Lockdown Protocol

The AMD Ryzen 9 9950X3D paired with the AMD Radeon RX 6600 is a lopsided combination: the CPU ranks in the 95th percentile of all processors, while the GPU settles at the 63rd percentile. That mismatch is clear in the measured results — in Lockdown Protocol, this combo lands at rank 2901 out of 3714 tested combinations, meaning it performs worse than nearly 78% of the pairs in the database. The data shows a system whose frame rate is strictly governed by the GPU, not the CPU, and that the CPU is never the deciding factor at any resolution or preset. The following analysis uses only the measured numbers from the fact pack to explain why this pairing sits near the bottom of the stack for Lockdown Protocol — and why the GPU is the component to blame.

How This Combo Ranks

With a combo rank of 2901 out of 3714, this system is in the bottom 22% of all tested pairs for Lockdown Protocol. That ranking is unusual because the CPU is an exceptionally fast part — its percentileVsAllCpus is 95, meaning it outperforms 95% of all processors in the database. The GPU, however, is a different story: percentileVsAllGpus is 63, so it lands just above the median. In a game that is primarily GPU‑bound, an average GPU drags down an otherwise outstanding CPU. The 9950X3D’s benchmark scores are strong, with a multi‑core Cinebench R23 score of 42018 and a single‑core score of 2259, but these numbers do nothing for Lockdown Protocol’s frame rate once the GPU is saturated. The measured FPS are all 1080p/1440p/4K, and the CPU’s headroom never shows up because the FPS follow resolution and setting changes, never the CPU’s capabilities.

The GPU’s positioning also explains the low combination rank. Its 63rd percentile places it just above the midpoint. However, the ranking of the combo is far lower because FPS depends on the weakest link, and the RX 6600 is that link at every resolution tested. The CPU’s own rivals — the AMD Ryzen 7 PRO 9755, the Ryzen 7 PRO 9755X3D, the EPYC 8224P, and the Intel Core Ultra 9 285 — all fall within 0.4% of the 9950X3D’s average score, so the CPU is not the discriminating feature. Remove the CPU’s headroom and the only explanation for the 22nd percentile is the GPU.

FAQ

Q: What is the specific ranking of this combo among all tested combinations?

A: The combo ranks 2901 out of 3714 tested combinations, placing it in the bottom 22%.

Q: Which resolution and settings deliver the highest average FPS?

A: In Lockdown Protocol, the 1920x1080 Low preset gives an average of 146 FPS, the highest figure recorded across all tested settings.

Q: Which resolution and settings deliver the lowest average FPS?

A: The 3840x2160 Ultra preset yields an average of 32 FPS, the lowest of the measured groups.

Q: How does the CPU compare to its nearest rivals?

A: The Ryzen 9 9950X3D’s average benchmark score of 75779 is within 0.4% of four similar processors — the AMD Ryzen 7 PRO 9755, AMD Ryzen 7 PRO 9755X3D, AMD EPYC 8224P, and Intel Core Ultra 9 285. The performance delta between them is 0.1%, 0.1%, 0.3%, and 0.4%, respectively, so the CPU is not unique among top parts.

Q: How much VRAM does the GPU have?

A: The Radeon RX 6600 carries 8 GB of GDDR6 memory on a 128‑bit bus, yielding a memory bandwidth of 224.0 GB/s.

Q: Does lowering settings produce proportionally higher FPS?

A: Yes, but the effect is much larger at 1080p than at 4K. Dropping from Low to Ultra at 1080p changes the average from 146 FPS to 69 FPS (a 53% reduction). At 4K, the same preset change goes from 69 FPS to 32 FPS (a 54% reduction). The relative drop is similar, meaning the GPU is still the limiting factor.

Resolution Scaling

Scaling the resolution from 1080p to 4K at each quality level shows a consistent drop in the 50% region. At Low settings, 1920x1080 yields 146 FPS; at 3840x2160, 69 FPS — a 53% decrease. At Medium, 1080p gives 103 FPS, while 4K gives 49 FPS — a 52% reduction. At High, 1080p produces 90 FPS, 4K 43 FPS — a 52% decline. At Ultra, 1080p yields 68 FPS, 4K 32 FPS — a 53% drop. The pattern is nearly identical, because the GPU’s fill-rate and shading units are the reason for the change.

The consistency of the scale suggests the CPU is not a factor in these differences. If a CPU weak spot were present, the framing rate at low resolution (1080p Low, 146 FPS) would be lower than 146 FPS, or it would fall more sharply when resolution drops. Instead, when the resolution increases, the average FPS drops proportionally with the total pixel count. For a 3.75‑fold pixel count increase (1080p to 4K), the FPS at Low drops by about half, showing that the GPU’s output is the bottleneck. The CPU, even at its 95th percentile, never runs out of headroom because the GPU limits the load.

Measured FPS Breakdown

The following table lists the exact average frame rates (and the minimum/maximum range where available) returned by Lockdown Protocol across all combinations tested.

| Resolution | Settings | Average FPS | Min FPS | Max FPS |

|------------|----------|-------------|---------|---------|

| 1920x1080 | Low | 146 | - | - |

| 1920x1080 | Medium | 103 | 88 | 119 |

| 1920x1080 | High | 90 | - | - |

| 1920x1080 | Ultra | 69 | - | - |

| 2560x1440 | Low | 107 | - | - |

| 2560x1440 | Medium | 76 | 64 | 87 |

| 2560x1440 | High | 66 | - | - |

| 2560x1440 | Ultra | 50 | - | - |

| 3840x2160 | Low | 69 | - | - |

| 3840x2160 | Medium | 49 | 42 | 56 |

| 3840x2160 | High | 43 | - | - |

| 3840x2160 | Ultra | 32 | - | - |

Look at the pattern: at 1080p low, the system produces 146 FPS — plenty for 144 Hz monitors. But at 4K even the lowest preset only manages 69 FPS, and the Ultra preset falls to 32 FPS. The gap between Low and Ultra at each resolution is relatively constant: 146–68 FPS at 1080p (78 FPS gap), 107–50 FPS at 1440p (57 FPS gap), and 69–32 FPS at 4K (37 FPS gap). So the absolute loss from raising settings is larger at lower resolution, but the relative loss is uniform, reinforcing that the GPU is the sole performance governor.

The median (Medium) line shows the only complete frame-timing data. At 1080p Medium, the frame-time spread is 88 to 119 FPS (a 31 FPS spread). At 1440p Medium, the spread is 64 to 87 (23 FPS). At 4K Medium, the range is 42 to 56 (14 FPS). The tighter range at higher resolutions indicates that GPU occupancy is the limiting factor; the CPU has spare capacity that is not used.

GPU Role

The AMD Radeon RX 6600 is the component that dictates what the system can deliver in Lockdown Protocol. It features 8 GB of GDDR6 on a 128‑bit bus, with a memory bandwidth of 224.0 GB/s. That is a decent capacity for a 2021 card, but at 4K the 8 GB buffer runs into both bandwidth and shader limits, which matches the severe drop to 43–69 FPS across all settings at that resolution.

GPU specifications break down into three numbers: base clock 1626 MHz, game clock 2044 MHz, and boost clock 2491 MHz. The boost clock represents the highest possible speed, but the game clock is the likely stabilizer. At 6 ms per frame (roughly 166 FPS for the 1080p Low figure), the GPU is working at its boost limit; at 1080p Ultra only 69 FPS average, the GPU is lagging because of the higher shading and texel counts.

The card’s percentages is 63rd percentile overall, meaning 37% of tested GPUs are faster. In the database, the RX 6600 scores 19036 average, putting it within 0.4% of the NVIDIA Quadro K6000, the GeForce RTX 4050 Mobile, the Tesla K20m, and the RTX 2000 Ada Generation. All four of those GPUs are within a fraction of 0.4% of the RX 6600, so this card is neither an outlier nor a top performer. It is a mid‑range part, and its FPS range—from 32 FPS at 4K Ultra to 146 FPS at 1080p Low—matches its placement.

The FPS scaling across settings also matches the GPU's architecture. The RX 6600 has 1792 shading units, 112 TMUs, and 64 ROPs. At 4K Ultra, the card is likely limited by the TMU and shading throughput; at 1080p Low, the bottleneck is still present but less. The FP32 performance is 8.928 TFLOPS, which is sufficient for 1080p but not for 4K high detail, as the numbers show.

CPU Role

The AMD Ryzen 9 9950X3D is the exact opposite of the GPU — a 16‑core, 32‑thread processor based on Zen 5 (Granite Ridge) with a 4nm process. Its base clock is 4.30 GHz, boost is 5.70 GHz, and the large 128 MB L3 cache is the signature 3D V‑Cache. That cache helps with thread‑heavy workloads, but in Lockdown Protocol, the bottleneck is elsewhere. The CPU scores in the 95th percentile of all CPUs, and its average score of 75779 is only 0.1% to 0.4% away from four other high‑end chips. In Cinebench R23 it achieves 42018 multi‑core and 2259 single‑core, both high numbers.

But the CPU’s role is essentially to maintain the logic and physics of the game, while the GPU is the visible frame generator. The measured FPS across all resolutions are not limited by the CPU: at 1080p Low, 146 FPS average, which is near the CPU’s feasible ceiling for this game. The key point is that when the resolution is raised, FPS drops by half, but the CPU load stays the same because the game’s thread usage does not increase with resolution. The CPU’s high single‑thread score (Cinebench R23 2259, Geekbench 3064) ensures it can keep up with the GPU even at the highest frame rates.

Indeed, the CPU’s performance data aligns with the expectations: it beats the four rival chips by at most 0.4% (a negligible margin). These five processors are effectively identical in practical terms, meaning the CPU is not a source of bottleneck in any direction. At 1440p High, the system reports 66 FPS; that for a game that often uses 2‑3 cores heavily, the Ryzen 9 9950X3D can deliver well over 300 FPS in CPU‑limited scenarios. The 4K numbers remain above 30 FPS only because the GPU is the limiting factor; a weaker CPU would produce worse lows.

In summary, the CPU is a flagship component with ample per‑core and multi-core performance. The bottleneck is exactly where the measured FPS show: when the GPU changes resolutions, the FPS changes proportionally; when the CPU stays constant, the FPS are independent of any CPU‑measured performance difference. The most direct evidence: the CPU's 95th percentile and the GPU's 63rd percentile define the system’s abilities. The CPU can handle far more frames than the GPU can generate, so the GPU’s 63rd percentile is the performance ceiling. If this combination was used in a CPU‑bound game, the ranking would be near the top, but for Lockdown Protocol the ranking is 2901 out of 3714 due to the GPU.