The Medium

The AMD Ryzen 7 7700X is an 8-core, 16-thread processor from the 7000 series, built on the Zen 4 architecture with a 5 nm process. It operates with a base clock of 4.50 GHz and a boost clock of 5.40 GHz, supported by a 32 MB shared L3 cache and 1 MB of L2 cache per core. In The Medium, this configuration provides a strong foundation for the horror title’s fixed-camera scenes and streaming level transitions. The CPU’s multi-threaded capability is evident in its synthetic scores, such as a Cinebench R23 multicore result of 30325 and a Geekbench multicore score of 15538, which indicate ample headroom for the game’s logic and asset streaming demands. Single-thread performance is equally solid, with a Cinebench R23 single-core score of 4281, ensuring that the game’s primary render thread does not become a bottleneck. The processor’s memory bandwidth of 83.2 GB/s over a dual-channel DDR5 interface also supports the high data throughput required by The Medium’s split-world mechanic, where two scenes are rendered simultaneously. This CPU’s average benchmark score of 34313 positions it in the 89th percentile against all CPUs, meaning it outperforms the vast majority of processors on the market. Its nearest rivals, such as the Intel Core i5-13500 and Intel Core i7-12800HX, show negligible performance differences of 0.4% and 0.5% respectively, indicating that the 7700X is competitively matched at this level.

How This Combo Ranks

The pairing of the Ryzen 7 7700X with the NVIDIA GeForce RTX 5090 achieves a combo rank of 17 out of 1689 tested combinations in The Medium. This places the system in the top 1% of all configurations evaluated, a signal of the synergy between the 8-core processor and the flagship GPU. The RTX 5090, with its 32 GB of GDDR7 memory and 21760 shading units, is the dominant component in this pairing, driving the vast majority of frame generation. The CPU’s role is to feed the GPU with enough data to avoid starvation, and the data indicates that it succeeds admirably. While the GPU’s average benchmark score of 84306 places it in the 94th percentile against all GPUs, its nearest rivals—such as the RTX 5090 D with a 0.1% delta and the RTX 5050 Mobile with a 0.2% delta—show that the desktop 5090 is at the top of its class. The CPU’s 89th percentile ranking is slightly lower than the GPU’s, but in this game, the combination still lands at rank 17, suggesting that the processor does not hold back the graphics card in most scenarios. The high rank also reflects the game’s optimization for modern multi-core processors, as the 7700X’s 16 threads are fully utilized during the game’s heavier moments, such as when both the real world and the spirit world are displayed side-by-side.

Resolution Scaling

The measured FPS data reveals a clear trend as resolution increases, with the RTX 5090’s immense computational power gradually becoming the limiting factor. At 1080p, the system achieves 173.7 FPS on Low settings, which drops to 164 FPS at 1440p and further to 147.1 FPS at 4K—a reduction of 26.6 FPS from 1080p to 4K, or roughly 15%. This relatively modest drop at Low settings suggests that the CPU is still able to keep pace even at lower resolutions, where frame rates are high and the per-frame CPU workload is more significant. However, the scaling becomes more pronounced at higher settings. For instance, at Ultra settings, the frame rate declines from 78 FPS at 1080p to 66.3 FPS at 1440p and finally to 50.6 FPS at 4K—a total drop of 27.4 FPS, which represents a 35% performance loss. This indicates that as the graphical load increases, the GPU’s rendering capabilities—specifically its pixel and texture rates of 423.6 GPixel/s and 1,636.8 GTexel/s—become the primary constraint. The data suggests that at 1080p and 1440p, the CPU and GPU are more balanced, but at 4K with High or Ultra settings, the RTX 5090 is working near its limit, and the 7700X has ample headroom. The gap between Low and Ultra at each resolution further illustrates this: at 1080p, the difference is 95.7 FPS; at 1440p, it is 97.7 FPS; and at 4K, it is 96.5 FPS. This consistent delta across resolutions implies that the settings level, not the resolution, has the most significant impact on performance, a hallmark of a GPU-bound scenario where the CPU is not the bottleneck.

Measured FPS Breakdown

At 1920x1080, the system delivers 173.7 FPS on Low settings, demonstrating the CPU’s ability to drive high frame rates without GPU interference. Medium settings yield 135.4 FPS, while High settings produce 95.9 FPS—a substantial drop from Low, reflecting the increased shading and texture work. Ultra settings at 1080p result in 78 FPS, which is still smooth for a horror game that relies on atmosphere rather than twitch reflexes. Moving to 2560x1440, the frame rates scale predictably: Low settings achieve 164 FPS, Medium produces 115 FPS, High yields 84.9 FPS, and Ultra drops to 66.3 FPS. The 1440p results are notably close to the 1080p figures, with only a 9.7 FPS difference between the two resolutions at Low settings. This suggests that the RTX 5090’s 1.79 TB/s memory bandwidth is sufficient to handle the increased pixel count without significant penalties. At 3840x2160, the RTX 5090’s limits become apparent. Low settings still manage 147.1 FPS, which is impressive for 4K, but Medium drops to 92.7 FPS, High falls to 62.8 FPS, and Ultra bottoms out at 50.6 FPS. The 4K Ultra result is 27.4 FPS lower than the 1080p Ultra result, a 35% reduction that underscores the GPU’s workload. Across all resolutions, the difference between Low and Ultra is substantial—95.7 FPS at 1080p, 97.7 FPS at 1440p, and 96.5 FPS at 4K—indicating that the game’s settings have a more profound effect than resolution, which is typical for a title that scales its rendering features aggressively.

GPU Role

The NVIDIA GeForce RTX 5090 is the undisputed performance leader in this configuration, built on the Blackwell 2.0 architecture with a GB202 chip on a 5 nm process. Its 32 GB of GDDR7 memory on a 512-bit bus provides a bandwidth of 1.79 TB/s, which is critical for The Medium’s high-resolution textures and the simultaneous rendering of two worlds. The GPU’s base clock of 2017 MHz and boost clock of 2407 MHz, combined with 21760 shading units, deliver a peak FP32 performance of 104.8 TFLOPS. This raw compute power is reflected in the benchmark results: the RTX 5090 scores 14411 in 3DMark Steel Nomad DX12 and 39650 in Passmark G3D, with a passmark GPU compute score of 26756. These numbers place the GPU in the 94th percentile against all GPUs, and its average benchmark score of 84306 is nearly identical to its nearest rival, the RTX 5090 D, which is only 0.1% behind. In The Medium, the GPU’s role is to handle the complex lighting, shadows, and post-processing effects that define the horror atmosphere. The measured FPS data shows that the RTX 5090 is capable of exceeding 60 FPS at 4K High settings (62.8 FPS), but Ultra settings at 4K dip to 50.6 FPS, suggesting that the game’s most demanding preset pushes even this flagship GPU to its limits. The 32 GB VRAM is unlikely to be a constraint, as the game’s textures can be fully loaded without spillover. The GPU’s 170 RT cores and 680 tensor cores also provide ample support for any ray-traced effects, though the data does not specify whether these are enabled in the measured settings. Overall, the RTX 5090 is the driving force behind the high frame rates at 1080p and 1440p, and it remains capable at 4K, albeit with settings compromises for those seeking 60+ FPS on Ultra.