Thief

Thief, Eidos-Montréal's 2014 stealth title, is a light workload for a pairing of Intel's Core i5-12400 and NVIDIA's GeForce RTX 3080. The benchmark data measured for this configuration shows the game running comfortably above the 60 FPS playability threshold at every resolution and preset combination except one: Ultra settings at 3840x2160, which lands at 52.3 FPS average. Everything else — from 1080p Low through 4K Medium — clears the bar, and in most cases clears it by a wide margin. What follows is a resolution-by-resolution breakdown, the component balance behind these numbers, and how this pairing ranks against other tested configurations.

Measured FPS Breakdown

At 1920x1080, the Core i5-12400 + RTX 3080 combination is effectively untouchable by the game. Low settings average 168.7 FPS, Medium climbs slightly to 156.4, High delivers 137.9, and even Ultra holds a 134.8 FPS average. The spread between the cheapest and most expensive preset is only 33.9 FPS — roughly a fifth of the Low figure — which tells you the RTX 3080 is nowhere near saturation at this pixel count. Minimum and maximum frame rates were not recorded in this dataset, so the analysis rests on averages; with averages this high, dips below 60 are statistically unlikely at any 1080p preset.

At 2560x1440 the pattern holds. Low averages 150.3 FPS, Medium 127.9, High 96.8, and Ultra 90.8. The Ultra figure is still more than 50 percent above the 60 FPS threshold. Note the gap between Medium and High — 31.1 FPS — which is larger than the gap between Low and Medium, indicating that High settings introduce the game's heaviest effects, likely the higher-quality post-processing and shadow tiers. The step from High to Ultra costs a further 6 FPS, a comparatively cheap upgrade once you're already at High.

At 3840x2160 the RTX 3080 finally meets real resistance. Low averages 100.4 FPS, Medium 76.6, High 59.3, and Ultra 52.3. The High and Ultra results are the only two entries in the entire dataset that fall below the playability line, and High misses it by less than a single frame. This is the resolution where preset selection actually matters.

FAQ

Q: Can the Core i5-12400 + RTX 3080 run Thief at 60 FPS?

A: Yes, at nearly every setting tested. All four presets at 1920x1080 and 2560x1440 exceed 60 FPS average. At 3840x2160, Low (100.4 FPS) and Medium (76.6 FPS) clear the threshold, while High (59.3 FPS) and Ultra (52.3 FPS) fall just short.

Q: What is the best-looking setting I can use at 4K and still stay playable?

A: Medium at 3840x2160, averaging 76.6 FPS. That leaves a 16.6 FPS cushion above the 60 FPS threshold, whereas High at the same resolution averages 59.3 FPS and dips below the line.

Q: How much FPS do you lose going from 1440p Ultra to 4K Ultra?

A: Average frame rate drops from 90.8 to 52.3 — a fall of 38.5 FPS. This is the largest single resolution penalty in the dataset and confirms that 4K Ultra is where the RTX 3080 runs out of headroom in this title.

Q: How does this pairing rank among tested combinations for Thief?

A: It ranks 996th out of 3720 tested combinations, placing it in roughly the top quarter of configurations benchmarked for this game.

Q: What CPU is in this configuration, and does it limit performance?

A: The CPU is the Intel Core i5-12400, a 6-core, 12-thread Alder Lake-S processor on Intel Socket 1700 with a 2.50 GHz base clock and 4.40 GHz boost. The benchmark scaling data indicates it does not bottleneck this game — performance scales with resolution and preset, which is GPU-limited behavior.

Q: Which preset offers the best balance at 1440p?

A: Ultra is viable at 2560x1440 at 90.8 FPS average, so there is no reason to compromise. If a higher refresh target matters, Medium at 127.9 FPS is the sweet spot for high-framerate play.

CPU and GPU Roles

The scaling data points unambiguously to a GPU-bound profile. At every preset, frame rate falls as resolution rises: 1080p Ultra at 134.8 FPS becomes 1440p Ultra at 90.8 and 4K Ultra at 52.3. If the Core i5-12400 were the limiter, increasing the GPU's pixel load would not produce these steep, consistent declines — a CPU-bound scenario would show flat frame rates across resolutions.

The magnitude of the scaling reinforces this. At Low settings, moving from 1080p to 4K costs 68.3 FPS (168.7 down to 100.4). At Ultra, the same jump costs 82.5 FPS. The CPU's contribution sits in the platform's baseline: Thief is a 2014 release, and the i5-12400 — with a 910-point 3DMark single-thread score, a 3456 PassMark single-thread score, and a 5890 3DMark max-threads score — sits in the 72nd percentile of all CPUs in the database. For a game of this vintage, that single-thread figure alone is more than sufficient to keep the render pipeline fed at the highest frame rates measured here.

The corollary is that upgrading the CPU in this pairing would change nothing in Thief. Upgrading the GPU, by contrast, would directly attack the one failure case: 4K High and 4K Ultra.

Similar Performance Alternatives

On the CPU side, the database's nearest rivals for the Core i5-12400 (average benchmark score 18683, 72nd percentile) are a diverse set: the AMD EPYC 7643 at 18697 average score (a -0.1 percent delta), the Intel Core i7-1355U at 18730 (-0.3 percent), the AMD Ryzen AI 5 330 at 18811 (-0.7 percent), and the Intel Core i3-14100F at 18519 (0.9 percent slower). Any of these processors delivers effectively identical aggregate benchmark throughput — all within one percent — and since Thief is GPU-bound in this pairing, all would reproduce these frame rates within a narrow band.

On the GPU side, the RTX 3080 (average score 23172, 68th percentile versus all GPUs) clusters with the NVIDIA P106-100 at 23249 (-0.3 percent), the AMD Radeon Pro Vega 16 at 23250 (-0.3 percent), the AMD Radeon RX 6600M at 23273 (-0.4 percent), and the AMD Radeon R9 M290X at 23276 (-0.4 percent). These four cards sit within half a percent of the RTX 3080's average database score, meaning the measured Thief results here should transfer closely to those alternatives — 1080p and 1440p comfortably above threshold at all presets, with 4K playable up through Medium.

The Verdict

Yes — this PC runs Thief, and runs it well. At 1920x1080, every preset from Low through Ultra exceeds the 60 FPS threshold, topping out at 134.8 FPS on Ultra and 168.7 FPS on Low. At 2560x1440, the same is true: all four presets are playable, with Ultra at 90.8 FPS. At 3840x2160, the verdict narrows: Low (100.4 FPS) and Medium (76.6 FPS) are playable, while High (59.3 FPS) and Ultra (52.3 FPS) miss the threshold. Anyone targeting 4K with this hardware should cap the preset at Medium; everyone else can max the game out.

How This Combo Ranks

Out of 3720 hardware combinations tested for Thief, this pairing ranks 996th — comfortably inside the top third of the field. That placement is consistent with the components' individual standings: the RTX 3080 sits in the 68th percentile of all GPUs, and the Core i5-12400 in the 72nd percentile of all CPUs. For a 2014 stealth title measured against such a broad field of configurations, a top-quarter rank reflects a pairing that is substantially overqualified for the game — the rank ceiling is set almost entirely by the 4K Ultra result, the sole sub-60 entry in the dataset.

Best Settings per Resolution

• 1920x1080 — Ultra, 134.8 FPS average. No compromise needed; the most demanding preset more than doubles the playability threshold.
• 2560x1440 — Ultra, 90.8 FPS average. A 30.8 FPS cushion above 60 makes Ultra the clear choice at this resolution.
• 3840x2160 — Medium, 76.6 FPS average. Ultra (52.3) and High (59.3) both fall short of 60 FPS, making Medium the most demanding preset that stays at or above the threshold, with 16.6 FPS of headroom to spare.