Outriders

The pairing of an Intel Core i5-9400 with an NVIDIA GeForce RTX 4090 in Outriders presents a stark study in component imbalance. The data indicates a system where the graphics card's immense raw power is consistently held in check by a six-core processor that was already mid-range at its 2018 launch. Benchmark results across all measured resolutions show that while the RTX 4090 is capable of delivering high frame rates, the CPU's performance ceiling becomes the defining factor in this looter shooter, limiting the experience well below what the GPU alone could theoretically achieve.

Resolution Scaling

The measured FPS data reveals an unusual scaling pattern that flips the traditional bottleneck hierarchy. From 1080p to 1440p, the average frame rate drops by roughly 13-14% across all settings, while the jump from 1440p to 4K incurs a more substantial 19-20% penalty. Specifically, at High settings, the average FPS moves from 102 at 1080p to 88 at 1440p, then down to 71 at 4K. This progression suggests that the CPU is the primary limiter at lower resolutions, with the GPU only beginning to exert its influence as pixel count increases.

The fact that 1080p High produces just 102 FPS average is telling. A fully unconstrained RTX 4090 would typically push far higher numbers at this resolution in a game from 2021. The data implies that at 1080p, the Core i5-9400's six threads are saturated, preventing the GPU from being fully utilized. Moving to 1440p shows a relatively modest decrease, which further supports the theory that the CPU bottleneck persists, as the additional pixel workload is partially absorbed by the GPU's headroom. Only at 4K does the scaling begin to look more conventional, where the GPU's workload becomes significant enough to create a more balanced system.

The gap between Low and Ultra settings also narrows as resolution rises. At 1080p, the difference between Low (128 FPS) and Ultra (91 FPS) is 37 FPS. At 4K, that same comparison shows a spread of just 26 FPS (88 vs 62). This compression at higher resolutions indicates that the GPU is becoming the limiting factor at 4K, whereas at 1080p, the CPU's inability to feed frames quickly enough masks some of the graphics card's potential performance scaling.

CPU Role

The Intel Core i5-9400 is a Coffee Lake Refresh part with 6 cores and 6 threads, a base clock of 2.90 GHz, and a boost clock of 4.10 GHz. Its 9 MB of shared L3 cache and dual-channel DDR4 memory support are typical for the era, but the lack of hyper-threading is a significant drawback for modern titles. The processor's benchmark scores place it in the 47th percentile of all CPUs, with an average benchmark score of 2254. Its nearest rivals, such as the Intel Core i7-1068NG7 (average score 2259, deltaPct -0.2) and the AMD Ryzen 5 PRO 1500 (average score 2246, deltaPct 0.4), show that it performs almost identically to several other mid-range parts from the same period.

In Outriders, the CPU's role is defined by its inability to maintain high frame rates consistently. The measured data shows a hard ceiling around 128 FPS at 1080p Low settings. This is not a GPU limitation; the RTX 4090 is vastly overqualified for such a workload. Instead, this appears to be the point where the i5-9400's six threads are fully occupied. The game's engine, which handles numerous AI entities and physics calculations, likely creates a scenario where the CPU cannot process frames fast enough to keep up with the GPU's output capacity. The 4.10 GHz boost clock helps, but the limited thread count is a structural bottleneck that clock speed cannot overcome.

The processor's multi-threaded benchmarks, such as a Cinebench R23 multi-core score of 6629, are modest by modern standards. For a game like Outriders, which can utilize multiple cores for various subsystems, the lack of additional threads means that any background tasks or game logic spikes will directly impact frame pacing. The data shows that even at 4K Ultra, where the GPU is heavily loaded, the average FPS of 62 suggests that the CPU is still contributing to the overall performance picture, preventing the system from achieving the higher frame rates that the RTX 4090 could deliver if paired with a more capable processor.

GPU Role

The NVIDIA GeForce RTX 4090 is a behemoth of a graphics card, built on the Ada Lovelace architecture with a 5 nm process node from TSMC. It features 16,384 shading units, 512 texture mapping units, and 176 ROPs, along with 128 ray tracing cores and 512 tensor cores. Its memory subsystem is equally impressive, with 24 GB of GDDR6X on a 384-bit bus, providing a massive 1.01 TB/s of bandwidth. The boost clock of 2520 MHz, combined with an FP32 performance of 82.58 TFLOPS, places it in the 88th percentile of all GPUs, with an average benchmark score of 60347.

In the context of Outriders, the GPU's role is to render the game's environments and effects at high resolutions. The data shows that it is more than capable of handling the game at 4K, as evidenced by the 71 FPS average at High settings. The 24 GB VRAM is far beyond what a game from 2021 requires, meaning there is no risk of texture streaming issues or memory capacity limitations. The GPU's massive bandwidth and compute power ensure that the visual quality settings have a predictable impact on performance, with Ultra settings reducing the average FPS by 12.7% compared to High at 4K (62 vs 71).

However, the GPU's potential is clearly not being fully realized in this pairing. At 1080p Low, the RTX 4090 should be able to output several hundred frames per second in a game of this generation, yet the system only achieves 128 FPS. This is a clear indication that the GPU is idling for significant portions of time, waiting for the CPU to provide new draw calls. The graphics card's role in this system is to provide a safety margin for visual fidelity; players can crank settings to Ultra at 4K and still maintain a playable frame rate, but they cannot achieve the high refresh rate performance that the GPU's specifications would suggest is possible.

Measured FPS Breakdown

At 1920x1080, the data shows a clear progression based on settings. Low settings yield an average of 128 FPS, which is the highest measured value in the entire dataset. Medium settings drop to 114 FPS, with a minimum of 97 and a maximum of 131. High settings produce 102 FPS average, while Ultra settings bring the average down to 91 FPS. The range from Low to Ultra is a 37 FPS difference, indicating that the CPU is the primary constraint, as the GPU can handle the varying workload without issue.

Moving to 2560x1440, the averages decrease across the board. Low settings produce 110 FPS, Medium gives 98 FPS (with a min of 83 and max of 112), High yields 88 FPS, and Ultra settles at 78 FPS. The relative performance drop from 1080p to 1440p is consistent, around 12-14%, which suggests a balanced scaling where both CPU and GPU are being taxed more equally. The minimum FPS values for Medium at 1440p (83 FPS) are notably higher than the average FPS for Ultra at the same resolution, highlighting the importance of settings selection.

At 3840x2160, the system shows its most GPU-bound behavior. Low settings produce an average of 88 FPS, Medium yields 79 FPS (with a min of 67 and max of 90), High gives 71 FPS, and Ultra drops to 62 FPS. The scaling from Low to Ultra at 4K is approximately 30%, which is more pronounced than at lower resolutions, confirming that the GPU is now the primary bottleneck. The minimum FPS of 67 at Medium 4K is still playable, but the drop to 62 FPS average at Ultra shows that the game's highest settings demand significant GPU resources.

How This Combo Ranks

Within the benchmark database, this specific combination of Intel Core i5-9400 and NVIDIA GeForce RTX 4090 ranks 2387 out of 3710 tested combos for Outriders. This places it in the lower half of all configurations, which is a surprising result given the presence of the top-tier GPU. The ranking is heavily influenced by the CPU's limitations, as the data shows that the system cannot achieve frame rates that would be competitive with more balanced pairings.

The GPU's nearest rivals in synthetic benchmarks, such as the Intel Arc Pro A60 (avgScore 60326, deltaPct 0) and the AMD Radeon Pro W6600M (avgScore 61896, deltaPct -2.5), show that the RTX 4090's raw graphics power is not in question. However, the combo's rank of 2387 suggests that in a real-world game like Outriders, the processor's inability to keep pace negates the GPU's advantage. A system with a more modern CPU and a much weaker GPU would likely rank higher, as the overall frame rate would be more consistent and higher in practice.

The percentile data for the CPU (47th percentile) and GPU (88th percentile) highlights the disparity. The combo rank indicates that the whole is less than the sum of its parts, with the CPU dragging down the overall performance envelope. This pairing is an extreme example of a CPU bottleneck, where the upgrade to a faster GPU yields diminishing returns unless the processor is also upgraded.

Settings Recommendations

For users constrained to this specific hardware pairing, the measured data provides clear guidance for optimizing the experience. At 4K, the Medium preset offers the best balance, with an average of 79 FPS and a minimum of 67 FPS. This is a significant improvement over High (71 FPS) and Ultra (62 FPS), while the visual difference between Medium and High is often less noticeable than the frame rate improvement. The Low preset at 4K yields 88 FPS, but the visual quality reduction is substantial and likely not worth the 9 FPS gain over Medium.

At 1440p, the High preset is the recommended choice, providing an average of 88 FPS. This is a solid frame rate for most displays, and the visual quality is much better than Low (110 FPS) or Medium (98 FPS). The Ultra preset at 78 FPS is still playable, but the 10 FPS drop from High is a noticeable trade-off for marginal visual gains. For players with 144Hz monitors, the Low preset at 110 FPS is the only option that approaches high refresh rate territory, but the visual compromises are severe.

At 1080p, the situation is more nuanced. The Low preset delivers 128 FPS, which is the only setting that consistently exceeds 120 FPS. The Medium preset at 114 FPS is also viable for high refresh rate displays, with a minimum of 97 FPS ensuring smoother frame pacing. The High preset at 102 FPS is a good middle ground for players who prioritize visual quality over maximum frame rate, while the Ultra preset at 91 FPS is the most visually rich but offers the lowest performance headroom. Given the CPU bottleneck at this resolution, the data suggests that Medium settings at 1080p provide the best balance of visual fidelity and frame rate, as the step up to High yields only a 12 FPS average decrease but a more significant visual improvement.