Lockdown Protocol

# Lockdown Protocol with Intel Core i5-14400F + AMD Radeon RX 9060

The Intel Core i5-14400F paired with the AMD Radeon RX 9060 delivers a capable 1080p and 1440p gaming experience in Lockdown Protocol, with the measured data showing this combo ranking 1647th out of 2828 tested combinations. The CPU, a 10-core, 16-thread Raptor Lake Refresh part with a 4.70 GHz boost clock, sits in the 83rd percentile against all CPUs, while the RDNA 4.0-based GPU with 8 GB of GDDR6 memory lands in the 59th percentile against all GPUs. Benchmark results indicate that the sweet spot for this pairing is Medium settings at 1440p, where the system maintains smooth frame rates without pushing the GPU into diminishing returns territory.

Settings Recommendations

The measured FPS data reveals a clear hierarchy across the four presets tested at each resolution. At 1080p, Low settings produce 175 FPS average, Medium delivers 124 FPS, High drops to 109 FPS, and Ultra falls to 81 FPS. The jump from Low to Medium costs 51 FPS, while the step from High to Ultra costs 28 FPS. For competitive play in this FPS title, Medium at 1080p offers the best balance, retaining 124 FPS average with a minimum of 106 FPS, which keeps frame pacing consistent during intense firefights.

At 1440p, the story shifts slightly. Low settings yield 128 FPS, Medium 91 FPS, High 80 FPS, and Ultra 60 FPS. The Medium preset here provides 91 FPS average with a 77 FPS minimum, which remains above the 60 FPS threshold for smooth gameplay. High at 1440p drops to 80 FPS, still playable but with less headroom for scene complexity spikes. Ultra at 1440p lands exactly at 60 FPS average, which is borderline for a fast-paced FPS where reaction time matters.

For 4K, the data shows this combo struggles at higher presets. Ultra produces just 39 FPS, High 51 FPS, Medium 59 FPS, and Low 83 FPS. The Medium preset at 4K, with its 59 FPS average and 50 FPS minimum, is the only preset that approaches playability at this resolution, though it sits right at the edge of acceptable performance. Low at 4K offers 83 FPS but sacrifices visual fidelity significantly.

The best overall experience per the measured rows is Medium settings at 1440p. This preset delivers 91 FPS average, nearly double the 4K Medium result, while maintaining visual quality that takes advantage of the higher resolution. The 77 FPS minimum ensures that even during demanding scenes, the frame rate stays comfortably above 60 FPS. For players prioritizing maximum frame rates, Low at 1080p at 175 FPS is the clear choice, but Medium at 1440p represents the optimal compromise between visual fidelity and performance.

FAQ

Q: Can this combo handle Lockdown Protocol at 4K?

A: Yes, but only at Low or Medium settings. The measured data shows 83 FPS at Low and 59 FPS at Medium for 3840x2160. High and Ultra presets drop to 51 FPS and 39 FPS respectively, which fall below smooth gameplay thresholds for an FPS title.

Q: What is the maximum frame rate achievable with this hardware?

A: The highest measured average is 175 FPS at 1080p with Low settings. Medium at 1080p reaches 124 FPS, High 109 FPS, and Ultra 81 FPS. The data indicates that 175 FPS is the ceiling for this combo in Lockdown Protocol.

Q: How does the RX 9060 compare to its nearest GPU rivals in synthetic benchmarks?

A: The RX 9060 has an average benchmark score of 16014, placing it 0.7% behind the NVIDIA GeForce RTX 3060 Ti (16129), 1% ahead of the AMD Radeon R9 370X (15862), 1% ahead of the AMD Radeon RX 7700 (15852), and 2.1% ahead of the AMD Radeon Pro W5500 (15679). These are synthetic benchmark deltas, not game-specific results.

Q: Is the i5-14400F a bottleneck for the RX 9060 in this game?

A: The resolution scaling data suggests the GPU becomes the limiting factor at higher resolutions. At 1080p, the combo achieves 175 FPS on Low, but at 4K Low it drops to 83 FPS. The CPU's 83rd percentile ranking and Cinebench R23 multi-core score of 21645 indicate it has sufficient headroom for this GPU pairing.

Q: What is the minimum FPS recorded in the measured data?

A: The only presets with min FPS data are the Medium settings. At 1080p Medium, the minimum is 106 FPS; at 1440p Medium, it is 77 FPS; and at 4K Medium, it is 50 FPS. All other presets did not report minimum FPS values in the dataset.

Q: How does the i5-14400F's synthetic performance compare to its nearest CPU rivals?

A: The i5-14400F has an average benchmark score of 32279. It is 0.1% ahead of the AMD Ryzen 7 PRO 8840U (32233), 0.2% ahead of the Intel Core i9-11900 (32226), 0.5% ahead of the Intel Core i7-12800H (32121), and 0.2% behind the AMD Ryzen 7 6800HS (32354). These deltas are negligible in real-world gaming.

GPU Role

The AMD Radeon RX 9060 brings 8 GB of GDDR6 memory on a 128-bit bus, delivering 288.0 GB/s of bandwidth. The GPU's boost clock reaches 2990 MHz, with a game clock of 2400 MHz and a base clock of 1700 MHz. These specifications place the card in the 59th percentile against all GPUs, with an average benchmark score of 16014. The card's 1792 shading units, 112 texture mapping units, and 64 ROPs suggest it is positioned for 1080p and 1440p gaming rather than 4K ultra settings.

In Lockdown Protocol, the GPU's role becomes increasingly dominant as resolution increases. At 1080p, the CPU has enough headroom to push frame rates to 175 FPS on Low settings, suggesting the GPU is the primary driver even at this resolution. Moving to 1440p, the frame rates scale down proportionally, and at 4K, the GPU's 8 GB VRAM and 128-bit memory bus become apparent limitations. The 4K Medium result of 59 FPS average, with a 50 FPS minimum, shows the GPU working near its capacity.

The memory configuration deserves scrutiny. With 288.0 GB/s of bandwidth and 8 GB of VRAM, the RX 9060 is well-suited for 1080p and 1440p gaming but may encounter VRAM pressure at 4K with higher texture quality settings. The measured data supports this: 4K Ultra produces only 39 FPS, while 4K Medium achieves 59 FPS. The difference suggests that the Ultra preset's additional memory and compute demands exceed what this GPU can efficiently deliver.

The GPU's RDNA 4.0 architecture, built on a 4 nm process at TSMC with 29,700 million transistors, provides 21.43 TFLOPS of FP32 performance. This compute capability translates to the measured frame rates, which show a 31% increase from 4K Medium (59 FPS) to 1440p Medium (91 FPS) and a further 36% increase from 1440p Medium to 1080p Medium (124 FPS). These scaling patterns indicate the GPU is the bottleneck at all resolutions tested, with the CPU providing adequate support throughout.

How This Combo Ranks

This combination of Intel Core i5-14400F and AMD Radeon RX 9060 ranks 1647th out of 2828 tested combos in Lockdown Protocol. This places the pairing in the bottom 42% of all tested configurations, which is consistent with the GPU's 59th percentile ranking against all GPUs. The CPU's 83rd percentile ranking is notably higher, suggesting the GPU is the limiting factor in this pairing.

The rank of 1647 out of 2828 indicates that while this combo delivers playable frame rates at 1080p and 1440p, it does not compete with higher-end configurations. The measured data shows the combo's best result is 175 FPS at 1080p Low, which is respectable but not exceptional for an FPS title where competitive players often seek 240+ FPS. At 1440p, the 91 FPS Medium result is solid for mainstream gaming but falls short of high-refresh-rate monitors.

Comparing to the GPU's nearest rivals, the RX 9060's average benchmark score of 16014 places it nearly on par with the RTX 3060 Ti (16129, 0.7% faster). This suggests the combo's ranking is not due to an underperforming GPU relative to its class, but rather the inherent performance ceiling of this hardware tier. The CPU's nearest rivals show similar clustering, with deltas of less than 0.5% across four comparable processors.

The combo's rank relative to its component percentiles reveals an interesting dynamic. The CPU sits at the 83rd percentile, well above the GPU's 59th percentile. In a balanced system, these would be closer together. This disparity suggests that the RX 9060 is the constraining factor in Lockdown Protocol, and that upgrading the GPU would yield larger performance gains than upgrading the CPU. The measured FPS data reinforces this, as frame rates scale predictably with resolution changes, a hallmark of GPU-limited scenarios.

Resolution Scaling

The measured FPS data shows clear resolution scaling patterns that reveal the limiting component. At Low settings, the combo produces 175 FPS at 1080p, 128 FPS at 1440p, and 83 FPS at 4K. This represents a 27% drop from 1080p to 1440p and a 53% drop from 1080p to 4K. Medium settings show 124 FPS at 1080p, 91 FPS at 1440p, and 59 FPS at 4K, with drops of 27% and 52% respectively. High settings produce 109 FPS at 1080p, 80 FPS at 1440p, and 51 FPS at 4K, representing 27% and 53% drops.

The consistency of these percentage drops across settings is notable. Regardless of whether the preset is Low, Medium, or High, the scaling from 1080p to 1440p consistently costs roughly 27% of performance, and scaling to 4K costs roughly 52-53%. This uniform scaling pattern is characteristic of a GPU-limited scenario, where the rendering workload scales predictably with pixel count.

Ultra settings show a slightly different pattern: 81 FPS at 1080p, 60 FPS at 1440p, and 39 FPS at 4K. The drop from 1080p to 1440p is 26%, and from 1080p to 4K is 52%. The slightly smaller drop at Ultra may indicate that additional GPU features at this preset, such as more complex lighting or shadow calculations, add a fixed cost that dilutes the pure pixel-count scaling.

The 4K to 1440p comparison is particularly revealing. At 4K, the combo manages 83 FPS on Low, which is only 65% of the 1440p Low result of 128 FPS. This 35% performance loss from 1440p to 4K is expected for a GPU with 8 GB of VRAM and a 128-bit memory bus. The memory bandwidth of 288.0 GB/s becomes a limiting factor at 4K, where the GPU must move significantly more texture and geometry data per frame.

The data indicates that this combo is best utilized at 1080p or 1440p, where the GPU can maintain frame rates above 60 FPS at most settings. At 4K, only Low settings exceed 60 FPS, and even then, the 83 FPS result suggests the GPU is working near its maximum capacity. For players with 1440p monitors, Medium settings provide the best experience, while 1080p users can comfortably use High settings at 109 FPS.

Measured FPS Breakdown

At 1920x1080, the measured data shows a full range of performance across the four presets. Low settings deliver 175 FPS average, which is the highest result in the entire dataset. Medium settings produce 124 FPS average with a minimum of 106 FPS and a maximum of 143 FPS, providing tight frame pacing for competitive play. High settings reach 109 FPS average, while Ultra drops to 81 FPS average. The spread from Low to Ultra at 1080p is 94 FPS, indicating that visual quality settings have a substantial impact on performance at this resolution.

Moving to 2560x1440, the frame rates scale down while maintaining the same relative ordering. Low settings achieve 128 FPS average, Medium 91 FPS with a 77 FPS minimum and 105 FPS maximum, High 80 FPS, and Ultra 60 FPS. The Medium preset at 1440p offers the best balance of the measured rows, with the 77 FPS minimum ensuring consistent gameplay even during heavy action sequences. The Ultra result of 60 FPS exactly matches the 60 Hz refresh rate standard, though it leaves no headroom for frame time spikes.

At 3840x2160, the performance drops significantly across all presets. Low settings are the only preset above 60 FPS, delivering 83 FPS average. Medium produces 59 FPS average with a 50 FPS minimum and 68 FPS maximum, placing it just below the 60 FPS threshold. High settings reach 51 FPS, and Ultra drops to 39 FPS. The 4K results indicate that this combo is not well-suited for 4K gaming at higher presets, with only Low settings providing a consistently smooth experience.

The Medium preset is the only one with complete FPS data across all three resolutions, making it the most informative for analysis. At 1080p Medium, the 106 FPS minimum is 85% of the 124 FPS average, showing good frame consistency. At 1440p Medium, the 77 FPS minimum is 85% of the 91 FPS average, maintaining the same consistency ratio. At 4K Medium, the 50 FPS minimum is 85% of the 59 FPS average, confirming that frame pacing remains stable even as absolute performance drops.

The transition from 1080p to 1440p at Medium settings costs 33 FPS (from 124 to 91), while the transition from 1440p to 4K costs 32 FPS (from 91 to 59). This near-identical drop between resolution tiers suggests that the GPU's rendering workload scales consistently, further confirming that the RX 9060 is the primary bottleneck. The 8 GB VRAM capacity likely plays a role at 4K, where texture data exceeds what the 128-bit memory bus can efficiently feed to the GPU's 1792 shading units.