Archeage

# Archeage with Intel Core i7-14700K + NVIDIA GeForce RTX 5090 D

This combination of an Intel Core i7-14700K and NVIDIA GeForce RTX 5090 D produces a remarkable spread of frame rates across Archeage's four presets and three resolutions, revealing a system that is heavily constrained by the game's engine rather than by either component. The data shows a 2014 MMORPG at the center of a modern high-end pairing, and the measured FPS tells a story of diminishing returns at lower resolutions and severe preset sensitivity at 4K.

Resolution Scaling

The jump from 1080p to 1440p and then to 4K exposes how Archeage's workload shifts between CPU and GPU limits. At 1080p Low, the combo delivers 296 FPS, but at 1440p Low that drops to 219 FPS, a 26% reduction. Moving to 4K Low yields 125 FPS, another 43% drop. This scaling pattern suggests that even at Low settings, resolution scaling is not purely linear — the engine's draw call overhead and object culling at higher pixel counts begin to tax the GPU more heavily, though the CPU still has headroom.

At Medium settings, the pattern shifts. 1080p Medium runs at 285 FPS, 1440p Medium at 195 FPS (a 32% decrease), and 4K Medium at 112 FPS (a 43% drop from 1440p). The min FPS values for Medium settings — 242 at 1080p, 166 at 1440p, and 95 at 4K — show that frame pacing remains consistent relative to averages, suggesting the GPU is not stuttering but rather scaling down uniformly as pixel count grows.

High settings reveal a different bottleneck. 1080p High produces 197 FPS, 1440p High drops to 132 FPS (33% lower), and 4K High falls to 76 FPS (42% lower than 1440p). The similarity in percentage drops between Medium and High across resolutions implies the rendering pipeline is consistently GPU-bound at these settings, with no sudden cliff that would indicate a memory or bandwidth wall.

Ultra settings are where the scaling becomes dramatic. 1080p Ultra runs at 134 FPS, 1440p Ultra at 90 FPS (33% drop), and 4K Ultra at 52 FPS (42% drop). The 4K Ultra result is the lowest measured anywhere in the pack, and the gap between 4K High (76 FPS) and 4K Ultra (52 FPS) is a 32% performance hit for that single preset step. This suggests Ultra enables effects that are exceptionally expensive at high pixel counts, likely related to post-processing or shadow quality that scales non-linearly with resolution.

The overall picture from resolution scaling is that Archeage's engine does not reward the RTX 5090 D's raw compute at lower resolutions. At 1080p Low, the 296 FPS figure is likely CPU-limited — the i7-14700K's 20 cores and 5.60 GHz boost clock can push the game's single-threaded logic, but the engine's age caps how fast it can process frames. The GPU's 32 GB GDDR7 memory and 1.79 TB/s bandwidth are far beyond what this game requires, yet at 4K Ultra the card still drops to 52 FPS, indicating that the bottleneck shifts to the GPU's shading rate on specific effects.

Settings Recommendations

For 4K displays, the measured data strongly favors Medium settings. At 4K Medium, the combo achieves 112 FPS average with a 95 FPS minimum, which is playable for an MMORPG where reaction times matter less than in competitive shooters. The jump to 4K High costs 36 FPS (down to 76) for what is likely a modest visual improvement in a game from 2014. Ultra at 4K is nearly unplayable at 52 FPS average, so Medium represents the best balance of fluidity and visual fidelity at this resolution.

At 1440p, High settings at 132 FPS are the sweet spot. The 1440p Medium result of 195 FPS is smoother, but the 63 FPS gap between Medium and High is a substantial visual upgrade for most users. Ultra at 1440p (90 FPS) remains viable, but the 32% drop from High to Ultra suggests diminishing returns. For competitive play or large-scale raids with many players on screen, Medium at 195 FPS provides a safety margin that High cannot match.

At 1080p, the data shows that High settings (197 FPS) are the recommended starting point. Low at 296 FPS is unnecessarily fast for this genre, and Medium at 285 FPS only adds 8 FPS over High while likely reducing visual quality. Ultra at 134 FPS is the only preset that dips below 144 Hz at 1080p, so players with high-refresh monitors should stick to High or Medium. The 1080p Medium min FPS of 242 ensures no drops below 240 Hz, making it the choice for extreme refresh rate displays.

The pattern across resolutions suggests that Archeage's presets are not evenly spaced in GPU cost. Medium to High is a moderate step, but High to Ultra is a massive jump — at 1080p it costs 63 FPS, at 1440p it costs 42 FPS, and at 4K it costs 24 FPS. This non-linear scaling means users should test Ultra carefully, as the visual gains may not justify the frame rate loss.

FAQ

Q: Why does 4K Ultra drop to 52 FPS when the RTX 5090 D is one of the fastest GPUs available?

A: The measured data shows 4K Ultra at 52 FPS versus 4K Medium at 112 FPS, a 54% reduction. This indicates Archeage's Ultra preset includes effects that are disproportionately expensive at high resolutions, likely related to the game's 2014-era rendering pipeline that does not scale efficiently with modern GPU architectures.

Q: Is the i7-14700K or the RTX 5090 D the limiting factor at 1080p Low?

A: At 1080p Low, the combo reaches 296 FPS, which is likely near the engine's maximum frame rate. The CPU's 20 cores and 28 threads are far more than Archeage needs, so the limit is the game's single-threaded logic and draw call processing, not the GPU.

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

A: At Low settings, 1080p is 296 FPS versus 4K at 125 FPS, a 137% increase. At Medium, 1080p is 285 FPS versus 4K at 112 FPS (154% faster). At High, 1080p is 197 FPS versus 4K at 76 FPS (159% faster). At Ultra, 1080p is 134 FPS versus 4K at 52 FPS (158% faster).

Q: What is the highest FPS measured for this combo in Archeage?

A: The highest average FPS in the measured data is 296 FPS at 1920x1080 with Low settings. The highest minimum FPS is 242 FPS at 1920x1080 with Medium settings, and the highest maximum FPS is 327 FPS at the same resolution and settings.

Q: Does the 32 GB VRAM on the RTX 5090 D help in Archeage?

A: The measured data shows no evidence of VRAM-related bottlenecks, as even at 4K Ultra the FPS does not exhibit stuttering patterns typical of memory swapping. The 32 GB capacity is far beyond Archeage's requirements, so the GPU's 1.79 TB/s bandwidth and 104.8 TFLOPS compute are the relevant factors.

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

A: This combo ranks 12th out of 2761 tested combinations for Archeage, placing it in the top 0.4% of all systems measured for this game.

How This Combo Ranks

The combo rank of 12 out of 2761 tested combinations places this system in the top percentile for Archeage performance. This ranking is notable because Archeage is a 2014 MMORPG, and the data suggests that only 11 other CPU-GPU pairings out of over two thousand can produce higher frame rates in this game. The ranking implies that the combination of the i7-14700K's high single-core performance and the RTX 5090 D's raw rasterization power is nearly optimal for this title.

The fact that 11 combos outperform this pairing suggests those systems likely use even faster CPUs or GPUs with architectural advantages in Archeage's specific workload. The CPU's percentile of 94 versus all CPUs and the GPU's percentile of 92 versus all GPUs indicate that both components are near the top of their respective hierarchies, yet the game's age means that the ranking is more about how well each component handles the engine's quirks than about raw benchmark scores.

The deltaPct values for the CPU's nearest rivals are all within 0.9% of the i7-14700K's average benchmark score, meaning the CPU is not a differentiator at this performance tier. The GPU's nearest rivals show deltas of 1.1% to -2.4%, with the RTX 5090 D sitting between the AMD Radeon RX 6650M XT and RX 6850M XT in average benchmark score. This tight clustering suggests that the combo's rank of 12 is more a function of the game's engine limits than of component superiority.

GPU Role

The RTX 5090 D's specifications are vastly over-provisioned for Archeage, yet the measured data shows the GPU still matters at higher settings. The 32 GB GDDR7 memory on a 512-bit bus provides 1.79 TB/s bandwidth, while the 21760 shading units and 680 tensor cores deliver 104.8 TFLOPS of FP32 compute. The boost clock of 2407 MHz and base clock of 2017 MHz are within normal ranges for a high-end card, but the game's engine from 2014 does not utilize modern features like the 170 RT cores or DirectX 12 Ultimate API in any meaningful way.

The GPU's role becomes apparent when comparing Low to Ultra at the same resolution. At 4K, Low produces 125 FPS and Ultra produces 52 FPS, meaning the GPU is responsible for a 73 FPS difference purely based on settings. The pixel rate of 423.6 GPixel/s and texture rate of 1,636.8 GTexel/s are more than sufficient for Archeage's relatively simple geometry, so the bottleneck at Ultra likely comes from specific shader effects that are not parallelized well across the GPU's 176 ROPs.

The GPU's benchmark scores — 44065 in Passmark G3D and 14326 in 3DMark Steel Nomad DX12 — do not directly translate to Archeage performance. The game's API usage is likely DirectX 11, given its release date, so the Passmark DirectX 11 score of 371 is more relevant than the DirectX 12 score of 219. This suggests the GPU is running Archeage in a compatibility mode that does not leverage its full architectural efficiency.

Measured FPS Breakdown

At 1920x1080, the data shows a clear hierarchy across settings. Low settings produce 296 FPS average with no min or max recorded. Medium settings average 285 FPS with a minimum of 242 and maximum of 327. High settings drop to 197 FPS average. Ultra settings halve the High result to 134 FPS average. The spread from Low to Ultra is 162 FPS, indicating that settings have a massive impact at this resolution.

At 2560x1440, the pattern compresses. Low settings yield 219 FPS average, Medium produces 195 FPS with a minimum of 166 and maximum of 224, High falls to 132 FPS, and Ultra reaches 90 FPS. The spread is now 129 FPS, narrower than at 1080p but still substantial. The Medium setting's minimum of 166 FPS ensures smooth gameplay even in busy scenes.

At 3840x2160, the numbers compress further. Low settings average 125 FPS, Medium averages 112 FPS with a minimum of 95 and maximum of 128, High averages 76 FPS, and Ultra averages 52 FPS. The spread is now 73 FPS, showing that at 4K, the low settings are also affected by GPU load more than at lower resolutions. The Medium setting's 95 FPS minimum is the only 4K result that stays above 60 FPS at all times.

The measured data includes min/max FPS only for Medium settings at all three resolutions. At 1080p Medium, the 242-327 FPS range shows variability of 85 FPS. At 1440p Medium, the range is 166-224 FPS, a 58 FPS spread. At 4K Medium, the range is 95-128 FPS, a 33 FPS spread. This decreasing variability at higher resolutions suggests that frame time consistency improves as the GPU becomes more uniformly loaded.

CPU Role

The Intel Core i7-14700K provides 20 cores and 28 threads across its Raptor Lake architecture, with a base clock of 3.40 GHz and boost clock of 5.60 GHz. The 33 MB shared L3 cache and 2 MB per-core L2 cache are substantial for a desktop processor, and the CPU's benchmark scores — 33440.5 in Cinebench R23 multi-core and 2160 in single-core — place it in the 94th percentile of all CPUs. The nearest rival AMD Ryzen 9 7950X is only 0.2% behind in average benchmark score, indicating the CPU is not uniquely positioned for Archeage.

Archeage, as a 2014 MMORPG, relies heavily on single-threaded performance for game logic and network handling. The i7-14700K's single-core score of 2160 in Cinebench R23 is strong, but the game's engine likely caps out at a certain frame rate regardless of CPU speed. The measured data supports this: at 1080p Low, the 296 FPS result is probably near the engine's ceiling, as even the fastest CPUs cannot push a 2014 game beyond its logical tick rate.

The CPU's 20 cores and 28 threads are massively over-provisioned for Archeage, which likely uses only a few threads for rendering and game logic. The Passmark single-thread score of 4472 and multi-thread score of 52392 show the CPU's capability, but in this game, the multi-thread advantage is irrelevant. The data compression score of 695234 and encryption score of 40091 are similarly irrelevant to gaming performance.

The CPU's role becomes more evident at lower resolutions where the GPU is not the bottleneck. At 1080p, the difference between Low (296 FPS) and Medium (285 FPS) is only 11 FPS, suggesting the CPU is the limiting factor at both settings. At 4K, the same settings differ by 13 FPS (125 vs 112), indicating the GPU is taking over as the primary constraint. This crossover point — where the workload transitions from CPU-bound to GPU-bound — is the key insight for this combo in Archeage.