Thief

Resolution Scaling

The measured frame rates across 3840x2160, 2560x1440, and 1920x1080 tell a clear story about where this combination of an AMD Ryzen 5 7500F and an AMD Radeon RX 570 hits its ceiling. At 1080p with Low settings, the combo produces 72.5 FPS, which is the highest average recorded in the entire dataset. Moving to 1440p at the same Low preset drops that figure to 53.2 FPS, a reduction of roughly 27%. The jump to 4K Low cuts the average further to 30 FPS, which is less than half of the 1080p Low result. This scaling pattern is steep and consistent, pointing directly at the GPU as the dominant limiting component.

The curve steepens dramatically as settings increase. At 1080p High, the average is 40.6 FPS; at 1440p High, it falls to 31.4 FPS; and at 4K High, it collapses to 15.8 FPS. The gap between 1080p High and 4K High is a 61% loss in frame rate. Ultra settings follow the same trajectory: 39.1 FPS at 1080p, 28.1 FPS at 1440p, and 17.7 FPS at 4K. Medium settings show 57.8 FPS at 1080p, 40.1 FPS at 1440p, and 25.1 FPS at 4K. The pattern is unmistakable — every resolution step upward costs a substantial chunk of performance, and every settings tier upward compounds that cost.

What this says about the limiting component is straightforward. The Ryzen 5 7500F, with its Zen 4 architecture and 6 cores running at a base clock of 3.70 GHz and boost up to 5.00 GHz, is not the bottleneck here. The RX 570, built on the Polaris 20 chip with GCN 4.0 architecture, has only 4 GB of GDDR5 memory on a 256-bit bus and a boost clock of 1244 MHz. The data shows that even at 1080p Low, the GPU is already working hard to maintain 72.5 FPS, and the steep drop-off at higher resolutions confirms that the graphics card is saturated long before the CPU's capabilities are exhausted. The CPU's single-threaded performance, as reflected in its 3DMark single-thread score of 974, is more than adequate for this title, which launched in 2014 and does not demand modern multi-core throughput. The GPU's 32 ROPs and 128 TMUs are the structural limits here, and they show up clearly in the scaling numbers.

Settings Recommendations

The measured rows provide a clear hierarchy of playable configurations. At 1080p, the Low preset delivers 72.5 FPS, which is the only row in the entire dataset that clears the 70 FPS threshold. Medium at 1080p produces 57.8 FPS, still a comfortable margin above the 40 FPS zone. High at 1080p drops to 40.6 FPS, and Ultra falls to 39.1 FPS. For a game like Thief, which is a stealth title where responsiveness matters but not at the level of a competitive shooter, the data suggests that Medium at 1080p is the sweet spot. It offers a 42% improvement over High at the same resolution, and it is only 20% below Low in raw frame rate, while presumably providing substantially better visual quality given the settings tier.

At 1440p, the situation becomes more constrained. Low delivers 53.2 FPS, which is playable but not smooth by modern standards. Medium drops to 40.1 FPS, and High falls to 31.4 FPS. Ultra at 1440p is 28.1 FPS, which is below the threshold for comfortable play. The data indicates that 1440p should only be attempted with the Low preset if the user prioritizes frame rate, and even then, the experience will be marginal. At 4K, no preset is viable. Low produces 30 FPS, Medium produces 25.1 FPS, High produces 15.8 FPS, and Ultra produces 17.7 FPS. These numbers are all below playable thresholds for a game that requires situational awareness and quick reaction times.

The best experience per the measured rows is clearly 1080p Medium at 57.8 FPS. This configuration balances the need for smooth motion with the visual fidelity that the Medium preset presumably offers over Low. The alternative, 1080p Low at 72.5 FPS, is the only row that approaches high-refresh territory, but it sacrifices visual quality for a 25% frame rate gain over Medium. Given that the game is from 2014 and its Medium preset is unlikely to be visually demanding by modern standards, the 57.8 FPS result is the recommended target. Users who cannot tolerate any frame rate below 60 FPS should consider 1080p Low, as it is the only configuration that clears that bar with margin to spare.

How This Combo Ranks

The combination of the AMD Ryzen 5 7500F and the AMD Radeon RX 570 ranks 1588 out of 1642 tested combos for Thief. This places it in the bottom 3.3% of all combinations in the database. The rank is a sobering reflection of the GPU's age and capability relative to modern hardware. The CPU alone, with an average benchmark score of 24993 and a percentile rank of 82 among all CPUs, is a strong performer. Its nearest rivals in the CPU benchmark database include the Intel Core i7-11850H, which scores 24974 (a 0.1% delta), and the AMD Ryzen 9 6900HX, which scores 24897 (a 0.4% delta). The Ryzen 5 7500F sits slightly above the Intel part and slightly below the Ryzen 7 2700X, which scores 25057 with a -0.3% delta. This is a CPU that holds its own against mobile and older desktop parts.

The GPU, however, drags the combination down. The RX 570 has an average benchmark score of 30158 and a percentile rank of 74 among all GPUs. Its nearest rivals in the GPU benchmark database are the NVIDIA GeForce RTX 5060, which scores 30109 (a 0.2% delta), and the AMD Radeon RX 7700 XT, which scores 30097 (a 0.2% delta). These deltas are remarkably small, indicating that the RX 570's average benchmark score is competitive with much newer cards in synthetic tests, but the measured FPS in Thief tells a different story. The GPU's 4 GB of VRAM and GCN 4.0 architecture are simply not sufficient for this game at higher resolutions, and the combo rank reflects that reality. At 1588 out of 1642, this combination is effectively at the bottom of the heap for Thief, which is a demanding title for the GPU despite its 2014 release date.

Measured FPS Breakdown

The measured FPS data provides a full matrix of results across three resolutions and four settings tiers. At 1920x1080, the Low preset produces 72.5 FPS, the highest average in the entire dataset. Medium at the same resolution produces 57.8 FPS, High produces 40.6 FPS, and Ultra produces 39.1 FPS. The spread between Low and Ultra at 1080p is 33.4 FPS, which is a 46% drop from the Low result. At 2560x1440, Low delivers 53.2 FPS, Medium delivers 40.1 FPS, High delivers 31.4 FPS, and Ultra delivers 28.1 FPS. The spread here is 25.1 FPS, a 47% drop from Low to Ultra. At 3840x2160, Low produces 30 FPS, Medium produces 25.1 FPS, High produces 15.8 FPS, and Ultra produces 17.7 FPS. The 4K spread is 14.2 FPS, a 47% drop from Low to Ultra.

The data shows a consistent pattern: the percentage drop from Low to Ultra is nearly identical across all three resolutions, hovering around 46-47%. This suggests that the settings tiers impose a uniform load increase on the GPU, regardless of resolution. The absolute numbers, however, tell a different story about playability. At 1080p, every preset except Ultra clears the 30 FPS threshold, and Low and Medium both exceed 50 FPS. At 1440p, only Low clears 50 FPS, and Ultra falls below 30 FPS. At 4K, no preset clears 30 FPS except Low, which hits exactly 30 FPS. The 4K Low result is the only 4K row that is even marginally playable, and it is 20% below the 1440p Medium result.

The most striking single data point is the 4K High result of 15.8 FPS, which is the lowest in the entire dataset. It is 5% below the 4K Ultra result of 17.7 FPS, which is an anomaly — typically Ultra would be lower than High. This inversion suggests that the Ultra preset may not actually increase the GPU load in a meaningful way for this particular title, or that the measurement captured some variability in the game's rendering. Regardless, both 4K High and 4K Ultra are unplayable, and the 4K Low result of 30 FPS is the only 4K data point that approaches a playable threshold.

GPU Role

The AMD Radeon RX 570 is the defining component in this combination's performance in Thief. The GPU is built on the Polaris 20 chip with a 14 nm process node from GlobalFoundries, containing 5,700 million transistors on a 232 mm² die. Its GCN 4.0 architecture provides 2048 shading units, 128 TMUs, and 32 ROPs. The clocks are set at a base of 1168 MHz and a boost of 1244 MHz, with memory running at 1750 MHz (7 Gbps effective) across a 256-bit bus. This yields a memory bandwidth of 224.0 GB/s, which is substantial for a card of this era but insufficient for the demands of 4K rendering in a game like Thief.

The VRAM situation is critical. The RX 570 has 4 GB of GDDR5 memory, which is the likely culprit behind the severe frame rate drops at higher resolutions. At 1080p, the game fits within the 4 GB frame buffer, allowing the card to maintain 72.5 FPS at Low and 57.8 FPS at Medium. At 1440p, the frame buffer is likely being stressed, as evidenced by the drop to 53.2 FPS at Low. At 4K, the 4 GB capacity is almost certainly exceeded, causing the card to fall to 30 FPS at Low and 15.8 FPS at High. The data strongly suggests that VRAM capacity, not raw compute throughput, is the primary limiter at 4K.

The GPU's compute capabilities, rated at 5.095 TFLOPS FP32 and a pixel rate of 39.81 GPixel/s, are adequate for 1080p gaming but fall short at higher resolutions. The texture rate of 159.2 GTexel/s and the 32 ROPs are simply not enough to sustain high frame rates when the render target scales up. The card's TDP of 150 W and its 1x 6-pin power connector indicate that it was designed for mainstream systems, not for high-end 4K gaming. The 241 mm dual-slot design and PCIe 3.0 x16 interface are consistent with its 2017 release date, and the card's end-of-life production status reflects its age. In Thief, the RX 570 is the bottleneck at every resolution above 1080p Low, and even at 1080p, it cannot maintain 60 FPS at High or Ultra settings. The CPU, by contrast, has ample headroom, as evidenced by its 82nd percentile rank among all CPUs and its strong multi-threaded benchmark scores. This is a GPU-limited combination, and the data makes that unambiguous.