Red Dead Redemption 2

The benchmark data for Red Dead Redemption 2 with the Intel Core i3-12100F and NVIDIA GeForce RTX 5070 Ti shows a combination that scales predictably with graphical presets, delivering its best balance of visual fidelity and frame rate at High settings across all resolutions. The combo ranks in the 90th percentile of tested systems, proving that this pairing is far more capable than the modest CPU specifications might suggest.

Settings Recommendations

The measured results point to High as the optimal preset for this hardware combination. At 1920x1080, High produces an average of 118.3 FPS, which is comfortably above the 60 FPS threshold for smooth gameplay while retaining substantial visual quality over Medium's 140 FPS or Low's 184.7 FPS. The jump from High to Ultra costs 36.5 FPS at 1080p (118.3 down to 81.8), a 31% performance penalty that most players would find excessive for incremental visual gains.

At 2560x1440, High delivers 83.9 FPS, still well within high-refresh territory. This resolution presents the best overall experience because it maintains a fluid frame rate while the RTX 5070 Ti's 16 GB of GDDR7 memory and 256-bit bus width handle the additional pixel workload without bottlenecking. Ultra at 1440p drops to 59.9 FPS, which misses the 60 FPS mark, making High the clear choice for consistent performance.

The 3840x2160 results reveal a different story. High manages exactly 60.1 FPS, which is playable but leaves no headroom for demanding scenes. Medium at 4K produces 67.8 FPS and Low reaches 91 FPS, but Ultra falls to 41.4 FPS, which is below acceptable smoothness standards. For 4K gaming, High is the only preset that balances playability with meaningful visual detail, though players prioritizing frame rate could consider Medium for extra safety margin.

How This Combo Ranks

The combo ranks 162nd out of 1687 tested combinations, placing it in the top 10% of all systems in the database for this game. This ranking is particularly notable because the Core i3-12100F is a 4-core, 8-thread processor with a base clock of 3.30 GHz and boost clock of 4.30 GHz, while the RTX 5070 Ti carries the bulk of the workload with its 8960 shading units and 43.94 TFLOPS of FP32 performance.

The GPU's average benchmark score of 52086 places it in the 87th percentile of all GPUs, with its nearest rival being the NVIDIA GeForce RTX 4080 at a 0% delta. This near-parity with the prior generation's flagship explains why the combo performs so well in a demanding title like Red Dead Redemption 2. The CPU's average benchmark score of 13516 places it in the 72nd percentile, with its closest competitor being the AMD Ryzen Threadripper PRO 3975WX at a -0.1% delta.

The 4K results demonstrate that this combination is not CPU-limited in most scenarios. The fact that High settings at 4K achieves 60.1 FPS while Ultra drops to 41.4 FPS indicates that the GPU is the primary determinant of performance, with the CPU providing sufficient frame pacing for the 8 threads it offers.

GPU Role

The RTX 5070 Ti's specifications directly explain the measured results. With 16 GB of GDDR7 memory running at 28 Gbps effective across a 256-bit bus, the card delivers 896.0 GB/s of bandwidth. This memory configuration is critical for Red Dead Redemption 2's large open-world textures, particularly at 4K resolution where the High preset maintains playable frame rates.

The GPU's boost clock of 2452 MHz and base clock of 2295 MHz allow the 8960 shading units to sustain high throughput. The 70 RT cores and 280 tensor cores provide additional processing capability that the game's DirectX 12 Ultimate path can utilize, though the measured results suggest traditional rasterization dominates the workload.

The performance scaling across settings reveals the GPU's headroom. At 1080p, Low produces 184.7 FPS while Ultra produces 81.8 FPS, a 103 FPS spread that shows the card's raw compute capability is not the limiting factor at lower resolutions. At 4K, the same settings spread produces only 49.6 FPS difference (91 FPS Low to 41.4 FPS Ultra), indicating that memory bandwidth and pixel fill rate become the constraining factors at higher resolutions.

Measured FPS Breakdown

At 1920x1080, the measured averages are: Low 184.7 FPS, Medium 140 FPS, High 118.3 FPS, and Ultra 81.8 FPS. The progression from Low to Ultra shows a 56% reduction in frame rate, which is a steeper drop than at higher resolutions, suggesting the CPU can feed frames fast enough to expose the GPU's full range of settings-based performance scaling.

At 2560x1440, the averages are: Low 138.1 FPS, Medium 103.9 FPS, High 83.9 FPS, and Ultra 59.9 FPS. The 1440p results show tighter grouping between Medium and High (20 FPS difference) compared to 1080p (21.7 FPS difference), but the Ultra preset falls below 60 FPS, making it unsuitable for consistent gameplay.

At 3840x2160, the averages are: Low 91 FPS, Medium 67.8 FPS, High 60.1 FPS, and Ultra 41.4 FPS. The 4K data reveals that Low is the only preset that provides substantial headroom above 60 FPS, while High barely achieves the target. Ultra at 4K is effectively unplayable by common standards, representing a 31.7% drop from High.

Resolution Scaling

The performance degradation from 1080p to 4K follows a clear pattern that identifies the GPU as the primary bottleneck. At Low settings, 1080p produces 184.7 FPS, 1440p produces 138.1 FPS (25% lower), and 4K produces 91 FPS (51% lower than 1080p). This scaling aligns with pixel count increases: 1440p has 1.78x the pixels of 1080p, and 4K has 4x the pixels.

At Ultra settings, the scaling is less linear: 1080p yields 81.8 FPS, 1440p yields 59.9 FPS (27% lower), and 4K yields 41.4 FPS (49% lower than 1080p). The consistent 50% drop from 1080p to 4K across all settings indicates that the GPU's pixel throughput, not the CPU, is the limiting component at higher resolutions.

The CPU's role in resolution scaling is evident in the 1080p Low result of 184.7 FPS. This number is high enough to suggest that the Core i3-12100F's 4 cores and 8 threads can still deliver frames to the GPU without becoming a severe constraint, though the 3dmark_16_threads score of 4051 and cinebench_r23_multicore score of 11912 indicate the processor's multi-threaded limits are near.

CPU Role

The Intel Core i3-12100F operates at a base clock of 3.30 GHz and boost clock of 4.30 GHz, with 4 cores and 8 threads. Its L3 cache is 12 MB shared, and it supports DDR4 and DDR5 memory in dual-channel configuration. The benchmark scores show a single-thread performance of 893 in 3dmark, 1681 in cinebench_r23, and 2224 in geekbench, which are respectable for a quad-core part.

In Red Dead Redemption 2, the CPU's 4 cores are sufficient to maintain playable frame rates because the GPU is the dominant bottleneck at all measured resolutions and settings. The 1080p Low result of 184.7 FPS demonstrates that even a modest quad-core processor can push high frame rates when the GPU has headroom, though the 3dmark_max_threads score of 4023 suggests the CPU's multi-threaded ceiling is around this range.

The CPU's 72nd percentile ranking among all processors, with its nearest rival being the Intel Core i7-7700K at a 1.8% delta, indicates that this processor performs above average for gaming workloads. However, the 4K results show no evidence of CPU bottlenecking: the GPU's performance scales consistently with pixel count, and the Ultra preset at 4K drops to 41.4 FPS purely due to GPU load.

FAQ

Q: What is the best settings preset for 1440p gaming?

A: High settings at 2560x1440 produce 83.9 FPS average, which is the highest preset that maintains a comfortable margin above 60 FPS. Ultra drops to 59.9 FPS, below the smoothness threshold.

Q: How does this combo rank against all tested systems?

A: The combination ranks 162nd out of 1687 total tested combos for Red Dead Redemption 2, placing it in the top 10% of all systems in the database.

Q: Is the RTX 5070 Ti the limiting factor at 4K?

A: Yes. At 4K, Low settings produce 91 FPS while Ultra produces 41.4 FPS, and the 50% frame rate drop from 1080p to 4K across all settings indicates GPU-bound performance.

Q: Can the Core i3-12100F handle high frame rates?

A: The CPU supports up to 184.7 FPS at 1080p Low settings, and its single-thread score of 1681 in cinebench_r23 is sufficient to avoid bottlenecking the GPU at all tested settings.

Q: What is the frame rate difference between High and Ultra at 1080p?

A: High settings average 118.3 FPS, while Ultra averages 81.8 FPS, a 36.5 FPS difference that represents a 31% performance penalty for the highest preset.

Q: How much memory bandwidth does the GPU have?

A: The RTX 5070 Ti provides 896.0 GB/s of bandwidth through its 16 GB of GDDR7 memory on a 256-bit bus, which is adequate for the game's 4K texture demands.