Thief

The Intel Core i5-11400F and AMD Radeon RX 570 combination delivers playable performance in Thief primarily at 1080p, but the data shows that settings management is critical. The measured results indicate that the Medium preset at 1920x1080 offers the best balance of visual quality and fluidity, producing an average of 60.2 FPS. While the Low preset reaches 77.8 FPS, the jump to Medium costs only 17.6 FPS yet provides a substantial visual upgrade typical of moving from minimal to standard detail levels. The High preset drops to 45.9 FPS, which is still playable but begins to sacrifice smoothness, while Ultra falls to 43.4 FPS, a marginal gain in fidelity for a noticeable performance hit. At 1440p, Medium remains the most viable option at 41.9 FPS, but the frame rate is already below the 60 FPS threshold, making 1080p the practical target for this hardware.

Settings Recommendations

For a consistent experience, the benchmark data strongly favors the Medium preset at 1920x1080. This configuration yields an average of 60.2 FPS, which aligns with standard display refresh rates and provides a comfortable margin above the 43.4 FPS seen at Ultra. The jump from Low to Medium costs roughly 23% performance, but the visual improvements in textures and lighting are generally worth it for a stealth game where environmental readability matters. If you prioritize frame rate above all else, Low at 77.8 FPS is the fallback, but the data suggests that Medium is the sweet spot for this CPU-GPU pairing.

At 2560x1440, the situation changes. The Medium preset averages 41.9 FPS, which is below the ideal smoothness threshold but still playable for a slower-paced stealth title. High and Ultra dip to 30.6 and 30.4 FPS respectively, which are borderline for comfortable play. The data indicates that 1440p is only recommended if you are willing to accept Medium settings and a frame rate in the low 40s. At 4K, all presets fall below 30.5 FPS, with Ultra bottoming out at 18.8 FPS, making this resolution effectively unplayable with this hardware.

GPU Role

The AMD Radeon RX 570's 4 GB of GDDR5 memory on a 256-bit bus provides 224.0 GB/s of bandwidth. This memory configuration is a significant factor in the observed frame rates. At 1080p, the GPU's 5.095 TFLOPS of FP32 performance is sufficient to drive Medium settings to 60.2 FPS, but the data shows a steep drop when moving to higher resolutions. The 4 GB VRAM capacity is likely a limiting factor at 1440p and 4K, where texture data exceeds this allocation, causing the average FPS to plummet from 60.2 at 1080p Medium to 41.9 at 1440p Medium and 24.5 at 4K Medium.

The GPU's clocks are set at a base of 1168 MHz with a boost of 1244 MHz, and the memory runs at 1750 MHz (7 Gbps effective). These specifications place the RX 570 in a position where it can handle 1080p gaming well but struggles with higher resolutions. The benchmark results confirm this: the gap between 1080p and 1440p at Medium settings is 18.3 FPS, while the gap between 1440p and 4K is 17.4 FPS. This consistent drop across resolution tiers indicates that the GPU is the primary bottleneck in this configuration, as the i5-11400F with its 6 cores and 12 threads provides ample processing power for this 2014 title.

FAQ

*Q: Can this combo run Thief at 4K?*

A: No, not at playable frame rates. The measured data shows the best 4K result is 30.5 FPS on Low settings, with Medium dropping to 24.5 FPS and Ultra falling to 18.8 FPS. All of these are below the 30 FPS minimum for acceptable gameplay.

Q: What is the best preset for a 60 Hz monitor at 1080p?

A: The Medium preset is the only one that hits the 60 FPS target, averaging exactly 60.2 FPS. High and Ultra fall short at 45.9 and 43.4 FPS respectively, while Low exceeds it at 77.8 FPS but with reduced visual quality.

Q: How much performance is lost when going from 1080p to 1440p?

A: At Medium settings, the average FPS drops from 60.2 to 41.9, a loss of 18.3 FPS. At Ultra, the drop is from 43.4 to 30.4, a loss of 13.0 FPS. The percentage loss is roughly 30% across most presets.

Q: Is the CPU or GPU the limiting factor in this game?

A: The data indicates the GPU is the bottleneck. The Intel Core i5-11400F has a 75th percentile ranking among all CPUs and scores 17181 on average, which is more than sufficient for a 2014 title. The RX 570, while ranking in the 74th percentile among GPUs, shows significant frame rate drops as resolution increases, a classic sign of GPU limitation.

Q: Does the Ultra preset provide a meaningful improvement over High?

A: At 1080p, Ultra averages 43.4 FPS versus High's 45.9 FPS, a difference of only 2.5 FPS. This marginal gain in frame rate is offset by the 2.5 FPS loss, suggesting that Ultra is not worth the performance cost over High in this configuration.

Q: What is the performance difference between Low and Medium at 1080p?

A: Low averages 77.8 FPS while Medium averages 60.2 FPS, a difference of 17.6 FPS. This represents a 22.6% performance drop, but the visual upgrade from Low to Medium is typically substantial in terms of texture detail and shadow quality.

How This Combo Ranks

This specific combination of the Intel Core i5-11400F and AMD Radeon RX 570 ranks at 1547 out of 1642 tested combos for Thief. This places it in the bottom 6% of all configurations tested, which is expected given the GPU's age and the game's release date. The CPU itself is well-regarded, with an average benchmark score of 17181, placing it in the 75th percentile of all CPUs. Its nearest rivals in the CPU benchmark include the AMD Ryzen 7 5700U (17189 score, 0% delta), Intel Core i7-1260P (17212, -0.2% delta), and Intel Core Ultra 7 164U (17215, -0.2% delta).

The GPU, however, pulls the combo down. The RX 570 has an average benchmark score of 30158, placing it in the 74th percentile of all GPUs. Its nearest rivals are notably modern: the NVIDIA GeForce RTX 5060 (30109, 0.2% delta), AMD Radeon RX 7700 XT (30097, 0.2% delta), and NVIDIA Tesla M60 (29969, 0.6% delta). This indicates that while the RX 570 is not a weak card in absolute terms, it is significantly outclassed by newer hardware in this game's workload. The low combo rank reflects that the GPU, not the CPU, is what holds this pairing back in Thief.

Resolution Scaling

The measured FPS data reveals a clear pattern of GPU-bound scaling. From 1080p to 1440p at Medium settings, the average FPS drops from 60.2 to 41.9, a 30.4% decrease. From 1440p to 4K at Medium, it drops from 41.9 to 24.5, a 41.5% decrease. This accelerating drop at higher resolutions is characteristic of a GPU that is running out of memory bandwidth and raw compute power.

At Low settings, the scaling is slightly less severe: 77.8 FPS at 1080p drops to 49.8 FPS at 1440p (36.0% decrease) and then to 30.5 FPS at 4K (38.8% decrease). This consistency across settings suggests that the RX 570's 224.0 GB/s memory bandwidth and 5.095 TFLOPS are the hard limits. The CPU, with its 12 MB of L3 cache and 51.2 GB/s memory bandwidth, is not the constraint here; the frame rate drops are directly proportional to the pixel count increase from 2.07 million (1080p) to 3.69 million (1440p) to 8.29 million (4K).

Measured FPS Breakdown

The complete set of measured results for this combo is as follows:

1920x1080:

• Low: 77.8 FPS
• Medium: 60.2 FPS
• High: 45.9 FPS
• Ultra: 43.4 FPS

2560x1440:

• Low: 49.8 FPS
• Medium: 41.9 FPS
• High: 30.6 FPS
• Ultra: 30.4 FPS

3840x2160:

• Low: 30.5 FPS
• Medium: 24.5 FPS
• High: 19.6 FPS
• Ultra: 18.8 FPS

At 1080p, the data shows a spread of 34.4 FPS between Low and Ultra, with Medium sitting almost exactly in the middle. At 1440p, the spread narrows to 19.4 FPS, and at 4K it narrows further to 11.7 FPS. This compression of frame rates at higher resolutions reinforces that the GPU is saturated at 1440p and above. The 1080p Medium result of 60.2 FPS is the only preset across all resolutions that hits the 60 FPS target, making it the definitive recommendation for this hardware.