To The Core

FAQ

Q: What is the overall performance percentile of this CPU and GPU pairing?

A: The Intel Core i7-14700KF sits in the 94th percentile among all CPUs, while the NVIDIA GeForce RTX 3070 ranks in the 61st percentile among all GPUs. This creates a lopsided combo where the processor is a top-tier part but the graphics card is more mid-range in the broader market.

Q: How does the Core i7-14700KF compare to its closest rival, the AMD Ryzen 7 9700F?

A: The Core i7-14700KF averages a benchmark score of 70,163, which is just 0.2% higher than the Ryzen 7 9700F’s 69,996. This places the two effectively in a statistical tie, though the Intel part edges ahead by a negligible margin. Against the Intel Core Ultra 7 265K, the i7-14700KF is 1% slower (70,163 vs. 70,879).

Q: What is the RTX 3070's closest rival, and how large is the performance gap?

A: The AMD Radeon RX 7600 XT is the nearest rival, with an average score of 17,083 compared to the RTX 3070’s 17,208 — a 0.7% advantage for the NVIDIA card. The gap is even smaller against the GTX 690 (17,037, a 1% difference), making this GPU's position in the market highly competitive.

Q: Does this game favor the CPU or the GPU based on the measured frame rates?

A: The data suggests a strong CPU influence. At 1080p Low, the combo produces 355 FPS, and even at 4K Low it maintains 136 FPS — both exceptionally high. The GPU's 61st percentile ranking is modest, yet the frame rates are far above typical expectations, indicating the game is likely light on GPU load and heavily dependent on processor throughput.

Q: What is the best-performing settings preset for this combo in To The Core?

A: At every resolution, the Low preset yields the highest average FPS: 355 at 1080p, 239 at 1440p, and 136 at 4K. However, Medium provides a better balance, with 300 FPS at 1080p and 115 FPS at 4K, while also offering recorded minimum and maximum frame data that Low lacks in the measured set.

Q: How does the combo rank among all tested combinations in this game?

A: The combo ranks 1601st out of 3,725 tested combinations, placing it in the 57th percentile of all pairings. This is a mid-pack result, which is surprising given the CPU's high percentile, suggesting the GPU is holding the combo back from a top-tier overall ranking.

How This Combo Ranks

The combo's rank of 1601 out of 3725 tested configurations places it squarely in the middle of the distribution — about 57% of tested combos perform better. This is a notable discrepancy when you consider the CPU alone sits in the 94th percentile of all processors. The ranking suggests that in To The Core, the pairing's overall effectiveness is limited by the GPU, not the CPU.

Data supports this interpretation: the i7-14700KF's average benchmark score of 70,163 is 0.2% ahead of the Ryzen 7 9700F and 0.4% ahead of the Ryzen 9 7940HX, yet those CPUs likely pair with different GPUs to achieve higher combo ranks. The RTX 3070's 61st percentile GPU ranking, combined with its modest 17,208 average score, means the visual processing is the bottleneck.

Compare this to the CPU's rivals: the i7-14700KF beats the Ryzen 9 7950X by 0.9% (70,163 vs. 69,515) but loses to the Core Ultra 7 265K by 1% (70,163 vs. 70,879). These are tiny margins, showing the CPU is competitive at the top. Yet the combo rank is mid-pack because the GPU's 61st percentile is the weaker link. The data implies that swapping the RTX 3070 for a higher-percentile GPU would dramatically improve the combo's standing, independent of any CPU change.

GPU Role

The RTX 3070 is built on the GA104 chip using Samsung's 8nm process, with 17,400 million transistors on a 392 mm² die. Its base clock runs at 1500 MHz and boosts to 1725 MHz, while the 8 GB of GDDR6 memory operates at 1750 MHz (14 Gbps effective) across a 256-bit bus, providing 448.0 GB/s of bandwidth. These specs place the GPU in the 61st percentile of all GPUs, with an average benchmark score of 17,208.

In To The Core, the GPU's role appears to be secondary. At 1080p Ultra, the combo delivers 209 FPS, and even at 4K Ultra it manages 81 FPS — both well above playable thresholds. The GPU's modest 61st percentile ranking does not prevent high frame rates, which indicates the game is not GPU-bound in the traditional sense. The RTX 3070's nearest rival, the RX 7600 XT, scores 0.7% lower (17,083 vs. 17,208), yet the FPS deltas between settings presets suggest the GPU still matters for quality scaling.

The 8 GB VRAM is a consideration, though the measured data does not show VRAM-related stutters at any resolution. The memory bandwidth of 448.0 GB/s is sufficient for this game's demands, as evidenced by the 115 FPS average at 4K Medium. The GPU's 46 RT cores and 184 tensor cores are present but likely underutilized in an idle genre game, where the workload is more about rasterization and draw calls. The data implies the RTX 3070 is more than adequate for To The Core, with headroom to spare for higher refresh rate displays.

Settings Recommendations

The measured FPS rows provide clear guidance on preset selection. For the best experience, the Medium preset at 1440p offers the most balanced outcome: 202 FPS average, with minimums at 172 and maximums at 232. This is a strong result that avoids the potential instability of Low settings while maintaining high fluidity.

At 1080p, Medium also shines with 300 FPS average (min 255, max 345). The Ultra preset at 1080p delivers 209 FPS, which is still excellent but 30% lower than Medium — a significant drop for marginal visual gains. The High preset at 1080p yields 260 FPS, positioning it between Medium and Ultra.

For 4K, the choices are more constrained. Medium offers 115 FPS (min 98, max 133), which is the only 4K preset with recorded minimums and maximums, making it the most reliable option. High at 4K gives 100 FPS, while Ultra drops to 81 FPS — still playable but with a 30% reduction from Medium. Low at 4K hits 136 FPS, but without min/max data, its consistency is unknown.

The best experience per the measured rows is Medium at 1440p or 4K, depending on display resolution. The data shows Medium provides the most stable frame pacing (evidenced by available min/max values) while sacrificing only modestly on average FPS compared to Low. Users with high-refresh 1080p displays could justify Medium at 300 FPS, but for 4K, Medium's 115 FPS is the sweet spot.

Measured FPS Breakdown

1080p: The Low preset delivers the highest average at 355 FPS. Medium follows at 300 FPS (min 255, max 345), High at 260 FPS, and Ultra at 209 FPS. The spread from Low to Ultra is 146 FPS, a 41% reduction in average frame rate. The minimum FPS for Medium (255) is higher than the average for Ultra (209), showing that Medium maintains better frame consistency even at lower average values.

1440p: Low produces 239 FPS, Medium 202 FPS (min 172, max 232), High 175 FPS, and Ultra 141 FPS. The gap from Low to Ultra is 98 FPS (41% drop), mirroring the 1080p scaling pattern. Medium's minimum of 172 FPS is above the Ultra average of 141 FPS, reinforcing that Medium is the more reliable choice for smooth gameplay.

4K: Low averages 136 FPS, Medium 115 FPS (min 98, max 133), High 100 FPS, and Ultra 81 FPS. The drop from Low to Ultra is 55 FPS (40% reduction), consistent with the other resolutions. Notably, Medium's maximum of 133 FPS nearly matches Low's average of 136 FPS, indicating that Medium can occasionally hit Low-level performance while offering better visual quality.

Across all resolutions, the percentage drop from Low to Ultra remains remarkably consistent at roughly 40-41%. This suggests a uniform scaling factor tied to resolution, not a sudden bottleneck at any particular setting. The min/max data for Medium at each resolution (255/345 at 1080p, 172/232 at 1440p, 98/133 at 4K) shows that frame variance increases with resolution, but the average FPS remains high even at 4K.

CPU Role

The Intel Core i7-14700KF is a 20-core, 28-thread processor based on Raptor Lake architecture, fabricated on Intel's 10nm process. It has a base clock of 3.40 GHz and boosts to 5.60 GHz, with a 125W TDP. The cache hierarchy includes 80 KB L1 per core, 2 MB L2 per core, and 33 MB shared L3. Its benchmark scores are impressive: Cinebench R23 multi-core at 44,167, single-core at 6,235, and Geekbench multi-core at 21,462.

In To The Core, the CPU's role is dominant. The 94th percentile ranking among all CPUs means this processor is faster than 94% of alternatives, and the game's frame rates reflect this. At 1080p Low, the combo produces 355 FPS, which is far beyond what a typical GPU-bound title would achieve with a 61st-percentile GPU. The CPU's high single-core performance (6,235 in Cinebench R23 single-core) likely drives the game's logic and simulation, which is typical for idle genre titles.

The CPU's nearest rivals provide context: the Ryzen 7 9700F scores 69,996 (0.2% lower), the Ryzen 9 7940HX 69,875 (0.4% lower), and the Ryzen 9 7950X 69,515 (0.9% lower). The i7-14700KF leads all of these but trails the Core Ultra 7 265K by 1% (70,163 vs. 70,879). These margins are small, yet the CPU's 28 threads and 5.60 GHz boost clock give it an edge in multi-threaded workloads that may appear in the game's background calculations.

The PassMark multi-thread score of 52,425 and single-thread of 4,480 further illustrate the CPU's capability. The data strongly suggests that To The Core is CPU-bound at lower resolutions, as evidenced by the 355 FPS at 1080p Low — a figure that would be unattainable if the GPU were the limiting factor. The CPU's 33 MB L3 cache likely helps with the game's data streaming, reducing latency and maintaining high frame rates.

Resolution Scaling

Examining the FPS drop from 1080p to 4K reveals important insights about the system's bottleneck. At Low settings, the average FPS drops from 355 at 1080p to 239 at 1440p (a 33% reduction) and then to 136 at 4K (a 62% reduction from 1080p). At Medium settings, the progression is 300 → 202 → 115, a similar 62% drop from 1080p to 4K. For Ultra, the numbers are 209 → 141 → 81, a 61% reduction.

The consistency of these drops — approximately 33% from 1080p to 1440p, and another 43% from 1440p to 4K — indicates that the GPU becomes progressively more involved as resolution increases. The GPU's 448.0 GB/s bandwidth and 8 GB VRAM are sufficient at 1080p, where the CPU drives the high FPS. At 4K, the GPU's pixel fill rate (165.6 GPixel/s) and texture rate (317.4 GTexel/s) become more relevant, yet the combo still manages 81 FPS at Ultra.

This scaling pattern reveals that the system is CPU-bound at 1080p, transitioning to GPU-bound at 4K. The 355 FPS at 1080p Low is a CPU-limited ceiling; the GPU could likely render more frames if the CPU could feed it faster. At 4K, the GPU's 61st-percentile performance becomes the limiting factor, capping FPS at 136 even on Low settings.

The data implies that for this game, the i7-14700KF's power is underutilized at 1080p, where it has headroom to spare. At 4K, the RTX 3070's limitations become apparent, but the frame rates remain high enough for smooth gameplay. The resolution scaling suggests that users with 1080p displays are leaving CPU performance on the table, while 4K users are more fully utilizing the GPU. This is a classic imbalance where the CPU's 94th-percentile performance is wasted until higher resolutions or more demanding titles are introduced.