Lockdown Protocol

Lockdown Protocol presents a demanding workload for the AMD Ryzen 7 5800X + Intel Arc B390 combination, with benchmark data showing a system that is progressively limited by the integrated graphics solution as resolution increases. The Arc B390, operating as an IGP with system-shared memory, exhibits a steep performance curve that places it in the 9th percentile of all tested GPUs and ranks this specific combo at 3302 out of 3714 tested combinations in this game, putting it in the lower tenth of the database.

Resolution Scaling

The measured FPS data shows a severe drop in performance as resolution climbs from 1920x1080 to 3840x2160, indicating that the Intel Arc B390 is the dominant limiting component across all tested settings. At High settings, average FPS falls from 55 at 1080p to 40 at 1440p, then further down to 26 at 4K. That represents a 29% reduction from 1080p to 1440p, followed by a 35% reduction from 1440p to 4K. The scaling is not linear, suggesting that memory bandwidth constraints become more acute at higher resolutions.

Low settings show the most dramatic scaling pattern. The system achieves 88 FPS at 1080p Low, which drops to 65 FPS at 1440p Low — a 26% decrease — and then plummets to 42 FPS at 4K Low, a 35% reduction from the 1440p result. The 1080p to 4K delta of 46 FPS represents a 52% performance loss, the largest absolute drop across any of the four settings presets. This steep curve points to the system-shared memory architecture of the Arc B390, where frame buffer data must travel over the system memory bus for each frame.

Medium settings demonstrate the same downward trajectory: 63 FPS at 1080p, 46 FPS at 1440p, and 30 FPS at 4K. The measured minimum and maximum values for Medium settings show a consistent gap — at 1080p the range is 53 to 72 FPS, at 1440p it is 39 to 53, and at 4K it narrows to 25 to 34. The shrinking range at higher resolutions indicates that the GPU is hitting harder performance ceilings as resolution grows, with less headroom for frame-time variation.

Ultra settings produce the lowest absolute numbers and exhibit the steepest relative degradation. The system manages 41 FPS at 1080p Ultra, falls to 30 FPS at 1440p Ultra, and bottoms out at 19 FPS at 4K Ultra. The 4K Ultra result, at under 20 FPS, is effectively unplayable by any standard measure. The scaling from 1080p to 4K at Ultra is a 54% reduction, the largest percentage drop of any settings level.

The overall pattern makes it clear that Lockdown Protocol's pixel-pushing workload overwhelms the Arc B390's capabilities well before the Ryzen 7 5800X's eight Zen 3 cores become relevant. Even at 1080p Low, where the CPU has the least graphical overhead competing for resources, the system only reaches 88 FPS — and that figure drops rapidly as resolution increases, confirming the GPU as the primary constraint.

FAQ

Q: What is the best-case frame rate this combo can achieve in Lockdown Protocol?

The highest measured average FPS is 88, recorded at 1920x1080 with the Low settings preset. At 2560x1440 Low, the average drops to 65 FPS, and at 3840x2160 Low, it falls to 42 FPS.

Q: Can this system handle 4K gaming in Lockdown Protocol?

Barely playable at Low settings, where the average is 42 FPS. At Medium, the average is 30 FPS with a min of 25 and max of 34. High and Ultra are not viable at 4K, with averages of 26 and 19 FPS respectively.

Q: How does the GPU compare to its nearest rivals in benchmark performance?

The Intel Arc B390 has an average benchmark score of 1482, sitting 1.3% above the NVIDIA GeForce GT 520MX (score 1463), 1.5% above the GeForce 800M (score 1460), 2.5% above the GeForce GT 625 OEM (1446), and 2.7% above the GeForce GT 710 (1443). This places it at the 9th percentile of all tested GPUs.

Q: Is the Ryzen 7 5800X the bottleneck in this system?

No — resolution scaling data shows the GPU is the primary limiter. The CPU's 8 cores and 16 threads, with a boost clock of 4.70 GHz, produce strong synthetic scores (e.g., 15,476 in Cinebench R23 multi-core), but FPS drops as resolution rises regardless of settings, which is the signature of a GPU-bound system.

Q: What is the best settings preset for this combo at 1080p?

The Low preset delivers 88 FPS on average, which is the only preset that approaches high-refresh territory. Medium averages 63 FPS, High averages 55, and Ultra averages 41. For competitive play, Low at 1080p is the most viable.

Q: How does this combo rank against other tested combinations in Lockdown Protocol?

It ranks 3302nd out of 3714 tested combos, placing it in the lower 11% of the database. The GPU's 9th percentile score and the CPU's 81st percentile score make the imbalance clear.

CPU Role

The AMD Ryzen 7 5800X is a Zen 3 Vermeer part on the AM4 socket, fabricated on TSMC's 7 nm process node. It offers 8 cores and 16 threads, with a base clock of 3.80 GHz and a boost clock of 4.70 GHz. The processor carries 32 MB of L3 cache, plus 512 KB of L2 per core and 64 KB of L1 per core, and it connects to dual-channel DDR4 memory with a theoretical bandwidth of 51.2 GB/s. Its TDP is 105 W, and it was released in November 2020 with a launch MSRP of $449.

In synthetic multi-threaded tests, the 5800X delivers a Cinebench R23 multi-core score of 15,476 and a single-core score of 1,574.5. Geekbench results show 11,036 multi-core and 2,032 single-core. The 3DMark 16-thread test yields 7,586, while the max-thread run scores 7,578, indicating near-linear scaling from 16 threads. Single-thread 3DMark is 943, and the 2-thread score is 1,846.

In terms of the CPU's percentile standing, the 5800X sits at the 81st percentile against all CPUs. Its nearest rivals are close: the Intel Core Ultra 5 135H (avg score 29,093, a 0.1% delta), the Intel Xeon Phi 7210 (29,245, –0.4% delta), the Intel Core i5-13500HX (29,270, –0.5% delta), and the AMD Ryzen 5 5600XT (28,940, +0.6% delta). This positioning shows the 5800X is a balanced mid-range performer, but none of its rivals are directly relevant to the gaming bottleneck here.

The PassMark results further characterize the 5800X: multi-threaded score of 27,732, single-thread of 3,445, integer math of 94,969, floating-point math of 52,639, and find prime numbers score of 124. These numbers confirm the CPU has ample compute headroom for a game like Lockdown Protocol; the frame rate ceiling is set by the GPU, not the CPU.

How This Combo Ranks

The combo of the Ryzen 7 5800X and Intel Arc B390 ranks 3302nd out of 3714 tested combinations in Lockdown Protocol. That places it at the 88.9th percentile of the worst-performing combos — only about 412 combinations perform worse. The ranking reflects the Arc B390's 9th percentile GPU score, which dominates the overall result despite the CPU's 81st percentile standing.

The delta between CPU and GPU percentiles is stark: the 5800X outperforms 81% of all CPUs, while the Arc B390 outperforms only 9% of GPUs. This imbalance means the combo is heavily constrained by graphics hardware. The measured FPS numbers confirm this — the best possible result (88 FPS at 1080p Low) is achieved only when the graphical load is minimized, and any increase in resolution or settings quickly exposes the GPU's limits.

The 3302nd rank is a poor result for a CPU that is itself ranked in the top 20% of processors. The Arc B390's nearest GPU rivals are all NVIDIA parts from the GeForce 500M/600M era — the GT 520MX, GeForce 800M, GT 625 OEM, and GT 710 — with scores between 1,443 and 1,463. That this modern Intel IGP is only 1.3% to 2.7% faster than those legacy parts in the Steel Nomad test underscores how far the GPU lags the CPU in this pairing.

Measured FPS Breakdown

At 1920x1080, the average FPS numbers are 88 Low, 63 Medium (min 53, max 72), 55 High, and 41 Ultra. The spread from Low to Ultra is 47 FPS, indicating that the GPU scales with settings load without hitting artificial caps — 88 FPS at Low is a genuine result, not a V-Sync or driver limit.

At 2560x1440, the numbers compress: Low 65, Medium 46 (min 39, max 53), High 40, Ultra 30. The gap between Low and Ultra narrows to 35 FPS, and the Medium range tightens. The 4K row shows Low 42, Medium 30 (min 25, max 34), High 26, Ultra 19. At 4K, even the Low preset is only 23 FPS better than Ultra — a compression that reflects the frame buffer and bandwidth constraints of system-shared memory.

The data also reveals that the Medium preset is the only setting with min/max values recorded at every resolution. At 1080p, the range is 53 to 72; at 1440p it is 39 to 53; at 4K it is 25 to 34. These ranges show frame time consistency: the variance is roughly ±9 FPS at 1080p, ±7 FPS at 1440p, and ±4.5 FPS at 4K. This is a strong sign that the GPU is the frame-time governor, since the CPU is far more capable (its 3DMark 16-thread score of 7,586 and 8-core/16-thread design can easily feed the renderer at these low FPS levels).

Settings Recommendations

For this combo, the data strongly favors the 1080p resolution. At 1080p, the Low preset delivers 88 FPS on average, which is the only setting that approaches 90 FPS. Medium at 1080p gives 63 FPS with a range of 53 to 72, which is acceptable for casual play. High at 1080p gives 55 FPS, and Ultra 41. If the user prioritizes frame rate, Medium is the best compromise — it is 63 FPS average, only 25 FPS below Low, but with a much better visual quality.

At 1440p, only Low (65 FPS) is consistently above 60 FPS. Medium at 1440p (46 FPS) and High (40) are borderline, while Ultra (30) is not smooth. At 4K, no setting passes 42 FPS, and the Ultra preset is 19 FPS — effectively unplayable. The data suggests that 1080p Medium is the best balance of visuals and performance, delivering 63 FPS with a usable frame time range. The 4K and 1440p Ultra options are strictly for static scenes or screenshot work, not for actual gameplay.

The range data also gives a hint about frame pacing. The 1080p Medium range of 53 to 72 FPS shows a 19 FPS spread — that is a 26% variance, which is noticeable but tolerable. The 4K Medium range of 25 to 34 is a 9 FPS spread on a 30 FPS average, a 30% variance that is much less stable. The 1440p Medium (39–53) is a 14 FPS spread on a 46 average, about 30%. Oddly, the 1080p Medium has the tightest variance relative to the average, making it the most stable preset in the measured set.

GPU Role

The Intel Arc B390 is an integrated GPU built on Intel's Xe3-LPG architecture, using the Panther Lake chip at a 3nm process node (Intel foundry). Its boost clock is 2500 MHz with a base of 300 MHz. Memory is system-shared — the GPU has no dedicated VRAM; it uses system RAM with "System Shared" bus width and "System Dependent" bandwidth. That architecture is the root cause of the heavy resolution scaling seen in the FPS data.

The GPU's compute configuration is modest: 1,536 shading units, 48 TMUs, 24 ROPs, and 12 ray tracing cores. Its theoretical rates are 60.00 GPixel/s pixel rate, 120.0 GTexel/s texture rate, and 7.680 TFLOPS FP32 (with FP16 at 15.36 TFLOPS). The TDP is only 80 W, and the bus interface is IGP — meaning it sits on the CPU die or package and uses the memory controller for all graphics data. The display outputs are "Portable Device Dependent," and the GPU supports DirectX 12 Ultimate (12_2), OpenGL 4.6, and Vulkan 1.4.

The single benchmark result for the Arc B390 is 3DMark Steel Nomad at 1,482, which places it at the 9th percentile of all GPUs. Its nearest rivals are all legacy NVIDIA parts: GT 520MX (score 1,463, +1.3%), GeForce 800M (1,460, +1.5%), GT 625 OEM (1,446, +2.5%), GT 710 (1,443, +2.7%). This means that in raw compute, the B390 is only slightly faster than a GeForce GT 710, a part from a prior decade.

In Lockdown Protocol, the GPU's limitations manifest immediately. The highest recorded FPS at 1080p Low is 88, which is a plausible frame rate for an IGP with 1,536 shaders, but the FPS drops hard as resolution climbs — the 4Kp Low result of 42 is a 52% reduction from 1080p Low. The system-shared memory is the likely culprit: at 4K, the frame buffer size plus geometry and texture storage competes with the OS and CPU for system memory bandwidth, which is only 51.2 GB/s for the dual-channel DDR4 of the 5800X. The "System Dependent" bandwidth figure is effectively the system memory bandwidth, and it is insufficient for 4K rendering at high settings. The data confirms the GPU role: it is the primary constraint, and the CPU is never the performance limiter in any of the 12 measured data points.