual quality than Medium (122.1 FPS) or Low (131.5 FPS). The Ultra preset at 1440p drops to 95.7 FPS, which is a 10.6% reduction from High with only marginal visual improvements expected. At 1920x1080, the High preset achieves 126.5 FPS and is the recommended choice if the user prioritizes maximum frame rates with acceptable quality. The Ultra preset at 1080p produces 110.3 FPS, which is still playable, but the 12.8% drop from High may not justify the visual gains. For 4K, the Medium preset at 95.3 FPS is preferable to High (76.4 FPS) or Ultra (58.8 FPS), as it maintains a frame rate near 95 FPS while offering better quality than Low (107.5 FPS). The Low presets at any resolution are only advisable if the user requires the absolute highest frame rates; at 1080p Low, the system reaches 158.8 FPS, but this comes at a significant visual cost.

Measured FPS Breakdown

At 1920x1080, the system produces the following average frame rates: Low settings achieve 158.8 FPS, Medium settings achieve 139.6 FPS, High settings achieve 126.5 FPS, and Ultra settings achieve 110.3 FPS. The spread from Low to Ultra is 30.5%, which indicates that the CPU is limiting performance at this resolution, as the GPU would normally produce a much wider gap between presets. The 1080p Low result is the highest in the entire data set, confirming that this resolution and preset combination is the most CPU-bound configuration measured.

At 2560x1440, the results are: Low settings achieve 131.5 FPS, Medium settings achieve 122.1 FPS, High settings achieve 107.0 FPS, and Ultra settings achieve 95.7 FPS. The spread from Low to Ultra is 27.2%, slightly narrower than at 1080p. The 1440p High result is the only configuration in this resolution that falls below 100 FPS, and it does so by a narrow margin of 3.0 FPS. The 1440p Medium result of 122.1 FPS is the strongest mid-range option at this resolution.

At 3840x2160, the results are: Low settings achieve 107.5 FPS, Medium settings achieve 95.3 FPS, High settings achieve 76.4 FPS, and Ultra settings achieve 58.8 FPS. The spread from Low to Ultra is 45.3%, which is the widest of any resolution, confirming that the GPU is the dominant constraint at 4K. The 4K Low result of 107.5 FPS is nearly identical to the 1440p High result of 107.0 FPS, demonstrating that the CPU's performance ceiling is consistent across resolutions once the GPU workload is sufficiently reduced. The 4K Ultra result of 58.8 FPS is the lowest in the data set, and it is the only configuration that drops below 60 FPS, which may be problematic for users with high-refresh displays.