The Medium

The AMD Ryzen 5 7600X paired with the NVIDIA GeForce RTX 2060 SUPER produces a mixed bag of results in The Medium, a horror title that clearly scales with both resolution and preset. The measured data indicates that the sweet spot for this combination is the Medium preset at 2560x1440, which delivers an average frame rate of 48 FPS with a minimum of 41 FPS and a maximum of 55 FPS. This preset offers a playable experience that balances visual fidelity with performance, avoiding the severe drops seen at Ultra settings and the visual compromises of Low. At 1920x1080, the Medium preset achieves an average of 57 FPS, with min/max of 49 and 66, which is smoother but not dramatically better than the 1440p result, suggesting the GPU is the primary constraint even at the lower resolution. The High preset at 1440p drops to 35 FPS average, which is below the 48 FPS of Medium, making it a less desirable choice for sustained gameplay. For those prioritizing frame rate above all, the Low preset at 1080p yields 92 FPS average, but the Medium preset at 1440p provides the best compromise between image quality and fluid motion, as the data shows a 27% improvement over High at the same resolution.

Settings Recommendations

The benchmark results clearly indicate that the Medium preset offers the most favorable experience for this specific CPU-GPU combination. At 2560x1440, the Medium preset achieves an average of 48 FPS, which is 37% higher than the High preset’s 35 FPS at the same resolution. The jump from Medium to High costs 13 FPS, a significant penalty that is not justified by the marginal visual gains in a horror game where atmosphere matters more than fine detail. At 1920x1080, the Medium preset delivers 57 FPS average, compared to 41 FPS on High, a difference of 39%, reinforcing that Medium is the optimal tier. The Ultra preset is effectively unplayable across all resolutions, with averages of 33 FPS at 1080p, 27 FPS at 1440p, and 21 FPS at 4K, so it should be avoided entirely. The Low preset, while offering high frame rates (92 FPS at 1080p, 77 FPS at 1440p, 61 FPS at 4K), sacrifices too much visual quality for a game that relies on lighting and shadows for its horror atmosphere. Therefore, the data supports Medium as the best setting, with a recommendation to prioritize 2560x1440 over 1080p, as the performance difference is only 9 FPS (48 vs 57) while providing a sharper image.

GPU Role

The NVIDIA GeForce RTX 2060 SUPER is a Turing-architecture GPU with a base clock of 1470 MHz and a boost clock of 1650 MHz, featuring 8 GB of GDDR6 memory on a 256-bit bus with a bandwidth of 448.0 GB/s. In The Medium, the GPU’s memory capacity and bandwidth play a critical role, as the game’s dual-reality rendering technique demands substantial VRAM. The measured FPS data shows a clear pattern: as resolution increases, the average frame rate drops proportionally, indicating that the GPU is the limiting factor. For instance, on the Medium preset, the average FPS falls from 57 at 1080p to 48 at 1440p and further to 38 at 4K, a decline of 33% from 1080p to 4K. This suggests that the 8 GB VRAM buffer is sufficient at 1080p and 1440p, but at 4K, the GPU struggles to maintain memory bandwidth, leading to the 38 FPS average. The GPU’s 7.181 TFLOPS of FP32 performance and 224.4 GTexel/s texture rate are adequate for Medium settings but insufficient for High or Ultra, where the average FPS drops below 35 at all resolutions above 1080p. The data also shows that the GPU’s performance percentile is 62, indicating it is a mid-range card, which aligns with its measured performance in this title.

Resolution Scaling

The frame rate scaling from 1080p to 4K reveals a classic GPU-bound scenario. On the Medium preset, the average FPS decreases from 57 at 1920x1080 to 48 at 2560x1440, a drop of 15.8%, and then to 38 at 3840x2160, a further drop of 20.8% from 1440p. This linear scaling suggests that the RTX 2060 SUPER is being pushed to its limits as pixel count increases, with the 4K resolution exposing the GPU’s inability to maintain high frame rates. On the Low preset, the drop is less severe: 92 FPS at 1080p, 77 FPS at 1440p (16.3% decrease), and 61 FPS at 4K (20.8% decrease from 1440p). The High and Ultra presets show even steeper declines, with Ultra dropping from 33 FPS at 1080p to 27 FPS at 1440p (18.2% decrease) and 21 FPS at 4K (22.2% decrease). This pattern indicates that the CPU, the AMD Ryzen 5 7600X, is not the bottleneck, as its strong single-thread performance (Cinebench R23 single-core score of 1965) ensures it can feed the GPU at all resolutions. Instead, the GPU’s rendering capability is the primary constraint, with the data showing that 4K is only viable on Low settings, where 61 FPS is achievable, while Medium at 4K drops to 38 FPS, which is borderline playable but not ideal for a horror game requiring smooth movement.

Measured FPS Breakdown

At 1920x1080, the measured FPS values show a clear hierarchy: Low preset averages 92 FPS, Medium averages 57 FPS with a minimum of 49 and maximum of 66, High averages 41 FPS, and Ultra averages 33 FPS. The gap between Low and Medium is 35 FPS, while the gap between Medium and High is 16 FPS, and between High and Ultra is 8 FPS. This suggests diminishing returns as settings increase, with Ultra providing only a marginal improvement over High in visual quality while costing 8 FPS. At 2560x1440, the averages are 77 FPS for Low, 48 FPS for Medium (min 41, max 55), 35 FPS for High, and 27 FPS for Ultra. The drop from 1080p to 1440p is 15 FPS for Low, 9 FPS for Medium, 6 FPS for High, and 6 FPS for Ultra, indicating that the GPU handles the resolution increase better on lower settings. At 3840x2160, the averages are 61 FPS for Low, 38 FPS for Medium (min 32, max 43), 27 FPS for High, and 21 FPS for Ultra. The 4K resolution shows a significant drop from 1440p, with Medium losing 10 FPS, High losing 8 FPS, and Ultra losing 6 FPS. The min FPS data for Medium presets (49 at 1080p, 41 at 1440p, 32 at 4K) indicates that frame pacing remains stable, which is crucial for a horror game where stutter can break immersion.

How This Combo Ranks

In the database of tested combinations for The Medium, this specific pairing of the AMD Ryzen 5 7600X and NVIDIA GeForce RTX 2060 SUPER ranks 2606 out of 3724 combos, placing it in the 30th percentile of all tested systems. This ranking reflects the GPU’s mid-range positioning, as the CPU is a high-end part (79th percentile among all CPUs) that is clearly not the limiting factor. The GPU’s percentile is 62, which is lower than the CPU’s, confirming that the RTX 2060 SUPER is the bottleneck in this pairing. The combo rank of 2606 out of 3724 suggests that while this system is capable of running the game, it is not optimized for high settings or high resolutions. The data shows that the CPU’s nearest rivals, such as the AMD Ryzen 7 5700X and Intel Core i5-12600K, have average scores within 0.2% of the 7600X (27578 vs 27636), indicating that swapping the CPU would not change the gaming outcome. Conversely, the GPU’s nearest rivals, including the NVIDIA GeForce RTX 3060 Mobile and AMD Radeon Pro 5700, have scores within -0.4% and -0.5% respectively, meaning the GPU’s performance is closely matched with these alternatives. Therefore, the combo rank is primarily driven by the GPU’s limitations, and users seeking better performance in The Medium would need a more powerful graphics card rather than a CPU upgrade.

CPU Role

The AMD Ryzen 5 7600X is a 6-core, 12-thread processor based on the Zen 4 architecture, codenamed Raphael, with a base clock of 4.70 GHz and a boost clock of 5.30 GHz. In The Medium, the CPU’s role is to feed the GPU with enough data to maintain frame rates, and the data indicates that it does so effectively at all tested resolutions. The CPU’s Cinebench R23 multi-core score of 15236 and single-core score of 1965 demonstrate strong performance, and its 3DMark 16-thread score of 6879 shows robust multi-threaded capabilities. However, the measured FPS data reveals that the CPU is not the bottleneck, as frame rates scale consistently with resolution and settings, a pattern that would not occur if the CPU were limiting. For example, at 1080p Medium, the average FPS is 57, which drops to 48 at 1440p and 38 at 4K, a trend that is purely GPU-driven. The CPU’s 32 MB of L3 cache and DDR5 memory support with 83.2 GB/s bandwidth ensure that it can deliver data to the GPU without stalling, even in complex scenes typical of a horror game. The CPU’s 79th percentile ranking among all CPUs further confirms that it is a high-performing part, and its performance is within 0.4% of the AMD Ryzen 7 5800, meaning that any CPU limitation would be negligible. Therefore, the data supports that the Ryzen 5 7600X is more than adequate for this game, and the RTX 2060 SUPER is the component that determines the overall experience.

FAQ

*Q: What is the best resolution and settings combo for this system in The Medium?*

A: Based on the measured FPS data, the 2560x1440 resolution with Medium settings provides the best balance, offering an average of 48 FPS with a minimum of 41 FPS and maximum of 55 FPS. This is 13 FPS higher than High settings at the same resolution (35 FPS) and only 9 FPS lower than Medium at 1080p (57 FPS).

Q: How does the GPU’s VRAM capacity affect performance at 4K?

A: The RTX 2060 SUPER has 8 GB of GDDR6 memory with a 256-bit bus and 448.0 GB/s bandwidth. At 4K, the Medium preset achieves 38 FPS average, which is a 20.8% drop from 1440p’s 48 FPS, suggesting that the GPU’s memory bandwidth is insufficient for higher settings at 4K, as the Low preset is the only one that maintains a playable 61 FPS.

Q: Is the CPU a bottleneck in this configuration?

A: No, the data indicates the CPU is not the limiting factor. The Ryzen 5 7600X has a boost clock of 5.30 GHz and scores 1965 in Cinebench R23 single-core, which is strong enough to feed the GPU. The FPS drops from 1080p to 4K are consistent with GPU-bound behavior, confirming the RTX 2060 SUPER is the primary constraint.

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

A: This combination ranks 2606 out of 3724 tested combos for The Medium, placing it in the 30th percentile. This is driven by the GPU’s mid-range performance (62nd percentile), while the CPU is a high-end part (79th percentile), indicating that the graphics card is the limiting factor.

Q: What is the difference in average FPS between Medium and Ultra settings at 1440p?

A: At 2560x1440, the Medium preset averages 48 FPS, while the Ultra preset averages 27 FPS, a difference of 21 FPS (43.8% lower). This highlights that Ultra settings are not viable for this system, as even the High preset at 35 FPS is below the Medium preset’s performance.

*Q: Can this system handle 4K gaming in The Medium?*

A: Yes, but only on Low settings, where it achieves 61 FPS average. Medium settings at 4K drop to 38 FPS, which is borderline playable, while High and Ultra are not recommended due to averages of 27 FPS and 21 FPS respectively. For a smooth experience, 1440p with Medium settings is the recommended option.