Ready Or Not

Ready Or Not is a tactical shooter that stresses both CPU and GPU depending on the resolution and preset, and the measured data for the Intel Core Ultra 5 235 paired with the NVIDIA GeForce RTX 5090 D shows a combination that tops the charts. Across all tested settings, this combo delivers frame rates that range from the high triple digits at 4K Ultra to over 500 FPS at 1080p Low, indicating that the system is rarely the limiting factor at lower resolutions. The following analysis breaks down how the CPU and GPU each contribute to these results, how the combo ranks against other tested configurations, and which settings provide the best experience based solely on the measured FPS data.

Resolution Scaling

The measured FPS data reveals a clear pattern of scaling as resolution increases from 1920x1080 to 3840x2160. At High settings, the average frame rate drops from 449 FPS at 1080p to 284 FPS at 1440p, and further to 148 FPS at 4K. This represents a 37% reduction from 1080p to 1440p, and a 48% reduction from 1440p to 4K. Such a steep decline indicates that the GPU becomes progressively more involved as pixel count rises, which is typical for a game like Ready Or Not that relies heavily on draw calls and geometry.

At Low settings, the scaling is even more pronounced. The average FPS goes from 567 at 1080p to 358 at 1440p, and then to 187 at 4K. The drop from 1080p to 1440p is 37%, and from 1440p to 4K is 48%, mirroring the High preset’s relative scaling. This suggests that even with reduced graphical load, the rendering pipeline at higher resolutions still taxes the GPU significantly. The fact that 4K Low (187 FPS) is lower than 1080p Ultra (316 FPS) further underscores that resolution has a larger impact on performance than the preset level in this configuration.

Medium settings show a similar trend, with 494 FPS at 1080p, 312 FPS at 1440p, and 163 FPS at 4K. The min and max FPS values for Medium at each resolution (420–568 at 1080p, 265–359 at 1440p, 139–187 at 4K) indicate that frame pacing remains consistent, though the range tightens as resolution grows, suggesting the GPU is working closer to its limits at 4K. Ultra settings, the heaviest preset, produce 316 FPS at 1080p, 199 FPS at 1440p, and 104 FPS at 4K, with the 4K figure being the only one below 100 FPS in the entire dataset.

The scaling behavior points to the GPU as the primary limiter at 4K, while the CPU has more headroom at 1080p. At 1080p Low, the system hits 567 FPS, which is likely near the engine’s frame-rate cap or the CPU’s single-thread limit. The fact that 1080p Ultra (316 FPS) is lower than 1440p Low (358 FPS) confirms that settings have a larger impact than resolution alone, but the consistent 48% drop from 1440p to 4K across all presets indicates that the RTX 5090 D’s rendering throughput is the dominant constraint at higher pixel counts.

How This Combo Ranks

In the database of tested combinations, this specific pairing of the Intel Core Ultra 5 235 with the NVIDIA GeForce RTX 5090 D achieves a rank of 1 out of 2,947 combos for Ready Or Not. This top position means that no other CPU-GPU pairing in the database produces higher average frame rates in this game, making it the best-performing configuration tested. The rank is based on measured FPS data, not synthetic benchmarks, so it directly reflects real-world gameplay performance across the tested resolutions and settings.

The CPU’s benchmark percentile of 89 versus all CPUs places it in the upper tier of processors, but its nearest rivals in synthetic tests include the AMD Ryzen AI 9 HX 375 (0.1% higher average score), Intel Core i9-13900HX (0.1% lower), AMD EPYC 4364P (0.2% higher), and AMD EPYC 7303 (0.2% higher). These deltas are negligible, indicating that the Ultra 5 235’s computational performance is on par with those chips. However, in Ready Or Not, the combination with the RTX 5090 D outperforms all other combos, suggesting that the GPU’s capabilities are the deciding factor for this game’s frame rates.

The GPU itself has a percentile of 92 versus all GPUs, with nearest rivals including the AMD Radeon RX 6650M XT (1.1% higher average synthetic score), AMD Radeon RX 6850M XT (1.6% lower), NVIDIA Tesla P100 PCIe 12 GB (2.1% lower), and NVIDIA Tesla P100 PCIe 16 GB (2.4% lower). These synthetic benchmark differences are small, but the RTX 5090 D’s measured performance in Ready Or Not clearly separates it from those alternatives, as evidenced by the combo’s rank. The data shows that while the CPU is a solid mid-to-high performer, the GPU’s raw rasterization power is what pushes this combo to the top of the leaderboard.

CPU Role

The Intel Core Ultra 5 235 is built on the Arrow Lake architecture with a 3 nm process node, featuring 14 cores and 14 threads. Its base clock is 3.40 GHz, with a boost clock of 5.00 GHz, and it has a 65 W TDP. The cache hierarchy includes 192 KB of L1 per core, 3 MB of L2 per core, and 24 MB of shared L3 cache. Memory support is dual-channel DDR5 with a bandwidth of 102.4 GB/s, and the CPU connects via PCIe Gen 5 with 20 lanes. These specifications indicate a modern desktop processor designed for balanced gaming and productivity workloads.

In synthetic benchmarks, the Ultra 5 235 scores 14,769 in Cinebench R23 multi-core and 2,085 in single-core. Its PassMark multithread score is 37,816, with a single-thread score of 4,516. The data compression test yields 390,711, and the extended instructions score is 32,752. These numbers place the CPU in the 89th percentile, meaning it outperforms 89% of all CPUs in the database. For Ready Or Not, which is a tactical shooter that often relies on single-thread performance for game logic and AI, the 5.00 GHz boost clock is likely a key factor in maintaining high frame rates at lower resolutions.

At 1080p Low, the combo reaches 567 FPS, which is the highest measured value across all settings. This suggests that the CPU can feed the GPU with enough frames to exceed 500 FPS, even with only 14 threads. The fact that 1080p Ultra (316 FPS) is lower than 1080p Low (567 FPS) indicates that the GPU is still handling the increased graphical load at Ultra, but the CPU’s single-thread performance keeps the frame rate from collapsing. In comparison, the CPU’s nearest rivals in synthetic tests have nearly identical average scores, but the data shows that the Ultra 5 235’s combination of high boost clock and adequate core count is sufficient for this game’s requirements.

The CPU’s 14 threads are fewer than many high-end desktop processors, but Ready Or Not’s engine appears to scale well with fewer threads, as evidenced by the top rank. The L3 cache of 24 MB shared across all cores helps reduce memory latency, which is beneficial for the frequent asset streaming in tactical shooters. The 102.4 GB/s memory bandwidth ensures that data can move quickly between the CPU and system memory, though the game’s performance at 1080p suggests that the CPU is not the bottleneck in most scenarios.

Measured FPS Breakdown

At 1920x1080, the measured average FPS values are 567 for Low, 494 for Medium, 449 for High, and 316 for Ultra. The Medium preset shows a min of 420 and a max of 568, indicating a tight frame range. The progression from Low to Ultra shows a 44% drop in performance, which is expected as more graphical effects are enabled. At 1080p, even the heaviest preset stays above 300 FPS, making the game highly playable on high-refresh-rate monitors.

Moving to 2560x1440, the average FPS drops to 358 for Low, 312 for Medium, 284 for High, and 199 for Ultra. The Medium preset’s min and max are 265 and 359, respectively. The drop from 1080p to 1440p is consistent across presets, with Low falling by 37%, Medium by 37%, High by 37%, and Ultra by 37%. This uniformity suggests that the GPU’s pixel throughput scales linearly with resolution, and the CPU remains capable of keeping up at this resolution.

At 3840x2160, the average FPS is 187 for Low, 163 for Medium, 148 for High, and 104 for Ultra. The Medium preset has a min of 139 and a max of 187. The drop from 1440p to 4K is also consistent, with Low falling by 48%, Medium by 48%, High by 48%, and Ultra by 48%. This pattern confirms that the RTX 5090 D’s rendering load increases proportionally with pixel count, and the CPU’s role diminishes as the GPU becomes the primary limiter. The 4K Ultra result of 104 FPS is still above 60 FPS, but it is the only scenario where the combo dips below 100 FPS.

The data shows that the combo is capable of delivering high frame rates at all resolutions, with the 1080p Low setting being the only case where the CPU might be the bottleneck, given the extremely high FPS. For most users, the Medium or High presets at 1440p or 4K provide a good balance, as the frame rates remain well above 100 FPS.

GPU Role

The NVIDIA GeForce RTX 5090 D is built on the Blackwell 2.0 architecture with a 5 nm process node, featuring 21,760 shading units, 680 texture mapping units, and 176 raster output units. It has 170 ray tracing cores and 680 tensor cores, with a base clock of 2017 MHz and a boost clock of 2407 MHz. The memory subsystem is 32 GB of GDDR7 on a 512-bit bus, providing a bandwidth of 1.79 TB/s. The GPU’s pixel rate is 423.6 GPixel/s, and its texture rate is 1,636.8 GTexel/s, with a FP32 performance of 104.8 TFLOPS.

In synthetic benchmarks, the RTX 5090 D scores 14,326 in 3DMark Steel Nomad DX12, 310,674 in Geekbench OpenCL, and 376,915 in Geekbench Vulkan. Its PassMark G3D score is 44,065, and the GPU compute score is 28,396. The GPU’s percentile of 92 places it above most GPUs, though its nearest rivals in synthetic tests show small deltas. The 32 GB VRAM is more than sufficient for Ready Or Not, which likely uses less than 16 GB even at 4K Ultra, so memory capacity is not a limiting factor.

The GPU’s role in this combo is evident from the resolution scaling. At 4K, the FPS drops by 48% from 1440p, which is a significant reduction that aligns with the increase in pixel count (2.25 times). This indicates that the RTX 5090 D’s shading units and ROPs are heavily utilized at 4K, and the GPU’s boost clock of 2407 MHz helps maintain high throughput. The 1.79 TB/s memory bandwidth ensures that texture and geometry data can be fed to the shading units without stalling, which is crucial for a game with detailed environments like Ready Or Not.

The GPU’s performance in Ready Or Not is further highlighted by the combo’s rank of 1 out of 2,947, meaning that no other GPU paired with any CPU produces higher average FPS in this game. The 104.8 TFLOPS FP32 performance allows for high compute workloads, but for this game, the rasterization and pixel processing are the key factors. The 176 ROPs provide fast pixel fill rates, and the 680 TMUs handle texture mapping efficiently, contributing to the high frame rates observed across all settings.

FAQ

Q: What is the best resolution for this combo in Ready Or Not based on measured data?

A: The data shows that at 1920x1080, the combo achieves 449 FPS on High and 316 FPS on Ultra, while at 2560x1440, it reaches 284 FPS on High and 199 FPS on Ultra. At 3840x2160, the High preset yields 148 FPS and Ultra yields 104 FPS. All are above 60 FPS, but 1440p Ultra (199 FPS) offers a strong balance of visual quality and high refresh rates.

Q: How does the CPU’s single-thread performance impact the game?

A: The Intel Core Ultra 5 235 has a boost clock of 5.00 GHz and scores 2,085 in Cinebench R23 single-core, which is in the 89th percentile. The high boost clock likely enables the 567 FPS result at 1080p Low, as the game’s logic and AI benefit from fast single-thread execution.

Q: Is the GPU the bottleneck at 4K?

A: Yes, the FPS drops by 48% from 1440p to 4K across all presets, indicating that the RTX 5090 D’s rendering throughput is the limiting factor at 4K. The CPU’s performance is sufficient, as the frame rates remain above 100 FPS even at 4K Ultra.

Q: What is the combo’s rank compared to other tested configurations?

A: This combo ranks 1 out of 2,947 tested combos for Ready Or Not, meaning it produces the highest average frame rates among all CPU-GPU pairings in the database.

Q: How much VRAM does the GPU have, and is it enough?

A: The RTX 5090 D has 32 GB of GDDR7 memory on a 512-bit bus with 1.79 TB/s bandwidth. This is more than sufficient for Ready Or Not, as the game’s maximum settings at 4K do not exceed this capacity, ensuring no memory-related stuttering.

Q: Which preset shows the smallest performance drop from 1080p to 4K?

A: All presets show a consistent 48% drop from 1440p to 4K, and a 37% drop from 1080p to 1440p. This consistency indicates that the GPU’s workload scales linearly with resolution, regardless of preset level.

Settings Recommendations

Based on the measured FPS data, the best experience depends on the user’s display resolution and refresh rate. At 1920x1080, the Ultra preset delivers 316 FPS, which is well above 240 Hz refresh rates, so users with high-refresh monitors can enable Ultra without sacrificing smoothness. The Medium preset at 1080p yields 494 FPS, which is overkill for most displays, but it provides a margin for future driver overhead. For 1080p, Ultra is recommended as the best visual quality while still maintaining frame rates above 300 FPS.

At 2560x1440, the Ultra preset averages 199 FPS, which is ideal for 144 Hz or 165 Hz monitors. The High preset at 284 FPS offers even more headroom, but the visual difference between High and Ultra may be minimal for some users. Given that 1440p Ultra stays above 190 FPS, it is the recommended choice for a balance of image quality and speed. The Medium preset at 312 FPS is also viable, but it sacrifices visual fidelity for a marginal FPS gain.

At 3840x2160, the High preset averages 148 FPS, which is excellent for 4K gaming on high-refresh panels. The Ultra preset drops to 104 FPS, which is still smooth but might be preferable for users who prioritize frame rate over maximum detail. The Medium preset at 163 FPS provides a middle ground, but it reduces shadow and texture quality. For 4K, the High preset is the best overall choice, as it maintains 148 FPS while delivering near-maximum visual fidelity. The Low preset at 187 FPS is not recommended, as the visual downgrade is significant for only a 26% FPS increase over High.

In summary, the data supports Ultra at 1080p, Ultra at 1440p, and High at 4K as the optimal settings for this combo. The RTX 5090 D’s 32 GB VRAM and high bandwidth ensure that even the Ultra preset does not cause memory issues, and the CPU’s 5.00 GHz boost clock prevents any CPU-side bottlenecks at lower resolutions. Users with 4K 144 Hz monitors will find the High preset to be the sweet spot, while those with 1080p or 1440p displays can push to Ultra without hesitation.