Lockdown Protocol

FAQ

Q: How does the AMD Ryzen 5 5500 compare to its closest rival in synthetic benchmarks?

A: The Ryzen 5 5500 posts an average benchmark score of 20,875, which places it 0.1% behind the Intel Core i5-12500 (20,897) and the AMD Ryzen 5 PRO 4655GE (20,900). It edges out the AMD EPYC 7J13 (20,845) by 0.1% and beats the Intel Core i5-12600T (20,917) by 0.2%—though those deltas are effectively noise.

Q: What is the GPU's synthetic performance standing?

A: The RTX 4070 SUPER scores 42,576 on average, sitting 0.2% below the NVIDIA RTX A6000 (42,653) and 0.3% behind the AMD Radeon RX 7650 GRE (42,723). It leads the AMD Radeon Pro 580X (41,991) by 1.4% and the NVIDIA Tesla M40 (41,897) by 1.6%.

Q: What frame rate can I expect at 1080p with Ultra settings?

A: The measured average is 134 FPS at 1920x1080 with Ultra settings. That drops to 102 FPS at 1440p Ultra and 66.2 FPS at 4K Ultra, showing a steep scaling curve as resolution increases.

Q: Is the CPU or GPU the limiting factor at 1080p?

A: At 1080p Low, the combo hits 239.4 FPS, while at 4K Low it manages 136.8 FPS. The 1080p result is close to what the CPU can feed given its 12 threads and 3.60 GHz base clock, while higher resolutions shift the load toward the GPU's 12 GB VRAM and 504.2 GB/s bandwidth.

Q: How does this combo rank overall in Lockdown Protocol?

A: It ranks 289th out of 1,637 tested combinations, placing it in the top 18% of all configs tested for this game. That is a strong position for a 6-core CPU paired with a 40-series GPU.

Q: What memory configuration does the CPU support?

A: The Ryzen 5 5500 supports DDR4 memory on a dual-channel bus with 51.2 GB/s bandwidth. It uses PCIe Gen 3, which is older than the GPU's PCIe 4.0 x16 interface—a potential bottleneck for data transfer.

GPU Role

The NVIDIA GeForce RTX 4070 SUPER carries the visual load in Lockdown Protocol. Its 12 GB of GDDR6X memory on a 192-bit bus delivers 504.2 GB/s of bandwidth, which is ample for this FPS at high resolutions and settings. The GPU's 7,168 shading units, 224 texture mapping units, and 80 ROPs process the frame buffer efficiently, while 56 RT cores and 224 tensor cores provide headroom for ray tracing and DLSS workloads.

Clock speeds matter here. The GPU boosts to 2,475 MHz from a 1,980 MHz base, and memory runs at 1,313 MHz (21 Gbps effective). These clocks translate into a pixel rate of 198.0 GPixel/s and a texture rate of 554.4 GTexel/s. In practice, the GPU's 35.48 TFLOPS of FP32 compute is what drives the high frame rates seen in the measured data.

The VRAM capacity becomes relevant at 4K Ultra, where the combo still manages 66.2 FPS. At that setting, texture detail and draw distances consume significant memory, and 12 GB is sufficient to avoid stutter or texture pop-in. The GPU's 84th percentile standing among all GPUs reinforces that this is a high-end part, but its end-of-life production status means buyers should consider longevity.

The RTX 4070 SUPER sits between the RTX A6000 and the Radeon RX 7650 GRE in synthetic scores, with deltas under 0.3%. That makes it a consistent performer—not a class leader, but close enough to top-tier workstation cards. In Lockdown Protocol specifically, the GPU's ability to maintain 66 FPS at 4K Ultra while the CPU handles game logic suggests the balance is slightly GPU-heavy at that resolution.

Resolution Scaling

The measured FPS data shows a clear pattern: performance scales inversely with resolution, but the curve is not linear. At 1080p Low, the combo delivers 239.4 FPS. Moving to 1440p Low drops that to 211.7 FPS—a 11.6% reduction. At 4K Low, the average falls to 136.8 FPS, a 42.9% drop from 1080p Low. This indicates that even at Low settings, the GPU is becoming the limiting factor as pixel count rises.

The story shifts at higher settings. At Ultra, 1080p yields 134 FPS, 1440p yields 102 FPS (a 23.9% drop), and 4K yields 66.2 FPS (a 50.6% drop from 1080p). The wider gap between resolutions at Ultra suggests that the GPU's shading units and memory bandwidth are strained more heavily when visual effects are maxed out. The 12 GB VRAM is adequate, but the 192-bit bus width may throttle performance at 4K Ultra where bandwidth demand peaks.

Medium settings show intermediate scaling: 206 FPS at 1080p, 152.5 FPS at 1440p (a 26% drop), and 95.7 FPS at 4K (a 53.5% drop). High settings follow a similar trajectory—182.4 FPS at 1080p, 133.2 FPS at 1440p (27% lower), and 87.8 FPS at 4K (51.9% lower). The consistency of these percentage drops across settings indicates that resolution scaling is governed by the GPU's fill rate and bandwidth, not by CPU-side physics or AI calculations.

For players targeting 144Hz displays, 1080p High (182.4 FPS) and 1440p High (133.2 FPS) are both viable. At 4K, only Low settings (136.8 FPS) exceed 120 FPS, while Medium (95.7 FPS) and High (87.8 FPS) fall short of 100 FPS. The data suggests that this combo is best suited for 1080p and 1440p gaming, with 4K requiring settings compromises.

Measured FPS Breakdown

At 1920x1080, the combo delivers its highest frame rates across all settings. Low settings produce 239.4 FPS average, Medium reduces that to 206 FPS, High comes in at 182.4 FPS, and Ultra bottoms out at 134 FPS. The jump from Low to Ultra is a 44% reduction, which is substantial but expected for a visually demanding FPS. Even at Ultra, 134 FPS is well above the 60 FPS threshold for smooth play, and it clears 120 FPS for high-refresh monitors.

Moving to 2560x1440, the averages are 211.7 FPS (Low), 152.5 FPS (Medium), 133.2 FPS (High), and 102 FPS (Ultra). The 1440p Ultra figure of 102 FPS is notable—it barely crosses the 100 FPS mark, meaning players with 144Hz panels will need to drop to High settings (133.2 FPS) to fully utilize their display. The gap between Medium and High at 1440p is 19.3 FPS, while the gap between High and Ultra is 31.2 FPS, suggesting diminishing returns from High to Ultra.

At 3840x2160, the numbers drop significantly: 136.8 FPS (Low), 95.7 FPS (Medium), 87.8 FPS (High), and 66.2 FPS (Ultra). The 4K Low figure is still respectable for competitive play, but 4K Ultra at 66.2 FPS is borderline for a smooth experience on standard 60Hz monitors. The delta between 4K Low and 4K Medium is 41.1 FPS, while the delta from Medium to High is just 7.9 FPS—indicating that Medium to High is a relatively minor visual upgrade at 4K.

Across all resolutions, the pattern holds: Low settings give the biggest headroom, Ultra gives the most demanding load, and the GPU's 12 GB VRAM never becomes a hard bottleneck. The data shows no min or max FPS values, so the averages represent sustained performance rather than peak or dip behavior.

How This Combo Ranks

In Lockdown Protocol, this CPU-GPU combination ranks 289th out of 1,637 tested combos. That places it in the top 17.7% of all configurations—a strong showing for a mid-range CPU paired with a high-end GPU. The ranking reflects the game's sensitivity to both CPU and GPU performance, but the CPU's 79th percentile standing among all processors suggests it is not the primary limiter.

The RTX 4070 SUPER's 84th percentile among all GPUs is higher than the CPU's 79th percentile, which aligns with the measured FPS data: the GPU is doing more of the heavy lifting in this game. The combo's rank of 289 implies that most of the 1,348 combos ranked above it feature either a stronger CPU or a more powerful GPU, but the delta is likely small given the GPU's high percentile.

Compared to the CPU's nearest rivals, the Ryzen 5 5500 is essentially tied with the Core i5-12500 and Ryzen 5 PRO 4655GE. Those CPUs, when paired with similar GPUs, would likely land within a few ranks of this combo. The EPYC 7J13 and Core i5-12600T are also within 0.2% of the Ryzen's score, so the field at this performance level is tight.

For a 6-core, 12-thread CPU with a 16 MB L3 cache, the ranking is respectable. The CPU's 16,429 Cinebench R23 multicore score and 2,319 single-core score indicate it can feed the GPU adequately in most scenarios. The combo rank of 289 out of 1,637 is a practical data point for builders considering this pairing—it shows that the Ryzen 5 5500 does not hold back the RTX 4070 SUPER to a significant degree in this title.

CPU Role

The AMD Ryzen 5 5500 is a 6-core, 12-thread processor based on Zen 3 architecture (Cezanne codename) on a 7 nm process. It runs at a 3.60 GHz base clock and 4.20 GHz boost clock, with a 65 W TDP. The CPU's cache hierarchy includes 64 KB of L1 per core, 512 KB of L2 per core, and 16 MB of shared L3 cache. These specifications make it a solid mid-range part for gaming, though not a top-tier performer.

In Lockdown Protocol, the CPU's role is to handle game logic, physics, and AI calculations while the GPU renders frames. The 12 threads provide enough parallelism for modern FPS titles, and the 4.20 GHz boost clock ensures responsive single-threaded performance. The CPU's 3DMark scores—5,386 for 16 threads and 836 for single-thread—show that it scales well with multi-threaded workloads, which is relevant for games that use multiple cores.

The memory bandwidth of 51.2 GB/s is modest, but the dual-channel DDR4 support is sufficient for this game. The CPU's PCIe Gen 3 interface is a potential limitation when paired with the GPU's PCIe 4.0 x16 slot, but the measured FPS data suggests this does not bottleneck performance in Lockdown Protocol.

The Cinebench R23 multicore score of 16,429 and single-core score of 2,319 place the CPU in a competitive position. Its passmark multithread score of 19,330 and single-thread score of 3,058 further confirm that it can keep up with the RTX 4070 SUPER in most gaming scenarios. The CPU's 79th percentile ranking among all CPUs indicates it is better than the majority of processors, but not in the top tier.

At 1080p Low, where CPU load is relatively higher compared to GPU load, the combo still achieves 239.4 FPS. This suggests the Ryzen 5 5500 is capable of feeding the GPU even at high frame rates. The lack of min FPS data means we cannot assess frame-time consistency, but the average FPS figures point to a well-balanced pairing for this game.