The Medium

Settings Recommendations

The benchmark data for The Medium with the AMD Ryzen 5 5600 and NVIDIA GeForce RTX 5090 D clearly indicates that the Medium preset delivers the most balanced experience across all tested resolutions. At 1920x1080, Medium produces an average of 114 FPS with a minimum of 97 FPS and a maximum of 131 FPS, providing a smooth and consistent frame pacing that avoids the dips seen at higher settings. The High preset at the same resolution reaches 100 FPS average, while Ultra drops to 82 FPS; neither offers the headroom of Medium. The Low preset hits 136 FPS average, but the visual compromise is unnecessary given the GPU's capability.

At 2560x1440, the Medium preset again stands out with an average of 107 FPS, a minimum of 91 FPS, and a maximum of 123 FPS. This is significantly ahead of High's 87 FPS and Ultra's 69 FPS, while Low reaches 129 FPS. The Medium preset maintains a 91 FPS minimum, which is above the 60 FPS threshold for fluid gameplay, making it the safest choice for consistent performance without sacrificing too much visual fidelity. High at 1440p is playable but leaves less margin for demanding scenes, and Ultra approaches the edge of comfort at 69 FPS average.

At 3840x2160, the situation becomes more critical. Medium delivers a 95 FPS average with an 81 FPS minimum and 110 FPS maximum, which is the only preset that keeps the minimum above 80 FPS at 4K. High drops to 68 FPS average, Ultra falls to 54 FPS, and Low rises to 119 FPS. The 4K Medium preset is the recommended choice for a high-refresh-rate 4K display, as it provides nearly double the frame rate of Ultra while maintaining a playable minimum. The data shows that Medium offers the best combination of smoothness and visual quality across all three resolutions, making it the default recommendation for this hardware combination.

GPU Role

The NVIDIA GeForce RTX 5090 D is the dominant component in this pairing, and its specifications explain the performance headroom observed in the benchmark results. The GPU features 32 GB of GDDR7 memory on a 512-bit bus, yielding a memory bandwidth of 1.79 TB/s. This vast memory pool and bandwidth are more than sufficient for The Medium's demands, as the game's asset streaming and texture loading benefit from the high throughput. The RTX 5090 D's base clock is 2017 MHz, with a boost clock of 2407 MHz, and it contains 21760 shading units alongside 680 texture mapping units and 176 raster output pipelines.

The GPU's architectural strengths are evident in the measured FPS data. At 1920x1080 Low, the RTX 5090 D pushes 136 FPS average, but the ceiling appears to be constrained by the CPU rather than the GPU, as the gap between Low and Medium (114 FPS) is only 22 FPS. This indicates that the GPU is not fully utilized at lower settings, and the bottleneck shifts to the processor. At 4K Ultra, however, the GPU's raw compute power is taxed, producing 54 FPS average, which is a 60% drop from the 1080p Low result. The GPU's ray tracing cores (170) and tensor cores (680) are present but The Medium's implementation does not appear to leverage them heavily, as the performance scaling between presets is relatively linear.

The RTX 5090 D's benchmark scores reinforce its dominance: it achieves a Passmark G3D score of 44065 and a Geekbench Vulkan score of 376915. Its percentile ranking of 92 among all GPUs places it in the top tier, though its nearest rivals in the database show interesting comparisons. The AMD Radeon RX 6850M XT has an average score of 78940, which is 1.6% higher, and the NVIDIA Tesla P100 PCIe 16 GB scores 79605, 2.4% higher. These deltas are small, suggesting that the RTX 5090 D is competitive with these workstation-class parts in synthetic benchmarks, but in real-world gaming, its 32 GB VRAM and Blackwell architecture provide advantages that synthetic scores may not fully capture.

Resolution Scaling

The FPS data reveals a predictable decline as resolution increases, but the magnitude of the drop varies by preset. From 1920x1080 to 2560x1440, the Medium preset falls from 114 FPS to 107 FPS, a 6.1% reduction. From 1440p to 2160p, Medium drops from 107 FPS to 95 FPS, an 11.2% reduction. The High preset shows a steeper decline: 100 FPS at 1080p, 87 FPS at 1440p (13% drop), and 68 FPS at 4K (21.8% drop from 1440p). This non-linear scaling indicates that the GPU becomes the limiting factor at higher resolutions, particularly for the High and Ultra presets.

The Low preset exhibits the least scaling sensitivity: 136 FPS at 1080p, 129 FPS at 1440p (5.1% drop), and 119 FPS at 4K (7.8% drop from 1440p). This suggests that at Low settings, the game is heavily CPU-bound or limited by other system constraints, as the GPU has ample headroom even at 4K. The Ultra preset shows the most dramatic scaling: 82 FPS at 1080p, 69 FPS at 1440p (15.9% drop), and 54 FPS at 4K (21.7% drop). This pattern confirms that Ultra settings place significant load on the GPU's shading and memory subsystems.

The limiting component shifts based on resolution and settings. At 1080p Low and Medium, the AMD Ryzen 5 5600's six cores and twelve threads likely cap performance, as the GPU is underutilized. At 4K Ultra, the RTX 5090 D's 104.8 TFLOPS FP32 compute is fully engaged, and the frame rate drops to 54 FPS, indicating a GPU-bound scenario. The data shows that the sweet spot for this combination is 1440p Medium, where the CPU and GPU are balanced, yielding 107 FPS average with a 91 FPS minimum.

FAQ

Q: What is the best preset for 4K gaming with this hardware?

A: The Medium preset at 3840x2160 produces a 95 FPS average with an 81 FPS minimum and 110 FPS maximum. This is the only 4K preset that maintains a minimum above 80 FPS, making it the recommended choice for smooth 4K gameplay.

Q: How does the RTX 5090 D compare to its nearest rivals in synthetic benchmarks?

A: The RTX 5090 D has an average benchmark score of 77712, which is 0.1% higher than the Intel Core Ultra 7 258V's 20454 score in CPU tests, but for GPU scores, it trails the AMD Radeon RX 6850M XT by 1.6% (78940) and the NVIDIA Tesla P100 PCIe 16 GB by 2.4% (79605).

Q: Is the CPU a bottleneck at 1080p?

A: Yes, evidence suggests CPU limitation at lower settings. At 1920x1080 Low, the average FPS is 136, but at 1440p Low it is 129, and at 4K Low it is 119. The relatively small FPS drop across resolutions at Low settings indicates the GPU is not the limiting factor; the Ryzen 5 5600's six cores and twelve threads cap performance.

Q: What is the frame time consistency like for the Medium preset?

A: The Medium preset shows strong consistency. At 1080p, it has a 97 FPS minimum and 131 FPS maximum (a 34 FPS range). At 1440p, the range is 91 to 123 FPS (32 FPS range). At 4K, the range is 81 to 110 FPS (29 FPS range). This tight range indicates stable frame pacing.

Q: How much faster is the Low preset compared to Ultra at 1440p?

A: At 2560x1440, Low achieves 129 FPS average, while Ultra achieves 69 FPS average. This represents an 87% performance increase for Low over Ultra, but the visual quality trade-off is substantial.

Q: Does the GPU's 32 GB VRAM matter for this game?

A: The RTX 5090 D's 32 GB GDDR7 memory with 1.79 TB/s bandwidth provides ample headroom. The game's results show no signs of VRAM limitation, as even at 4K Ultra, the GPU maintains 54 FPS average, indicating the memory subsystem is not a bottleneck.

CPU Role

The AMD Ryzen 5 5600 is a six-core, twelve-thread processor based on the Zen 3 architecture, codenamed Vermeer, fabricated on TSMC's 7 nm process. It has a base clock of 3.50 GHz and a boost clock of 4.40 GHz, with a 65 W TDP. The CPU's cache hierarchy includes 64 KB of L1 per core, 512 KB of L2 per core, and a 32 MB shared L3 cache. This configuration provides strong single-threaded performance, as evidenced by its Cinebench R23 single-core score of 2584 and Passmark single-thread score of 3256.

In The Medium, the CPU's role is most apparent at lower resolutions and settings. At 1920x1080 Low, the system produces 136 FPS, but at 4K Low, it still manages 119 FPS. This 12.5% drop from 1080p to 4K at Low settings is modest, suggesting that the CPU is the primary limiter at these settings. The Ryzen 5 5600's multi-threaded capabilities, shown by its Cinebench R23 multi-core score of 18309 and 3DMark max threads score of 5659, are sufficient to feed the RTX 5090 D in most scenarios, but the data indicates a ceiling.

The CPU's percentile ranking of 74 among all CPUs places it in the upper-middle tier. Its average benchmark score of 20468 is nearly identical to its nearest rivals: the Intel Core Ultra 7 258V scores 20454 (0.1% lower), the AMD Ryzen 5 8500G scores 20425 (0.2% lower), and the AMD EPYC 9454P scores 20422 (0.2% lower). These negligible deltas suggest that the Ryzen 5 5600 is well-positioned for gaming workloads, but it does not have the headroom to fully unlock the RTX 5090 D's potential at lower resolutions.

At higher resolutions like 3840x2160, the CPU's influence diminishes. The difference between the 4K Medium (95 FPS) and 4K Low (119 FPS) is 24 FPS, while at 1080p, the difference between Medium (114 FPS) and Low (136 FPS) is 22 FPS. This similar gap suggests that the CPU's impact is consistent across resolutions, but the GPU's load increases, making the combination more balanced. The Ryzen 5 5600's 4,150 million transistors on a 74 mm² die deliver efficient performance, but for a GPU as powerful as the RTX 5090 D, a higher-core-count processor might reduce the CPU bottleneck observed at 1080p.

Measured FPS Breakdown

The measured FPS data provides a comprehensive view of performance across three resolutions and four settings presets. At 1920x1080, the Low preset delivers the highest average at 136 FPS, followed by Medium at 114 FPS (with a minimum of 97 FPS and maximum of 131 FPS), High at 100 FPS, and Ultra at 82 FPS. The 1080p results show a clear hierarchy, with Low being 19.3% faster than Medium and 65.9% faster than Ultra. The Medium preset's minimum of 97 FPS ensures a smooth experience even in demanding scenes.

At 2560x1440, the pattern continues but with narrower gaps. Low achieves 129 FPS average, Medium reaches 107 FPS (minimum 91 FPS, maximum 123 FPS), High delivers 87 FPS, and Ultra drops to 69 FPS. The percentage differences shrink compared to 1080p: Low is 20.6% faster than Medium, and 87% faster than Ultra. The Medium preset's 91 FPS minimum is particularly notable, as it remains above 90 FPS, providing a stable high-refresh-rate experience at 1440p.

At 3840x2160, the GPU's load becomes significant. Low produces 119 FPS average, Medium achieves 95 FPS (minimum 81 FPS, maximum 110 FPS), High falls to 68 FPS, and Ultra bottoms out at 54 FPS. The 4K Ultra result is the only sub-60 FPS average in the entire dataset, indicating that this preset exceeds the comfortable range for the hardware. The Medium preset at 4K maintains an 81 FPS minimum, which is the lowest minimum recorded but still above 60 FPS.

Comparing resolutions, the Medium preset shows the following progression: 114 FPS at 1080p, 107 FPS at 1440p, and 95 FPS at 4K. This represents a 6.1% drop from 1080p to 1440p and an 11.2% drop from 1440p to 4K. The High preset drops from 100 FPS at 1080p to 87 FPS at 1440p (13% drop) and then to 68 FPS at 4K (21.8% drop). The Ultra preset falls from 82 FPS at 1080p to 69 FPS at 1440p (15.9% drop) and then to 54 FPS at 4K (21.7% drop). The Low preset is the most stable, with only a 12.5% total drop from 1080p to 4K.

The data also shows the benefit of the Medium preset's measured minimum and maximum values, which are only provided for this setting. At 1080p Medium, the range is 97 to 131 FPS, a 34 FPS spread. At 1440p Medium, the range is 91 to 123 FPS, a 32 FPS spread. At 4K Medium, the range is 81 to 110 FPS, a 29 FPS spread. This narrowing range at higher resolutions suggests that the frame time variance decreases as the GPU becomes more consistently loaded, which is a positive indicator for gameplay smoothness. The combination rank of 131 out of 2911 combos places this configuration in the top 4.5% of tested combinations, confirming its high performance tier.