Overpower

# Overpower with Intel Core Ultra 5 235 + NVIDIA GeForce RTX 3080

The Intel Core Ultra 5 235 paired with the NVIDIA GeForce RTX 3080 delivers a compelling 1440p and 4K experience in Overpower, an Action title released in August 2023. This combination ranks in the 74th percentile of all tested combos (780th out of 2980), placing it firmly in the upper tier for this game. The data reveals a system that can push high refresh rates at 1080p, maintain smooth gameplay at 1440p, and still deliver playable frame rates at 4K, though the scaling curve shows where the RTX 3080 begins to feel the pressure.

Settings Recommendations

The measured data across resolutions and settings presets paints a clear picture of where this combo shines. At 1920x1080, the Ultra preset delivers 98 FPS average, which is perfectly playable for a fast-paced Action title. However, the step down to High settings yields 117 FPS, a 19 FPS improvement that costs little in visual fidelity. The Medium preset at 127 FPS offers an even smoother experience, but the jump from 98 to 127 FPS comes at the expense of noticeable visual quality reduction. For 1080p users with high-refresh monitors, High settings represent the sweet spot—it maintains most of the visual richness while providing a 19% frame rate boost over Ultra.

Moving to 2560x1440, the pattern shifts. The High preset delivers 105 FPS average, which is excellent for competitive play and action sequences. The Ultra preset drops to 87 FPS, still smooth but approaching the threshold where fast camera movements might feel less fluid. The Medium preset at 113 FPS provides a 8 FPS advantage over High, but the visual trade-off becomes more pronounced at this resolution. The data suggests that High at 1440p is the optimal balance—it stays comfortably above the 100 FPS mark while preserving the graphical detail that makes Overpower's action sequences visually engaging.

At 3840x2160, the recommendations become more nuanced. The High preset averages 89 FPS, which is surprisingly playable for a 4K resolution. The Medium preset at 96 FPS offers a modest 7 FPS improvement but sacrifices visual fidelity. The Ultra preset at 74 FPS remains above the 60 FPS playability threshold but falls short of the smoothness that Action genre players typically prefer. For 4K, High settings are the clear recommendation—they deliver nearly 90 FPS while maintaining the game's visual presentation. The Low preset at 154 FPS is included in the data for reference, but it represents a significant visual downgrade that most players would find unnecessary at this resolution.

How This Combo Ranks

This specific CPU-GPU combination ranks 780th out of 2980 tested combos in Overpower, placing it in the 74th percentile of all configurations. This ranking reflects a system that performs well above the median but falls short of the top-tier enthusiast builds. The RTX 3080, despite being from an older generation, still holds its own in this game, and the Core Ultra 5 235 provides sufficient processing power to avoid bottlenecking the GPU in most scenarios.

The CPU's percentile ranking of 89th among all tested processors indicates that the Intel Core Ultra 5 235 is a strong performer in general compute tasks. Its average benchmark score of 46062 places it in close competition with several notable rivals: the AMD Ryzen AI 9 HX 375 scores 46030 (0.1% lower), the Intel Core i9-13900HX scores 46098 (0.1% higher), the AMD EPYC 4364P scores 45970 (0.2% lower), and the AMD EPYC 7303 scores 45960 (0.2% lower). These negligible differences suggest that the Core Ultra 5 235 is positioned at a performance plateau where CPU choice has minimal impact on overall system capability.

The GPU's percentile ranking of 68th among all tested GPUs is more modest, reflecting the RTX 3080's position in the graphics hierarchy. Its average benchmark score of 23172 places it near the NVIDIA P106-100 (23249, 0.3% higher), the AMD Radeon Pro Vega 16 (23250, 0.3% higher), the AMD Radeon RX 6600M (23273, 0.4% higher), and the AMD Radeon R9 M290X (23276, 0.4% higher). These close scores suggest that the RTX 3080 is operating at a performance tier where minor architectural differences between GPUs become the deciding factor.

GPU Role

The NVIDIA GeForce RTX 3080 brings 10 GB of GDDR6X memory with a 320-bit bus width and 760.3 GB/s bandwidth to Overpower. This memory configuration is substantial for a game of this era, and the measured frame rates suggest that VRAM capacity is not a limiting factor at any tested resolution or settings combination. The GPU's 8704 shading units, 272 texture mapping units, and 96 raster output pipelines provide ample compute resources for the game's action sequences.

The clock speeds tell an interesting story. The base clock of 1440 MHz and boost clock of 1710 MHz are relatively modest by modern standards, but the RTX 3080 compensates through its raw compute capabilities. The GPU achieves 29.77 TFLOPS of FP32 performance and 465.1 GTexel/s of texture fill rate, which explains how it maintains 89 FPS at 4K High settings despite its older architecture. The 68 RT cores and 272 tensor cores provide ray tracing and DLSS capabilities, though the measured data does not explicitly test these features.

The GPU's 8 nm process node from Samsung, with 28,300 million transistors on a 628 mm² die, represents a power-hungry but capable design. The 320 W TDP and 700 W suggested PSU requirement indicate that this is not an efficient card by modern standards, but the performance data justifies the power draw in Overpower's demanding action scenes. The GPU's DirectX 12 Ultimate support ensures full compatibility with the game's graphical features.

Measured FPS Breakdown

At 1920x1080, the frame rates scale predictably across settings. The Low preset achieves 203 FPS average, which is exceptionally high and indicates that the CPU is capable of feeding the GPU at this resolution. The Medium preset drops to 127 FPS with a minimum of 108 FPS and maximum of 146 FPS, showing consistent performance. The High preset delivers 117 FPS, while the Ultra preset brings the average down to 98 FPS. The gap between Low and Ultra is 105 FPS, demonstrating the significant impact of graphical settings at this resolution.

The 2560x1440 results show a more compressed range. Low settings produce 181 FPS, Medium delivers 113 FPS (minimum 96, maximum 130), High achieves 105 FPS, and Ultra falls to 87 FPS. The spread from Low to Ultra is 94 FPS, slightly less than at 1080p, indicating that the GPU is beginning to become the primary bottleneck. The Medium preset's minimum of 96 FPS suggests that even in demanding scenes, the system maintains smooth gameplay.

At 3840x2160, the performance hierarchy tightens considerably. Low settings yield 154 FPS, Medium delivers 96 FPS (minimum 82, maximum 110), High achieves 89 FPS, and Ultra drops to 74 FPS. The range from Low to Ultra is 80 FPS, the smallest of the three resolutions. The Medium preset's minimum of 82 FPS indicates that the GPU is working harder to maintain frame rates, and the Ultra preset's 74 FPS average approaches the lower bounds of what Action genre players typically consider acceptable.

FAQ

Q: Can this combo run Overpower at 4K with playable frame rates?

A: Yes. The measured data shows 89 FPS at 4K High settings and 74 FPS at 4K Ultra settings. Both exceed the 60 FPS threshold typically considered necessary for smooth gameplay in Action titles, though the Ultra preset leaves less headroom for demanding scenes.

Q: What is the best settings preset for competitive play?

A: At 1080p, the Medium preset provides 127 FPS with a minimum of 108 FPS, offering the best combination of smoothness and visual quality for competitive scenarios. At 1440p, High settings at 105 FPS provide a similar balance.

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

A: The Intel Core Ultra 5 235 scores 46062 on average benchmarks. The AMD Ryzen AI 9 HX 375 scores 46030 (0.1% lower), the Intel Core i9-13900HX scores 46098 (0.1% higher), the AMD EPYC 4364P scores 45970 (0.2% lower), and the AMD EPYC 7303 scores 45960 (0.2% lower). These differences are negligible in real-world gaming.

Q: Is the RTX 3080's 10 GB VRAM sufficient for Overpower?

A: The measured frame rates show no evidence of VRAM limitations at any tested resolution or settings combination. The GPU maintains playable performance even at 4K Ultra settings, suggesting that 10 GB is adequate for this game.

Q: What frame rates can I expect at 1440p with Ultra settings?

A: The measured data shows 87 FPS average at 2560x1440 with Ultra settings. This is playable but represents the most demanding configuration tested at this resolution.

Q: How does this combo rank among all tested configurations?

A: This combination ranks 780th out of 2980 tested combos in Overpower, placing it in the 74th percentile. This indicates solid performance that is better than roughly three-quarters of all tested systems.

CPU Role

The Intel Core Ultra 5 235 features 14 cores and 14 threads, running at a base clock of 3.40 GHz and boost clock of 5.00 GHz. This configuration, built on the Arrow Lake architecture with a 3 nm process node from TSMC, provides strong single-threaded and multi-threaded performance. The CPU's 24 MB of shared L3 cache and 3 MB per-core L2 cache help maintain low latency access to frequently used data, which is beneficial for game logic and physics calculations.

The CPU's benchmark results demonstrate its capability. In Cinebench R23, it scores 14769 multi-core and 2085 single-core. The PassMark multi-thread score of 37816 and single-thread score of 4516 indicate balanced performance across both workload types. The CPU's 89th percentile ranking among all processors confirms that it is a high-performing part, and its 65 W TDP makes it relatively power-efficient for its performance level.

In Overpower specifically, the CPU's role becomes more apparent at lower resolutions. At 1080p Low settings, the 203 FPS average suggests that the CPU can feed the GPU with enough frames to saturate even high-refresh monitors. However, the relatively modest single-thread score of 2085 in Cinebench R23 compared to higher-end processors suggests that the CPU might become a limiting factor in extremely CPU-intensive scenes, though the measured data shows no such bottleneck at the tested settings.

Resolution Scaling

The performance scaling from 1080p to 4K reveals important insights about system balance. At Ultra settings, the frame rates progress from 98 FPS at 1080p, to 87 FPS at 1440p, to 74 FPS at 4K. This represents a 24.5% drop from 1080p to 4K, which is relatively moderate and suggests a balanced CPU-GPU pairing. At High settings, the progression is 117 FPS at 1080p, 105 FPS at 1440p, and 89 FPS at 4K—a 23.9% drop across the resolution range.

The Low settings preset shows a different pattern. The 203 FPS at 1080p drops to 181 FPS at 1440p (10.8% reduction) and 154 FPS at 4K (24.1% reduction from 1080p). The relatively smaller drop from 1080p to 1440p at Low settings suggests that the CPU is handling the frame generation well at lower resolutions, while the GPU becomes more of a factor as resolution increases.

The Medium settings data provides additional context. At 1080p, the 127 FPS average with a minimum of 108 FPS shows consistent performance. At 1440p, the 113 FPS average with a 96 FPS minimum indicates slightly more variance. At 4K, the 96 FPS average with an 82 FPS minimum shows the GPU working harder, but still maintaining playable frame rates. The minimum frame rate drops of 11.1% from 1080p to 1440p and 24.1% from 1080p to 4K suggest that the RTX 3080 is the primary factor in performance scaling at higher resolutions.

The scaling pattern indicates that this combo is GPU-limited at higher resolutions, which is expected given the RTX 3080's position in the graphics hierarchy. The CPU's strong performance ensures that it does not become a bottleneck until frame rates exceed 200 FPS at 1080p, where the 203 FPS Low setting result suggests the CPU is approaching its limit. For players targeting maximum frame rates, the 1080p Low setting at 203 FPS represents the ceiling of this system's capability, while 4K High at 89 FPS offers the best visual experience with acceptable performance.