Lockdown Protocol

The AMD Ryzen 5 8400F and NVIDIA GeForce RTX 4080 SUPER combination delivers a remarkably strong performance profile in Lockdown Protocol, with measured frame rates that comfortably exceed the 144Hz threshold at most quality settings. The data indicates a system that is well-balanced for high-refresh-rate competitive play, though the specific settings chosen will determine whether the experience is optimized for maximum smoothness or maximum visual fidelity.

Settings Recommendations

Benchmark results across the three tested resolutions reveal a clear pattern: the Ultra preset consistently imposes a significant performance penalty, while the Low preset offers the highest frame rates but at a substantial graphical cost. For the best balance of visual quality and performance, the High preset emerges as the recommended choice across all resolutions.

At 1920x1080, the High preset achieves an average of 208 FPS, which is 54.1 FPS higher than the Ultra preset’s 153.9 FPS. This difference is substantial enough to matter for competitive play, where higher frame rates translate directly to smoother input response and reduced latency. The Medium preset sits between the two at 236.1 FPS, but the visual improvement from Medium to High is typically more noticeable than the incremental frame rate gain from High to Medium.

At 2560x1440, the High preset delivers 149 FPS, which is still comfortably above the 144Hz refresh rate that many gaming monitors support. The Ultra preset drops to 112.1 FPS, which is still playable but may introduce noticeable frame pacing issues on high-refresh-rate displays. The Low preset at 242.8 FPS offers headroom for maximum responsiveness, but the graphical compromises are often too severe for a title like Lockdown Protocol where visual clarity can aid target acquisition.

At 3840x2160, the High preset drops to 97.4 FPS. While this is below the 144Hz threshold, it remains well above the 60 FPS minimum for a smooth experience on 4K displays. The Ultra preset at 73.9 FPS is still playable but approaches the lower boundary of what most players would consider acceptable for a fast-paced FPS. The data suggests that for 4K gaming, players should accept the High preset as the optimal balance—it provides 23.5 FPS more than Ultra while maintaining most of the visual enhancements that matter in a competitive shooter.

FAQ

Q: What is the highest average frame rate this combination achieves at 1080p?

A: The highest measured average frame rate at 1920x1080 is 287.4 FPS, achieved with the Low preset. This drops to 208 FPS at High settings and 153.9 FPS at Ultra settings.

Q: How does the RTX 4080 SUPER compare to its nearest rival in terms of average benchmark score?

A: The RTX 4080 SUPER has an average benchmark score of 53610, which is 0.2% higher than the AMD Radeon RX 6900 XT with a score of 53489. It leads the RX 7700S by 2.1% and the RTX 5070 Ti by 2.9%.

Q: Is the Ryzen 5 8400F a bottleneck for this GPU at 4K resolution?

A: The frame rate drop from 1080p to 4K at High settings is significant—from 208 FPS to 97.4 FPS—indicating the GPU is the primary limiting factor at higher resolutions. The CPU’s single-thread performance of 951 in 3DMark is sufficient to keep up with the GPU’s output at 1440p and below.

Q: What is the combo’s overall ranking among tested configurations?

A: The Ryzen 5 8400F + RTX 4080 SUPER combination ranks 111th out of 1637 tested combos in Lockdown Protocol, placing it in the top 6.8% of all configurations tested.

Q: Does increasing settings from Medium to High cost more performance than going from High to Ultra?

A: At 1440p, the Medium to High transition costs 27 FPS (from 176 to 149), while the High to Ultra transition costs 36.9 FPS (from 149 to 112.1). The Ultra preset incurs a larger performance penalty, suggesting it enables computationally expensive effects that scale disproportionately.

Q: What is the CPU’s multithreaded performance relative to its closest rival?

A: The Ryzen 5 8400F achieves a Cinebench R23 multicore score of 20851. Its average benchmark score of 25064 is 0.3% higher than the AMD Ryzen 5 7500F, which scores 24993 in the same metric.

Resolution Scaling

The measured frame rates reveal a predictable scaling pattern as resolution increases, but the magnitude of the drop provides insight into the system’s bottleneck characteristics. At High settings, the transition from 1920x1080 to 2560x1440 reduces performance by 28.4%, from 208 FPS to 149 FPS. The further step to 3840x2160 reduces performance by an additional 34.6%, down to 97.4 FPS.

This scaling behavior indicates that the RTX 4080 SUPER is the dominant limiting component at higher resolutions. The pixel count increases by 78% from 1080p to 1440p, yet frame rate drops by only 28.4%, suggesting the GPU has sufficient headroom at 1080p to handle the additional load. However, the 1440p to 4K transition increases pixel count by 125%, and the frame rate drops by 34.6%, which is closer to linear scaling—a sign that the GPU is becoming saturated.

At Low settings, the scaling is more dramatic. The 1080p result of 287.4 FPS drops to 242.8 FPS at 1440p (a 15.5% reduction) and then to 157.7 FPS at 4K (a 35% reduction from 1440p). The relatively small drop from 1080p to 1440p at Low settings suggests the CPU is more involved in maintaining high frame rates at lower resolutions. The 8400F’s 6-core, 12-thread configuration with a boost clock of 4.70 GHz appears sufficient to feed the GPU at these frame rates, but the increasing pixel workload at 4K shifts the balance firmly toward the GPU.

The Ultra preset shows the steepest scaling curve, with 153.9 FPS at 1080p dropping to 112.1 FPS at 1440p (27.1% reduction) and then to 73.9 FPS at 4K (34.1% reduction). This indicates that Ultra settings introduce rendering features that are particularly demanding on the GPU’s shading and memory subsystems, making resolution scaling more pronounced.

How This Combo Ranks

The combination of the AMD Ryzen 5 8400F and NVIDIA GeForce RTX 4080 SUPER achieves a combo rank of 111 out of 1637 tested configurations in Lockdown Protocol. This places the setup in the top 6.8% of all tested combinations, indicating that it is a high-performing pairing for this specific game.

This ranking is noteworthy because the CPU is not a top-tier processor in absolute terms. The Ryzen 5 8400F has an average benchmark score of 25064, placing it at the 82nd percentile of all CPUs. Its nearest rivals include the AMD Ryzen 7 2700X, which scores nearly identically with a deltaPct of 0%, and the AMD Ryzen 5 7500F, which is 0.3% behind. This suggests the CPU is mid-pack in overall processing power, yet the combo still ranks highly due to the GPU’s strength.

The RTX 4080 SUPER, by contrast, sits at the 88th percentile of all GPUs with an average benchmark score of 53610. Its nearest rival, the AMD Radeon RX 6900 XT, scores 53489 (0.2% behind), while the RTX 5070 Ti is 2.9% behind at 52086. The GPU’s high percentile ranking is the primary driver of the combo’s top-7% placement in Lockdown Protocol.

The gap between the CPU’s 82nd percentile and the GPU’s 88th percentile suggests the combo is slightly GPU-favored, which aligns with the resolution scaling data showing the GPU becoming the primary bottleneck at 4K. The high combo ranking despite a mid-tier CPU indicates that Lockdown Protocol is not exceptionally CPU-demanding, or that the 8400F’s architectural efficiency compensates for its core count.

CPU Role

The AMD Ryzen 5 8400F is a 6-core, 12-thread processor based on the Zen 4 architecture, manufactured on TSMC’s 4 nm process. Its base clock of 4.20 GHz and boost clock of 4.70 GHz provide strong single-thread performance, which is critical for FPS games like Lockdown Protocol that often rely on a few threads for game logic and physics.

Single-thread performance, as measured by the 3DMark single-thread test, is 951. In Cinebench R23, the single-core score is 2943. These numbers indicate solid per-core performance that allows the CPU to maintain high frame rates without becoming a bottleneck at 1080p, where the GPU is less stressed. The 3DMark 2-thread score of 1874 further confirms that the CPU can handle the light multi-threading typical of game engines.

The 12 threads provide sufficient parallel processing for background tasks and modern game engines that use more than 8 threads. The Cinebench R23 multicore score of 20851 demonstrates that the CPU scales reasonably well with thread count, though it is not a workstation-class processor. The L3 cache is 16 MB shared, which is modest by modern standards but adequate for gaming workloads.

The CPU’s role in Lockdown Protocol becomes more apparent at lower resolutions. At 1080p Low settings, the system achieves 287.4 FPS, which is likely approaching the CPU’s frame delivery limit. The 3DMark max-thread score of 6165 and PassMark multithread score of 24530 suggest that the CPU has enough throughput to sustain high frame rates without becoming the limiting factor, provided the GPU is not saturated.

At 4K resolution, the CPU’s relative importance diminishes. The frame rates at all settings are below 158 FPS, which is well within the CPU’s capability to feed the GPU. The bottleneck clearly shifts to the GPU, as evidenced by the 157.7 FPS at Low settings versus the 73.9 FPS at Ultra settings—a 113% difference that is attributable almost entirely to GPU workload.

The 8400F’s 65W TDP and 4 nm process node indicate efficient operation, which is relevant for sustained gaming sessions. The DDR5 memory support with dual-channel configuration and 83.2 GB/s bandwidth ensures the CPU has adequate memory bandwidth to feed its cores, and the PCIe Gen 4 interface with 20 lanes provides sufficient bandwidth for the RTX 4080 SUPER’s PCIe 4.0 x16 connection.