Outriders

The data for Outriders with the Intel Core i5-10400F and NVIDIA GeForce RTX 5090 presents a clear hierarchy of performance across its four graphics presets, with the measured frames per second (FPS) indicating that the Ultra preset, while visually demanding, incurs a significant performance cost. Across all three tested resolutions, the Low preset delivers the highest average frame rates, followed by High, Medium, and finally Ultra. For instance, at 1920x1080, the Low preset achieves an average of 157 FPS, while High delivers 125 FPS, Medium 139 FPS, and Ultra drops to 111 FPS. The pattern is consistent at higher resolutions; at 2560x1440, Low produces 134 FPS, High 108 FPS, Medium 120 FPS, and Ultra 95 FPS. At 3840x2160, the delta widens, with Low at 108 FPS, High at 87 FPS, Medium at 96 FPS, and Ultra falling to 64 FPS.

The optimal choice for a balanced experience is the High preset, which provides a substantial improvement in visual fidelity over Low while maintaining frame rates that are only modestly lower. The performance gap between High and Low is roughly 20% across all resolutions, but the visual uplift from High settings in a game like Outriders is typically considerable, involving higher-resolution textures and more complex lighting. The Medium preset, interestingly, performs closer to High than to Low, with 139 FPS at 1080p and 96 FPS at 4K, suggesting it may not offer a significant performance advantage over High to justify the graphical downgrade. The Ultra preset, conversely, shows a steep drop-off, particularly at 4K where it falls to 64 FPS, indicating that it is the most demanding setting and is likely reserved for users who prioritize image quality over raw frame rate.

Settings Recommendations

For users seeking the best balance between visual quality and performance, the High preset is the recommended starting point. At 1920x1080, it yields an average of 125 FPS, which is more than sufficient for smooth gameplay on high-refresh-rate monitors. When moving to 2560x1440, the High preset still delivers a solid 108 FPS, keeping the experience fluid. Even at 3840x2160, the High preset manages an average of 87 FPS, which is playable and offers a much better visual experience than the Low or Medium presets. The data shows that High consistently sits within a reasonable range of the top-performing Low preset, with a performance deficit of approximately 20% at each resolution, a trade-off that is justified by the expected increase in graphical detail.

The Ultra preset, while offering the highest visual fidelity, comes with a severe performance penalty that makes it difficult to recommend for most users. At 2560x1440, Ultra achieves 95 FPS, which is a 12% drop from High, but at 3840x2160, the drop is a stark 26% (from 87 FPS to 64 FPS). This suggests that Ultra is not well-optimized for this combination, or that its effects are disproportionately heavy on the GPU. Conversely, the Low preset, while delivering the highest frame rates (157 FPS at 1080p, 134 FPS at 1440p, and 108 FPS at 4K), will significantly reduce visual quality, making the game look dated and potentially hindering visibility of distant enemies. Therefore, High stands out as the sweet spot, providing a strong frame rate and likely a much better overall visual experience than Low, without the harsh performance hit of Ultra.

GPU Role

The NVIDIA GeForce RTX 5090 is the dominant component in this pairing, and its specifications are central to interpreting the frame rates. The GPU features a massive 32 GB of GDDR7 memory on a 512-bit bus, yielding a bandwidth of 1.79 TB/s. This memory configuration is more than ample for Outriders, even at 4K resolution with High settings, and it ensures that the game’s textures and assets are not bottlenecked by memory capacity or bandwidth. The GPU’s base clock is 2017 MHz with a boost clock of 2407 MHz, and its raw compute power is substantial, with an FP32 throughput of 104.8 TFLOPS. These specifications place the RTX 5090 in the 92nd percentile of all GPUs, and its average benchmark score is 79,842.

The benchmark results for this GPU show that it is a top-tier performer, but in Outriders, the frame rates at 4K Ultra (64 FPS) suggest that the game’s Ultra preset is exceptionally demanding, likely due to heavy use of effects that stress even the most powerful hardware. The GPU’s performance in synthetic benchmarks, such as a 3DMark Steel Nomad DX12 score of 18,355 and a Geekbench Vulkan score of 376,728, confirms its high ceiling. However, the measured FPS in Outriders indicates that the game engine is able to utilize this power effectively at lower settings, but the Ultra preset's demands outpace the gains, leading to a non-linear scaling of performance. The data shows a clear correlation: as the settings increase, the GPU is the primary driver of the FPS drop, especially at 4K where the difference between Low (108 FPS) and Ultra (64 FPS) is a 41% reduction.

How This Combo Ranks

In the benchmark database, this specific combination of the Intel Core i5-10400F and NVIDIA GeForce RTX 5090 is ranked 1572 out of 3710 tested combos for Outriders. This places the combo in the upper-middle tier of all tested configurations, which is a significant finding given the high-end nature of the GPU. The ranking suggests that while the RTX 5090 is a powerful card, the Core i5-10400F is holding back the overall potential of the system in this particular title. The combo’s rank is not at the top, which would be expected for a flagship GPU, indicating a bottleneck is present.

The GPU itself ranks in the 92nd percentile of all GPUs, showing it is a top-10% performer globally. However, the CPU’s percentile is lower at 68, and its average benchmark score of 14,185 is much lower than the GPU's. This disparity in relative performance is the key to understanding the combo's rank. The data suggests that the CPU is not able to feed the GPU enough data to reach its maximum frame output in Outriders, particularly at lower resolutions where the CPU load is relatively higher. The combo's rank of 1572 out of 3710 means that a significant number of other CPU-GPU pairings achieve higher frame rates, likely those with more powerful processors paired with the same or similar high-end graphics card. This indicates that users with this combo are leaving performance on the table.

Measured FPS Breakdown

The measured FPS data provides a detailed look at performance across all settings and resolutions. At 1920x1080, the Low preset leads with an average of 157 FPS. The Medium preset follows at 139 FPS, with a minimum of 118 FPS and a maximum of 160 FPS. The High preset achieves 125 FPS, and the Ultra preset drops to 111 FPS. The spread between Low and Ultra is 46 FPS, a 29% reduction. At 2560x1440, the order remains the same, with Low at 134 FPS, Medium at 120 FPS (min 102, max 137), High at 108 FPS, and Ultra at 95 FPS. The reduction from Low to Ultra here is 39 FPS, or 29%. The pattern shifts slightly at 3840x2160, where Low achieves 108 FPS, Medium 96 FPS (min 82, max 111), High 87 FPS, and Ultra 64 FPS. The drop from Low to Ultra is 44 FPS, a more severe 41% reduction.

The data reveals that the performance scaling is not linear. At 1080p and 1440p, the gap between High and Ultra is consistent, but at 4K, the Ultra preset takes a disproportionate hit. The Medium preset consistently provides a minimum FPS that is within 10% of its average, indicating stable frame pacing, whereas the High and Ultra presets do not have reported minimum FPS values, making it difficult to assess their frame time consistency. The High preset at 4K, with an average of 87 FPS, is the highest playable setting for a smooth experience, as the Ultra preset's 64 FPS average may result in noticeable stutters on displays with high refresh rates.

Resolution Scaling

The scaling of performance from 1920x1080 to 3840x2160 shows how the workload shifts between the CPU and GPU. At 1080p, the High preset averages 125 FPS. Moving to 1440p, this drops to 108 FPS, a 14% reduction. The scaling from 1440p to 4K is more pronounced, with the High preset falling to 87 FPS, a 19% reduction. This pattern indicates that the system is not purely GPU-bound at lower resolutions. The relatively flat scaling from 1080p to 1440p suggests that the CPU is able to keep up with the increased GPU load, but the larger drop to 4K shows the GPU is becoming the limiting factor as pixel count increases.

For the Low preset, the scaling is smoother: 157 FPS at 1080p to 134 FPS at 1440p (a 15% drop) and then to 108 FPS at 4K (a 19% drop). This smoother scaling suggests that at Low settings, the GPU is more efficiently utilized, and the CPU bottleneck is less apparent. In contrast, the Ultra preset shows a steep decline: 111 FPS at 1080p, 95 FPS at 1440p (a 14% drop), and 64 FPS at 4K (a 33% drop). This sharp drop for Ultra at 4K indicates that the GPU is heavily overloaded, and the CPU is no longer the primary constraint. The data suggests that the Core i5-10400F, with its six cores and twelve threads, is sufficient to drive the RTX 5090 at 1080p and 1440p, but at 4K with the highest settings, the GPU’s immense processing requirements become the sole bottleneck, leading to the significant FPS reduction.

FAQ

Q: What is the best resolution to play Outriders with this combo for a high refresh rate experience?

A: For the highest frame rates, 1920x1080 with the Low preset provides an average of 157 FPS. However, to balance quality and speed, the High preset at 1920x1080 yields 125 FPS, which is suitable for most high-refresh monitors.

Q: Is the Ultra preset viable for this CPU and GPU combination?

A: The Ultra preset is playable at 1920x1080 and 2560x1440, with average frame rates of 111 FPS and 95 FPS, respectively. At 3840x2160, however, the average drops to 64 FPS, which is often considered too low for fast-paced action.

Q: How much of a frame rate penalty is there for using High settings instead of Low?

A: The penalty for using High over Low is consistent across resolutions. At 1080p, the drop is from 157 FPS to 125 FPS (a 20% reduction). At 1440p, it drops from 134 FPS to 108 FPS (a 19% reduction), and at 4K, it drops from 108 FPS to 87 FPS (a 19% reduction).

Q: Which component is more likely to be the limiting factor in this game?

A: The data suggests the CPU is a limiting factor at lower resolutions and settings. The combo ranks 1572 out of 3710, which is low for a GPU with a 92nd percentile ranking, indicating the Intel Core i5-10400F is holding back performance. At 4K Ultra, the GPU becomes the clear bottleneck due to the massive workload.

Q: Is the 32 GB of VRAM on the RTX 5090 necessary for Outriders?

A: While the 32 GB of GDDR7 memory is not fully utilized by Outriders, it ensures that there is no memory-related performance drop at any tested setting, including 4K Ultra. The game is more sensitive to compute load than memory capacity.

Q: How does the Medium preset compare to the High preset in terms of minimum FPS?

A: The Medium preset is the only one with reported minimum FPS values. At 1080p, it reports a minimum of 118 FPS, at 1440p a minimum of 102 FPS, and at 4K a minimum of 82 FPS. This data indicates stable frame pacing, making Medium a reliable choice if you want to avoid frame drops.

CPU Role

The Intel Core i5-10400F is a six-core, twelve-thread processor based on the Comet Lake architecture. Its base clock is 2.90 GHz, with a boost clock of 4.30 GHz, and it has 12 MB of shared L3 cache. These specifications, while competent, place the CPU in the 68th percentile of all processors, with an average benchmark score of 14,185. This is in stark contrast to the GPU’s 92nd percentile ranking, creating a performance imbalance that is evident in the Outriders benchmark results. The CPU’s Cinebench R23 multi-core score is 10,283, and its single-core score is 1,451, which are modest figures compared to modern high-end processors.

The role of the CPU in Outriders is critical in scenarios where the GPU is not the bottleneck. The benchmark data shows that at 1080p with the Low preset, the system achieves 157 FPS, which is a high frame rate, but the combo's overall rank of 1572 out of 3710 suggests that many other configurations with more powerful CPUs achieve higher frame rates with the same GPU. This indicates that the Core i5-10400F is limiting the maximum frame output. The CPU's 3DMark scores, such as 4,748 for 16 threads and 688 for single-thread, show it has a moderate multi-threading capability, but it lacks the high single-thread performance found in newer processors. In a game like Outriders, which has a mix of physics, AI, and rendering tasks, the CPU’s six cores can become saturated, preventing the RTX 5090 from reaching its full potential, particularly when the graphics settings are lowered and the GPU has spare capacity.