The Medium

# The Medium with AMD Ryzen 5 2600 + AMD Radeon RX 9060

The AMD Ryzen 5 2600 paired with the AMD Radeon RX 9060 delivers a playable but uneven experience in The Medium, a horror title that stresses both CPU and GPU depending on resolution. Benchmark results show this combo ranks 1737th out of 2911 tested combinations, placing it in the lower-middle tier of the database. The sweet spot for this pairing is 1080p Medium settings, where the average frame rate hits 63 FPS with a minimum of 53 FPS, providing a stable baseline for the game's fixed-camera horror sequences. At 1440p Medium, performance drops to 53 FPS average, which remains acceptable for a slow-paced horror title, while 4K pushes the GPU to its limits with only 42 FPS average on Medium settings. The data suggests that this combination is GPU-limited at higher resolutions, but CPU-bound at 1080p where the Ryzen 5 2600's six cores and twelve threads become the bottleneck.

Settings Recommendations

The measured FPS rows reveal a clear hierarchy: Medium settings offer the best balance of visual fidelity and performance across all three resolutions. At 1080p Medium, the combo achieves 63 FPS average with a 53 FPS minimum, which is 40% faster than High settings (45 FPS) and 75% faster than Ultra (36 FPS). The jump from Medium to High costs 18 FPS at 1080p, while the jump from Low to Medium only costs 31 FPS but delivers significantly better visuals for a horror game that relies on atmospheric lighting and shadow detail.

At 1440p, Medium settings produce 53 FPS average with a 45 FPS minimum, which is still playable for this genre. The drop from 1080p Medium to 1440p Medium is exactly 10 FPS (63 to 53), indicating that the GPU is beginning to take on more load but the experience remains smooth. High settings at 1440p drop to 38 FPS, which is borderline for a game that can have sudden action sequences, while Ultra falls to 30 FPS — right at the edge of playability.

At 4K, the picture changes dramatically. Medium settings yield 42 FPS average with a 35 FPS minimum, which is technically playable but may feel sluggish during camera transitions. High settings at 4K drop to 30 FPS, and Ultra falls to 24 FPS, which is below the threshold for smooth motion. Low settings at 4K produce 67 FPS, but the visual compromise is severe for a game that uses fixed camera angles to build tension — the loss of shadow quality and texture detail undermines the horror atmosphere.

The best experience per the measured rows is 1080p Medium, where the 63 FPS average and 53 FPS minimum ensure that no frame drops are noticeable during the game's loading transitions between the two parallel worlds. For users with 1440p displays, Medium settings are the highest acceptable preset, while 4K users should stick to Low settings (67 FPS) if they prioritize smoothness over visual quality, or accept 42 FPS on Medium for a more atmospheric presentation.

FAQ

Q: What is the best resolution and settings combo for this hardware?

A: The data shows 1080p Medium provides the optimal experience with 63 FPS average and a 53 FPS minimum. This is the only preset/resolution combination that maintains a minimum above 50 FPS while retaining Medium-level visual quality.

Q: How does the Ryzen 5 2600 perform relative to its nearest rivals?

A: The Ryzen 5 2600's average benchmark score is 21484, which is 0.2% ahead of the Intel Core Ultra 5 228V (21440), 0.5% ahead of the Intel Core i9-11900H (21367), 0.7% behind the Intel Xeon D-1746TER (21635), and 1.2% ahead of the AMD EPYC 9454 (21223). The CPU sits at the 75th percentile of all tested CPUs.

Q: Is the Radeon RX 9060 a strong GPU for this game?

A: The RX 9060 ranks at the 59th percentile of all GPUs with an average benchmark score of 16014. It is 0.7% behind the NVIDIA GeForce RTX 3060 Ti (16129), 1% ahead of the AMD Radeon R9 370X (15862), 1% ahead of the AMD Radeon RX 7700 (15852), and 2.1% ahead of the AMD Radeon Pro W5500 (15679). In The Medium, it shows it can handle 1080p Medium well but struggles at 4K Ultra.

Q: Why does 4K Ultra only achieve 24 FPS?

A: The 4K Ultra preset demands the maximum from the GPU's 8 GB VRAM and 288.0 GB/s memory bandwidth. At 3840x2160, the RX 9060's 1792 shading units and 64 ROPs are insufficient to maintain fluid frame rates, resulting in 24 FPS average — a 62% drop from 1080p Ultra's 36 FPS.

Q: Is this combo better suited for 1080p or 1440p gaming?

A: The measured data shows 1080p Medium (63 FPS) is significantly better than 1440p Medium (53 FPS), a 19% performance advantage. At 1440p High, the combo drops to 38 FPS, suggesting that 1080p is the intended resolution for this pairing if you want to use Medium or higher presets.

Q: How does this combo rank compared to all other tested combinations?

A: The combo ranks 1737th out of 2911 total tested combos, placing it in the 40th percentile (roughly 60% of combos perform better). This reflects the CPU's age (released in 2018) and the GPU's mid-range positioning.

GPU Role

The Radeon RX 9060 is the primary performance driver in this pairing, and its specifications explain the measured results. With 8 GB of GDDR6 memory on a 128-bit bus providing 288.0 GB/s bandwidth, the GPU has sufficient memory capacity for The Medium's dual-world rendering at 1080p and 1440p, but the 4K Ultra preset pushes memory pressure to the limit. The GPU's boost clock of 2990 MHz and game clock of 2400 MHz are high for a mid-range card, yet the 1792 shading units and 64 ROPs limit raw pixel throughput.

The measured FPS data shows the GPU's scaling behavior. At 1080p Medium, the combo achieves 63 FPS, but at 4K Medium, it drops to 42 FPS — a 33% reduction that aligns with the 4x increase in pixel count. This indicates the GPU is the limiting factor at higher resolutions. The GPU's RT cores (28) and RDNA 4.0 architecture support DirectX 12 Ultimate, but The Medium's fixed-camera perspective means ray tracing is not a dominant workload; instead, the game's reliance on pre-baked lighting and shadow maps favors raw rasterization performance.

The RX 9060's benchmark scores contextualize its in-game performance. Its 3DMark Steel Nomad DX12 score of 3322 and PassMark G3D score of 17631 place it in the mid-range tier, consistent with its 59th percentile ranking. The GPU's Vulkan score of 39476 and OpenCL score of 88183 suggest strong compute capabilities, but The Medium is a DirectX-based title, so the DX11 score of 182 and DX12 score of 44 are more relevant. The low DX12 score relative to DX11 indicates that the game may not fully utilize the GPU's modern feature set, which could explain why the FPS gains from Medium to High are modest (18 FPS at 1080p) compared to the visual quality increase.

How This Combo Ranks

The combo's rank of 1737 out of 2911 tested combinations places it firmly in the lower half of the database. This ranking reflects the combination of a 2018-era six-core CPU and a 2025-era mid-range GPU. The CPU's percentile of 75 among all CPUs is respectable for its age, but its single-thread performance (Geekbench single-core score of 1154) limits the combo in games that rely on strong per-core performance. The GPU's percentile of 59 is below average, indicating that the RX 9060 is not a high-end part.

To contextualize the rank, consider that the combo sits alongside other mid-range pairings. The CPU's nearest rivals include the Intel Core Ultra 5 228V (0.2% faster), Intel Core i9-11900H (0.5% faster), Intel Xeon D-1746TER (0.7% faster), and AMD EPYC 9454 (1.2% slower) — all within a 2% band, showing that the Ryzen 5 2600's overall performance is competitive with much newer parts. The GPU's nearest rivals include the RTX 3060 Ti (0.7% faster), R9 370X (1% slower), RX 7700 (1% slower), and Pro W5500 (2.1% slower), placing the RX 9060 in a tight cluster with other mid-range options.

The rank of 1737 means that approximately 1174 combos perform worse, and 1736 perform better. For The Medium specifically, this rank suggests that while the combo can run the game, it does so with compromises — the 1080p Medium result of 63 FPS is good, but the 4K Ultra result of 24 FPS is among the worst outcomes in the database. The wide spread between resolutions (from 94 FPS at 1080p Low to 24 FPS at 4K Ultra) indicates that the combo has a narrow optimal window, and users must carefully choose settings to stay within it.

Resolution Scaling

The measured FPS data reveals how the combo scales across resolutions. Starting at 1080p Low (94 FPS), the performance drops to 85 FPS at 1440p Low (a 9.6% decrease) and 67 FPS at 4K Low (a 28.7% decrease from 1080p). This scaling suggests that at Low settings, the CPU is the primary bottleneck at 1080p, as the GPU has enough headroom to render frames quickly, and the CPU's six cores limit the frame rate.

At Medium settings, the scaling is more pronounced: 1080p Medium (63 FPS) drops to 53 FPS at 1440p (15.9% decrease) and 42 FPS at 4K (33.3% decrease). This steeper drop indicates the GPU is becoming more involved, as Medium settings increase texture and shadow quality, which taxes the 8 GB VRAM and 288.0 GB/s bandwidth. The 1440p to 4K drop of 11 FPS (20.8%) is larger than the 1080p to 1440p drop of 10 FPS (15.9%), showing that the GPU's pixel throughput becomes the limiting factor at 4K.

At High settings, the scaling is dramatic: 1080p High (45 FPS) drops to 38 FPS at 1440p (15.6% decrease) and 30 FPS at 4K (33.3% decrease). The 4K High result of 30 FPS is exactly at the edge of playability, and the 1080p High result of 45 FPS is below the 50 FPS threshold that many consider minimum for smooth gameplay. Ultra settings show the worst scaling: 1080p Ultra (36 FPS) drops to 30 FPS at 1440p (16.7% decrease) and 24 FPS at 4K (33.3% decrease).

The consistent ~33% drop from 1080p to 4K across Medium, High, and Ultra presets indicates that the GPU is the limiting component at these settings. The CPU's impact is most visible at Low settings, where the 1080p-to-4K drop is only 28.7%, suggesting that at Low, the CPU is still partially bottlenecking even at 4K. This analysis points to the GPU being the primary constraint for this game at Medium and above, while the CPU becomes relevant only at the lowest preset.

Measured FPS Breakdown

At 1920x1080, the combo delivers its best results. Low settings produce 94 FPS average, which is the highest measured score across all resolution/settings combinations. Medium settings yield 63 FPS average with a 53 FPS minimum and 72 FPS maximum, providing a stable experience. High settings drop to 45 FPS average, representing a 28.6% reduction from Medium, which is a significant visual quality trade-off. Ultra settings produce 36 FPS average, which is 42.9% below Medium and approaches unplayable territory for a game that can have quick-time events.

At 2560x1440, performance scales proportionally. Low settings achieve 85 FPS average, which is 9.6% lower than 1080p Low. Medium settings produce 53 FPS average with a 45 FPS minimum and 61 FPS maximum, maintaining playability but with a 15.9% drop from 1080p Medium. High settings drop to 38 FPS average, which is 15.6% below 1080p High and may cause noticeable stuttering during scene transitions. Ultra settings produce 30 FPS average, exactly at the minimum threshold for console-like performance.

At 3840x2160, the combo struggles. Low settings achieve 67 FPS average, which is surprisingly playable and only 28.7% below 1080p Low. Medium settings produce 42 FPS average with a 35 FPS minimum and 48 FPS maximum, which is below the 50 FPS threshold but usable for a slow-paced horror game. High settings drop to 30 FPS average, which is marginal at best. Ultra settings produce 24 FPS average, which is below the standard 30 FPS baseline for cinematic games and will feel choppy.

The Medium settings row provides the only complete dataset with min and max FPS values, showing that at 1080p, the combo can maintain a 53-72 FPS range, at 1440p a 45-61 FPS range, and at 4K a 35-48 FPS range. These ranges indicate that frame pacing is consistent, with no severe dips below the minimum values, which is important for a horror game where sudden frame drops can break immersion. The 1080p Medium range of 53-72 FPS shows a 19 FPS spread, while the 1440p range of 45-61 FPS has a 16 FPS spread, and the 4K range of 35-48 FPS has a 13 FPS spread — tighter variance at higher resolutions suggests the GPU is more consistently loaded.