The Medium

The AMD Ryzen 5 5500 and AMD Radeon RX 6750 XT combination in The Medium presents a clear picture of a system that is heavily constrained by its graphics processor at higher resolutions, while the CPU remains capable of driving high frame rates at lower settings. The benchmark data shows a predictable scaling pattern across the three tested resolutions, but the magnitude of the performance drop from 1080p to 4K reveals where the bottleneck lies.

Resolution Scaling

The frame rate scaling from 1920x1080 to 3840x2160 is steep and consistent across all four settings presets. At Low settings, the average frame rate falls from 117.1 FPS at 1080p to 99.1 FPS at 1440p, a reduction of approximately 15%, before dropping further to 77.1 FPS at 4K. This 34% total decline from 1080p to 4K indicates that even at the lowest settings, the GPU is beginning to feel the pressure of the higher pixel count. The scaling is more dramatic at Medium settings, where the 1080p average of 69.9 FPS drops to 58.3 FPS at 1440p and then to 49.3 FPS at 4K. The 4K result here represents a 29% deficit compared to the 1080p figure.

The High and Ultra presets show even more pronounced degradation. At High settings, the system averages 48.5 FPS at 1080p, 43.4 FPS at 1440p, and 33.8 FPS at 4K. The Ultra preset is the most demanding, with averages of 40.5 FPS at 1080p, 36 FPS at 1440p, and just 30.1 FPS at 4K. The relatively small gap between 1080p and 1440p results at these higher settings—less than 12% for both High and Ultra—suggests that the game's visual effects are already taxing the GPU heavily at 1080p. The larger relative drop from 1440p to 4K, particularly at High settings where the frame rate falls by 22%, confirms that the RX 6750 XT is the limiting component in this configuration. The data indicates that 4K gaming is only viable at Low settings, and even then, the 77.1 FPS average is the sole 4K result that approaches a smooth experience.

CPU Role

The AMD Ryzen 5 5500 is a 6-core, 12-thread processor based on the Zen 3 architecture, built on a 7 nm process at TSMC. It operates with a base clock of 3.60 GHz and a boost clock of 4.20 GHz, and it features a 16 MB L3 cache. In synthetic benchmarks, this CPU achieves a Cinebench R23 multi-core score of 16429 and a single-core score of 2319, placing it in the 79th percentile among all tested CPUs. Its average benchmark score of 20875 is nearly identical to that of the Intel Core i5-12500, which scores 20897, a negligible 0.1% difference.

In the context of The Medium, the CPU's role is primarily to ensure that the GPU is fed with enough data. The benchmark results show that at 1080p Low settings, the system reaches 117.1 FPS, a figure that is likely near the ceiling of what this processor can support in this title. At 1440p Low, the average is 99.1 FPS, and at 4K Low it is 77.1 FPS. The fact that the frame rate drops consistently as resolution increases, even at Low settings, suggests that the CPU is not the primary bottleneck at these lower graphics loads. The processor's 12 threads are sufficient for the game's demands, as evidenced by the fact that the frame rate scales inversely with resolution rather than plateauing at a CPU limit. The Ryzen 5 5500's 65W TDP and dual-channel DDR4 memory support provide a solid platform, but the data shows that its performance headroom is more than adequate for this horror title, as the GPU becomes the limiting factor well before the CPU's capabilities are exhausted.

GPU Role

The AMD Radeon RX 6750 XT is the dominant component in this pairing, and its specifications directly explain the observed frame rates. This GPU features 12 GB of GDDR6 memory on a 192-bit bus, providing a memory bandwidth of 432.0 GB/s. Its base clock is 2150 MHz, with a game clock of 2495 MHz and a boost clock of 2600 MHz. The card is built on the RDNA 2.0 architecture with 2560 shading units and 40 ray accelerators, delivering a theoretical FP32 performance of 13.31 TFLOPS. In synthetic tests, it scores 20700 in Passmark G3D and 2548 in 3DMark Steel Nomad DX12, placing it in the 79th percentile among all GPUs.

The GPU's performance in The Medium is directly tied to its memory subsystem and compute capabilities. At 1080p Ultra, the average frame rate of 40.5 FPS indicates that the card is heavily loaded by the game's maximum settings. The 12 GB VRAM is sufficient for this resolution, but the compute load from the game's fixed-camera angles and layered scenes is substantial. The scaling from Ultra to Low at 1080p—from 40.5 FPS to 117.1 FPS—shows a 2.9x improvement, which is a strong indicator that the GPU's raw processing power is the primary determinant of performance. At 4K, the Ultra preset drops to 30.1 FPS, which is below the 30 FPS threshold for playability, while the Low preset manages 77.1 FPS. The GPU's 250W TDP and dual-slot cooler design are appropriate for the thermal demands of these workloads, but the data suggests that the RX 6750 XT is best suited for 1080p and 1440p gaming in this title, with 4K requiring significant settings reductions.

Measured FPS Breakdown

The measured frame rates provide a complete picture of this combination's performance across all tested scenarios. At 1920x1080, the system delivers 117.1 FPS at Low settings, 69.9 FPS at Medium, 48.5 FPS at High, and 40.5 FPS at Ultra. These results indicate that 1080p gaming is viable at all settings, with even Ultra surpassing the 40 FPS mark. The step from Low to Medium incurs a 40% performance penalty, while the step from Medium to High incurs a 31% penalty, and High to Ultra incurs a 16% penalty. This diminishing returns curve is typical for a GPU-bound scenario.

At 2560x1440, the averages are 99.1 FPS at Low, 58.3 FPS at Medium, 43.4 FPS at High, and 36 FPS at Ultra. The 1440p results show that Medium settings are required for a smooth 60 FPS experience, while High settings are playable but not ideal for competitive play. The gap between Low and Medium at this resolution is 41%, which is consistent with the 1080p scaling. At 3840x2160, the system produces 77.1 FPS at Low, 49.3 FPS at Medium, 33.8 FPS at High, and 30.1 FPS at Ultra. The 4K results are the most telling: only the Low setting provides a frame rate above 60 FPS, while Medium is playable, but High and Ultra hover near the 30 FPS line. The difference between the 4K Medium and 4K Ultra results is 39%, showing that the Ultra preset adds significant load. Overall, the data shows a well-behaved scaling pattern, with the GPU being the clear limiter at every resolution above 1080p Low.

How This Combo Ranks

In the database of tested combinations for The Medium, this pairing of the AMD Ryzen 5 5500 and AMD Radeon RX 6750 XT ranks 822nd out of 1689 total combinations. This places it in the middle of the pack, which is consistent with its component specifications. The CPU's 79th percentile ranking among all CPUs and the GPU's 79th percentile ranking among all GPUs suggest that this is a balanced mid-range system. However, the game's specific demands, particularly its heavy reliance on GPU compute, mean that this rank is more reflective of the GPU's performance than the CPU's.

The ranking indicates that there are 821 combinations that deliver higher frame rates in this game, but also 867 combinations that deliver lower performance. The data shows that this combo is well-suited for 1080p and 1440p gaming, with the 4K results being the weakest aspect. The RX 6750 XT's nearest rivals in synthetic benchmarks include the AMD Radeon RX 5600M, which scores 35264 and is only 0.2% slower, and the NVIDIA GeForce RTX 3080, which scores 35787 and is 1.3% faster. These small deltas in synthetic tests do not directly translate to in-game performance, but they suggest that this GPU is positioned in a competitive tier. For The Medium, the 822nd rank out of 1689 combos reflects a system that can handle the game at high settings in 1080p and 1440p, but requires compromises at 4K, making it a reasonable, if not exceptional, choice for this title.