The Medium

The AMD Ryzen 5 8400F and AMD Radeon RX 580 pairing produces a starkly GPU-bound experience in The Medium, where the 8 GB Polaris card dictates performance across all tested configurations. The data shows a consistent pattern: the jump from 1080p to 1440p and then to 4K carries a heavy penalty, while the difference between Low and High settings at the same resolution is equally punishing. This is a classic case of an aging mid-range GPU struggling with a modern horror title's rendering demands, and the benchmark results confirm that the CPU is rarely the limiting factor.

Resolution Scaling

The resolution scaling behavior in The Medium reveals a GPU that is thoroughly saturated at every setting tier. Moving from 1920x1080 to 2560x1440 at High settings drops the average frame rate from 22.1 FPS to 18.5 FPS, a reduction of roughly 16%. The subsequent step to 3840x2160 at High is far more brutal, cutting the average to 11.9 FPS, which is a 36% loss from the 1440p result. This non-linear degradation is characteristic of a graphics card running out of fillrate and memory bandwidth as pixel count increases.

At Low settings, the trend is similar but with higher absolute numbers. The 1080p Low average of 46.4 FPS falls to 42.2 FPS at 1440p, a modest 9% drop, but then plummets to 34 FPS at 4K. That 4K Low figure is notable because it is the only 4K result that approaches playability, yet it still represents a 27% loss from 1440p Low. The scaling pattern across all settings indicates that the Radeon RX 580's 256-bit memory bus and 256.0 GB/s bandwidth are the primary bottlenecks; the game demands more data throughput than the card can supply as resolution climbs.

The most telling sign of GPU limitation is that the frame rate deltas between resolutions are far larger than any potential CPU overhead. The Ryzen 5 8400F, with its 6 cores and 12 threads boosting to 4.70 GHz, is more than capable of feeding frames; the data shows the RX 580 is the component holding the system back. At 1080p Ultra, the average of 15.4 FPS versus 22.1 FPS at High suggests that the GPU's shading units are overwhelmed by the quality preset's shader complexity, independent of resolution. This is a GPU-bound scenario where lowering resolution provides less benefit than lowering settings, a common trait in titles with heavy post-processing.

How This Combo Ranks

The combination of the Ryzen 5 8400F and the Radeon RX 580 ranks 1568th out of 1689 tested combos in The Medium, placing it in the bottom 7% of all configurations. This is a poor showing that aligns with the measured frame rates, which rarely exceed 46 FPS even at the lowest settings. The rank reflects that this pairing is severely mismatched for the game's demands; the CPU is a modern part with strong single-thread performance, but the GPU is a legacy component from 2017 that sits near the bottom of current performance charts.

Benchmark results indicate that the GPU's percentile ranking of 53rd place among all GPUs is misleading in this context. While the RX 580 is an average card by synthetic benchmarks, The Medium's specific rendering paths are particularly harsh on its GCN 4.0 architecture. The combo's rank is dragged down almost entirely by the GPU, as the Ryzen 5 8400F's 82nd percentile standing among all CPUs shows it is a far more capable component. In practical terms, this combo performs near the level of much older hardware, which is consistent with the GPU's nearest rivals being the NVIDIA GeForce GTX 570 and GTX 950, both of which are over a decade old.

The deltaPct values for the CPU's rivals show that the 8400F is statistically tied with the AMD Ryzen 7 2700X and Ryzen 5 7500F, with deltas of 0% and 0.3%, respectively. This means the CPU is not the differentiator in this combo's poor rank; swapping the 8400F for a cheaper or older processor would yield nearly identical results in The Medium. The ranking data suggests that any upgrade path must focus on the GPU, as the current card is the clear performance limiter.

GPU Role

The AMD Radeon RX 580's role in The Medium is defined by its 8 GB of GDDR5 memory and modest clock speeds. The card operates at a base clock of 1257 MHz and a boost clock of 1340 MHz, with memory running at 2000 MHz (8 Gbps effective). These figures are low by modern standards, and the 6.175 TFLOPS of FP32 performance is insufficient for the game's complex lighting and shadow calculations at higher presets. The 4K Ultra result of 8.8 FPS is a direct consequence of the GPU's 32 ROPs and 144 TMUs being overwhelmed by the pixel and texture workload.

The VRAM capacity of 8 GB is adequate for the game's textures, but the bandwidth of 256.0 GB/s is not. The data shows that at 4K, even Low settings produce only 34 FPS, which indicates the memory subsystem is saturated. The GPU's 53rd percentile ranking and average benchmark score of 13559 place it in the mid-range, but in this specific title, it performs like a low-end part. The nearest rivals, including the GTX 570 and GTX 950, have average scores within 1.1% of the RX 580, confirming that it is competing with hardware from a much earlier era.

The card's 14 nm process node and 185 W TDP are architectural limitations that cannot be overcome by drivers. The measured FPS numbers show a clear ceiling: the card cannot break 50 FPS at 1080p even on Low settings, and it falls below 25 FPS at any High or Ultra preset. This suggests that the GPU's shading units are the primary constraint, and the game's use of DirectX 12 (12_0) features does not play to the GCN architecture's strengths. The RX 580 is a capable 1080p card for older titles, but The Medium's requirements exceed its capabilities.

Settings Recommendations

For the best experience per the measured rows, the Low preset is the only viable option across all resolutions. At 1920x1080 Low, the system achieves an average of 46.4 FPS, which is the only result in the entire dataset that approaches smooth gameplay. This is the recommended setting for any playable session, as the Medium preset at 1080p drops to 32.8 FPS, which is borderline but still playable for a horror title where frame pacing is less critical. The High preset at 1080p yields 22.1 FPS, which is too low for comfortable play, and Ultra at 15.4 FPS is effectively a slideshow.

At 2560x1440, the Low preset delivers 42.2 FPS, which is surprisingly close to the 1080p Low result and suggests the game is not heavily pixel-bound at this resolution with reduced effects. However, the Medium preset at 1440p falls to 27.9 FPS, and High drops to 18.5 FPS, making these settings impractical. For 4K, the Low preset's 34 FPS is the only remotely playable figure, but the visual quality trade-off is severe; the Medium preset at 4K produces 21.3 FPS, which is too low for a game that relies on atmosphere and timing.

The data indicates that the GPU's performance cliff between Low and Medium settings is steep, with an average drop of roughly 10 FPS at every resolution. This is likely due to the game enabling more complex volumetric effects and shadow resolution at Medium. Users should stick to Low at any resolution above 1080p, and even at 1080p, the Medium preset is the maximum acceptable option for those who prioritize visual fidelity over frame rate. The Ultra preset is never recommended, as the 8.8 FPS at 4K and 15.4 FPS at 1080p are unplayable under any circumstances.

Measured FPS Breakdown

The measured FPS data provides a complete picture of the RX 580's performance envelope in The Medium. At 1920x1080, the results are: Low at 46.4 FPS, Medium at 32.8 FPS, High at 22.1 FPS, and Ultra at 15.4 FPS. The spread from Low to Ultra is 31 FPS, showing that the settings menu has an enormous impact on performance. The 1080p Low result is the only one that clears 30 FPS in the entire dataset, making it the baseline for any playable configuration.

At 2560x1440, the averages are: Low at 42.2 FPS, Medium at 27.9 FPS, High at 18.5 FPS, and Ultra at 16.6 FPS. The drop from 1080p to 1440p at Low is only 4.2 FPS, which is encouraging, but the Medium setting loses 4.9 FPS, and High loses 3.6 FPS. The Ultra setting at 1440p is only 1.2 FPS slower than at 1080p, which suggests that the GPU is so constrained that resolution differences become less significant at the highest preset.

At 3840x2160, the results collapse: Low at 34 FPS, Medium at 21.3 FPS, High at 11.9 FPS, and Ultra at 8.8 FPS. The 4K Low figure is notable because it exceeds the 1080p Ultra result, proving that the game's quality settings have a greater impact on performance than resolution. The 4K Medium result of 21.3 FPS is nearly identical to the 1080p High result of 22.1 FPS, indicating that the GPU is hitting a hard computational wall. The 4K Ultra result of 8.8 FPS is the lowest in the dataset and confirms that the RX 580 cannot handle this game at native 4K with any visual quality.

CPU Role

The AMD Ryzen 5 8400F plays a supporting role in this combo, as its performance headroom is never fully utilized in The Medium. The CPU's 6 cores and 12 threads are based on the Zen 4 architecture with a boost clock of 4.70 GHz and a base clock of 4.20 GHz, providing strong single-thread and multi-thread capabilities. The benchmark scores confirm this: a Cinebench R23 multi-core score of 20851 and a single-core score of 2943 place it well above the median, and the 82nd percentile ranking among all CPUs shows it is a high-performing part.

In The Medium, the CPU's role is limited to feeding the GPU with draw calls and game logic, and the data shows it does so without bottlenecking. The 1080p Low result of 46.4 FPS is not a CPU limit; it is a GPU limit, as the RX 580's average benchmark score of 13559 is far lower than what the CPU can support. The CPU's nearest rivals, such as the Ryzen 7 2700X and Ryzen 5 7500F, have average scores within 0.3% of the 8400F, meaning any of these processors would produce identical frame rates in this game.

The CPU's 16 MB of shared L3 cache and dual-channel DDR5 memory support provide ample bandwidth for the game's data streaming. The memory bandwidth of 83.2 GB/s is more than sufficient for a GPU-bound title, and the PCIe Gen 4 interface offers plenty of bandwidth for the RX 580, which uses a PCIe 3.0 x16 connection. The 65 W TDP of the CPU ensures it runs cool and stable, but the benchmark results indicate that the CPU is not the reason this combo ranks 1568th out of 1689. The CPU is a modern, capable part that is simply paired with a GPU that cannot keep up with the game's demands. Upgrading the GPU would unlock the CPU's full potential, but as configured, the Ryzen 5 8400F is effectively idle, waiting for a graphics card that can match its throughput.