Evolve

Evolve, a 2015 FPS title, shows a wide performance spread across settings on the Intel Core i5-14600KF and Intel Arc B570 combination. The measured data reveals a system that can handle the game smoothly at mainstream resolutions, but struggles to maintain playable frame rates at 4K with higher quality presets. The following analysis breaks down the measured FPS results, examines the scaling behavior, and contextualizes the component roles based strictly on the provided benchmark data.

Settings Recommendations

The measured FPS data for this combination points to Medium as the optimal settings preset for the best balance of visual quality and performance. At 1920x1080, the Medium preset delivers an average of 106 FPS, which is a substantial 28% higher than the High preset's 83 FPS. This frame rate is well above the threshold for smooth gameplay and provides significant headroom for demanding scenes. The minimum FPS recorded at Medium 1080p is 90, indicating that even in less favorable moments, the experience remains fluid.

For users with 2560x1440 displays, the Medium preset also stands out as the recommended choice. The data shows an average of 71 FPS at this resolution, with a minimum of 60 FPS. This keeps the frame rate in a range that most players would find acceptable for a fast-paced FPS. While the High preset at 1440p achieves 56 FPS, the Medium setting offers a more comfortable margin above the 60 FPS threshold, making it the safer and more consistent option.

At 3840x2160, the situation becomes more challenging. The Low preset is the only viable option for playable performance, yielding an average of 52 FPS. The Medium preset at 4K drops to 40 FPS, which is borderline for a competitive shooter, and High falls to 32 FPS. The Ultra preset at 4K is effectively unplayable at 22 FPS. Therefore, for 4K gaming, the Low preset is the recommended setting, though it requires a significant compromise in visual fidelity.

The Ultra preset is not recommended at any resolution. At 1080p it produces 58 FPS, which is lower than the High preset's 83 FPS, suggesting a steep performance cost for marginal visual gains. At 1440p, Ultra drops to 39 FPS, and at 4K it falls to 22 FPS. The data clearly indicates that the Ultra preset imposes a heavy load on the GPU, and the performance penalty outweighs the benefits for this title.

FAQ

Q: What is the best resolution for this CPU and GPU combo in Evolve?

A: Based on the measured data, 1920x1080 with Medium settings provides the highest average frame rate (106 FPS) with a solid minimum (90 FPS). While 2560x1440 on Medium is also playable at 71 FPS, 1080p offers the best combination of speed and stability.

Q: How does the Ultra preset compare to High in terms of performance?

A: The Ultra preset is significantly more demanding. At 1920x1080, Ultra yields 58 FPS compared to High's 83 FPS, a 30% decrease in performance. This pattern holds at 1440p (39 FPS vs 56 FPS) and 4K (22 FPS vs 32 FPS), indicating that Ultra's visual enhancements come at a steep cost.

Q: Is this combo capable of 4K gaming in Evolve?

A: Yes, but only with the Low preset, which achieves an average of 52 FPS. Medium at 4K drops to 40 FPS, and High falls to 32 FPS. For a smooth 4K experience, users must accept the Low settings.

Q: What frame rate can I expect at 1440p with High settings?

A: The measured data shows an average of 56 FPS for the High preset at 2560x1440. This is playable but leaves little headroom for frame rate drops, as the minimum FPS is not recorded for this configuration.

Q: Does the game scale well from Medium to High settings?

A: The scaling is moderate. At 1080p, moving from Medium (106 FPS) to High (83 FPS) results in a 22% performance drop. At 1440p, the drop is from 71 FPS to 56 FPS (21% lower). This suggests that High settings offer a noticeable visual upgrade but require a proportional reduction in frame rate.

Q: How does the combo's performance rank among all tested configurations?

A: The combo ranks 2294 out of 2872 tested combos for Evolve, placing it in the lower 20% of all configurations. This indicates that while it can run the game, many other CPU-GPU pairings deliver higher frame rates.

Resolution Scaling

The measured FPS data reveals a clear pattern in how performance scales from 1080p to 4K. At the Medium preset, the average frame rate drops from 106 FPS at 1920x1080 to 71 FPS at 2560x1440, a 33% reduction. Moving to 3840x2160, the frame rate falls to 40 FPS, which is a further 44% decrease from the 1440p figure. This steep decline suggests that the GPU is the primary limiting factor, as the pixel count quadruples from 1080p to 4K but the frame rate drops by more than half.

The High preset shows a similar trend. The average FPS goes from 83 at 1080p to 56 at 1440p (a 33% drop) and then to 32 at 4K (a 43% drop from 1440p). This consistent scaling pattern across presets indicates that the Intel Arc B570's rendering throughput is the bottleneck at higher resolutions. The CPU's role becomes less significant as resolution increases, since the GPU is tasked with processing a larger number of pixels.

However, the Low preset exhibits a different scaling characteristic. At 1080p, it achieves 137 FPS, which drops to 92 FPS at 1440p (a 33% reduction). At 4K, the frame rate is 52 FPS, a 43% drop from 1440p. The relative decreases are similar to other presets, but the absolute frame rates are higher, suggesting that the GPU still has headroom when graphical complexity is low. The data implies that at 1080p Low, the system may be partially limited by the CPU, as the GPU is not fully saturated.

The scaling behavior indicates that the Arc B570's 10 GB of VRAM and 380.0 GB/s bandwidth are sufficient for the lower resolutions but become strained at 4K, particularly with higher settings. The 160-bit memory bus likely contributes to the significant performance drop at 4K, where the demand for texture data and frame buffer operations increases substantially.

Measured FPS Breakdown

At 1920x1080, the measured average frame rates are as follows: Low settings produce 137 FPS, Medium settings produce 106 FPS (with a minimum of 90 and maximum of 122), High settings produce 83 FPS, and Ultra settings produce 58 FPS. The progression from Low to Ultra shows a consistent decline, with each step up in quality costing roughly 20-25% of the frame rate. The Medium preset's minimum FPS of 90 ensures a smooth experience even during intense gameplay moments.

At 2560x1440, the average frame rates are: Low at 92 FPS, Medium at 71 FPS (with a minimum of 60 and maximum of 82), High at 56 FPS, and Ultra at 39 FPS. The Medium preset again provides the most balanced experience, with the minimum FPS of 60 aligning exactly with the commonly cited target for fluid gaming. The High and Ultra presets fall below this threshold, making them less suitable for competitive play.

At 3840x2160, the average frame rates are: Low at 52 FPS, Medium at 40 FPS (with a minimum of 34 and maximum of 47), High at 32 FPS, and Ultra at 22 FPS. Only the Low preset achieves an average above 50 FPS, while Medium dips below the 60 FPS target. The Ultra preset's 22 FPS is a slideshow and is not recommended for any practical use. The Minimum FPS data for Medium at 4K (34 FPS) shows significant frame time variance, which could lead to noticeable stuttering.

The data reveals that the Arc B570 can handle 1080p gaming with high frame rates across all settings, but its performance degrades rapidly at higher resolutions. The gap between Low and Ultra settings widens as resolution increases, indicating that the GPU's shading units and memory bandwidth are stretched thin at 4K with high graphical loads.

How This Combo Ranks

The Intel Core i5-14600KF and Intel Arc B570 combination ranks 2294 out of 2872 tested combos in Evolve. This places it in the 20th percentile of all configurations, meaning that 80% of tested combos deliver higher frame rates in this game. The ranking suggests that while this system is functional, it is not optimized for Evolve's engine, which may favor other hardware architectures.

The CPU's benchmark percentile is high, ranking in the 90th percentile of all CPUs, with an average benchmark score of 49394. Its nearest rivals include the AMD Ryzen 9 7900 (0.3% higher score), the AMD Ryzen 7 PRO 5755G (0.4% higher), and the Intel Core Ultra 5 245 (0.8% higher). This indicates that the i5-14600KF has ample processing power, yet the combo's in-game rank is low. This disparity suggests that the GPU is the limiting factor in Evolve's performance.

The GPU's percentile is 65, with an average benchmark score of 20556. Its nearest rivals include the NVIDIA GeForce RTX 3070 Mobile (0.1% higher score), the Intel Arc A750 (0.1% lower), and the AMD Radeon R9 M390X (0.5% lower). The Arc B570's mid-range standing aligns with the measured FPS results, which show moderate performance at 1080p but struggles at higher resolutions. The combo's low rank in Evolve is likely due to the GPU's inability to sustain high frame rates at demanding settings, despite the CPU's strong compute capabilities.

CPU Role

The Intel Core i5-14600KF features 14 cores and 20 threads, with a base clock of 3.50 GHz and a boost clock of 5.30 GHz. Its cache hierarchy includes 80 KB of L1 per core, 2 MB of L2 per core, and 24 MB of shared L3 cache. This configuration is designed for high multi-threaded performance, as evidenced by its Cinebench R23 multi-core score of 32544 and single-core score of 4594. The CPU's PassMark multithread score is 38697, and its single-thread score is 4273.

In Evolve, the CPU's role is to feed the GPU with draw calls and physics calculations. The measured FPS data shows that at 1080p Low, the system achieves 137 FPS, which is likely near the CPU's frame rate ceiling for this game. At 4K Low, the frame rate drops to 52 FPS, indicating that the GPU becomes the bottleneck as resolution increases. The CPU's high single-thread performance, demonstrated by its Geekbench single-core score of 2445, ensures that it can keep up with the game's logic without becoming a limiting factor at lower resolutions.

The CPU's 125W TDP and support for DDR4 and DDR5 memory suggest it can maintain high clocks under load, but the game's performance is more dependent on the GPU. The fact that the combo ranks in the 20th percentile despite the CPU's 90th percentile standing implies that Evolve's performance is not CPU-bound in most scenarios. The CPU's 14 cores and 20 threads provide ample headroom for background tasks, but the game's engine likely does not utilize all of them effectively.

GPU Role

The Intel Arc B570 is built on the Xe2-HPG architecture with 2304 shading units, 144 TMUs, and 80 ROPs. It has a base and boost clock of 2500 MHz, with 10 GB of GDDR6 memory on a 160-bit bus, providing 380.0 GB/s of bandwidth. The GPU's FP32 performance is 11.52 TFLOPS, and it features 18 ray tracing cores. Its PassMark G3D score is 14195, and its 3DMark Steel Nomad DX12 score is 2649.

The GPU's performance in Evolve is directly reflected in the measured FPS data. At 1080p, the GPU can deliver high frame rates, with Low settings hitting 137 FPS and Medium at 106 FPS. However, as resolution increases, the GPU's limited memory bandwidth and 10 GB VRAM become apparent. At 4K, the frame rates drop significantly, with even Medium settings only reaching 40 FPS. The 160-bit memory bus is a likely culprit, as higher resolutions require more memory traffic for textures and frame buffers.

The GPU's 65th percentile standing among all GPUs aligns with its mid-range performance. Its nearest rival, the Intel Arc A750, scores nearly identically (0.1% difference), suggesting that the B570 is a refined but not dramatically faster version of its predecessor. The GPU's 2500 MHz clock speed is consistent across base and boost, indicating a fixed operating point. The data shows that the GPU is the primary limiter in Evolve at higher resolutions, as the CPU's strong benchmark scores do not translate into proportional in-game performance gains.