Evolve

FAQ

Q: How does the Intel Core i5-14400F compare to its closest rivals in average benchmark score?

A: The i5-14400F posts an average benchmark score of 32,279, placing it in the 83rd percentile of all CPUs. It is effectively tied with the AMD Ryzen 7 PRO 8840U (32,233, deltaPct 0.1) and the Intel Core i9-11900 (32,226, deltaPct 0.2), while sitting just 0.5% above the Intel Core i7-12800H (32,121). The AMD Ryzen 7 6800HS (32,354) edges it out by 0.2%.

Q: What is the GPU's performance position relative to its nearest rivals?

A: The AMD Radeon RX 7600 XT has an average benchmark score of 17,083, placing it in the 60th percentile of all GPUs. It sits 0.3% above the NVIDIA GeForce GTX 690 (17,037) and 0.4% above the AMD Radeon HD 7970M (17,019), while trailing the NVIDIA GeForce RTX 3070 (17,208) by 0.7%. The NVIDIA Tesla M4 (16,932) is 0.9% behind.

Q: What frame rates can be expected at 1080p with Medium settings?

A: At 1920x1080 with Medium settings, the combo delivers an average of 130 FPS, with a minimum of 111 FPS and a maximum of 150 FPS. This represents a comfortable margin above 60 FPS, indicating a smooth experience for fast-paced FPS gameplay.

Q: How does the 4K Ultra performance compare to 1080p Low?

A: At 3840x2160 with Ultra settings, the average FPS drops to 27, while at 1920x1080 with Low settings, the average is 168 FPS. This represents a six-fold difference in frame rate, highlighting the extreme load that 4K Ultra places on the GPU.

Q: Does this configuration rank well for Evolve specifically?

A: The combo ranks 2,342 out of 3,700 tested combinations for Evolve, placing it in the lower-middle portion of the overall distribution. While not a top-tier configuration for this title, the measured data shows it can handle 1080p and 1440p gaming well at most settings.

Q: What are the CPU's multi-threaded performance highlights?

A: The i5-14400F scores 21,645 in Cinebench R23 multi-core and 9,090 in Cinebench R20 multi-core. Its PassMark multithread score is 25,470, with a data compression score of 315,521 and an integer math score of 81,524, showing strong throughput for a 10-core, 16-thread desktop part.

GPU Role

The AMD Radeon RX 7600 XT is built on the RDNA 3.0 architecture with the Navi 33 chip, fabricated on a 6 nm process at TSMC. The GPU packs 2,048 shading units, 128 texture mapping units, and 64 raster operation units, along with 32 ray tracing cores. Its FP32 compute throughput is rated at 22.57 TFLOPS, with the same figure for FP16 (1:1 ratio).

Memory configuration is a defining feature of this card: 16 GB of GDDR6 on a 128-bit bus, delivering 288.0 GB/s of bandwidth. This is a substantial capacity for the class, which matters in Evolve because the game's large, detailed environments and monster-texture assets can demand significant VRAM at higher resolutions. The 128-bit bus width, however, limits raw memory bandwidth compared to wider-bus competitors.

Clock speeds are aggressive for the architecture. The base clock is 1980 MHz, the game clock is 2470 MHz, and the boost clock reaches 2755 MHz. Memory runs at 2250 MHz (18 Gbps effective). These high clocks help compensate for the relatively narrow memory bus.

In Evolve, the GPU's role becomes increasingly dominant as resolution and settings rise. At 1080p Low, the card produces 168 FPS, showing ample headroom. But at 4K Ultra, the same GPU drops to 27 FPS, a clear indication that the rasterization and shading load at that setting overwhelms the card's 22.57 TFLOPS compute and 288.0 GB/s bandwidth. The pixel rate of 176.3 GPixel/s and texture rate of 352.6 GTexel/s are the throughput limits that constrain performance at high resolutions.

The GPU's benchmark scores reinforce this profile. Its PassMark G3D score is 17,132, with a DirectX 12 score of 65 and a DirectX 11 score of 167. The 3DMark Steel Nomad DX12 score of 2,348 is a modern measure of DX12 gaming performance. Geekbench OpenCL and Vulkan scores are 92,426 and 48,366 respectively, showing compute capability that is adequate but not exceptional for the 60th percentile ranking.

Resolution Scaling

The measured data reveals a steep performance curve across resolutions. Starting at 1920x1080 with Low settings, the average FPS is 168. Moving to 2560x1440 Low drops that to 113 FPS, a 32.7% reduction. At 3840x2160 Low, the average falls to 64 FPS, another 43.4% cut from 1440p. This pattern demonstrates that pixel throughput is the primary limiter at lower settings.

With Medium settings, the scaling is similarly steep: 130 FPS at 1080p, 87 FPS at 1440p (33.1% drop), and 50 FPS at 4K (42.5% drop from 1440p). The minimum and maximum frames at Medium settings show a consistent spread: 111-150 at 1080p, 74-101 at 1440p, and 42-57 at 4K. These ranges indicate that frame pacing remains stable even as the average drops.

High settings show 102 FPS at 1080p, 69 FPS at 1440p (32.4% drop), and 39 FPS at 4K (43.5% drop from 1440p). Ultra settings are the most demanding: 71 FPS at 1080p, 48 FPS at 1440p (32.4% drop), and 27 FPS at 4K (43.8% drop from 1440p).

The consistent ~33% reduction from 1080p to 1440p and ~43% reduction from 1440p to 4K across all settings indicates that the GPU is the limiting component throughout. The CPU's role is secondary; if the i5-14400F were the bottleneck, the scaling from 1080p to 4K would be less pronounced because the GPU load would dominate less at lower resolutions. Instead, the data shows uniform scaling, confirming that the RX 7600 XT's rendering throughput — its 176.3 GPixel/s pixel rate and 352.6 GTexel/s texture rate — is what determines frame rates.

At 1080p Low, the 168 FPS average suggests the CPU can feed the GPU adequately even at high frame rates. The i5-14400F's single-thread performance (Cinebench R23 single-core score of 3,055, Geekbench single-core of 2,058) is sufficient to avoid capping performance at this resolution. The limiting factor remains the GPU's fill rate and shading capacity.

Settings Recommendations

Based on the measured FPS rows, the optimal balance between visual quality and playability depends on the target resolution. For a 60 FPS baseline, the data shows which settings are viable.

At 1920x1080, all four settings exceed 60 FPS. Low delivers 168 FPS, Medium 130 FPS, High 102 FPS, and Ultra 71 FPS. Ultra is the only setting that dips below 100 FPS, but it still maintains a playable average. For competitive play, Low or Medium provides the highest frame rates; for visual fidelity, Ultra remains viable with a 71 FPS average.

At 2560x1440, Ultra drops to 48 FPS, which falls below the 60 FPS threshold. High settings produce 69 FPS, Medium 87 FPS, and Low 113 FPS. The recommendation here is High, which maintains a 69 FPS average while offering improved detail over Medium. Ultra is not recommended at this resolution given the 48 FPS average.

At 3840x2160, only Low settings achieve a 64 FPS average. Medium drops to 50 FPS (minimum 42), High to 39 FPS, and Ultra to 27 FPS. For 4K gaming, Low settings are the only option that maintains a playable frame rate. Medium with a 42 FPS minimum may be tolerable for some players, but the data suggests that Low is the safest choice for consistent performance.

The measured data shows that the GPU's 16 GB VRAM is not a limiting factor at any setting; rather, the compute and memory bandwidth constraints dominate. The 128-bit bus and 288.0 GB/s bandwidth become the binding constraint at high resolutions and settings, as evidenced by the dramatic FPS drops from 1080p to 4K.

For the best experience per the measured rows, 1440p High offers the sweet spot: 69 FPS average with moderate visual enhancements over Medium. At 1080p, Ultra at 71 FPS is viable for players prioritizing image quality. At 4K, players must accept Low settings to stay above 60 FPS.

Measured FPS Breakdown

The measured data provides a complete matrix of resolution and settings combinations. At 1920x1080, the averages are 168 FPS (Low), 130 FPS (Medium), 102 FPS (High), and 71 FPS (Ultra). The Medium preset includes a minimum of 111 FPS and maximum of 150 FPS, showing a tight frame-time distribution.

At 2560x1440, the averages are 113 FPS (Low), 87 FPS (Medium), 69 FPS (High), and 48 FPS (Ultra). Medium at this resolution has a minimum of 74 FPS and maximum of 101 FPS. The jump from High to Ultra represents a 30.4% drop in average FPS, the largest relative decrease among the 1440p settings.

At 3840x2160, the averages are 64 FPS (Low), 50 FPS (Medium), 39 FPS (High), and 27 FPS (Ultra). Medium at 4K has a minimum of 42 FPS and maximum of 57 FPS. The drop from Low to Medium is 21.9%, from Medium to High is 22.0%, and from High to Ultra is 30.8%. This progressive degradation shows that each settings tier adds substantial GPU work at 4K.

Comparing across resolutions for the same setting: Low goes from 168 FPS (1080p) to 113 FPS (1440p) to 64 FPS (4K). Medium goes from 130 to 87 to 50. High goes from 102 to 69 to 39. Ultra goes from 71 to 48 to 27. The consistent scaling pattern — roughly 33% loss from 1080p to 1440p and 43% from 1440p to 4K — holds for every preset, confirming the GPU-bound nature of the workload.

The data also reveals that the gap between Low and Ultra grows with resolution. At 1080p, Ultra is 57.7% slower than Low (71 vs 168 FPS). At 1440p, Ultra is 57.5% slower (48 vs 113 FPS). At 4K, Ultra is 57.8% slower (27 vs 64 FPS). This consistency suggests that the settings presets scale uniformly with pixel count, and the GPU's architecture handles the additional load proportionally across all resolutions.

CPU Role

The Intel Core i5-14400F is a 10-core, 16-thread processor based on the Raptor Lake architecture, specifically the Raptor Lake-R refresh. It has a base clock of 2.50 GHz and a boost clock of 4.70 GHz, with a 65 W TDP. The CPU supports DDR4 and DDR5 memory in a dual-channel configuration, with 20 MB of shared L3 cache and 1.25 MB of L2 per core.

Benchmark results show strong multi-threaded performance: Cinebench R23 multi-core scores 21,645, Cinebench R20 multi-core scores 9,090, and Cinebench R15 multi-core scores 2,181. Geekbench multi-core is 11,268. PassMark multithread is 25,470, with floating-point math at 61,319 and integer math at 81,524. The data compression score of 315,521 and encryption score of 16,949 indicate solid throughput for varied workloads.

Single-thread performance is equally important for gaming. The i5-14400F scores 3,055 in Cinebench R23 single-core, 1,283 in Cinebench R20 single-core, and 307 in Cinebench R15 single-core. Geekbench single-core is 2,058, and PassMark single-thread is 3,701. These figures place the CPU in the 83rd percentile of all CPUs, with an average benchmark score of 32,279.

In Evolve, the CPU's role is to maintain frame delivery, particularly at lower resolutions where the GPU can produce high frame rates. At 1080p Low, the combo achieves 168 FPS, which requires the CPU to issue draw calls and update game state at a rate of 168 times per second. The i5-14400F's single-thread score of 3,055 (Cinebench R23) suggests it has sufficient headroom for this task, as the GPU remains the limiting factor even at this high frame rate.

The CPU's 10 cores and 16 threads provide ample parallel processing for the game's AI, physics, and streaming systems. Evolve features large maps with multiple AI-controlled monsters and hunters, which can create multi-threaded workloads. The i5-14400F's PassMark physics score of 1,523 and extended instructions score of 19,937 indicate capable processing for these game logic tasks.

The data shows that the CPU is not the bottleneck in any measured configuration. The consistent ~33% FPS drop from 1080p to 1440p and ~43% drop from 1440p to 4K across all settings is characteristic of a GPU-limited scenario. If the CPU were limiting, the scaling from 1080p to 1440p would be less severe because the GPU would idle waiting for CPU data at lower resolutions. Instead, the GPU's pixel rate and texture rate are the binding constraints.

The i5-14400F's nearest rivals in average benchmark score are the AMD Ryzen 7 PRO 8840U (deltaPct 0.1), Intel Core i9-11900 (deltaPct 0.2), AMD Ryzen 7 6800HS (deltaPct -0.2), and Intel Core i7-12800H (deltaPct 0.5). These deltas are all within 0.5%, indicating that the i5-14400F's performance is comparable to a range of mobile and desktop parts from both Intel and AMD. For Evolve, this means the CPU choice is unlikely to produce meaningful frame rate differences; the GPU is the determining factor.