Lockdown Protocol

The AMD Ryzen 9 9900X and AMD Radeon RX 5700 XT pairing delivers a playable but not exceptional experience in Lockdown Protocol, with frame rates that scale predictably across resolutions and settings. The data shows a system where the GPU is the dominant constraint at higher resolutions, while the CPU’s strong multi-threaded performance keeps 1080p results competitive. The combo places in the 23rd percentile of tested configurations, indicating that while it can handle the game, it is outclassed by a significant majority of other pairings.

Resolution Scaling

The measured FPS reveals a steep performance drop as resolution increases, a classic indicator of GPU-bound operation. At 1080p with Low settings, the system produces 155.3 FPS. Moving to 1440p Low reduces this to 112.5 FPS, a decline of 42.8 FPS, and at 4K Low, the average falls to 75.8 FPS. This pattern shows that the Radeon RX 5700 XT’s rendering throughput is the limiting factor; the Ryzen 9 9900X’s 12 cores and 24 threads are not the bottleneck at these settings.

The scaling becomes more pronounced at higher quality presets. At Ultra settings, the frame rate drops from 73 FPS at 1080p to 51.5 FPS at 1440p, and finally to 37.6 FPS at 4K. The gap between 1080p and 4K at Ultra is a 35.4 FPS reduction, which is a 48.5% loss. This indicates that the GPU’s pixel fill rate and memory bandwidth are being saturated, as the 8 GB of GDDR6 memory and 448.0 GB/s bandwidth are strained by the increased load. The CPU’s high boost clock of 5.60 GHz and robust Cinebench R23 multi-core score of 46438 appear sufficient to feed the GPU, as frame rates do not plateau at the lower resolutions, which would suggest a CPU limit.

Settings Recommendations

The optimal balance between visual quality and performance is found at Medium settings for most resolutions. At 1080p, Medium yields 110.1 FPS, which is only 45.2 FPS less than Low but provides a substantial visual upgrade over Low. At 1440p, Medium delivers 83.4 FPS, a very playable figure for a fast-paced FPS, while High drops to 73.8 FPS. The data suggests that High settings are only viable for 1080p gaming, where the 98.9 FPS average remains smooth.

Ultra settings are largely impractical across the board. At 1080p, Ultra produces 73 FPS, which is below the 75.8 FPS achieved at 4K Low, highlighting the disproportionate cost of Ultra effects. At 1440p and 4K, Ultra falls to 51.5 FPS and 37.6 FPS respectively, both of which are below the typical 60 FPS target for competitive play. The data indicates that Medium is the recommended preset for this combo, offering a 32.7% performance uplift over High at 1440p, while still maintaining a higher fidelity than Low. For 4K, even Medium is borderline, and users should expect to lower settings to Low to achieve a stable 75.8 FPS.

GPU Role

The AMD Radeon RX 5700 XT, with its 8 GB of GDDR6 memory on a 256-bit bus, is the clear performance limiter in this configuration. The GPU’s boost clock of 1905 MHz and game clock of 1755 MHz are typical for the RDNA 1.0 architecture, but the card’s age is evident in its 9.754 TFLOPS FP32 throughput. The benchmark results show that the GPU is most comfortable at 1080p, where it can leverage its 64 ROPs to maintain high fill rates.

The VRAM capacity is a critical factor. At 4K with High settings, the card averages 44 FPS, and this drops further to 37.6 FPS at Ultra. The 8 GB frame buffer likely becomes a constraint at these higher resolutions, as texture data exceeds the available memory, causing the GPU to rely on slower system memory over PCIe 4.0. The GPU’s PassMark G3D score of 16277 places it in the 68th percentile of all GPUs, which aligns with its mid-range positioning. Compared to its nearest rivals, the RTX A5000 Mobile is 0.1% slower, the Arc A350M is 0.3% faster, and the RTX 5060 Mobile is 0.6% faster, showing that the RX 5700 XT is still competitive with modern entry-level mobile parts, but it is not a high-end desktop performer.

Measured FPS Breakdown

The complete dataset provides a clear picture of the combo’s capabilities. At 1920x1080, the average FPS ranges from 155.3 on Low to 73 on Ultra. The jump from Low to Medium is a 45.2 FPS drop, while the transition from High to Ultra is a 25.9 FPS drop. This suggests that the Ultra preset introduces effects that are disproportionately expensive relative to their visual benefit.

At 2560x1440, the figures are 112.5 FPS (Low), 83.4 FPS (Medium), 73.8 FPS (High), and 51.5 FPS (Ultra). The gap between Medium and High is only 9.6 FPS, indicating that High is a reasonable step up for 1440p if the user prioritizes fidelity over a small margin of performance. The 4K results are the most telling: 75.8 FPS (Low), 53.2 FPS (Medium), 44 FPS (High), and 37.6 FPS (Ultra). The difference between Low and Medium at 4K is 22.6 FPS, which is a significant enough drop that most users would opt for Low to maintain fluidity.

The data shows a consistent pattern: the RX 5700 XT loses roughly 25-30% of its performance when moving from 1080p to 1440p at the same settings, and another 30-35% when moving from 1440p to 4K. This logarithmic scaling is typical for a GPU with a 256-bit memory interface, as the bandwidth requirement outstrips the available 448.0 GB/s.

How This Combo Ranks

In the overall database of tested combinations for Lockdown Protocol, this pairing of the Ryzen 9 9900X and the RX 5700 XT ranks 1260 out of 1637 combos. This places it in the bottom 23% of all configurations, indicating that it is a lower-mid-tier performer for this specific game. The rank reflects the GPU’s age and performance ceiling relative to the CPU, which is a top-tier processor with a 94th percentile rating among all CPUs.

The CPU’s nearest rivals, such as the Ryzen 9 9900X3D (0.4% faster) and the Core i7-14700F (0.7% slower), show that the processor is not the weak link. Instead, the GPU’s 68th percentile ranking drags the overall combo down. The data suggests that this pairing would be significantly improved by a more modern GPU, as the CPU has ample headroom to support higher frame rates. The combo’s rank is consistent with the measured FPS data, which shows it cannot consistently hit 60 FPS at 4K on High settings, a feat achieved by higher-ranked combinations with more powerful graphics cards.