Lockdown Protocol

# Lockdown Protocol with Intel Core i3-12100F + NVIDIA GeForce GTX 1650

The Intel Core i3-12100F paired with the NVIDIA GeForce GTX 1650 delivers a playable but constrained Lockdown Protocol experience, with the data showing a clear ceiling at 1080p Low settings where the combo achieves 74.4 FPS. This pairing ranks 1574th out of 1637 tested combos in this game, placing it in the bottom 4% of configurations, yet the measured results reveal that the GTX 1650's 4 GB VRAM and 128.1 GB/s bandwidth are the primary bottlenecks rather than the CPU's compute capacity.

Settings Recommendations

The measured FPS rows make the optimal settings choice unambiguous: 1080p Low is the only preset that consistently crosses the 60 FPS threshold, delivering 74.4 FPS average. At 1080p Medium, the average drops to 55.9 FPS, which is a 24.9% reduction from Low and falls below the smoothness standard most FPS players expect. High settings at 1080p yield 49.1 FPS, a further 12.2% decline from Medium, while Ultra at 1080p collapses to 34 FPS — less than half of what Low achieves.

For 1440p users, the situation worsens. Low at 2560x1440 produces 58.2 FPS, which is playable but not ideal, while Medium falls to 38.2 FPS and High to 37.2 FPS. Ultra at 1440p is effectively unplayable at 26.6 FPS.

At 4K, no preset is viable. Low manages only 37.5 FPS, Medium 24.6 FPS, High 22.4 FPS, and Ultra 16 FPS. The data suggests that players should prioritize resolution reduction over quality reduction: dropping from 1440p High (37.2 FPS) to 1080p Low (74.4 FPS) doubles the frame rate, whereas dropping from 1080p High to 1080p Low yields only a 51.5% improvement. The verdict is clear: run 1080p Low for competitive play, or accept 1080p Medium if visual fidelity matters more than frame rate headroom.

GPU Role

The NVIDIA GeForce GTX 1650, built on the Turing architecture with a TU117 chip, carries 896 shading units, 56 texture mapping units, and 32 ROPs. Its 4 GB of GDDR5 memory on a 128-bit bus delivers 128.1 GB/s bandwidth, which proves to be the limiting factor in this game's higher presets. The GPU's boost clock of 1665 MHz and base clock of 1485 MHz are modest by modern standards, and its 2.984 TFLOPS FP32 throughput confirms its entry-level positioning.

The GPU's percentile ranking of 43rd among all GPUs, with an average benchmark score of 8713, places it just 0.4% behind the NVIDIA GeForce RTX 3050 A Mobile and 0.5% ahead of the NVIDIA Quadro P2200. In Lockdown Protocol specifically, the data shows that the GTX 1650's VRAM capacity becomes a wall at higher settings: the gap between Low and Medium at 1080p is 18.5 FPS (74.4 vs 55.9), but the gap between Medium and High is only 6.8 FPS (55.9 vs 49.1), suggesting that texture memory pressure, not raw compute, is choking performance as settings rise.

Resolution Scaling

The FPS scaling from 1080p to 4K reveals a GPU-bound scenario across all settings. At Low, the drop from 1080p to 1440p is 16.2 FPS (74.4 to 58.2, a 21.8% decline), and from 1440p to 4K is another 20.7 FPS (58.2 to 37.5, a 35.6% decline). This accelerating degradation indicates that the GTX 1650's pixel throughput and memory bandwidth are overwhelmed as pixel count quadruples from 1080p to 4K.

At High settings, the pattern is even more pronounced: 1080p yields 49.1 FPS, 1440p drops to 37.2 FPS (24.2% decline), and 4K falls to 22.4 FPS (39.8% decline from 1440p). The Ultra preset shows the steepest cliff, with 34 FPS at 1080p, 26.6 FPS at 1440p, and just 16 FPS at 4K. These numbers confirm that the limiting component is the GPU: if the CPU were the bottleneck, the scaling between resolutions would be flatter, but the consistent 30-40% FPS losses at each resolution step point squarely at the GTX 1650's 4 GB VRAM and 128.1 GB/s bandwidth.

How This Combo Ranks

This configuration ranks 1574th out of 1637 tested combos in Lockdown Protocol, placing it in the bottom 4.3% of all tested systems. The data reveals a significant gap between this combo and the median performer, though the ranking is more a reflection of the GPU's age than the CPU's capability.

The Intel Core i3-12100F itself performs respectably in synthetic benchmarks, with an average score of 13516 and a percentile ranking of 72nd among all CPUs. Its nearest rivals include the AMD Ryzen Threadripper PRO 3975WX (0.1% behind), the Intel Core i7-1250U (0.4% ahead), the Intel Core i3-10105 (0.6% ahead), and the Intel Core i7-7700K (1.8% ahead). This clustering shows that the CPU is not the weak link in this pairing.

The GTX 1650, by contrast, sits at the 43rd percentile among GPUs with an average benchmark score of 8713. Its nearest rivals are the RTX 3050 A Mobile (0.4% ahead), the AMD Radeon 550X (0.4% ahead), the Quadro P2200 (0.5% behind), and the Radeon Pro WX 5100 (0.5% ahead). The combination of a top-quartile CPU with a below-median GPU explains why the combo ranks so low in this FPS title: the GPU starves the CPU of frames.

CPU Role

The Intel Core i3-12100F is a 4-core, 8-thread processor from the Alder Lake-S architecture, built on Intel's 10 nm process. Its base clock of 3.30 GHz boosts to 4.30 GHz, and it carries 12 MB of shared L3 cache. The CPU's single-thread performance is strong — a Geekbench single-core score of 2224 and a Cinebench R23 single-core score of 1681 — which matters for an FPS title like Lockdown Protocol where game logic and physics often rely on a few threads.

The multi-threaded results are equally solid for a quad-core: Cinebench R23 multi-core scores 11912, and Geekbench multi-core hits 7413. The 3DMark tests show the scaling pattern: 2-thread score of 1659, 4-thread score of 2859, 8-thread score of 4026, and max-thread score of 4023. The near-identical 8-thread and max-thread scores confirm that the 4-core/8-thread configuration is fully utilized without hyperthreading overhead issues.

In the context of this game, the CPU's capabilities are more than sufficient. The measured FPS at 1080p Low (74.4 FPS) is likely CPU-limited in certain scenes, but the GPU's 4 GB VRAM becomes the binding constraint at higher settings. The launch MSRP of $97 for this CPU underscores its entry-level positioning, yet its benchmark scores place it within 1.8% of the Intel Core i7-7700K, a former flagship.

Measured FPS Breakdown

At 1920x1080, the full settings spectrum shows: Low at 74.4 FPS, Medium at 55.9 FPS, High at 49.1 FPS, and Ultra at 34 FPS. The spread of 40.4 FPS between Low and Ultra demonstrates the GPU's sensitivity to quality presets.

At 2560x1440, the results are: Low at 58.2 FPS, Medium at 38.2 FPS, High at 37.2 FPS, and Ultra at 26.6 FPS. The gap between Medium and High narrows to just 1 FPS, indicating that the additional quality features in High are being handled by the same memory budget rather than adding meaningful strain.

At 3840x2160, the results are: Low at 37.5 FPS, Medium at 24.6 FPS, High at 22.4 FPS, and Ultra at 16 FPS. The Ultra preset at 4K produces fewer than half the frames of Low at 1080p, quantifying the resolution penalty.

Across all resolutions, the Low preset consistently outperforms the next tier (Medium) by 18.5 FPS at 1080p, 20 FPS at 1440p, and 12.9 FPS at 4K. The High-to-Ultra transition is the most punishing: a 15.1 FPS drop at 1080p, 10.6 FPS at 1440p, and 6.4 FPS at 4K.

FAQ

Q: What is the best settings preset for this combo in Lockdown Protocol?

A: The measured data shows 1080p Low at 74.4 FPS is the only preset exceeding 60 FPS. 1080p Medium drops to 55.9 FPS, and 1440p Low achieves 58.2 FPS.

Q: Is the GTX 1650's 4 GB VRAM sufficient for this game?

A: The data indicates VRAM becomes a limiting factor at higher presets. The FPS gap between Medium and High at 1440p is only 1 FPS (38.2 vs 37.2), suggesting memory pressure rather than compute limits.

Q: How does this combo rank among all tested systems?

A: It ranks 1574th out of 1637 combos in Lockdown Protocol, placing it in the bottom 4.3% of tested configurations.

Q: Is the CPU or GPU the bottleneck in this pairing?

A: The GPU is the limiting component. The i3-12100F ranks in the 72nd percentile among CPUs, while the GTX 1650 ranks in the 43rd percentile among GPUs, and FPS scaling across resolutions confirms GPU-bound performance.

Q: Can this combo run Lockdown Protocol at 1440p?

A: Yes, but only at Low settings, which produces 58.2 FPS. Medium at 1440p drops to 38.2 FPS, and High falls to 37.2 FPS.

Q: What is the FPS difference between 1080p and 4K at the same settings?

A: At Low, the drop is from 74.4 FPS at 1080p to 37.5 FPS at 4K, a 49.6% reduction. At Ultra, the drop is from 34 FPS to 16 FPS, a 52.9% reduction.