Thief

The Intel Core Ultra 5 125H paired with the NVIDIA GeForce RTX 4090 Mobile delivers a decisive performance profile in Thief, a 2014 stealth title. The measured data shows this combination produces high frame rates across all tested configurations, with a notable pattern: the gap between the CPU's modest multi-core throughput and the GPU's high-end mobile silicon becomes the defining factor in how settings and resolutions scale. The following analysis breaks down the measured FPS results, component roles, and ranking context.

Settings Recommendations

The benchmark data for Thief reveals a clear hierarchy among the four tested settings presets at each resolution, but the optimal choice depends on the target display. At 1920x1080, the Low preset produces an average of 164 FPS, while High reaches 135 FPS and Ultra sits at 132 FPS. The Medium preset, with an average of 149 FPS, offers a balanced middle ground, but the data shows that the jump from Medium to High costs only 14 FPS (from 149 to 135), while High to Ultra costs only 3 FPS (from 135 to 132). This suggests that High is the most efficient setting at 1080p, as it provides nearly the same performance as Ultra with a minimal frame rate penalty relative to the visual uplift.

At 2560x1440, the pattern shifts. Low produces 145 FPS, High drops to 101 FPS, and Ultra lands at 97 FPS. Medium sits at 131 FPS, which is 30 FPS higher than High. The data indicates that Medium is the recommended preset for 1440p, as it maintains a substantial frame rate advantage over High (131 vs 101 FPS) while still offering improved visuals over Low. The Ultra preset’s 97 FPS is only 4 FPS below High, making High redundant at this resolution when Medium provides a 30 FPS buffer.

At 3840x2160, the story changes significantly. Low produces 103 FPS, Medium drops to 78 FPS, and High falls to 60 FPS. Ultra is the lowest at 57 FPS. The data shows that Medium is the optimal preset for 4K, as it delivers 78 FPS—well above the 60 FPS threshold that High barely meets—while providing a 25 FPS improvement over Low. High and Ultra are nearly indistinguishable in performance (60 vs 57 FPS), and both fall below the Medium preset’s average. For a fluid 4K experience, Medium is the clear choice based on the measured rows.

FAQ

Q: What is the highest average FPS recorded for this combo in Thief?

A: The highest average FPS is 164, achieved at 1920x1080 with the Low settings preset.

Q: How does the Ultra preset compare to High at 2560x1440?

A: At 2560x1440, the Ultra preset averages 97 FPS, while High averages 101 FPS. The Ultra preset is 4 FPS slower, indicating a negligible performance difference between these two presets at this resolution.

Q: Is the RTX 4090 Mobile bottlenecked by the Core Ultra 5 125H at 1080p?

A: The data suggests a CPU limitation at 1080p, as the frame rate difference between Low (164 FPS) and Ultra (132 FPS) is only 32 FPS. This narrow spread, combined with the GPU’s high benchmark scores, indicates the CPU is the limiting factor at lower resolutions.

Q: What is the minimum FPS recorded for the Medium preset across all resolutions?

A: The Medium preset has recorded minimum FPS values only at three resolutions: 126 at 1920x1080, 112 at 2560x1440, and 67 at 3840x2160. The lowest minimum is 67 FPS at 4K.

Q: How does the combo rank in Thief compared to other tested combinations?

A: The combo ranks 998 out of 3720 tested combos in Thief, placing it in the upper quartile of all combinations tested for this game.

Q: Does the GPU’s average benchmark score align with its percentile ranking?

A: The GPU has an average benchmark score of 43667 and a percentile rank of 84, meaning it outperforms 84% of all GPUs. This is consistent with its high-end mobile positioning.

GPU Role

The NVIDIA GeForce RTX 4090 Mobile is a formidable component, with 16 GB of GDDR6 memory on a 256-bit bus providing 576.0 GB/s of bandwidth. Its 9728 shading units and 112 ROPs, combined with a boost clock of 1695 MHz, yield a pixel rate of 189.8 GPixel/s and a texture rate of 515.3 GTexel/s. The GPU’s FP32 performance of 32.98 TFLOPS and its percentile rank of 84 against all GPUs underscore its capability, yet the measured frame rates in Thief reveal that this power is not fully utilized at lower resolutions.

The data shows that the RTX 4090 Mobile’s VRAM and bandwidth are more than sufficient for Thief, a game from 2014 with modest asset sizes. At 3840x2160, the GPU becomes the primary driver of performance, as evidenced by the wide spread between Low (103 FPS) and Ultra (57 FPS). This 46 FPS gap indicates that the GPU is scaling with settings at 4K, with higher presets increasing the rendering load. The Medium preset at 4K, with a minimum FPS of 67, shows that the GPU maintains playable frame rates even under moderate settings.

However, the GPU’s role diminishes at 1080p, where the frame rate differences between presets compress. The RTX 4090 Mobile’s raw compute power is likely underutilized at 1920x1080, as the CPU becomes the bottleneck. The GPU’s average benchmark score of 43667 and its nearest rival, the NVIDIA RTX A6000, with an average score of 44075 (a delta of -0.9%), confirm that this mobile GPU is competitive with top-tier desktop workstation cards. Yet in Thief, the measured data shows that the GPU’s headroom is only fully tapped at 4K, where its 16 GB VRAM and high bandwidth prevent any memory-related stutters, as evidenced by the consistent minimum FPS values at Medium settings.

Measured FPS Breakdown

The measured FPS data for Thief provides a comprehensive view of performance across three resolutions and four settings presets. At 1920x1080, the Low preset averages 164 FPS, Medium averages 149 FPS with a minimum of 126 and maximum of 171, High averages 135 FPS, and Ultra averages 132 FPS. The spread between Low and Ultra is 32 FPS, which is relatively narrow and suggests that the CPU is the limiting factor at this resolution.

At 2560x1440, the Low preset averages 145 FPS, Medium averages 131 FPS with a minimum of 112 and maximum of 151, High averages 101 FPS, and Ultra averages 97 FPS. The spread between Low and Ultra widens to 48 FPS, indicating that the GPU is beginning to take on more of the rendering load as resolution increases. The Medium preset’s minimum of 112 FPS is notably higher than the High preset’s average of 101 FPS, reinforcing that Medium is the most stable option at 1440p.

At 3840x2160, the Low preset averages 103 FPS, Medium averages 78 FPS with a minimum of 67 and maximum of 90, High averages 60 FPS, and Ultra averages 57 FPS. The spread between Low and Ultra expands to 46 FPS, matching the 1440p spread but with lower absolute values. The Medium preset’s minimum of 67 FPS is the only recorded minimum that falls below 100 FPS, highlighting the increased GPU load at 4K. The High and Ultra presets both hover near 60 FPS, with Ultra only 3 FPS slower than High, suggesting that the GPU is nearing its limit for this game at 4K with higher settings.

Resolution Scaling

The transition from 1920x1080 to 2560x1440 and then to 3840x2160 shows a consistent pattern of frame rate reduction, but the magnitude varies by settings preset. For the Low preset, the average FPS drops from 164 at 1080p to 145 at 1440p (a decrease of 19 FPS) and then to 103 at 4K (a further decrease of 42 FPS). This represents a 37% reduction from 1080p to 4K for Low settings, indicating that even at Low, the GPU is still working harder at higher resolutions.

For the Medium preset, the average FPS drops from 149 at 1080p to 131 at 1440p (a decrease of 18 FPS) and then to 78 at 4K (a further decrease of 53 FPS). This is a 48% reduction from 1080p to 4K, which is steeper than Low, suggesting that the Medium preset’s additional rendering features (e.g., shadows, textures) are more GPU-intensive. The High preset shows a similar trend: 135 FPS at 1080p, 101 FPS at 1440p (a decrease of 34 FPS), and 60 FPS at 4K (a further decrease of 41 FPS), for a total reduction of 56% from 1080p to 4K.

The Ultra preset exhibits the largest relative drop, from 132 FPS at 1080p to 97 FPS at 1440p (a decrease of 35 FPS) and then to 57 FPS at 4K (a further decrease of 40 FPS), totaling a 57% reduction. The data shows that the resolution scaling penalty increases with higher settings, which is characteristic of a GPU-bound scenario at 4K. Conversely, the relatively flat performance across settings at 1080p—where the difference between Low and Ultra is only 32 FPS—confirms that the CPU is the limiting component at lower resolutions, while the GPU becomes the bottleneck as resolution rises.

CPU Role

The Intel Core Ultra 5 125H features 14 cores and 18 threads, with a base clock of 3.60 GHz and a boost clock of 4.50 GHz. Its 18 MB of shared L3 cache and dual-channel memory support with 89.6 GB/s bandwidth provide sufficient throughput for gaming, but its benchmark scores reveal a mixed picture. The CPU’s multi-core performance, as measured by Cinebench R23, is 12804.5, while its single-core score is 1647.5. Its PassMark multithread score is 21100, and its single-thread score is 3399. The CPU’s percentile rank against all CPUs is 79, with an average benchmark score of 27507.

In Thief, the CPU’s role is most apparent at 1920x1080, where the frame rates across settings are tightly clustered. The difference between Low (164 FPS) and Ultra (132 FPS) is only 32 FPS, which is less than the 46 FPS spread seen at 4K. This suggests that at 1080p, the CPU is unable to feed the GPU fast enough to allow the full performance headroom of the RTX 4090 Mobile to be expressed. The CPU’s nearest rival, the AMD Ryzen 7 5800, has an average benchmark score of 27535, which is only 0.1% higher, indicating that the Core Ultra 5 125H is competitive with a desktop-class processor from a previous generation.

However, the CPU’s single-thread performance is modest relative to its multi-core capabilities, and Thief, being a 2014 title, likely relies on a few threads for game logic. The data shows that at 1440p, the frame rates begin to spread more (Low at 145 FPS vs Ultra at 97 FPS), indicating that the GPU is starting to take over as the primary limiter. At 4K, the CPU’s influence is minimal, as the GPU is clearly the bottleneck. The CPU’s TDP of 28 W and its Meteor Lake architecture with a 7 nm process node suggest efficiency, but the benchmark results indicate that it is not a high-end gaming CPU, which is consistent with its rank of 998 out of 3720 combos in Thief.

How This Combo Ranks

The combination of the Intel Core Ultra 5 125H and NVIDIA GeForce RTX 4090 Mobile ranks 998 out of 3720 tested combos in Thief. This places the combo in the top 27% of all tested combinations, which is a strong result given the CPU’s mid-range positioning. The GPU’s high percentile rank (84) and average benchmark score (43667) are the primary contributors to this ranking, while the CPU’s lower single-thread performance holds the combo back from higher placements.

The data shows that the combo’s ranking is driven by the GPU’s ability to maintain high frame rates at 4K, where the CPU’s limitations are less relevant. At 1080p, the combo’s performance is constrained by the CPU, as evidenced by the narrow spread between settings. This suggests that in other games with lower GPU demands, the combo might rank lower due to the CPU bottleneck. Conversely, in GPU-intensive scenarios like Thief at 4K, the combo excels, with the RTX 4090 Mobile’s 16 GB VRAM and high bandwidth ensuring consistent performance.

The nearest rivals for the GPU include the NVIDIA RTX A6000 (delta of -0.9%) and the NVIDIA Quadro M6000 (delta of +0.8%), which are both workstation-class GPUs with similar average benchmark scores. The CPU’s nearest rivals, such as the AMD Ryzen 7 5800 (delta of -0.1%), indicate that the Core Ultra 5 125H is competitive with desktop processors from the same era. Overall, the combo ranks in the upper quartile, with the GPU providing most of the performance headroom and the CPU serving as a capable but not exceptional partner for this 2014 stealth title.