Thief

This analysis covers measured performance of the Intel Core i7-14700KF paired with the AMD Radeon RX 6600 XT in Thief (2014). Data was collected at 1080p, 1440p, and 4K across Low, Medium, High, and Ultra presets, with 34 unique average frame rates recorded. The combination ranks 2,625th out of 3,720 tested combos in this title, indicating a frame-rate profile that leans heavily on GPU characteristics. The CPU delivers extremely high single‑thread performance, while the GPU follows a typical mid‑range scaling pattern—smooth at 1080p, playable at 1440p, and challenging at 4K on high settings.

Resolution Scaling

The frame‑rate data shows a clear and consistent drop as resolution increases. At Low settings, average FPS moves from 155 (1080p) to 107 (1440p) to 63 (4K) – a 52‑FPS difference between the lowest and highest tested resolutions. At High settings the progression is 90 → 62 → 36 FPS across the same three resolutions, while Ultra follows a similar curve: 85 → 59 → 34. This pattern is characteristic of a GPU‑bounded workload, because the CPU (i7‑14700KF) delivers strong raw scores that would comfortably feed these frame rates in a CPU‑limited scenario.

The scaling also reveals that the 8 GB RX 6600 XT becomes the primary limitation at 4K. For instance, at 4K High the average is 36 FPS, but dropping the preset to Low raises 4K to 63 FPS – a +27 FPS gain from a setting change, far larger than the +0 change when moving from 1080p High to 1440p High at those same settings (90 to 62). This indicates that at 4K the pixel load dominates, while at 1080p the CPU and other engines can push more frames.

The Medium preset, the only setting with reported minimum and maximum values, reinforces the resolution trend. At 1080p Medium, the average sits at 118 FPS with a min‑max of 100–136; at 1440p Medium, the average is 81 FPS (min 69, max 93); and at 4K Medium the average falls to 48 FPS (min 40, max 55). The range width stays roughly constant (even shadow), but the whole curve shifts downward as the GPU’s fill rate is taxed by additional pixels.

No texture – the CPU does not appear to throttle the frame rate at any stop of the setting ladder. At 1080p Low, the system reaches 155 FPS; that is only a small margin from the CPU’s PassMark single‑thread score of 4,480, which is excellent.

How This Combo Ranks

In Thief’s aggregate test suite, this combination holds the 2,625th position out of 3,720 tested combos. That means only 1,095 other systems show slower average frame rates one or more settings, and 2,624 combos are faster. In percentile terms, the combo sits squarely in the lower third of the database (2,625 / 3,720 = ~70.5% of the combos are better).

The combo’s ranking is primarily shaped by the RX 6600 XT’s mid‑range GPU classification. Its GPU percentile is 70 (better than 70% of all GPUs in the benchmark database), but the CPU sits at the 94th percentile among all processors. The i7‑14700KF offers substantial headroom that does not find a counterpart in frame‑rate gains, especially at 4K where the GPU becomes the limiting factor regardless of CPU power. In this specific title, the ranking indicates that the GPU – not the CPU – defines the combo’s place relative to other systems.

For context, the CPU scores 70,163 points in the synthetic average, a solid figure within 1% of nearby rivals: the Ryzen 7 9700F (69,996, delta 0.2%), Ryzen 9 7940HX (69,875, delta 0.4%), Ryzen 9 7950X (69,515, delta 0.9%), and Intel Core Ultra 7 265K (70,879, delta −1%). This confirms that the CPU is not a bottleneck in typical 1080p‑1440p scenarios; it is the GPU that steers the overall benchmark rank.

CPU Role

The i7‑14700KF is a high‑performance desktop processor with 20 cores and 28 threads, running at a base clock of 3.40 GHz and boosting to 5.60 GHz. Its large 33 MB L3 cache and extra 2 MB per‑core L2 (from the 10 nm Raptor Lake architecture) contribute to its strength in both single‑threaded and multi‑threaded tasks. These specifications easily satisfy the CPU‑require of a 2014 stealth game like Thief, which does not demand massive thread counts.

In Thief’s actual measurements, the CPU’s influence is best seen at 1080p where the GPU is not yet saturated. At 1080p Low, the combo averages 155 FPS, and at 1080p High 90 FPS—numbers that require a large instruction issue from the CPU to feed the GPU. The i7’s Geekbench single‑core score of 2,592 and Cinebench R23 single‑core score of 6,235 confirm a high IPC (instructions per cycle) that keeps the render thread active. In multi‑core results (Cinebench R23 44,167, PassMark multithread 52,425), the CPU can juggle background tasks without interfering.

The CPU’s delta‑comparable rivals further contextualize its aptitude: it is only 0.2% faster in average benchmark than the Ryzen 7 9700F, which by itself demonstrates that the i7‑14700KF is positioned at the top of the scaling, not a limiting factor. When frame rates drop from 155 to 63 FPS from 1080p to 4K at Low settings, the CPU is not holding the frame rate; it is delivering continuous compute never clicks the GPU. At 4K Low the system stands at 63 FPS, which is still a fluid figure, and this is because the CPU can drive the reduction in quality without a CPU‑side math penalty.

Measured FPS Breakdown

| Resolution | Setting | Average FPS | Min / Max |

|------------|---------|-------------|-----------|

| 1920×1080 | Low | 155 | – |

| 1920×1080 | Medium | 118 | 100 / 136 |

| 1920×1080 | High | 90 | – |

| 1920×1080 | Ultra | 85 | – |

| 2560×1440 | Low | 107 | – |

| 2560×1440 | Medium | 81 | 69 / 93 |

| 2560×1440 | High | 62 | – |

| 2560×1440 | Ultra | 59 | – |

| 3840×2160 | Low | 63 | – |

| 3840×2160 | Medium | 48 | 40 / 55 |

| 3840×2160 | High | 36 | – |

| 3840×2160 | Ultra | 34 | – |

All numbers are directly measured. The table shows the full set of values. Notably, the Ultra preset at 4K produces only 34 FPS, while High brings 36 FPS—virtually within the margin of the same GPU limit. At 1440p, the gap between low and Ultra is 48 FPS (107 versus 59), a wider spread than at 4K (63 versus 34), which indicates that the GPU’s memory bandwidth (256.0 GB/s) is being used more at intermediate resolutions.

GPU Role

The AMD Radeon RX 6600 XT features 2048 shaders, 64 ROPs, and a boost clock of 2589 MHz. It packs 8 GB of GDDR6 memory on a 128‑bit bus, delivering 256.0 GB/s of bandwidth. These specifications point to a GPU that performs well at 1080p and decently at 1440p, but it struggles with 4K pixel density—confirmed by the frame rates measured.

In Thief, its role is decisive. At 1080p Low, the system achieves 155 FPS, a direly satisfying result that far exceeds a 60‑Hz display. Yet at 4K Ultra the combo drops to 34 FPS, showing that the GPU is the least able member of this pair. The 8 GB memory capacity is not exhausted in this 2014 title (which typically for that era used less than 4 GB), so the drop at 4K is not VRAM‑prbut a pixel‑count raster limit. The GPU’s shader throughput is 10.60 TFLOPS, which aligns with the mid‑range segment it occupies (70th percentile all GPUs).

The GPU’s average benchmark score is 24,442, and its nearest rivals include the GTX 1630 (avg 24,277, delta 0.7%), the Intel Arc A350M (avg 24,647, delta −0.8%), and the GTX 780 Ti (avg 24,236, delta 0.8%). This puts the RX 6600 XT right in the middle of a small group of GPUs that command similar rasterization throughput. In Thief, the frame rates at 1080p High (90 FPS) and 1440p High (62 FPS) are consistent with its place in that group—playable but not flagship. The UI requirement falls to the GPU more than the CPU in high‑resolution buffers.

FAQ

Q: What is the average FPS at 1080p High in Thief?

A: The combination delivers 90 FPS at 1920×1080 High.

Q: How does the frame rate scale from 1080p to 4K at Low settings?

A: The Low preset goes from 155 FPS (1080p) → 107 FPS (1440p) → 63 FPS (4K), a drop of 92 FPS across resolution.

Q: Which component limits the presentation at 4K?

A: The GPU, because at 4K the average FPS drops to between 34 (Ultra) and 63 (Low), regardless of the CPU, which is only 3.4 such an order is far above the needed pixel count.

Q: What improvements fully from reducing the preset?

A: At 4K Medium (48 FPS) versus 4K Low (63 FPS) yields +15 FPS; at 1440p High (62 FPS) to Low (107 FPS) is +45 FPS.

Q: How does the CPU compare to its nearest competitor ryzen 7 9700F?

A: The Core i7‑14700KF scores 70,158 average, which is 0.2% higher than the Ryzen 7 9700F’s 69,996.

Q: What is the combo’s rank in the tested population?

A: The combination is the 2,625th fastest out of 3,720 recorded systems in Thief.