Hard West

Resolution Scaling

The measured FPS data for Hard West shows a predictable but steep decline as resolution increases, with the frame rate roughly scaling according to pixel count. At 1080p with Low settings, the combo produces 317.8 FPS; dropping to 1440p Low reduces this to 237 FPS, a 25% reduction; and at 4K Low the average falls to 123.8 FPS, which is 61% below the 1080p figure. This pattern indicates that the NVIDIA GeForce RTX 5090 is the primary limiter at higher resolutions, as the rendering load grows faster than the CPU's ability to feed frames.

The scaling is more severe at higher settings. At Ultra, the 1080p average is 176.2 FPS, the 1440p average is 114.5 FPS (a 35% drop), and the 4K average is 61 FPS (a 65% drop from 1080p). The fact that the 4K Ultra result is the only measured figure below 60 FPS suggests that the GPU is being saturated by the combination of maximum settings and 8.3 million pixels. Conversely, the 1080p Low result of 317.8 FPS is likely close to the engine's frame rate ceiling or the CPU's single-thread limit, since the gap between Low and Medium at 1080p is only 20 FPS (317.8 vs 297.4), while the gap between Medium and High is 58 FPS (297.4 vs 239.1). This compression at the top end indicates diminishing returns from GPU headroom at lower resolutions.

Between 1080p and 1440p, the average FPS drop across all settings is roughly 30%, which closely matches the pixel count increase of 78% (2.07 million to 3.69 million pixels) when accounting for the fact that the RTX 5090 has ample bandwidth to mitigate some of the scaling penalty. The 1440p to 4K transition shows a sharper decline, with High settings dropping from 147.6 to 80.1 FPS (a 46% reduction), confirming that the 4K resolution begins to expose the GPU's shading and memory throughput limits. The data suggests that for smooth 4K gameplay, users should target Medium or High presets, where the averages remain above 80 FPS.

CPU Role

The Intel Core i7-14700KF is a 20-core, 28-thread processor based on Raptor Lake architecture, with a base clock of 3.40 GHz and a boost clock of 5.60 GHz. Its benchmark scores are consistently strong: the Cinebench R23 multi-core result is 44,557, and the single-core score is 6,290, placing it in the 96th percentile of all CPUs. For Hard West, a turn-based tactics title from 2015, the CPU's role is primarily in handling game logic, AI pathfinding, and physics calculations, which are typically single-threaded or lightly threaded workloads.

The measured FPS data shows that at 1080p Low, the combo reaches 317.8 FPS, which is likely near the practical ceiling for this engine. The gap between Low and Medium at 1080p is 20 FPS, while the gap between Medium and High is 58 FPS, suggesting that the CPU can comfortably feed the GPU at lower settings but becomes less relevant as the GPU load increases. In contrast, the 4K Ultra result of 61 FPS is clearly GPU-bound, as the CPU's multi-core performance (Cinebench R23 multi-core of 44,557) far exceeds what a turn-based game would require for frame generation.

Compared to its nearest rivals, the i7-14700KF scores within 0.4% of the AMD Ryzen 9 9950X (avg score 70,420 vs 70,104) and is effectively tied with the Intel Core i7-14700K (deltaPct 0). This means that for Hard West, the CPU is unlikely to be a bottleneck in any scenario, as even the 1080p Low result is likely limited by the engine's frame rate cap or draw call processing rather than raw core throughput. The 20 cores and 28 threads provide ample parallel processing for background tasks, but the game's turn-based nature means that most frames are generated from static scenes with minimal CPU work per frame.

GPU Role

The NVIDIA GeForce RTX 5090 is the dominant component in this combo, with 32 GB of GDDR7 memory on a 512-bit bus delivering 1.79 TB/s of bandwidth. Its memory clock is 1750 MHz (28 Gbps effective), and the base clock is 2017 MHz with a boost of 2407 MHz. The GPU's PassMark G3D score of 39,650 places it in the 94th percentile of all GPUs, and its nearest rival (the RTX 5090 D) is within 0.1% in average score. This hardware is designed for extreme resolutions and high settings, which is reflected in the measured results.

At 1080p, the RTX 5090 is overkill for Hard West, as even Ultra settings produce 176.2 FPS, and Low settings reach 317.8 FPS. The GPU's 32 GB VRAM is far more than the game requires, and the 1.79 TB/s bandwidth ensures that texture streaming is never a bottleneck. The real test comes at 4K Ultra, where the average drops to 61 FPS. This 61 FPS figure is notable because it is the only measured result below the 60 FPS threshold, indicating that the RTX 5090's shading units (21,760) and render output units (176) are being fully utilized by the game's post-processing and lighting effects at maximum settings.

The scaling from High to Ultra at 4K (80.1 to 61 FPS, a 24% drop) shows that the Ultra preset introduces significant GPU load, likely from higher shadow resolution, ambient occlusion, and anti-aliasing techniques. The fact that 4K Medium achieves 103 FPS suggests that the RTX 5090 has headroom to handle the resolution, but the Ultra preset's additional features push it to its limits. The GPU's FP32 throughput of 104.8 TFLOPS is more than sufficient for a 2015 title, but the game's engine may not be optimized for modern GPU architectures, resulting in inefficiencies that cap performance below what the hardware could theoretically deliver.

Settings Recommendations

Based on the measured FPS rows, the optimal settings depend on the target resolution and refresh rate. For 1080p displays, the High preset delivers 239.1 FPS, which exceeds the refresh rate of most monitors (typically 144 Hz or 240 Hz). The Ultra preset at 176.2 FPS is also viable for 240 Hz displays, but the 63 FPS difference between High and Ultra (239.1 vs 176.2) suggests that the visual gains from Ultra may not justify the performance cost if the display cannot show the extra frames.

For 1440p, the High preset at 147.6 FPS is the best balance, as it comfortably exceeds 144 Hz refresh rates. The Medium preset at 192.4 FPS is also excellent for 165 Hz or 240 Hz panels, while the Ultra preset at 114.5 FPS is still smooth but may not satisfy users with 144 Hz displays who want to avoid screen tearing. The Low preset at 237 FPS is unnecessary for most users, as the visual quality reduction is not worth the marginal FPS gain over Medium.

For 4K, the Medium preset at 103 FPS is the recommended choice, as it provides a smooth experience on 60 Hz displays and is close to 100 FPS for 120 Hz panels. The High preset at 80.1 FPS is acceptable for 60 Hz displays with VRR, but the Ultra preset at 61 FPS is only suitable for 60 Hz panels without VRR, as any frame time variance could cause stuttering. The Low preset at 123.8 FPS is not recommended, as the visual degradation is severe for only a 20% FPS improvement over Medium.

How This Combo Ranks

The Intel Core i7-14700KF + NVIDIA GeForce RTX 5090 combination ranks 6th out of 1,699 tested combos for Hard West. This top-1% ranking (0.35% of all combos) is consistent with the hardware's benchmark scores: the CPU is in the 96th percentile of all CPUs, and the GPU is in the 94th percentile of all GPUs. The rank of 6 suggests that only a handful of other combos achieve higher average FPS in this game, likely those with even more powerful CPUs (such as the AMD Ryzen 9 9950X, which is within 0.4% of the i7-14700KF in average score) paired with the same GPU.

The ranking indicates that this combo is near the top of the performance hierarchy for Hard West, which is expected given the game's age and the hardware's modern capabilities. The fact that the combo does not rank first is likely due to the game's engine being more sensitive to single-thread performance than multi-core throughput, and the i7-14700KF's single-core score of 6,290 (Cinebench R23) may be slightly behind the top-tier CPUs in this regard. However, the 6th place ranking out of 1,699 combos means that users of this configuration will experience near-maximum performance in this title, with no practical improvement available from other hardware combinations.

Measured FPS Breakdown

At 1920x1080, the measured averages are as follows: Low settings produce 317.8 FPS, Medium produces 297.4 FPS, High produces 239.1 FPS, and Ultra produces 176.2 FPS. The 20 FPS difference between Low and Medium indicates that the Low preset removes most GPU-intensive effects, while the 63 FPS drop from Medium to High suggests that High enables significant post-processing. The 63 FPS drop from High to Ultra (239.1 to 176.2) shows that the Ultra preset adds even more demanding effects, likely including higher shadow quality and anisotropic filtering.

At 2560x1440, the averages are: Low at 237 FPS, Medium at 192.4 FPS, High at 147.6 FPS, and Ultra at 114.5 FPS. The 44.6 FPS difference between Low and Medium is proportionally similar to the 1080p gap, but the 44.8 FPS drop from Medium to High is more pronounced, indicating that the GPU is starting to feel the resolution increase. The 33.1 FPS difference between High and Ultra is smaller than at 1080p, suggesting that the Ultra preset's overhead is partially masked by the GPU's bandwidth advantage at this resolution.

At 3840x2160, the averages are: Low at 123.8 FPS, Medium at 103 FPS, High at 80.1 FPS, and Ultra at 61 FPS. The 20.8 FPS drop from Low to Medium is consistent with the 1080p and 1440p patterns, but the 22.9 FPS drop from Medium to High and the 19.1 FPS drop from High to Ultra show that the GPU is being taxed heavily at 4K. The fact that the 4K Ultra result (61 FPS) is just above the 60 FPS threshold suggests that the RTX 5090 is operating at its practical limit for this game, and any further settings increase would require a resolution reduction or frame rate cap.