Lockdown Protocol

The Intel Core i5-14600KF paired with the AMD Radeon RX 580 presents a distinct performance profile in Lockdown Protocol, characterized by a powerful CPU constrained by an older GPU. The benchmark results reveal a combination that is heavily dependent on resolution and graphics settings, with the processor’s capabilities only becoming apparent at lower graphical loads.

Resolution Scaling

The FPS data demonstrates a clear and predictable decline as resolution increases from 1920x1080 to 3840x2160. At 1920x1080 with Low settings, the combo achieves an average of 82.3 FPS, which drops to 61.1 FPS at 2560x1440 and further to 39.4 FPS at 3840x2160 under the same Low settings. This represents a 52% reduction in frame rate from 1080p to 4K, indicating that even at the lowest settings, the rendering load scales heavily with pixel count.

The scaling pattern shifts with higher settings. At High settings, the average FPS moves from 54.6 at 1080p to 38.7 at 1440p and 25.9 at 4K, a 53% drop across the resolution range. Ultra settings show the steepest absolute decline, starting at 38.9 FPS at 1080p, falling to 28.4 FPS at 1440p, and bottoming out at 17.5 FPS at 4K. The consistent percentage drops across settings suggest that the GPU is the primary limiting factor, as its workload increases proportionally with resolution regardless of the quality preset.

The data indicates that the 4K resolution is largely impractical for this combination, with only the Low preset exceeding 30 FPS. The 2560x1440 resolution offers a more viable middle ground, particularly at Low settings where the frame rate approaches playable territory. The scaling behavior points to a system where the CPU headroom is substantial, but the RX 580’s rendering throughput caps performance at higher resolutions.

CPU Role

The Intel Core i5-14600KF is a 14-core, 20-thread processor based on the Raptor Lake architecture, with a base clock of 3.50 GHz and a boost clock of 5.30 GHz. Its benchmark scores place it in the 93rd percentile of all CPUs, with an average benchmark score of 49367. In Cinebench R23, it scores 32889 in multi-core and 4643 in single-core, demonstrating strong performance across both threaded and single-threaded workloads.

The CPU’s role in Lockdown Protocol appears to be secondary to the GPU, as evidenced by the FPS scaling. At 1080p Low, the system reaches 82.3 FPS, which is likely CPU-bound to some degree, but the frame rate does not increase dramatically at lower resolutions. The processor’s nearest rivals include the Intel Core i5-14600K with a deltaPct of 0.4, indicating near-identical performance, and the AMD Ryzen 9 5950X which trails by 0.6%. This places the 14600KF at the top of its immediate competitive tier.

The 14 cores and 20 threads provide ample processing power for game logic and physics, but the data suggests that Lockdown Protocol does not heavily stress the CPU. The fact that FPS drops consistently with resolution indicates that the GPU becomes the bottleneck well before the CPU’s limits are reached. The processor’s high single-core score of 4643 in Cinebench R23 suggests it can handle the game’s primary thread efficiently, but this advantage is masked by the GPU’s constraints at higher resolutions.

GPU Role

The AMD Radeon RX 580 is an older graphics card based on the GCN 4.0 architecture, featuring 8 GB of GDDR5 memory on a 256-bit bus with a bandwidth of 256.0 GB/s. Its base clock is 1257 MHz with a boost clock of 1340 MHz, and it offers 2304 shading units. The GPU’s benchmark scores place it in the 53rd percentile of all GPUs, with an average benchmark score of 13559.

The RX 580’s role is clearly the dominant factor in this combination’s performance. The GPU’s nearest rivals include the NVIDIA GeForce GTX 570 with a deltaPct of 0 and the NVIDIA GeForce GTX 950 with a deltaPct of 0.1, indicating that it sits in a performance tier that is now several generations old. The GPU’s 8 GB of VRAM is sufficient for the tested settings, but its raw compute power, rated at 6.175 TFLOPS FP32, appears inadequate for high-resolution gaming in Lockdown Protocol.

The GPU’s performance ceiling is evident in the measured FPS. At 4K Ultra, the combo manages only 17.5 FPS, while the 1080p Low setting achieves 82.3 FPS. The GPU’s pixel rate of 42.88 GPixel/s and texture rate of 193.0 GTexel/s are likely the limiting factors at higher resolutions, as the rendering pipeline becomes saturated. The GPU’s 14 nm process node and 5,700 million transistors reflect its age, and the data shows that it cannot keep pace with the CPU’s capabilities in this title.

Measured FPS Breakdown

The complete FPS dataset provides a detailed picture of performance across all tested configurations. At 1920x1080, the Low preset achieves 82.3 FPS, Medium hits 60.2 FPS, High reaches 54.6 FPS, and Ultra drops to 38.9 FPS. The gap between Low and Medium is 22.1 FPS, while the gap between High and Ultra is 15.7 FPS, indicating that the quality presets have a non-linear impact on performance.

At 2560x1440, the frame rates are 61.1 FPS on Low, 42.7 FPS on Medium, 38.7 FPS on High, and 28.4 FPS on Ultra. The drop from 1080p to 1440p is significant across all settings, with the Low preset losing 21.2 FPS and the Ultra preset losing 10.5 FPS. The 1440p resolution shows a more compressed range between settings, with only a 32.7 FPS difference between Low and Ultra compared to 43.4 FPS at 1080p.

At 3840x2160, the results are 39.4 FPS on Low, 30.3 FPS on Medium, 25.9 FPS on High, and 17.5 FPS on Ultra. The 4K resolution compresses the settings range further to 21.9 FPS, and only the Low preset approaches playability. The data shows that the High and Ultra presets are essentially unplayable at 4K, while the Medium preset sits at the edge of acceptability. The 1080p Low setting is the only configuration that exceeds 60 FPS, suggesting that users targeting higher frame rates must sacrifice significant visual quality.

How This Combo Ranks

The combination of the Intel Core i5-14600KF and AMD Radeon RX 580 ranks 1536 out of 1637 tested combos in Lockdown Protocol. This places it in the bottom 6% of all configurations, reflecting the GPU’s limitations despite the CPU’s strong positioning. The rank is likely driven by the GPU’s age and performance tier, as the CPU alone sits in the 93rd percentile of all processors.

The disparity between the CPU’s high percentile and the combo’s low rank underscores the GPU-bound nature of this pairing. While the 14600KF’s nearest rivals show minimal performance deltas, with the EPYC 4345P at -0.5% and the Ryzen 9 5950X at 0.6%, the GPU’s nearest rivals demonstrate a broader spread, with the Radeon Pro 455 at 1.1% and the P106-090 at -1.1%. This suggests that the GPU’s performance class is the determining factor in the overall rank.

The data indicates that this combination is best suited for 1080p gaming with reduced settings, where the CPU’s headroom can partially compensate for the GPU’s weaknesses. At higher resolutions, the combo falls behind the majority of tested configurations, making it a poor choice for 1440p or 4K gaming in Lockdown Protocol. The rank of 1536 out of 1637 is a clear signal that the GPU is the bottleneck, and users would need to upgrade the graphics card to unlock the CPU’s full potential in this title.