The Medium

The AMD Ryzen 7 7800X3D paired with the AMD Radeon RX 9060 delivers a playable but demanding experience in The Medium, with performance scaling that clearly favors lower settings and resolutions. The data indicates that this combo is best suited for 1080p Medium or 1440p Medium, where frame rates remain stable, while 4K Ultra is the only configuration that falls below playable thresholds.

FAQ

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

A: Based on the measured FPS data, 1920x1080 provides the highest frame rates, with the Medium preset averaging 63 FPS. At 2560x1440, the Medium preset averages 53 FPS, which remains fluid, while 3840x2160 Medium drops to 42 FPS, making 1440p the optimal balance for visual fidelity and performance.

Q: How does the CPU compare to its nearest rivals in synthetic benchmarks?

A: The AMD Ryzen 7 7800X3D has an average benchmark score of 33079, which is essentially identical to the AMD Ryzen 7 8700G (33089, delta 0%), the Intel Core i7-13650HX (33089, delta 0%), and the AMD Ryzen 7 7745HX (33091, delta 0%). It trails the AMD Ryzen 9 PRO 6950H by a negligible 0.4%.

Q: What is the GPU's standing relative to its closest competitors?

A: The AMD Radeon RX 9060 has an average benchmark score of 16014, placing it slightly below the NVIDIA GeForce RTX 3060 Ti (16129, delta -0.7%) and marginally above the AMD Radeon R9 370X (15862, delta 1%) and AMD Radeon RX 7700 (15852, delta 1%). It leads the AMD Radeon Pro W5500 by 2.1%.

Q: Does the 8 GB VRAM capacity limit the game at 4K?

A: The 8 GB GDDR6 memory with 288.0 GB/s bandwidth is a constraining factor. At 3840x2160, the average FPS drops from 67 on Low to 30 on High and 24 on Ultra, indicating that higher settings at 4K exceed what the memory subsystem can efficiently handle.

Q: How does the combo rank among all tested configurations?

A: This particular combination ranks 2162 out of 3724 tested combos in The Medium, placing it in the lower-middle portion of the database. This ranking reflects the GPU's mid-tier position (59th percentile) rather than the CPU's strong showing (83rd percentile).

Q: Is the CPU the bottleneck in this game?

A: No, the data suggests the GPU is the primary limiting factor. The CPU has a robust 16-thread design with a 96 MB L3 cache, and its benchmark scores are competitive with rivals. The FPS scaling across resolutions and settings follows GPU-bound patterns, not CPU limitations.

GPU Role

The AMD Radeon RX 9060 is the decisive component in this pairing, built on the RDNA 4.0 architecture with a Navi 44 chip. Its 8 GB GDDR6 memory operates at 2250 MHz (18 Gbps effective) across a 128-bit bus, yielding 288.0 GB/s of bandwidth. The GPU's base clock is 1700 MHz, with a game clock of 2400 MHz and a boost clock reaching 2990 MHz. These clocks, combined with 1792 shading units, 112 texture mapping units, and 64 ROPs, produce a theoretical FP32 performance of 21.43 TFLOPS.

In The Medium, the GPU's memory configuration and clock speeds directly dictate the measured results. At 1080p, the GPU has enough headroom to push average FPS from 101 on Low to 63 on Medium, but the gap narrows as resolution increases. At 4K, the 8 GB memory buffer becomes a bottleneck, as evidenced by the steep drop from 67 FPS on Low to 42 FPS on Medium and only 24 FPS on Ultra. The 128-bit bus width limits effective memory throughput, which is why higher settings at 1440p and 4K produce diminishing returns.

The GPU's 28 ray tracing cores are present but do not appear to be a major factor in the measured rows, as the FPS deltas between presets are consistent with rasterization-bound performance. The RDNA 4.0 architecture supports DirectX 12 Ultimate, OpenGL 4.6, and Vulkan 1.4, all of which are relevant for The Medium's rendering pipeline. The GPU's 59th percentile ranking among all GPUs places it in the mid-range tier, which aligns with the observed frame rates: capable at lower settings, struggling at maximum presets.

Resolution Scaling

The FPS scaling from 1080p to 4K reveals a GPU-bound scenario with clear limits. At Medium settings, the average FPS progresses from 63 at 1920x1080, to 53 at 2560x1440, and finally to 42 at 3840x2160. This represents a 33% drop from 1080p to 4K, a relatively moderate decline that suggests the GPU's compute resources, not just memory bandwidth, are engaged at higher resolutions. The min FPS values follow a similar pattern: 53 at 1080p, 45 at 1440p, and 35 at 4K, indicating that frame pacing remains stable even as absolute performance drops.

Low settings show the most dramatic scaling, with 101 FPS at 1080p falling to 85 FPS at 1440p and 67 FPS at 4K. This 34% reduction from 1080p to 4K on Low settings indicates that even at minimal graphical load, the GPU's fill rate and memory bandwidth are stretched at 4K. High settings tell a steeper story: 45 FPS at 1080p, 38 FPS at 1440p, and 30 FPS at 4K. The 33% drop from 1080p to 4K on High is consistent, but the absolute values show that High is only viable at 1080p.

Ultra settings exhibit the most punishing scaling, with 36 FPS at 1080p, 30 FPS at 1440p, and 24 FPS at 4K. The 4K Ultra result is the only configuration below 30 FPS, making it the sole unplayable preset in the measured data. The consistent proportional drops across settings suggest the GPU is the limiting component; if the CPU were the bottleneck, the scaling would flatten at higher resolutions. The 8 GB VRAM likely contributes to the Ultra preset's poor performance, as texture and shadow quality at maximum settings exceed the memory buffer's capacity, forcing constant data swaps.

How This Combo Ranks

This combo ranks 2162 out of 3724 tested combinations in The Medium, placing it in the 58th percentile of all combos. This is a middle-of-the-pack position, reflecting the GPU's modest standing rather than the CPU's strength. The AMD Ryzen 7 7800X3D sits in the 83rd percentile among all CPUs, with an average benchmark score of 33079 that matches its nearest rivals within a 0.4% margin. However, the AMD Radeon RX 9060 only reaches the 59th percentile among GPUs, with an average score of 16014 that is 0.7% behind the NVIDIA GeForce RTX 3060 Ti.

The combination of a high-tier CPU with a mid-tier GPU creates an imbalanced pairing in The Medium. The CPU's 8 cores and 16 threads, running at 4.20 GHz base and 5.00 GHz boost, provide ample processing power, as evidenced by its multi-threaded scores: 16817 in Cinebench R23 and 15610 in Geekbench multicore. The GPU's 21.43 TFLOPS and 288.0 GB/s bandwidth are adequate for 1080p but insufficient for 4K Ultra. The combo's rank of 2162 suggests that many other configurations with more balanced CPU-GPU pairings outperform it in this specific title.

The ranking also highlights that the CPU's 96 MB L3 cache, a hallmark of the 3D V-Cache design, does not translate into a significant advantage in The Medium. The game's performance is more dependent on the GPU's rasterization capabilities and memory throughput. This combo's position in the lower half of the database indicates that users seeking higher frame rates at 4K would need a more powerful GPU, while the CPU is more than capable of supporting future GPU upgrades.

Measured FPS Breakdown

At 1920x1080, the combo delivers its best results. Low settings produce an average of 101 FPS, which is the highest recorded value across all resolutions and settings. Medium settings average 63 FPS, with a minimum of 53 FPS and a maximum of 72 FPS, providing a smooth experience. High settings drop to 45 FPS, while Ultra averages 36 FPS. The 1080p resolution keeps the GPU's 8 GB memory buffer adequately fed, allowing for playable frame rates even at High.

At 2560x1440, performance decreases across all presets. Low settings average 85 FPS, still comfortably above 60 FPS. Medium settings average 53 FPS, with a minimum of 45 FPS and a maximum of 61 FPS, which is playable but with occasional dips. High settings average 38 FPS, and Ultra falls to 30 FPS, making the latter marginal for smooth gameplay. The 1440p resolution begins to stress the memory bandwidth, as the 128-bit bus and 288.0 GB/s throughput struggle to keep up with higher pixel counts.

At 3840x2160, the GPU's limitations become apparent. Low settings average 67 FPS, which is surprisingly strong, but Medium drops to 42 FPS with a minimum of 35 FPS and a maximum of 48 FPS. High settings average 30 FPS, and Ultra averages 24 FPS, the only preset below the playable threshold. The 4K results show a clear pattern: the GPU can handle the pixel count at Low settings but lacks the memory capacity and bandwidth for higher quality presets. The min FPS values at 4K Medium (35 FPS) indicate that frame times remain relatively consistent, but the overall performance is not ideal for a horror game requiring atmospheric immersion.

Settings Recommendations

The optimal experience for this combo is the Medium preset at 2560x1440. This configuration averages 53 FPS with a minimum of 45 FPS, which provides a stable and immersive frame rate for The Medium's fixed-camera horror gameplay. The Medium preset at 1080p offers a higher average of 63 FPS, but the visual upgrade at 1440p justifies the 10 FPS loss, given that both remain above the 45 FPS threshold for smooth play.

For users prioritizing maximum frame rates, the Low preset at 1920x1080 is the clear choice, delivering 101 FPS. This is the only preset that exceeds 100 FPS and is ideal for competitive or high-refresh-rate displays. However, the Low preset at 1440p (85 FPS) is a better balance for those who want higher resolution without sacrificing fluidity, as it remains well above 60 FPS.

The High preset is not recommended beyond 1080p, where it averages 45 FPS. At 1440p (38 FPS) and 4K (30 FPS), the frame rates are too low for a game that relies on tension and timing. The Ultra preset should be avoided entirely, as it only achieves 36 FPS at 1080p and drops to 24 FPS at 4K, which is unplayable. The data indicates that the Medium preset is the sweet spot, offering a balance between visual quality and performance across all three resolutions, with 1440p Medium being the standout choice for this hardware combination.