The Medium

The AMD Ryzen 7 9800X3D and NVIDIA GeForce RTX 4070 SUPER combination delivers a highly playable experience in The Medium, but the benchmark data reveals a system that is firmly constrained by the graphics card at higher resolutions. The measured frame rates show a clear pattern: the CPU’s substantial headroom is only fully utilized when the graphical load is lightened, making this pairing particularly sensitive to settings adjustments.

Resolution Scaling

The frame rate drop from 1080p to 4K is steep and consistent, indicating that the RTX 4070 SUPER is the dominant limiting factor as pixel count increases. At High settings, the average frame rate falls from 74.1 FPS at 1920x1080 to 60.6 FPS at 2560x1440, a reduction of 18.2%. Moving to 3840x2160 yields just 50.1 FPS, which is 32.4% lower than the 1080p result. This scaling pattern is typical of a GPU-bound scenario; the 9800X3D’s 8-core, 16-thread configuration with a 96 MB shared L3 cache is more than capable of feeding the GPU at these settings.

The divergence between resolutions becomes more pronounced at lower graphical presets, where the CPU has more room to stretch. At Low settings, the system achieves 167.7 FPS at 1080p, but this drops to 142.2 FPS at 1440p and 108.2 FPS at 4K. The 1080p-to-4K delta at Low is 35.5%, which is larger than the 32.4% delta at High. This suggests that while the GPU is still the primary bottleneck, the CPU’s performance ceiling is closer to being reached at 1080p Low. The Ryzen 7 9800X3D’s strong single-thread performance, evidenced by its 3dmark_single_thread score of 1212, ensures that even at 4K Low, the frame rate remains high, but the scaling curve clearly shows the GPU struggling with the resolution increase.

At Ultra settings, the pattern holds, with frame rates falling from 60.4 FPS at 1080p to 50.8 FPS at 1440p and 38.3 FPS at 4K. The 4K Ultra result is 36.6% lower than the 1080p Ultra figure, which is the largest percentage drop across all presets. This indicates that the most demanding settings amplify the GPU’s workload disproportionately, pushing the 4070 SUPER to its limits. The data shows that for a consistent 60 FPS target, 1440p is the practical ceiling for this combo at High settings, while 1080p is required for Ultra.

GPU Role

The NVIDIA GeForce RTX 4070 SUPER’s specifications directly inform its behavior in The Medium. With 12 GB of GDDR6X memory on a 192-bit bus, the card has a bandwidth of 504.2 GB/s. This memory configuration is sufficient for the title’s asset streaming at 1080p and 1440p, but the frame rate collapse at 4K Ultra (38.3 FPS) suggests that memory bandwidth and capacity are being taxed heavily. The card’s boost clock of 2475 MHz and its 7168 shading units provide substantial compute throughput, yet the game’s fixed camera angles and heavy post-processing effects appear to scale poorly with resolution.

The GPU’s 56 RT cores and 224 tensor cores are relevant, as The Medium uses fixed camera perspectives that can be computationally expensive. However, the measured data does not isolate ray tracing effects, so the analysis must focus on the rasterization performance. The card’s 80 ROPs and 554.4 GTexel/s texture rate are adequate for the game’s visual style, but the 4K results show that the pixel fill rate becomes a limiting factor. The 198.0 GPixel/s pixel rate is sufficient for 1080p and 1440p, but at 4K, the demand for pixel shading exceeds the GPU’s capacity, leading to the observed 38.3 FPS floor at Ultra.

The RTX 4070 SUPER’s position in the benchmark hierarchy, with a percentileVsAllGpus of 84, places it above average, but its nearest rivals show how close the competition is. The NVIDIA RTX A6000 is only 0.2% faster in average benchmark score, and the AMD Radeon RX 7650 GRE is 0.3% slower. This tight grouping suggests that the 4070 SUPER’s performance in The Medium is not exceptional but rather representative of its class. The 12 GB memory capacity, while adequate for most scenarios, does not provide the headroom needed for 4K Ultra, where the game’s texture detail exceeds the card’s comfortable envelope.

FAQ

*Q: Can this system maintain 60 FPS at 4K in The Medium?*

A: No, not at higher settings. The measured average frame rate at 3840x2160 is 50.1 FPS on High and 70.4 FPS on Medium. To hit 60 FPS at 4K, you must use Medium settings, as High and Ultra both fall below the threshold.

Q: What is the performance difference between 1080p and 4K at High settings?

A: The average frame rate drops from 74.1 FPS at 1920x1080 to 50.1 FPS at 3840x2160, a reduction of 32.4%. This indicates that the GPU’s workload scales significantly with resolution, and the RTX 4070 SUPER becomes the primary bottleneck at 4K.

Q: How does the CPU’s benchmark performance compare to its nearest rivals?

A: The AMD Ryzen 7 9800X3D has an average benchmark score of 37780, which is 0.1% lower than the Intel Xeon 6353P and 0.1% lower than the Intel Core Ultra 5 225. It is also 0.6% behind the Intel Core i9-13900HK and 0.7% behind the Intel Core i5-13600KF.

Q: Is the 12 GB VRAM on the RTX 4070 SUPER sufficient for Ultra settings?

A: The data shows that Ultra settings at 1080p produce 60.4 FPS, but at 1440p this falls to 50.8 FPS and at 4K to 38.3 FPS. The consistent frame rate drops across resolutions suggest that the 12 GB memory and 504.2 GB/s bandwidth are not enough to sustain the highest preset without significant performance loss.

Q: What is the best resolution to play at with High settings?

A: 2560x1440 is the sweet spot, delivering an average of 60.6 FPS. This is just above the 60 FPS target, while 1080p (74.1 FPS) is smoother and 4K (50.1 FPS) is below the target.

Q: How does the GPU’s benchmark score compare to its nearest rival?

A: The RTX 4070 SUPER has an average benchmark score of 42576, which is 0.2% lower than the NVIDIA RTX A6000 and 0.3% lower than the AMD Radeon RX 7650 GRE. It is 1.4% higher than the AMD Radeon Pro 580X and 1.6% higher than the NVIDIA Tesla M40.

Settings Recommendations

The measured frame rates indicate that the Medium preset offers the best balance between visual fidelity and performance for this hardware combination. At 1920x1080, Medium delivers 102.1 FPS, which is 37.9% higher than High (74.1 FPS) and 69.0% higher than Ultra (60.4 FPS). The jump from Medium to High costs 27.4% of the frame rate, while the jump from High to Ultra costs an additional 18.5%. This suggests that Medium is the most efficient setting for high refresh rate monitors at 1080p.

At 2560x1440, the Medium preset produces 85.6 FPS, which is a 41.3% improvement over High (60.6 FPS) and a 68.5% improvement over Ultra (50.8 FPS). This makes 1440p Medium the recommended configuration for users with 144 Hz displays, as it provides a smooth experience without the frame rate drops seen at higher presets. The 4K Medium result of 70.4 FPS is also viable for 60 Hz displays, but the gap to High (50.1 FPS) is 28.8%, making Medium the clear choice for 4K gaming.

The Low preset is not recommended for this combo, as it provides diminishing returns. At 1080p Low, the system achieves 167.7 FPS, which is 64.2% higher than Medium, but the visual quality loss is substantial. The CPU’s strong performance, with a 3dmark_16_threads score of 10081, ensures that the system is never CPU-limited at these settings, but the GPU’s capabilities are better utilized with higher presets. For the best experience, Medium is the optimal choice across all three resolutions, offering frame rates that are 70.4 FPS at 4K, 85.6 FPS at 1440p, and 102.1 FPS at 1080p.

How This Combo Ranks

The AMD Ryzen 7 9800X3D and RTX 4070 SUPER combination ranks 250th out of 1689 tested combinations in The Medium. This places it in the top 14.8% of all tested systems, indicating that it is a high-performing configuration for this game. The rank reflects the balance between the CPU’s 90th percentile performance (percentileVsAllCpus) and the GPU’s 84th percentile performance (percentileVsAllGpus), with the GPU being the more limiting factor in this title.

The CPU’s benchmark scores show it is competitive with its nearest rivals, but its performance in The Medium is dependent on the GPU’s ability to keep up. The 9800X3D’s 3dmark_8_threads score of 8252 and cinebench_r23_multicore score of 34004 indicate strong multi-threaded capabilities, which are relevant for a game that may use multiple threads for rendering and physics. However, the RTX 4070 SUPER’s 3dmark_steel_nomad_dx12 score of 4627 and passmark_g3d score of 29995 suggest that the GPU is the primary driver of frame rates in this title.

The combo’s rank of 250 out of 1689 is impressive, but it does not place it at the very top of the leaderboard. This is consistent with the data showing that the GPU is the bottleneck at higher resolutions and settings. The system’s performance is strong enough for smooth gameplay at Medium and High settings across 1080p and 1440p, but it is not optimized for Ultra 4K. The rank suggests that users with higher-end GPUs would see better results, but for this specific pairing, the measured frame rates provide a reliable guide to expected performance. The data indicates that the system is well-suited for The Medium at its most common resolutions, with the Medium preset offering the best overall experience.