The Medium

The AMD Ryzen 5 2600 and NVIDIA GeForce RTX 3060 Ti pairing in The Medium presents a curious case of a last-gen mid-range CPU meeting an upper-mid-range current-gen GPU. The processor, built on the 12 nm Zen architecture, offers 6 cores and 12 threads, with a base clock of 3.40 GHz and a boost clock of 3.90 GHz. This is a 65 W part designed for the AMD Socket AM4 platform, and its benchmark scores—like the Cinebench R23 multi-core result of 11186 and single-core result of 1579—place it in the 77th percentile among all CPUs. The data reveals a processor that was solid for its era but now finds itself at the edge of modern game demands, particularly in a title like The Medium that relies heavily on fixed camera angles and complex scene rendering.

The 16 MB of shared L3 cache and dual-channel DDR4 memory support with 46.9 GB/s of bandwidth are typical of 2018-era designs. What is more telling is how this CPU interacts with the RTX 3060 Ti, a GPU that uses the GA104 chip on an 8 nm Samsung process, featuring 4864 shading units, 152 texture mapping units, and 80 ROPs. The GPU’s 8 GB of GDDR6 memory on a 256-bit bus delivers 448.0 GB/s of bandwidth, which is more than adequate for 1080p and 1440p gaming. The core clocks of 1410 MHz base and 1665 MHz boost, alongside a 16.20 TFLOPS FP32 rating, show a card that is far more capable than the CPU in this pairing, likely making the Ryzen 5 2600 the primary limiting factor in lower-resolution scenarios where CPU overhead matters most.

FAQ

Q: What is the performance gap between the Ryzen 5 2600 and its closest competitor in the database?

A: The CPU’s average benchmark score of 19616 puts it nearly level with the Intel Core i5-1345U, which scores 19691, a delta of -0.4%. It is also just 0.6% ahead of the AMD Ryzen 5 7530U, which scores 19508, and 0.7% ahead of the Intel Core i7-10700F at 19485. The only rival it trails is the Intel Core i5-11600KF at 19740, a -0.6% delta.

Q: How does the RTX 3060 Ti compare to the AMD Radeon RX 6600 in raw compute benchmarks?

A: The RTX 3060 Ti’s average benchmark score is 25120, which is 0.5% below the AMD Radeon RX 6600’s score of 25235. It also trails the AMD Radeon RX 6700M (25180, -0.2%) and the AMD Radeon 890M (25246, -0.5%), while sitting 0.7% above the AMD Radeon RX 580 2048SP (25287). The GPU sits in the 69th percentile of all GPUs tested.

Q: What is the best achievable frame rate for this combo at 1080p?

A: The highest average FPS recorded is 89.8, achieved at 1920x1080 with Low settings. This drops to 54.9 FPS at Medium, 42.7 FPS at High, and 34.6 FPS at Ultra, showing that the settings preset has a dramatic impact on performance at this resolution.

Q: Is the Ryzen 5 2600 a bottleneck for the RTX 3060 Ti in this game?

A: The benchmark data suggests yes, particularly at lower resolutions. At 1080p Low, the combo hits 89.8 FPS, but this is the only setting where the frame rate approaches what the GPU could theoretically deliver. The CPU’s single-thread performance, as shown by the Cinebench R23 score of 1579, limits how quickly draw calls are processed, which becomes more apparent as resolution drops and GPU load decreases.

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

A: The combo ranks 1213 out of 1689 tested combinations, placing it in the lower-mid tier of the database. This rank reflects the CPU’s age and the fact that while the RTX 3060 Ti is capable, the overall system is not optimized for this specific game’s engine.

Q: What is the frame rate difference between High and Ultra settings at 1440p?

A: At 2560x1440, the High preset yields an average of 31.5 FPS, while Ultra drops to 25.2 FPS, a difference of 6.3 FPS. This is a smaller absolute gap than at 1080p, where the difference between the same two presets is 8.1 FPS, indicating that the GPU is becoming more of a limiting factor at higher resolutions.

Resolution Scaling

The measured FPS data shows a clear trend: performance degrades significantly as resolution increases, but the pattern is not uniform across settings. At Low settings, the combo achieves 89.8 FPS at 1080p, which falls to 78.8 FPS at 1440p, a 12.2% drop. Moving to 4K at Low yields 59.7 FPS, which is a 24.2% drop from the 1440p figure. This scaling is relatively gentle, suggesting that at Low settings, the GPU is still doing most of the heavy lifting without being fully saturated.

At High settings, the story changes. The 1080p result of 42.7 FPS drops to 31.5 FPS at 1440p, a 26.2% reduction, and then to 28.1 FPS at 4K, a further 10.8% drop. The transition from 1080p to 1440p is where the most significant loss occurs, implying that the RTX 3060 Ti’s 8 GB memory buffer and 448.0 GB/s bandwidth are being pushed harder, but the CPU’s limitations in feeding the GPU start to surface as the pixel count increases. At Ultra settings, the 1080p average of 34.6 FPS drops to 25.2 FPS at 1440p (27.2% loss) and then to 23.9 FPS at 4K (5.2% loss), showing that the GPU is the dominant constraint at higher resolutions, with the CPU becoming less relevant.

The data indicates that at 1080p, the Ryzen 5 2600 is likely the bottleneck, as the frame rates do not scale linearly with GPU load. At 4K, the RTX 3060 Ti is clearly the limiting factor, as the CPU overhead is amortized over longer render times. The 1440p resolution appears to be the sweet spot where neither component is entirely overwhelmed, though the results are still modest.

How This Combo Ranks

The combination of the AMD Ryzen 5 2600 and the NVIDIA GeForce RTX 3060 Ti ranks 1213 out of 1689 tested combos in The Medium, placing it in the 28th percentile of all system pairings. This is a surprisingly low rank given the GPU’s capabilities, but it aligns with the CPU’s age and the game’s engine characteristics. The Ryzen 5 2600’s average benchmark score of 19616 is 0.7% higher than the Intel Core i7-10700F, but in real-world gaming, the single-thread performance differences matter more than multi-core scores. The Cinebench R20 single-core score of 663 is modest, and this likely contributes to the low ranking, as The Medium may rely on single-threaded rendering logic.

When compared to other combos in the database, this pairing sits below the median, which suggests that many users with newer CPUs and similar GPUs achieve better results. The GPU’s percentile rank of 69 is higher than the CPU’s percentile rank of 77, but the combo rank is dragged down by the CPU’s inability to keep up with the GPU’s potential. The data implies that this is not a balanced pairing for this title, and that a more modern CPU would yield substantially higher frame rates, especially at 1080p where the CPU overhead is most pronounced.

Settings Recommendations

Based on the measured FPS data, the optimal settings preset for this combo depends on the target resolution and frame rate preference. At 1080p, the Low preset delivers 89.8 FPS, which is smooth and playable, but the Medium preset at 54.9 FPS offers a better balance of visual quality and performance. The High preset at 42.7 FPS is borderline, while Ultra at 34.6 FPS is not recommended for a consistent experience. At 1440p, Low yields 78.8 FPS, which is excellent, but Medium at 50.3 FPS is the highest playable setting, with High at 31.5 FPS being too low for a smooth experience. At 4K, only Low is viable at 59.7 FPS, while Medium at 36.3 FPS and High at 28.1 FPS are not satisfactory.

The data suggests that the Medium preset is the best compromise across all resolutions, as it provides a frame rate that is above 50 FPS at 1440p and 1080p, while also offering better visual fidelity than Low. For users prioritizing frame rate over visuals, Low is the only option that consistently exceeds 60 FPS at 1080p and 1440p. Ultra is never recommended, as it drops below 35 FPS at all resolutions, making it unplayable for this hardware.

Measured FPS Breakdown

At 1920x1080, the combo produces an average of 89.8 FPS on Low, 54.9 FPS on Medium, 42.7 FPS on High, and 34.6 FPS on Ultra. The step from Low to Medium is a 38.9% reduction in frame rate, while the step from Medium to High is a 22.2% reduction, and from High to Ultra is a 19.0% reduction. This shows that the Low to Medium transition is the most costly in performance terms.

At 2560x1440, the results are 78.8 FPS on Low, 50.3 FPS on Medium, 31.5 FPS on High, and 25.2 FPS on Ultra. The Low to Medium drop is 36.2%, Medium to High is 37.4%, and High to Ultra is 20.0%. The Medium to High drop is more significant at this resolution than at 1080p, indicating that the GPU is being stressed more.

At 3840x2160, the averages are 59.7 FPS on Low, 36.3 FPS on Medium, 28.1 FPS on High, and 23.9 FPS on Ultra. The Low to Medium drop is 39.2%, Medium to High is 22.6%, and High to Ultra is 14.9%. The High to Ultra gap narrows at 4K, suggesting that the GPU is reaching its limits and that further setting changes have diminishing returns.

GPU Role

The NVIDIA GeForce RTX 3060 Ti is the more capable component in this pairing, and the data shows its influence grows with resolution. The GPU’s 8 GB of GDDR6 memory on a 256-bit bus provides 448.0 GB/s of bandwidth, which is sufficient for the textures and effects in The Medium at 1080p and 1440p, but the 4K results suggest that memory capacity and bandwidth are stretched, as the frame rates drop below 60 FPS even at Low settings. The boost clock of 1665 MHz and the 16.20 TFLOPS FP32 performance are the key drivers of its compute power, but the game’s engine appears to be more sensitive to fill rate and memory bandwidth than raw compute, given the 80 ROPs and 253.1 GTexel/s texture rate.

The GPU’s average benchmark score of 25120 places it just below the AMD Radeon RX 6600 (25235) and the AMD Radeon 890M (25246), but its real-world performance in this game is hindered by the CPU. The 3DMark Steel Nomad DX12 score of 2626 is a measure of its DirectX 12 capabilities, which are relevant to The Medium’s rendering pipeline. The RTX 3060 Ti’s 38 RT cores and 152 tensor cores suggest it is well-equipped for ray tracing and DLSS, but these features are not reflected in the measured FPS data, which only covers fixed settings. The GPU’s end-of-life production status and 200 W TDP, with a suggested 550 W PSU, indicate that it is a mature design that still holds up in compute tasks, but its pairing with the Ryzen 5 2600 is the primary reason for the mediocre frame rates observed.