Evolve

The pairing of an Intel Core i5-14600K with an AMD Radeon RX 580 produces a starkly lopsided combination for Evolve: a modern, high-tier processor attached to an aging graphics card. The database shows this pairing ranked 3359 out of 3700 tested combinations in this game, and the numbers explain why. At 1920x1080 with Medium settings the combo manages a 64.6 FPS average, clearing the 60 FPS playability threshold, but every preset at 2560x1440 and 3840x2160 falls short. The i5-14600K sits in the 90th percentile of all CPUs in the database, while the RX 580 lands in the 53rd percentile of GPUs, and in a title like this the weaker half of the pairing dictates the outcome.

Measured FPS Breakdown

The recorded data covers three resolutions, each tested at Low, Medium, High, and Ultra presets, with average frame rates as follows.

At 1920x1080, the RX 580 delivers its best results. Low settings average 85.3 FPS, Medium settings average 64.6 FPS, High settings drop to 54.6 FPS, and Ultra settings fall to 35.7 FPS. The gap between Low and Medium is substantial, a drop of 20.7 FPS, while the step from Medium to High costs another 10 FPS on average and pushes the configuration below the playability threshold. Ultra at this resolution is firmly out of reach for smooth play.

At 2560x1440, performance degrades across the board. Low settings average 59.8 FPS, a hair under the 60 FPS line. Medium settings average 46.7 FPS, High settings 37 FPS, and Ultra settings 23.4 FPS. Notably, the Low preset at 1440p is nearly identical in frame rate to the High preset at 1080p, which indicates the GPU's Polaris 20 chip is being saturated as pixel count rises regardless of how much detail is stripped away.

At 3840x2160, the frame rates collapse. Low settings average 35.5 FPS, Medium settings 25.7 FPS, High settings 17.3 FPS, and Ultra settings 12.9 FPS. Even the least demanding preset at 4K runs at less than half the playability threshold, and Ultra is barely above a slideshow. The scaling pattern is consistent: quadrupling the pixel count from 1080p to 4K cuts frame rates by roughly 58 to 64 percent depending on the preset, a signature of a GPU-bound system.

Minimum and maximum frame rates were not recorded for these runs, so the averages are the authoritative figures here, but the shape of the data leaves little ambiguity about the experience at higher resolutions.

Best Settings per Resolution

Applying the 60 FPS threshold to the measured averages produces one clear recommendation and two dead ends.

At 1920x1080, the most demanding preset that stays at or above 60 FPS is Medium, averaging 64.6 FPS. Low runs faster at 85.3 FPS, but Medium already clears the threshold, so it is the correct choice for the best visual return. High, at 54.6 FPS, does not qualify.

At 2560x1440, no preset qualifies. The best result is Low at 59.8 FPS, which misses the threshold by a fraction of a frame. Medium at 46.7 FPS and everything below it in quality is further out of reach.

At 3840x2160, no preset comes close. The best average is 35.5 FPS at Low, and Ultra bottoms out at 12.9 FPS.

In short, 1080p Medium is the only measured configuration that delivers a playably smooth experience, and it does so with a modest 4.6 FPS cushion above the threshold.

Similar Performance Alternatives

Looking at hardware that would behave similarly in this game, the nearest rivals on each side of the pairing are informative.

On the CPU side, the i5-14600K's average benchmark score of 48618 places it within a fraction of a percent of several chips in the database. The Intel Xeon Gold 5318H scores 48698, a delta of -0.2 percent, meaning it performs essentially identically in aggregate. The AMD EPYC 4345P scores 48470, 0.3 percent behind. The Intel Core Ultra 5 245HX scores 48287, 0.7 percent behind, and the Intel Core Ultra 5 245 scores 48995, 0.8 percent ahead. Any of these processors would substitute cleanly for the i5-14600K in this game without changing the outcome, because the CPU is not the limiting factor.

On the GPU side, the RX 580's average score of 12928 is bracketed by the NVIDIA GeForce RTX 3050 Ti Mobile at 12940, just 0.1 percent ahead, and the NVIDIA GeForce GTX 1660 SUPER at 12986, 0.4 percent ahead. Below it sit the AMD Radeon 740M at 12870, 0.5 percent behind, and the AMD FirePro W5100 at 12847, 0.6 percent behind. A system built around the GTX 1660 SUPER or RTX 3050 Ti Mobile paired with a comparable CPU would be expected to post frame rates within rounding distance of the numbers recorded here, since the GPU differences are under half a percent in aggregate scoring.

The practical takeaway: swapping the CPU for any of its nearest rivals changes nothing in Evolve, while swapping the GPU for its nearest rivals changes almost nothing. To move the 1440p results above 60 FPS, a jump beyond this performance tier of graphics hardware is required.

The Verdict

Yes, this PC can run Evolve, but only in a narrow window of settings. The verdict by resolution is unambiguous.

At 1920x1080, the playable settings are Low and Medium, with Medium being the best option at 64.6 FPS average. This is a genuinely playable configuration for an FPS, and the 85.3 FPS at Low provides headroom for players who prioritize responsiveness over visuals.

At 2560x1440, no settings are playable. The best attempt, Low at 59.8 FPS, sits just under the threshold, and Medium at 46.7 FPS is well below it.

At 3840x2160, no settings are playable by a wide margin; even Low manages only 35.5 FPS.

The overall judgment: this combination handles Evolve acceptably at full HD with reduced-to-mid detail, and fails everywhere else. Given that Evolve is an FPS title released in early 2015, the fact that a dedicated GPU from 2017 cannot push it past 60 FPS at 1440p says more about the RX 580's aging position, in the 53rd percentile of all GPUs in the database, than about the game.

CPU and GPU Roles

The division of labor in this configuration is heavily tilted toward the GPU being the bottleneck, and the data makes this visible in several ways.

First, the scaling across resolutions is severe. Moving from 1920x1080 to 3840x2160 at Low settings drops the average from 85.3 FPS to 35.5 FPS, a reduction of roughly 58 percent, purely from increasing pixel count. At Medium, the drop is from 64.6 FPS to 25.7 FPS, about 60 percent. At High, it is from 54.6 FPS to 17.3 FPS, and at Ultra, from 35.7 FPS to 12.9 FPS. When frame rates fall this steeply and this consistently with resolution alone, the renderer is the constraint, not the simulation.

Second, the CPU attached to this system is dramatically overqualified for the role it plays. The i5-14600K posts a Cinebench R23 multi-core score of 24491 and a single-core score of 2064, sits in the 90th percentile of all CPUs in the database, and matches or trails chips like the Intel Core Ultra 5 245 and Intel Xeon Gold 5318H by less than one percent in aggregate scoring. A processor with 14 cores and 20 threads, boosting to 5.30 GHz, is never the reason a 2015 shooter runs at 23.4 FPS at 1440p Ultra.

Third, the preset scaling within a fixed resolution reinforces the point. At 1080p, going from Low to Ultra costs 49.6 FPS, from 85.3 down to 35.7. Detail-level changes of that magnitude, combined with the resolution-driven losses, indicate the RX 580's 6.175 TFLOPS of FP32 throughput and 256.0 GB/s of memory bandwidth are saturated long before the CPU's capabilities come into play.

At every resolution tested, the GPU is the component that matters. Upgrading the CPU would yield nothing in this game; upgrading the GPU is the only lever that changes the verdict at 1440p and 4K.

How This Combo Ranks

Within the database, this pairing ranks 3359 out of 3700 tested combinations in Evolve, placing it in the bottom tenth of the field for this specific game. That ranking is consistent with the measured outcomes: one playable configuration out of twelve tested cells.

The ranking also reflects the mismatch at the heart of the build. The i5-14600K, launched with a launch MSRP of $319 and positioned in the 90th percentile of processors, is anchored to an RX 580, an end-of-life card from the Polaris generation with a launch MSRP of 229 USD, sitting in the 53rd percentile of GPUs. The RX 580's own benchmark profile supports its mid-table placement: a PassMark G3D score of 8813, a 3DMark Steel Nomad DX12 score of 1005, and a Geekbench Vulkan score of 45173.

For players already running this hardware, the path is straightforward. Play Evolve at 1920x1080 on Medium for a 64.6 FPS average, drop to Low for 85.3 FPS when smoothness matters most, and avoid 1440p and 4K entirely with this graphics card. For anyone choosing hardware, the data indicates the processor is more than sufficient and the graphics card is the single component holding this combination near the bottom of the rankings.