The Medium

The AMD Ryzen 5 5600 and Intel Arc B580 combination presents a specific performance profile for The Medium, a horror title that relies heavily on both CPU and GPU resources. Based on measured data, this pairing delivers playable frame rates only at lower graphical presets, with the game's demanding visual effects creating a significant bottleneck at higher settings. The data shows a clear pattern: this combo excels at 1080p Low, remains viable at 1440p Low, and falls short of the 60 FPS threshold at 4K across all tested presets.

FAQ

Q: What is the highest average frame rate this combo achieves in The Medium?

A: The highest recorded average frame rate is 88 FPS, achieved at 1920x1080 resolution with Low settings.

Q: Can this system run The Medium at 4K resolution?

A: No. At 3840x2160, the best average FPS is 58 on Low settings, which falls just below the 60 FPS playable threshold. All other presets at this resolution (Medium 37 FPS, High 26 FPS, Ultra 21 FPS) are significantly lower.

Q: Which resolution and settings combination provides the best playable experience?

A: The best playable experience is at 1920x1080 with Low settings, delivering an average of 88 FPS. At 2560x1440, Low settings also clear the threshold with an average of 74 FPS.

Q: How does the CPU's multi-threaded performance compare to its nearest rivals?

A: The Ryzen 5 5600 scores 20,468 in average benchmark score, placing it within 0.5% of the AMD EPYC 7713 (20,363) and 0.1% of the Intel Core Ultra 7 258V (20,454). It holds a 0.2% advantage over both the AMD Ryzen 5 8500G (20,425) and AMD EPYC 9454P (20,422).

Q: What is the GPU's performance percentile among all tested graphics cards?

A: The Intel Arc B580 sits in the 68th percentile for all GPUs, with an average benchmark score of 23,021. This places it near the NVIDIA GeForce RTX 3080 (23,172, 0.7% faster) and AMD Radeon RX 580 2048SP (23,061, 0.2% faster).

Q: Does the GPU's average score differ significantly from its closest competitor?

A: The Arc B580's average score of 23,021 is essentially tied with the AMD Radeon RX 580 2048SP (23,061, -0.2% difference) and the NVIDIA GeForce RTX 2080 (22,895, 0.6% difference). These deltas are within measurement noise.

CPU and GPU Roles

The performance scaling across resolutions reveals a clear division of labor between the Ryzen 5 5600 and the Arc B580. At 1920x1080, the frame rate drops from 88 FPS at Low to 55 FPS at Medium, a 37.5% reduction, and further to 40 FPS at High. This steep decline with each preset increase indicates that the GPU is the primary limiter, as the CPU has ample headroom at this resolution with its 6 cores and 12 threads.

Moving to 2560x1440, the pattern shifts. Low settings produce 74 FPS, which is only 15.9% lower than the 1080p Low result. However, Medium settings fall to 47 FPS, a 36.2% drop from Low at the same resolution. The delta between 1080p Medium (55 FPS) and 1440p Medium (47 FPS) is 14.5%, suggesting that while resolution scaling affects performance, the graphical preset has a more pronounced impact. This indicates that the game's visual effects, such as volumetric lighting and shadow quality, are heavily taxing the GPU's 2560 shading units.

At 3840x2160, the GPU is decisively the bottleneck. The Arc B580's 192-bit memory bus and 456.0 GB/s bandwidth are insufficient for 4K rendering, as evidenced by the 58 FPS at Low settings — barely half of the 1080p Low result. The gap between 1440p Low (74 FPS) and 4K Low (58 FPS) is 21.6%, while the gap between 1080p Low and 4K Low is 34.1%. The CPU's role diminishes further at this resolution, with the Ryzen 5 5600's single-thread performance (Cinebench R23 single-core score of 2,584) being more than adequate for the game's logic at 4K.

The preset scaling at each resolution confirms the GPU-bound nature. At 1080p, the jump from Low to Medium costs 33 FPS, while Medium to High costs 15 FPS. At 1440p, Low to Medium costs 27 FPS, and at 4K, Low to Medium costs 21 FPS. This diminishing impact of presets at higher resolutions suggests that pixel throughput becomes the dominant factor, overriding the effects of individual graphical features.

Best Settings per Resolution

For 1920x1080, the most demanding preset that maintains 60 FPS is Low, with an average of 88 FPS. Medium falls short at 55 FPS, so Low is the only playable option at this resolution.

At 2560x1440, Low settings again provide the only playable experience, averaging 74 FPS. The Medium preset at 47 FPS misses the 60 FPS target by a substantial margin.

For 3840x2160, no preset achieves 60 FPS. The closest is Low at 58 FPS, which is 2 FPS below the playable threshold. Medium (37 FPS), High (26 FPS), and Ultra (21 FPS) are all well outside playable range.

The data indicates that this combination cannot handle higher presets even at 1080p, as the Ultra preset only manages 31 FPS. This suggests that the Arc B580's 13.67 TFLOPS FP32 performance is insufficient for the game's most demanding visual configurations, regardless of resolution.

Similar Performance Alternatives

For the CPU, the Ryzen 5 5600's nearest rivals in average benchmark score are the Intel Core Ultra 7 258V (20,454, 0.1% slower) and the AMD Ryzen 5 8500G (20,425, 0.2% slower). Both would deliver nearly identical CPU-bound performance in The Medium. The AMD EPYC 9454P (20,422, 0.2% slower) and EPYC 7713 (20,363, 0.5% slower) are server-class parts that would also behave similarly, though their different platform characteristics are not relevant to gaming performance.

On the GPU side, the Arc B580's nearest rivals are the AMD Radeon RX 580 2048SP (23,061, 0.2% faster) and the NVIDIA GeForce RTX 2080 (22,895, 0.6% slower). The NVIDIA GeForce RTX 3080 (23,172, 0.7% faster) is also within 1% performance parity. In practice, any of these GPUs paired with the Ryzen 5 5600 would yield nearly identical frame rates in The Medium, with differences well within the 2-3 FPS margins seen between preset levels.

Given that the GPU is the limiting factor at all resolutions, swapping the CPU for any of its nearest rivals would produce no measurable change in performance. Conversely, replacing the Arc B580 with the RTX 2080 or RTX 3080 would shift performance by less than 1%, meaning the playability verdict remains unchanged: only Low presets at 1080p and 1440p would clear 60 FPS.

How This Combo Ranks

The Ryzen 5 5600 + Arc B580 combination ranks 2,819 out of 3,724 tested combos for The Medium, placing it in the bottom 24.3% of all configurations. This low ranking is primarily driven by the GPU's inability to handle higher presets, as the CPU's 74th percentile ranking (vs all CPUs) is respectable for a mid-range desktop processor.

The combo's rank reflects its limited playability envelope. With only two playable settings across all resolutions (1080p Low and 1440p Low), it falls behind configurations that can manage Medium or High presets at standard resolutions. The 4K results, which max out at 58 FPS, further depress the ranking, as many competing combos achieve 60+ FPS at 1440p High or better.

The percentile data contextualizes this: the CPU sits in the 74th percentile, but the GPU is in the 68th percentile. The combination's rank suggests that the GPU's percentile is the limiting factor, as the CPU has sufficient headroom to support higher frame rates if the GPU could deliver them.

The Verdict

This PC can run The Medium, but only under strict conditions. At 1920x1080, the Low preset delivers 88 FPS average, comfortably clearing the 60 FPS playable threshold. The Medium preset at 55 FPS is not playable, and High (40 FPS) and Ultra (31 FPS) are even further from the target.

At 2560x1440, Low settings are playable at 74 FPS average. No other preset at this resolution reaches 60 FPS, with Medium at 47 FPS and High at 33 FPS.

At 3840x2160, the system cannot achieve 60 FPS at any setting. The Low preset reaches 58 FPS, which is tantalizingly close but still below the threshold.

The verdict is clear: this is a 1080p Low and 1440p Low machine for The Medium. Users seeking higher visual fidelity would need to either reduce resolution or accept sub-60 FPS performance. The data shows no scenario where Medium settings are playable, which is a significant limitation for a game that relies on atmospheric visuals.

Measured FPS Breakdown

3840x2160:

• Ultra: 21 FPS average
• High: 26 FPS average
• Medium: 37 FPS average (min 31, max 42)
• Low: 58 FPS average

2560x1440:

• Ultra: 26 FPS average
• High: 33 FPS average
• Medium: 47 FPS average (min 40, max 54)
• Low: 74 FPS average

1920x1080:

• Ultra: 31 FPS average
• High: 40 FPS average
• Medium: 55 FPS average (min 47, max 64)
• Low: 88 FPS average

The Medium preset at each resolution shows the narrowest frame time variance, with the 1080p Medium range spanning 47-64 FPS. This suggests the game's dynamic loading and camera transitions create occasional dips, but the overall experience remains stable. The Low presets have no recorded min/max values, indicating consistent performance without significant frame drops.

Across all resolutions, the scaling from Low to Ultra follows a consistent pattern: approximately 65-75% performance loss from the lowest to highest preset. This uniformity suggests the game's settings have additive rather than exponential GPU demands, making the Arc B580's performance predictable regardless of resolution. The 4K Low result of 58 FPS is the outlier, demonstrating that memory bandwidth becomes the ultimate constraint at higher pixel counts.