Greedfall

Greedfall, a 2019 Action RPG, presents a demanding workload for the Intel Core i5-14600K and NVIDIA GeForce GTX 1650 combination. The measured frame rates across the board indicate that this pairing is better suited for lower resolutions and settings, with the GPU acting as the primary constraint. The data shows that achieving a playable experience requires careful adjustment of the graphical presets, as the performance headroom varies significantly between the tested configurations.

Settings Recommendations

The benchmark results indicate that the most balanced experience for this combo is found at 1920x1080 with the Low preset, which delivers an average of 72.9 FPS. This is the only setting and resolution combination that breaks the 60 FPS threshold, providing a smooth and responsive frame rate that is ideal for action-oriented gameplay. While the Medium preset at the same resolution achieves a respectable 58.2 FPS, the 14.7 FPS drop from Low to Medium suggests that the additional graphical fidelity comes at a significant performance cost.

At 1920x1080 with the High preset, the average FPS falls to 50.3, which is still playable but begins to show the GPU's limitations. The Ultra preset at this resolution is largely impractical, with an average of only 30.7 FPS. This makes the Low preset the clear recommendation for the best experience, as it provides a substantial performance buffer and avoids the stutter-prone territory seen in higher settings. For users who prioritize visual quality over frame rate, the Medium preset at 1920x1080 is the highest viable option, offering a playable 58.2 FPS average. Moving to 2560x1440, even the Low preset dips to 47.7 FPS, and the High preset falls to 37 FPS, making 1080p the only resolution where this combo can be considered comfortably playable.

CPU Role

The Intel Core i5-14600K is a 14-core, 20-thread processor from the Core 14th Gen series, based on the Raptor Lake architecture. It features a base clock of 3.50 GHz and a boost clock of 5.30 GHz, which provides strong single-thread performance. This is reflected in its benchmark scores, such as a Cinebench R23 single-core score of 4642 and a Geekbench single-core score of 2803. This processor is clearly not the bottleneck in this configuration, as its high-frequency cores are more than capable of feeding frames to the GPU.

The processor's multi-threaded capabilities are also substantial, with a Cinebench R23 multi-core score of 32881 and a Passmark multithread score of 38682. It holds a 93rd percentile ranking against all CPUs, with an average benchmark score of 49166, placing it in the top tier of processors. Its nearest rival, the AMD Ryzen 9 5950X, has a nearly identical average score of 49062, showing a deltaPct of only 0.2. This indicates that the CPU is not a limiting factor in Greedfall, as the game's performance is far more dependent on the graphics card. The data suggests that the CPU has ample headroom, and the frame rates observed are a direct result of the GPU's rendering capabilities rather than any CPU constraint.

GPU Role

The NVIDIA GeForce GTX 1650 is the decisive component in this pairing. This GPU, based on the Turing architecture, is equipped with 4 GB of GDDR5 memory on a 128-bit bus, providing a bandwidth of 128.1 GB/s. It has a base clock of 1485 MHz and a boost clock of 1665 MHz. While its specifications are modest, they are the primary determinant of the performance seen in the measured FPS data. The GPU's 43rd percentile ranking against all GPUs, with an average benchmark score of 8713, confirms its position as an entry-level part in the current landscape.

The GPU's memory capacity and bandwidth are critical factors in Greedfall, as the game's texture and asset streaming demands can quickly overwhelm the 4 GB frame buffer, especially at higher resolutions and settings. The significant drop in FPS when moving from 1080p to 1440p and 4K underscores this limitation. The GTX 1650's nearest rival, the NVIDIA GeForce RTX 3050 A Mobile, has a nearly identical average score of 8746, with a deltaPct of -0.4, highlighting that this is performance tier is tightly clustered. The GPU's DirectX 12 benchmark score of 35 further indicates its limited capability in modern rendering workloads. The data clearly shows that the GTX 1650 is the limiting component, as the CPU is far more powerful in relative terms.

How This Combo Ranks

In the aggregate benchmark database, this specific combination of the Intel Core i5-14600K and NVIDIA GeForce GTX 1650 ranks 1657 out of 1705 tested combos for Greedfall. This places it in the bottom 3% of all tested configurations, indicating that while it can run the game, its performance is far below what most other pairings achieve. This low ranking is almost entirely attributable to the GTX 1650, which drags down the overall capability of the system despite the presence of a high-end processor.

The ranking illustrates a significant imbalance within the combo. The CPU sits in the 93rd percentile, while the GPU is in the 43rd percentile. This mismatch means that the system is heavily GPU-bound, wasting the potential of the i5-14600K. The data suggests that this pairing would be better served by a more powerful graphics card to unlock the CPU's full potential. As it stands, the combo's rank of 1657 is a direct consequence of the GPU's inability to keep pace with the CPU, resulting in a system that is not well-balanced for this specific game's demands.

Resolution Scaling

The measured FPS data reveals a steep performance decline as resolution increases, confirming the GPU's role as the bottleneck. At 1920x1080 with the Low preset, the combo achieves an average of 72.9 FPS. Moving to 2560x1440 with the same settings, the average FPS drops to 47.7, a decrease of 25.2 FPS. Further scaling to 3840x2160 results in an average of just 31.7 FPS, a significant drop from the 1080p figure. This pattern is consistent across all settings presets.

This scaling behavior is typical of a system where the GPU is the limiting factor. The CPU has enough power to handle the game's logic at all resolutions, but the GTX 1650's rendering capacity is quickly exhausted as the pixel count increases. The frame rate drop from 1080p to 4K at the Low setting is from 72.9 FPS to 31.7 FPS, a reduction of over 56%. This indicates that the GPU's fill rate and memory bandwidth are insufficient for higher resolutions. The data shows that the GTX 1650 is most comfortable at 1080p, and any attempt to scale to higher resolutions results in a disproportionate loss of performance, solidifying the conclusion that the graphics card, not the processor, dictates the playable settings for this combo.