Lockdown Protocol

Resolution Scaling

The measured FPS data for Lockdown Protocol across three resolutions reveals a clear GPU-bound scenario at higher settings, with the scaling pattern changing character as settings are reduced. At 1080p High, the combo produces 97.6 FPS, which drops to 68.4 FPS at 1440p High—a 30% reduction—and then to 44.9 FPS at 4K High, a further 34% decline. This progressive, near-linear drop from 1080p to 4K is the classic signature of a graphics card operating near its capacity ceiling, with the CPU having ample headroom to feed frames.

The picture shifts when settings are lowered. At Low settings, 1080p delivers 158.2 FPS, 1440p drops to 114.2 FPS (a 28% reduction), and 4K falls to 71.5 FPS (a 37% reduction from 1440p). The fact that even Low settings at 4K cannot reach 72 FPS suggests the Radeon RX 5700 XT is still the limiting factor at that resolution, despite the reduced shading load. The gap between Low and High at each resolution is substantial: at 1080p, Low is 62% faster than High; at 1440p, Low is 67% faster; at 4K, Low is 59% faster. This consistent differential indicates that the game's quality presets impose a heavy pixel-shading burden that the GPU must process, independent of resolution.

Looking at the Medium preset, the scaling follows the same trajectory: 112.3 FPS at 1080p, 79.7 FPS at 1440p, and 50.4 FPS at 4K. The 4K Medium result is nearly identical to the 1080p High result in absolute terms (50.4 vs 97.6 at 1080p High), confirming that resolution scaling and settings scaling trade off nearly one-for-one at the mid-range. The data indicates that this pairing is best suited to 1080p or 1440p gaming, with 4K reserved for Low or Medium presets if playable frame rates are the priority.

GPU Role

The AMD Radeon RX 5700 XT is built on the RDNA 1.0 architecture, fabricated on a 7 nm process by TSMC. Its GPU clock configuration lists a base of 1605 MHz, a boost of 1905 MHz, and a game clock of 1755 MHz. The memory subsystem consists of 8 GB of GDDR6 on a 256-bit bus, yielding 448.0 GB/s of bandwidth. These figures place the card in the 68th percentile of all GPUs in the benchmark database, with an average benchmark score of 24731. Its nearest rivals include the NVIDIA RTX A5000 Mobile (0.1% slower), the Intel Arc A350M (0.3% faster), and the NVIDIA GeForce RTX 5060 Mobile (0.6% faster). The RX 5700 XT sits effectively at parity with these parts in aggregate synthetic performance.

For Lockdown Protocol specifically, the GPU's 8 GB frame buffer appears adequate at 1080p and 1440p across all presets, given the measured FPS values. At 4K, however, the Ultra preset yields only 35.2 FPS, and High yields 44.9 FPS. Even with memory bandwidth of 448.0 GB/s, the card's raw compute throughput—9.754 TFLOPS FP32 and a pixel rate of 121.9 GPixel/s—is insufficient to maintain high frame rates at 4K with elevated settings. The card's texture rate of 304.8 GTexel/s and 160 TMUs help at lower resolutions, where the pixel fill rate is less taxed, but the 4K results show that the shader and ROP throughput becomes the bottleneck.

The GPU's passmark DirectX 12 score of 64 is notably low relative to its DirectX 11 score of 116, which may indicate driver inefficiencies in newer API workloads. However, the measured game FPS at 1080p Low (158.2) and Medium (112.3) suggests the hardware is still capable of high refresh rates when the settings are dialed back. The card's production status is End-of-life, and its successor is Navi II, but for this game, the RX 5700 XT remains functional, provided expectations are set to 1080p or 1440p.

How This Combo Ranks

In the database of tested combos for Lockdown Protocol, this pairing of the Intel Core i5-14600K with the AMD Radeon RX 5700 XT ranks 1269 out of 1637 total combinations. This places it in the lower-middle quartile, with roughly 77% of tested combos performing better. The rank reflects the GPU's age relative to newer cards in the database; the i5-14600K is a strong processor, sitting in the 93rd percentile of all CPUs, but the RX 5700 XT's 68th percentile GPU standing drags the combined result down.

The CPU's nearest rivals in aggregate benchmarks include the AMD Ryzen 9 5950X (0.2% faster), the Intel Core i5-14600KF (0.4% slower), and the AMD EPYC 4345P (0.9% slower). These deltas are within noise, indicating that the i5-14600K is not a performance differentiator in this pairing. Similarly, the GPU's nearest rivals are all within 1% of its average score, meaning that swapping the RX 5700 XT for an RTX A5000 Mobile or an Intel Arc A350M would yield almost identical game performance. The combo rank of 1269 is thus driven almost entirely by the GPU's position in the hierarchy, not by any CPU bottleneck or pairing inefficiency.

The measured FPS data confirms this: at 1080p Low, the combo achieves 158.2 FPS, which is a respectable result, but at 4K Ultra, it falls to 35.2 FPS. The rank of 1269 out of 1637 suggests that many other combos in the database are using faster GPUs, which is expected given the RX 5700 XT's 2019 release date. For an end-of-life card, the ranking is not surprising, and the data shows that the i5-14600K has no trouble keeping up even at the lowest settings.

Settings Recommendations

Based on the measured FPS rows, the optimal settings depend on the target resolution and refresh rate. For 1080p displays with a 60 Hz refresh, the Medium preset at 112.3 FPS provides a comfortable margin above 60 FPS, while High at 97.6 FPS also exceeds that threshold. The Ultra preset at 75.7 FPS is still playable, but it offers diminishing returns over High. For 1080p at 144 Hz or higher, Low at 158.2 FPS is the only preset that exceeds 144 FPS, making it the choice for competitive play where frame rate trumps visual fidelity.

At 1440p, the Medium preset delivers 79.7 FPS, which is above 60 FPS and suitable for most monitors. High at 68.4 FPS is also acceptable, though it sits closer to the 60 FPS threshold, leaving less headroom for demanding scenes. Low at 114.2 FPS is the best option for high-refresh 1440p panels, while Ultra at 55.3 FPS drops below 60 FPS and is not recommended for smooth gameplay. For 4K, the situation is more constrained: Low at 71.5 FPS is the only preset that clears 60 FPS. Medium at 50.4 FPS and High at 44.9 FPS are both below the playable threshold, and Ultra at 35.2 FPS is only suitable for screenshots or single-player exploration.

The data suggests that the "best experience" per the measured rows is 1080p Medium for a balance of visual quality and performance, or 1440p Low for higher resolution with a guaranteed 60+ FPS. The scaling from Low to Medium at 1080p costs 46 FPS (from 158.2 to 112.3), which is a significant trade-off for moderate visual gains. At 1440p, the same settings step costs 34.5 FPS (from 114.2 to 79.7), which is less severe. Users with 4K displays should stick to Low settings, as the jump to Medium costs 21.1 FPS and yields only marginal visual improvements.

FAQ

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

A: The data shows 1080p Medium at 112.3 FPS and 1440p Medium at 79.7 FPS are both above 60 FPS. For the highest frame rate, 1080p Low at 158.2 FPS is the best measured result.

Q: Can this combo handle 4K gaming?

A: At 4K, only Low settings achieve 71.5 FPS. Medium drops to 50.4 FPS, High to 44.9 FPS, and Ultra to 35.2 FPS, so 4K is only viable at Low settings.

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

A: The Intel Core i5-14600K is 0.2% slower than the AMD Ryzen 9 5950X, 0.4% faster than the Intel Core i5-14600KF, and 0.9% faster than the AMD EPYC 4345P in aggregate benchmarks.

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

A: The AMD Radeon RX 5700 XT is 0.1% slower than the NVIDIA RTX A5000 Mobile, 0.3% faster than the Intel Arc A350M, and 0.6% faster than the NVIDIA GeForce RTX 5060 Mobile.

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

A: The scaling pattern from 1080p to 4K indicates the GPU is the limiting factor. The CPU's 93rd percentile standing among all CPUs, combined with the GPU's 68th percentile, points to the RX 5700 XT as the performance ceiling.

Q: What is the combo's rank among all tested combos?

A: This pairing ranks 1269 out of 1637 total combos in the database for Lockdown Protocol, placing it in the lower-middle range of tested systems.

CPU Role

The Intel Core i5-14600K is a 14-core, 20-thread processor based on the Raptor Lake architecture, fabricated on Intel's 10 nm process node. Its base clock is 3.50 GHz with a boost clock of 5.30 GHz, and it features a 24 MB shared L3 cache along with 2 MB L2 per core and 80 KB L1 per core. The CPU supports both DDR4 and DDR5 memory in dual-channel configuration, and it has an integrated UHD Graphics 770 unit, though this is irrelevant for gaming with a discrete GPU. In aggregate CPU benchmarks, it sits in the 93rd percentile of all CPUs, with an average score of 49166, placing it just 0.2% below the AMD Ryzen 9 5950X and 0.4% above the Intel Core i5-14600KF.

For Lockdown Protocol, the CPU's role is to feed frames to the GPU without becoming a bottleneck. The measured FPS at 1080p Low (158.2) indicates that the CPU can push well over 150 FPS in this game, which is far above what the RX 5700 XT can render at higher settings. The Cinebench R23 multicore score of 32881 and single-core score of 4642 demonstrate strong thread scaling and per-thread performance, respectively. The Geekbench multicore score of 15846 and single-core score of 2803 further confirm that this processor has ample headroom for gaming workloads.

The passmark multithread score of 38682 and single-thread score of 4270 suggest that even if the game were CPU-bound at some settings, the i5-14600K would not be the limiting factor. The data shows that at 4K Ultra, the combo achieves only 35.2 FPS, which is far below the CPU's capability. The CPU's nearest rival, the Ryzen 9 5950X, scores nearly identically (49062 vs 49166, a 0.2% delta), meaning that swapping the processor would not change game performance. In contrast, the GPU's nearest rivals are also within 1%, so the entire pairing is balanced in the sense that neither component is dramatically mismatched—but the GPU's absolute performance ceiling defines what this combo can achieve in Lockdown Protocol.