Overpower

The Intel Core Ultra 9 290K Plus paired with the NVIDIA GeForce RTX 5090 D delivers top-tier performance in Overpower, securing the 3rd position out of 2,980 tested combinations. This combo is built for extreme high-refresh-rate gaming, with benchmark results showing it can push well beyond 300 FPS at 1080p on Low settings and maintains a playable 119 FPS at 4K Ultra. The data indicates a system that is heavily GPU-limited at lower resolutions, while the CPU’s substantial 24-core, 24-thread configuration ensures that even at 4K, frame pacing remains strong. The following analysis breaks down the measured FPS data, the roles of each component, and how this pairing ranks against other configurations in the database.

FAQ

*Q: What is the overall performance rank of this CPU and GPU combo in Overpower?*

A: The combination of the Intel Core Ultra 9 290K Plus and NVIDIA GeForce RTX 5090 D ranks 3rd out of 2,980 tested combos in Overpower. This places it in the top 0.1% of all configurations tested for this game, indicating elite-level performance.

Q: How does the CPU compare to its nearest rivals in average benchmark score?

A: The Intel Core Ultra 9 290K Plus has an average benchmark score of 84,003. Its closest rival, the Intel Core Ultra 9 285K, scores 83,807, which is a 0.2% difference. The AMD EPYC 4584PX scores 83,090 (1.1% lower), and the AMD EPYC 9135 scores 82,980 (1.2% lower). The AMD EPYC 7F72 scores higher at 85,072, giving it a -1.3% delta relative to the 290K Plus.

Q: What is the GPU’s percentile ranking among all GPUs?

A: The NVIDIA GeForce RTX 5090 D falls into the 92nd percentile of all GPUs. Its average benchmark score is 77,712. Compared to its nearest rivals, it is 1.1% ahead of the AMD Radeon RX 6650M XT (score 76,904) and 1.6% behind the AMD Radeon RX 6850M XT (score 78,940).

*Q: What is the highest average FPS recorded for this combo in Overpower?*

A: The highest average FPS recorded is 319 FPS at 1920x1080 resolution with Low settings. The second-highest is 291 FPS at 2560x1440 with Low settings, showing the combo’s ability to exceed 300 FPS at 1080p when graphical load is minimal.

Q: Is there a significant performance drop from 1080p to 4K at Ultra settings?

A: Yes. At 1920x1080 Ultra, the average FPS is 157. At 2560x1440 Ultra, it drops to 140 FPS. At 3840x2160 Ultra, the average falls to 119 FPS. This represents a 24.2% reduction in FPS from 1080p Ultra to 4K Ultra, indicating that the GPU is the primary bottleneck as resolution increases.

Q: Does the CPU have ECC memory support?

A: Yes, the Intel Core Ultra 9 290K Plus supports ECC memory. It also supports DDR5 memory on a dual-channel bus, with a memory bandwidth of 115.2 GB/s.

GPU Role

The NVIDIA GeForce RTX 5090 D is the dominant component in this combo for Overpower, especially at higher resolutions. The GPU is built on the Blackwell 2.0 architecture, using the GB202 chip manufactured on a 5 nm process by TSMC. It contains 92,200 million transistors on a 750 mm² die. The GPU has a base clock of 2017 MHz and a boost clock of 2407 MHz. Memory clocks run at 1750 MHz, which translates to 28 Gbps effective on the GDDR7 memory.

The memory subsystem is a key asset: 32 GB of GDDR7 on a 512-bit bus delivers a bandwidth of 1.79 TB/s. This massive bandwidth is crucial for Overpower at 4K, where texture streaming and high-resolution assets require rapid data transfer. The GPU also has 21,760 shading units, 680 TMUs, and 176 ROPs. For ray tracing, there are 170 RT cores, and 680 tensor cores handle AI workloads. The pixel rate is 423.6 GPixel/s, and the texture rate is 1,636.8 GTexel/s. FP32 performance is rated at 104.8 TFLOPS, with FP16 also at 104.8 TFLOPS (1:1 ratio).

In the measured FPS data, the GPU’s role becomes clear when comparing Low versus Ultra settings. At 1080p Low, the average FPS is 319, but at 1080p Ultra, it drops to 157. This is a 50.8% reduction, showing that the GPU’s shading and ROP throughput becomes the limiting factor as settings increase. At 4K, the gap narrows: Low gives 248 FPS, and Ultra gives 119 FPS, a 52.0% reduction. The data suggests that the RTX 5090 D is powerful enough to push high frame rates at 1440p and 4K, but the Ultra preset demands more from the GPU than the CPU.

The GPU’s percentile rank of 92 places it among the top graphics cards, but interestingly, its nearest rivals are all mobile or older data center parts. The RTX 5090 D is 1.1% ahead of the AMD Radeon RX 6650M XT and 2.4% ahead of the NVIDIA Tesla P100 PCIe 16 GB. This indicates that while the RTX 5090 D is strong, the database’s comparison pool includes some unusual entries. For Overpower specifically, the GPU is the primary driver of FPS differences across resolutions, as evidenced by the measured FPS scaling from 1080p to 4K.

CPU Role

The Intel Core Ultra 9 290K Plus provides the computational foundation for this combo. It is a 24-core, 24-thread processor from the Core Ultra Series 2, based on the Arrow Lake Refresh architecture. The CPU has a base clock of 3.70 GHz and a boost clock of 5.80 GHz, with a TDP of 125 W. It is manufactured on a 3 nm process by TSMC, containing 17,800 million transistors on a 243 mm² die. The cache hierarchy includes 192 KB of L1 per core, 3 MB of L2 per core, and 36 MB of shared L3 cache.

The CPU’s benchmark scores are impressive. In Cinebench R23, it scores 51,731 multi-core and 7,303 single-core. PassMark multi-thread score is 60,860, and single-thread is 4,823. The PassMark data compression score is 698,346, and floating-point math is 214,760. These numbers indicate a processor that excels in both heavily threaded workloads and single-threaded tasks, which is beneficial for Overpower’s game logic and physics calculations.

In the context of Overpower, the CPU’s role is less about raw FPS and more about maintaining minimum frame rates and avoiding bottlenecks. At 1080p Low, the combo hits 319 FPS, which is likely near the CPU’s limit for frame generation. The fact that the same CPU with a different GPU might not reach this number suggests the CPU is capable of feeding the GPU at high frame rates. However, the data shows that the CPU is not the primary bottleneck in most scenarios. For example, at 4K Ultra, the average FPS is 119, which is likely GPU-limited. The CPU’s strong single-thread performance (7,303 in Cinebench R23) ensures that the game’s main thread does not become a limiting factor.

The CPU’s closest rival, the Intel Core Ultra 9 285K, has an average score of 83,807, which is only 0.2% lower. This means the 290K Plus offers a marginal improvement over its direct predecessor. The AMD EPYC 7F72 scores 85,072, which is 1.3% higher, but that is a server-class chip. For gaming, the 290K Plus’s combination of high boost clock and 24 cores provides ample headroom. The CPU also supports PCIe Gen 5 with 20 lanes, allowing the RTX 5090 D to run at full bandwidth on a PCIe 5.0 x16 interface.

How This Combo Ranks

The combo of Intel Core Ultra 9 290K Plus and NVIDIA GeForce RTX 5090 D ranks 3rd out of 2,980 tested combinations in Overpower. This is an elite position, placing it ahead of 99.9% of all other CPU-GPU pairings tested. The rank is based on measured FPS data across multiple resolutions and settings, making it a reliable indicator of real-world performance.

Being 3rd out of 2,980 means only two other combos outperform it. While the names of those combos are not in the data, the implication is that they likely feature even more specialized hardware or better-tuned configurations. The 3rd-place rank is notable because the RTX 5090 D is not the absolute highest-scoring GPU in the database (its percentile is 92, not 99), and the CPU, while strong, is only 0.2% better than its direct predecessor. This suggests that the combination of a high-end CPU and a top-tier GPU yields synergistic benefits in Overpower.

The GPU’s nearest rivals include the AMD Radeon RX 6850M XT, which scores 1.6% higher on average, but that is a mobile GPU. The RTX 5090 D’s desktop design, with 32 GB of GDDR7 and 1.79 TB/s bandwidth, likely gives it an edge in sustained gaming performance. The CPU’s nearest rival, the AMD EPYC 7F72, scores 1.3% higher, but that is a data center CPU with different thermal and power characteristics. For a gaming-focused combo, the 3rd-place rank in Overpower reflects the balance between the 290K Plus’s high clocks and the RTX 5090 D’s massive shading and memory throughput.

Resolution Scaling

The measured FPS data shows clear scaling patterns as resolution increases from 1920x1080 to 3840x2160. At Low settings, the average FPS drops from 319 at 1080p to 291 at 1440p (an 8.8% decrease), and then to 248 at 4K (a 22.3% decrease from 1440p). This indicates that at Low settings, the CPU is still capable of high frame rates, and the GPU’s workload increases significantly at 4K.

At Medium settings, the drop is more pronounced. 1080p Medium yields 204 FPS, 1440p Medium yields 182 FPS (10.8% decrease), and 4K Medium yields 155 FPS (14.8% decrease from 1440p). High settings show a similar pattern: 189 FPS at 1080p, 169 FPS at 1440p (10.6% decrease), and 144 FPS at 4K (14.8% decrease). Ultra settings have the smallest relative drops: 157 FPS at 1080p, 140 FPS at 1440p (10.8% decrease), and 119 FPS at 4K (15.0% decrease).

The data reveals that the FPS drop from 1080p to 4K is consistent across settings, roughly 24-25% for Medium, High, and Ultra, but only 22.3% for Low. This suggests that the GPU is the limiting component at higher resolutions, as the CPU’s workload does not scale with resolution. The RTX 5090 D’s 32 GB VRAM ensures that memory capacity is not an issue, even at 4K Ultra. The limiting factor is the GPU’s shading and rasterization throughput, which must process more pixels at higher resolutions.

The fact that 4K Low (248 FPS) is higher than 1080p Ultra (157 FPS) highlights the GPU’s ability to handle high pixel counts when settings are reduced. Conversely, the CPU’s performance is relatively constant across resolutions, meaning that at 1080p Low, the combo is likely CPU-bound, but at 4K Ultra, it is firmly GPU-bound. This is typical for a high-end pairing, where the CPU provides enough headroom for the GPU to be the primary determinant of FPS.

Measured FPS Breakdown

The measured FPS data provides a complete picture of performance across four resolutions and four settings presets. All values are average FPS, with some entries also including minimum and maximum FPS for Medium settings.

At 1920x1080, the combo achieves its highest numbers. Low settings produce an average of 319 FPS. Medium settings yield 204 FPS, with a minimum of 174 and a maximum of 235. High settings give 189 FPS. Ultra settings result in 157 FPS. This shows a clear progression: reducing settings from Ultra to Low nearly doubles the frame rate, from 157 to 319 FPS.

At 2560x1440, the performance remains strong. Low settings average 291 FPS. Medium settings average 182 FPS, with a minimum of 155 and a maximum of 209. High settings average 169 FPS. Ultra settings average 140 FPS. The drop from 1080p to 1440p is modest, ranging from 8.8% at Low to 10.8% at Ultra.

At 3840x2160, the combo still delivers high frame rates. Low settings average 248 FPS. Medium settings average 155 FPS, with a minimum of 132 and a maximum of 178. High settings average 144 FPS. Ultra settings average 119 FPS. These numbers indicate that the RTX 5090 D can handle 4K gaming at high refresh rates, especially at Medium and High settings.

The Medium settings entries are the only ones with min/max data. At 1080p Medium, the minimum FPS is 174, which is 85.3% of the average (204 FPS). At 1440p Medium, the minimum is 155, which is 85.2% of the average (182 FPS). At 4K Medium, the minimum is 132, which is 85.2% of the average (155 FPS). This consistency suggests stable frame pacing, with no severe dips below 85% of the average. The maximum FPS values show less variance, with 1080p reaching 235, 1440p reaching 209, and 4K reaching 178.

In summary, the measured FPS data shows that this combo is capable of exceeding 300 FPS at 1080p Low, and it remains above 100 FPS at 4K Ultra. The sweet spot for high-refresh-rate 4K gaming is Medium settings, where the average is 155 FPS with a minimum of 132. For competitive play at 1080p, Low settings provide the highest frame rates, while Ultra settings still offer a smooth 157 FPS. The data confirms that this is a top-tier configuration for Overpower, ranking 3rd overall and providing exceptional performance across all tested scenarios.