Lockdown Protocol

The Intel Core i9-14900K paired with the NVIDIA GeForce RTX 3080 Ti delivers a high-refresh-rate experience in Lockdown Protocol, though the most extreme settings at 4K will test its limits. Measured data shows the combo clears the 60 FPS playable threshold at every resolution when using appropriate presets, with the strongest headroom appearing at 1080p and 1440p. The i9-14900K sits in the 95th percentile among all CPUs, while the RTX 3080 Ti ranks in the 83rd percentile among all GPUs, indicating a balanced pairing where the processor’s exceptional single-thread performance complements the graphics card’s substantial rasterization throughput.

Measured FPS Breakdown

At 3840x2160, the combo produces a wide spread of average frame rates depending on the preset. Low settings yield an average of 120.8 FPS, which is more than double the 60 FPS threshold. Medium settings drop to 91.2 FPS, still comfortably playable, while High settings deliver 75.2 FPS. The Ultra preset, however, falls below the playable line at 55.4 FPS average. The gap between Low and Ultra at 4K is 65.4 FPS, demonstrating that this resolution places heavy demands on the GPU, with each step up in quality costing roughly 15 to 30 FPS.

Moving to 2560x1440, the frame rates scale upward substantially. Low settings produce an average of 191.5 FPS, and Medium reaches 138.8 FPS. High settings hold at 117.1 FPS, while Ultra remains above the threshold at 88.5 FPS. The delta between Low and Ultra at 1440p is 103 FPS, showing that the GPU still dominates performance scaling, but the overall headroom is much larger than at 4K. Every preset at this resolution clears 60 FPS with at least 28.5 FPS of margin.

At 1920x1080, the combo shows its full potential. Low settings average 261.8 FPS, which is exceptionally high for a modern FPS title. Medium settings deliver 188.2 FPS, and High settings reach 159.5 FPS. Ultra still manages 120.2 FPS, a figure that exceeds the 4K High result by 45 FPS. The resolution scaling from 1080p to 4K at Ultra settings shows a drop from 120.2 FPS to 55.4 FPS, a 64.8 FPS reduction, which indicates that the RTX 3080 Ti’s 12 GB GDDR6X memory and 384-bit bus become increasingly stressed as pixel count rises.

Best Settings per Resolution

For 3840x2160, the most demanding preset that stays at or above 60 FPS is High, with an average of 75.2 FPS. Ultra fails the threshold at 55.4 FPS, so High is the recommended ceiling for 4K gaming. Medium and Low also qualify, but High offers the best visual fidelity while retaining a 15.2 FPS margin above the playable line.

At 2560x1440, Ultra is the best setting, averaging 88.5 FPS. This gives a 28.5 FPS cushion over the 60 FPS threshold, allowing players to max out the game’s visual options without concern. High, Medium, and Low all exceed 117 FPS, but Ultra provides the full experience while remaining well within playable territory.

For 1920x1080, Ultra is again the best setting, with an average of 120.2 FPS. This is exactly double the playable threshold, meaning the combo has substantial headroom even at maximum quality. The 1080p Ultra result is 31.7 FPS higher than the 1440p Ultra result, confirming that lower resolutions shift the bottleneck away from the GPU and allow the i9-14900K’s 32 threads to drive higher frame rates.

CPU and GPU Roles

The data shows a clear pattern: the RTX 3080 Ti is the primary performance limiter at higher resolutions, while the i9-14900K becomes more relevant at lower resolutions. Comparing 4K Ultra at 55.4 FPS to 1080p Ultra at 120.2 FPS, the 64.8 FPS difference is almost entirely attributable to GPU workload, as the CPU’s frame generation capability is not the constraining factor at 4K. The i9-14900K’s Cinebench R23 multi-core score of 39399.5 and single-core score of 2262.5 indicate it can feed frames far faster than the GPU can render them at 4K.

The scaling between presets reinforces this. At 1080p, moving from Low to Ultra costs 141.6 FPS (from 261.8 to 120.2), a drop of 54 percent. At 4K, the same preset change costs 65.4 FPS (from 120.8 to 55.4), a drop of 54 percent as well. This proportional scaling suggests the GPU is consistently the bottleneck across resolutions, but the absolute frame rates at 1080p are high enough that CPU overhead becomes a larger relative factor. The 1440p results sit between the two extremes, with Ultra at 88.5 FPS representing a 36.7 FPS reduction from 4K High’s 75.2 FPS when considering the opposite direction — moving from 1440p Ultra to 4K High actually improves frame rate, which is counterintuitive but explained by the preset change reducing GPU load more than the resolution increase adds it.

The i9-14900K’s PassMark single-thread score of 4697 and Geekbench single-core score of 2655 show strong per-core performance, which is critical for FPS titles that rely on a single main thread. However, the measured FPS data does not show CPU-induced frame drops at any resolution, as even 4K Low exceeds 120 FPS. The 24 cores and 32 threads provide ample parallel processing for background tasks and game logic, but the RTX 3080 Ti’s 34.10 TFLOPS FP32 performance and 912.4 GB/s memory bandwidth are the decisive factors for achieving high frame rates at 1440p and above.

Similar Performance Alternatives

For the CPU, the nearest rivals in benchmark scores are all within a narrow band. The Intel Core i9-14900KF scores 79371 on average, which is 0.3 percent higher than the i9-14900K’s 79097, making it a functionally identical alternative for this game. The Intel Core Ultra 9 290HX Plus scores 79574, 0.6 percent higher, and the AMD EPYC 7413 scores 80041, 1.2 percent higher. On the lower side, the AMD Ryzen AI Max+ 395 scores 77740, which is 1.7 percent lower. These deltas are all within 2 percent, meaning any of these CPUs would produce nearly identical frame rates in Lockdown Protocol, as the game’s performance is not CPU-limited at the tested settings.

For the GPU, the nearest rivals show similar clustering. The AMD Radeon Pro 5300 scores 40870, which is 0.8 percent lower than the RTX 3080 Ti’s 41187. The NVIDIA Tesla M40 24 GB scores 41707, 1.2 percent higher, and the Tesla M40 scores 41897, 1.7 percent higher. The NVIDIA GeForce RTX 5070 scores 40377, which is 2 percent lower. These differences are small enough that in-game FPS would be within a few frames of the RTX 3080 Ti’s results. However, the Tesla cards are datacenter-oriented and lack the same display outputs, while the Radeon Pro 5300 has far less memory bandwidth, so real-world gaming behavior could differ despite similar synthetic scores.

The Verdict

This PC can run Lockdown Protocol at all three tested resolutions, but the quality ceiling varies. At 3840x2160, the combo clears 60 FPS on High, Medium, and Low presets, with High being the best playable option at 75.2 FPS. Ultra is not playable at 4K, falling to 55.4 FPS. At 2560x1440, all four presets exceed 60 FPS, with Ultra averaging 88.5 FPS, making this the sweet spot for maximum visual quality. At 1920x1080, every preset is well above the threshold, with Ultra at 120.2 FPS and Low at 261.8 FPS. The verdict is positive: this is a high-performance combo that delivers smooth gameplay at 1080p and 1440p with full settings, and at 4K with a modest preset reduction to High.

FAQ

*Q: Can this combo run Lockdown Protocol at 4K Ultra settings?*

A: No. The measured average FPS at 3840x2160 Ultra is 55.4 FPS, which is below the 60 FPS playable threshold. The best 4K preset is High, averaging 75.2 FPS.

Q: What is the highest playable preset at 2560x1440?

A: Ultra is playable at 1440p, with an average of 88.5 FPS. This is 28.5 FPS above the threshold, providing a comfortable margin.

Q: How much faster is 1080p compared to 4K on the same settings?

A: At Ultra settings, 1080p averages 120.2 FPS versus 55.4 FPS at 4K, a difference of 64.8 FPS. At Low settings, the gap is 141 FPS (261.8 vs 120.8).

Q: Is the CPU or GPU the limiting factor in this game?

A: The GPU is the primary limiter. The i9-14900K’s benchmark scores (95th percentile) far exceed what the RTX 3080 Ti (83rd percentile) can feed at high resolutions, as shown by the large FPS drops when increasing resolution.

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

A: It ranks 841st out of 3714 tested combos, placing it in the top 23 percent of all configurations tested for this game.

Q: What is the average FPS at 1440p Medium settings?

A: The measured average is 138.8 FPS, which is 78.8 FPS above the playable threshold and 50.3 FPS higher than the 4K High result.

How This Combo Ranks

The Intel Core i9-14900K and NVIDIA GeForce RTX 3080 Ti combination ranks 841st out of 3714 tested combos for Lockdown Protocol. This places it in the 77th percentile of all configurations, meaning roughly 23 percent of tested systems perform better. The ranking reflects the GPU’s 83rd percentile standing among all GPUs, tempered by the fact that many higher-ranked combos likely pair newer graphics cards with similar or better CPUs. The i9-14900K’s 95th percentile CPU rank does not boost the combo further because the game’s performance is GPU-bound at the tested resolutions. The 841st rank is still a strong result, placing this system well above the median and capable of high-refresh-rate play at 1080p and 1440p, with 4K available at reduced settings. The gap between this combo and the top-ranked systems is primarily due to newer GPU architectures with higher ray tracing and rasterization throughput, but for pure rasterized FPS performance in Lockdown Protocol, this pairing delivers a smooth and responsive experience across most settings.