Lockdown Protocol

The Intel Core i7-12700K paired with the NVIDIA GeForce GTX 1070 in Lockdown Protocol demonstrates a clear progression of performance degradation as resolution increases, but the pattern reveals more about the GPU's limits than the CPU's capabilities. From 1920x1080 to 3840x2160, the average frame rate drops consistently across all settings, with the most dramatic decline occurring at Ultra settings, which fall from 60.3 FPS at 1080p to 26.6 FPS at 4K—a reduction of 55.9%. This steep drop indicates that the GTX 1070's rendering pipeline becomes the primary constraint at higher resolutions, particularly when pixel count quadruples from 1080p to 4K. The scaling between 2560x1440 and 3840x2160 is less severe proportionally than the jump from 1080p to 1440p, suggesting that the GPU's memory bandwidth and shading throughput are being saturated progressively rather than hitting a hard wall at any single resolution. The data shows that at 1080p Low, the combo achieves 132.8 FPS, but at 4K Low, it drops to 60.4 FPS, meaning even the lowest settings cannot escape the resolution penalty. This behavior points to a system where the CPU can feed frames adequately at lower resolutions, but the GPU's 256-bit memory bus and 6.463 TFLOPS of FP32 performance become the limiting factor as pixel workload increases.

Resolution Scaling — how FPS drops from 1080p to 4K and what it says about the limiting component

The measured frame rates across resolutions tell a consistent story of GPU-bound performance at higher pixel counts. At High settings, the average FPS moves from 82.3 at 1920x1080 to 57.5 at 2560x1440, then to 41.1 at 3840x2160—a stepwise decline that mirrors the increasing pixel fill requirements. The Medium settings follow a similar trajectory: 94.7 FPS at 1080p, 69.2 FPS at 1440p, and 43.8 FPS at 4K, with the 1440p-to-4K drop representing a 36.7% reduction. Low settings show the widest absolute spread, from 132.8 FPS at 1080p down to 60.4 FPS at 4K, demonstrating that even when graphical load is minimized, the resolution scaling still exacts a heavy toll. The Ultra preset is the most demanding, producing only 60.3 FPS at 1080p, 46.4 FPS at 1440p, and 26.6 FPS at 4K—the latter being the only sub-30 FPS result in the entire dataset. This pattern indicates that Lockdown Protocol's rendering engine scales resolution almost linearly in terms of pixel workload, and the GTX 1070's 8 GB of GDDR5 memory with 256.3 GB/s bandwidth cannot sustain high frame rates when pixel counts surge. The fact that 1080p Low produces more than double the frame rate of 4K Ultra (132.8 vs 26.6 FPS) underscores that resolution, rather than settings complexity, is the dominant factor limiting this combination.

GPU Role — VRAM, clocks, and how they relate to this game's results

The NVIDIA GeForce GTX 1070 operates with a base clock of 1506 MHz and a boost clock of 1683 MHz, which are modest by modern standards but still provide predictable performance in this FPS title. Its 8 GB of GDDR5 memory, running at 2002 MHz with 8 Gbps effective speed, delivers 256.3 GB/s of bandwidth across a 256-bit bus—a specification that appears adequate for 1080p but becomes strained at 4K, where the average FPS across all settings never exceeds 60.4 (Low preset). The GPU's 1920 shading units and 64 ROPs contribute to a pixel rate of 107.7 GPixel/s and a texture rate of 202.0 GTexel/s, which directly influence how quickly the card can fill screen space at higher resolutions. The benchmark results show that the GTX 1070 sits at the 51st percentile among all GPUs, with an average benchmark score of 12331, placing it in the middle of the pack. Its nearest rivals include the NVIDIA Quadro K4200 (0.7% higher score), the GeForce GTX 880M (1.3% lower), and the GeForce GTX 1650 SUPER (1.4% lower), indicating that this GPU is competitive with mid-range Pascal and Turing cards despite its age. In Lockdown Protocol specifically, the GPU's DirectX 12 support (version 12_1) and Vulkan 1.4 API compatibility mean it can handle the game's modern rendering paths, but the measured FPS at 4K Ultra (26.6) versus 1080p Low (132.8) shows that the card's FP32 throughput of 6.463 TFLOPS is simply insufficient for high-resolution, high-detail workloads.

How This Combo Ranks — use comboRankInGame vs other tested combos

Within the benchmark database, the Intel Core i7-12700K and NVIDIA GeForce GTX 1070 combination ranks 1381 out of 1637 tested combos in Lockdown Protocol, placing it in the bottom 15.6% of all configurations. This rank reflects the GPU's mid-tier standing (51st percentile) combined with the CPU's strong performance (89th percentile), meaning the pairing is heavily imbalanced—the processor is capable of much more than the graphics card can deliver. The combo's position suggests that many other pairings, even those with weaker CPUs but stronger GPUs, achieve higher frame rates in this game because Lockdown Protocol is more dependent on GPU throughput than CPU compute. The rank of 1381 out of 1637 means that 256 combinations tested worse than this setup, while 1380 performed better, which is a significant gap given that the CPU alone outperforms 89% of all processors. This disparity highlights that users looking to improve performance in this game should prioritize GPU upgrades over CPU changes, as the GTX 1070 is the bottleneck in virtually every resolution and settings combination tested.

Measured FPS Breakdown — resolution by resolution, settings by settings, exact numbers

At 1920x1080, the combination produces its best results across all settings. Low settings achieve an average of 132.8 FPS, Medium reaches 94.7 FPS, High drops to 82.3 FPS, and Ultra settles at 60.3 FPS. These numbers indicate that at 1080p, the system is capable of smooth gameplay on all presets, with even Ultra maintaining a playable frame rate above 60. Moving to 2560x1440, the averages fall to 98 FPS on Low, 69.2 FPS on Medium, 57.5 FPS on High, and 46.4 FPS on Ultra—a pattern where only Low and Medium remain comfortably above 60 FPS. At 3840x2160, the performance becomes marginal: Low produces 60.4 FPS, Medium drops to 43.8 FPS, High manages 41.1 FPS, and Ultra falls to 26.6 FPS. The spread between settings at each resolution is notable: at 1080p, the difference between Low and Ultra is 72.5 FPS (132.8 vs 60.3), while at 4K, that difference shrinks to 33.8 FPS (60.4 vs 26.6). This narrowing suggests that at higher resolutions, the GPU is so saturated that settings changes have diminishing returns, whereas at 1080p, the card has enough headroom to respond to graphical adjustments. The data also shows that 1080p Low is the only configuration exceeding 120 FPS, while 4K Ultra is the only one falling below 30 FPS, defining the practical operational envelope for this combo.

FAQ

Q: What is the highest average FPS this combo achieves in Lockdown Protocol?

A: The highest average FPS is 132.8, achieved at 1920x1080 resolution with Low settings.

Q: At which resolution and settings does the combo drop below 30 FPS?

A: The combo drops to 26.6 FPS at 3840x2160 resolution with Ultra settings, which is the only configuration below 30 FPS in the measured data.

Q: How does the GTX 1070 compare to its nearest rival in general benchmarks?

A: The GTX 1070 has an average benchmark score of 12331, while its nearest rival, the NVIDIA Quadro K4200, scores 12241, which is 0.7% lower. The GeForce GTX 1650 SUPER scores 12504, which is 1.4% higher.

Q: What is the difference between 1080p High and 4K High average FPS?

A: At 1080p High, the average FPS is 82.3, while at 4K High, it drops to 41.1, representing a 50% reduction.

Q: Does the CPU or GPU limit performance more at lower resolutions?

A: The data shows that at 1080p, the combo achieves 132.8 FPS on Low, which is well above typical display refresh rates, while the GTX 1070's 51st percentile GPU ranking and the combo's overall rank of 1381 out of 1637 suggest the GPU remains the limiting factor even at lower resolutions.

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

A: The combo ranks 1381 out of 1637 tested combinations in Lockdown Protocol, placing it in the lower 15.6% of all tested systems.

CPU Role — cores, clocks, and how they relate to this game's results

The Intel Core i7-12700K provides substantial compute resources with 12 cores and 20 threads, running at a base clock of 3.60 GHz and a boost clock of 5.00 GHz. This Alder Lake-S processor, built on Intel's 10 nm process, delivers strong synthetic benchmark scores including 29241 in Cinebench R23 multicore and 4128 in single-core, placing it at the 89th percentile among all CPUs. Its nearest rivals include the AMD Ryzen 7 PRO 5845 (0.3% lower average score), the Intel Core i7-13700T (0.6% higher), and the Intel Core i5-14500HX (0.7% lower), showing that the 12700K is competitive with newer mid-range parts. In Lockdown Protocol, the CPU's role appears secondary to the GPU, as evidenced by the combo's low rank of 1381 out of 1637 despite the processor's high percentile standing. The 25 MB of shared L3 cache and dual-channel memory support (DDR4 and DDR5) provide ample bandwidth for feeding the GTX 1070, but the measured FPS data shows no scenario where CPU limits manifest—even at 1080p Low with 132.8 FPS, the frame rate is likely capped by the GPU's rendering speed rather than the CPU's ability to submit draw calls. The i7-12700K's 3dmark scores, including 9276 for 16 threads and 9979 for max threads, indicate strong multi-threaded performance that would excel in CPU-intensive scenarios, but Lockdown Protocol's FPS results suggest the game is not CPU-bound with this pairing. The 125 W TDP and unlocked multiplier allow for overclocking headroom, but the benchmark data indicates that additional CPU performance would not translate into higher frame rates given the GTX 1070's constraints.