The Medium

The AMD Ryzen 9 5950X paired with the AMD Radeon RX 570 produces a severely GPU-bound experience in The Medium, with the graphics card acting as the overwhelming bottleneck across all tested resolutions. The data shows this combination ranks 1637th out of 1689 tested combos, placing it in the bottom 3% of all configurations—a position driven entirely by the RX 570's inability to maintain playable frame rates at any setting above Low.

Settings Recommendations

The measured FPS rows make the optimal preset selection unambiguous: Low settings are the only viable option for acceptable performance, and even then only at 1080p. At 1920x1080 with Low settings, the combo achieves 45.2 FPS average, which is the sole configuration in the dataset that approaches a smooth experience. Moving to Medium at the same resolution drops performance to 25.9 FPS, a 43% reduction that pushes the experience into stutter-prone territory for a horror game that relies on atmospheric pacing.

At 2560x1440, the Low preset yields 38.9 FPS, which remains borderline playable but represents a 14% decline from the 1080p Low result. The High preset at 1080p produces only 22.7 FPS, while Ultra at the same resolution falls to 16.3 FPS—both figures indicating that visual quality upgrades come at an unacceptable cost to fluidity. For users who prioritize visual fidelity over frame rate, the Medium preset at 1080p (25.9 FPS) is the highest setting that stays above 20 FPS, but the data strongly suggests that Low at 1080p is the only setting where the game's fixed-camera horror sequences remain consistently responsive.

The 4K results reinforce this conclusion, with even Low settings at 3840x2160 managing only 27.6 FPS. Given that the RX 570's 4 GB GDDR5 memory and 224.0 GB/s bandwidth are clearly insufficient for this game's asset streaming at higher presets, Low settings represent the best balance between playability and visual clarity across all resolutions.

GPU Role

The AMD Radeon RX 570 is the definitive limiting factor in this combination. Its GCN 4.0 architecture, built on a 14 nm process at GlobalFoundries, operates with a base clock of 1168 MHz and a boost clock of 1244 MHz. The 4 GB GDDR5 memory on a 256-bit bus provides 224.0 GB/s of bandwidth, which proves inadequate for The Medium's demanding texture loads at higher presets.

The GPU's benchmark data shows a 74th percentile ranking among all GPUs, with an average benchmark score of 30158. Its nearest rivals in the database—the NVIDIA GeForce RTX 5060 (deltaPct 0.2), AMD Radeon RX 7700 XT (deltaPct 0.2), NVIDIA Tesla M60 (deltaPct 0.6), and NVIDIA GeForce RTX 5070 Mobile (deltaPct 0.8)—all score within 1% of the RX 570, indicating that this GPU's raw compute is competitive with much newer hardware on synthetic tests. However, the measured FPS data tells a different story for The Medium specifically, where the RX 570's 5.095 TFLOPS FP32 performance and 32 ROPs are simply not enough to drive the game's rendering pipeline.

The GPU's memory configuration is particularly problematic. With only 4 GB of VRAM, the card likely exceeds its memory capacity even at Medium settings, causing significant frame time spikes that the average FPS figures do not fully capture. The pixel rate of 39.81 GPixel/s and texture rate of 159.2 GTexel/s are adequate for 1080p at Low settings but become progressively overwhelmed as resolution and quality increase.

Resolution Scaling

The FPS scaling across resolutions reveals a textbook case of GPU saturation. From 1080p to 1440p at Low settings, performance drops from 45.2 FPS to 38.9 FPS—a 14% decline for a 78% increase in pixel count. This relatively modest drop suggests that at 1080p Low, the GPU is not fully saturated, and the additional pixel load at 1440p is partially absorbed by remaining headroom. However, from 1440p to 4K at Low settings, the drop is more severe: 38.9 FPS to 27.6 FPS, a 29% reduction for another 125% increase in pixels.

The Medium preset shows similar scaling patterns: 25.9 FPS at 1080p, 20.4 FPS at 1440p, and 17.7 FPS at 4K. The High preset follows the same trajectory: 22.7 FPS, 15.9 FPS, and 11.6 FPS. The Ultra preset is the most punishing, with 16.3 FPS at 1080p falling to 15.2 FPS at 1440p and 8.9 FPS at 4K—the 4K Ultra result being the single lowest measured value in the entire dataset.

These scaling patterns confirm that the RX 570's memory bandwidth and compute resources are the limiting components, not the Ryzen 9 5950X. The 16-core, 32-thread CPU with a 4.90 GHz boost clock and 64 MB L3 cache is vastly overqualified for this workload, and its benchmark scores—including a Cinebench R23 multi-core score of 38607 and a 93rd percentile ranking—indicate it would not bottleneck even a much faster GPU.

FAQ

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

A: The data shows 1920x1080 with Low settings is the only configuration achieving above 45 FPS (45.2 FPS average). All other resolution/settings combinations fall below 39 FPS, with most below 26 FPS.

Q: How does the RX 570 compare to its nearest GPU rivals?

A: The RX 570 has an average benchmark score of 30158, placing it in the 74th percentile. Its nearest rivals—NVIDIA GeForce RTX 5060, AMD Radeon RX 7700 XT, NVIDIA Tesla M60, and NVIDIA GeForce RTX 5070 Mobile—all score within 0.8% of the RX 570, indicating near-identical synthetic performance.

Q: Is the Ryzen 9 5950X the bottleneck?

A: No. The Ryzen 9 5950X scores in the 93rd percentile of all CPUs with an average benchmark score of 49062, and its nearest rivals (Intel Core i5-14600K, i5-14600KF, Intel Xeon Gold 5318H, AMD EPYC 4345P) are all within 1.1% of its score. The GPU is clearly the limiting factor.

Q: What is the highest playable setting at 1440p?

A: At 2560x1440, only the Low preset achieves a playable frame rate at 38.9 FPS. Medium drops to 20.4 FPS, High to 15.9 FPS, and Ultra to 15.2 FPS.

Q: How does 4K performance compare to 1080p?

A: At 4K, Low settings deliver 27.6 FPS (39% lower than 1080p Low), Medium delivers 17.7 FPS (32% lower), High delivers 11.6 FPS (49% lower), and Ultra delivers 8.9 FPS (45% lower).

Q: What does the combo's rank of 1637 out of 1689 mean?

A: This rank places the combo in the bottom 3.1% of all tested configurations for The Medium, confirming that the RX 570's performance is a severe limitation regardless of the powerful CPU paired with it.

CPU Role

The AMD Ryzen 9 5950X is a 16-core, 32-thread processor from the 5000 series, built on Zen 3 architecture (codenamed Vermeer) using TSMC's 7 nm process. It operates with a base clock of 3.40 GHz and a boost clock of 4.90 GHz, with a TDP of 105 W on the AMD Socket AM4 platform. The CPU's cache hierarchy includes 64 KB L1 per core, 512 KB L2 per core, and a substantial 64 MB L3 cache.

Synthetic benchmarks show the 5950X is a powerhouse: Cinebench R23 multi-core scores 38607, single-core scores 5450, and Geekbench multi-core reaches 12084 with single-core at 2211. The 3DMark 16-thread test scores 10810, while the max-thread test reaches 11597. PassMark multithread scores 45424, with floating-point math at 100280 and integer math at 185520. These numbers place the CPU in the 93rd percentile of all CPUs, with an average benchmark score of 49062.

Its nearest rivals—the Intel Core i5-14600K (deltaPct -0.2), Intel Core i5-14600KF (deltaPct -0.6), Intel Xeon Gold 5318H (deltaPct 0.7), and AMD EPYC 4345P (deltaPct -1.1)—are all within 1.1% of the 5950X's average score, indicating that the CPU is not a meaningful differentiator in this combo's poor performance.

For The Medium specifically, the CPU's role is minimal. The game's measured FPS values do not improve with the 5950X's massive thread count or high boost clock, as the RX 570's rendering limits prevent the CPU from ever becoming the bottleneck. The 5950X's 3.40 GHz base clock alone would be sufficient to feed this GPU at 1080p Low, and the 4.90 GHz boost clock provides ample single-thread performance for the game's fixed-camera scenes.

Measured FPS Breakdown

The complete dataset reveals a consistent pattern of GPU-limited performance across all 12 measured configurations. At 1920x1080, the full settings range is: Low 45.2 FPS, Medium 25.9 FPS, High 22.7 FPS, and Ultra 16.3 FPS. The spread from Low to Ultra is 28.9 FPS, representing a 64% reduction in performance when maxing out settings.

At 2560x1440, the values are: Low 38.9 FPS, Medium 20.4 FPS, High 15.9 FPS, and Ultra 15.2 FPS. The drop from Low to Medium is 18.5 FPS (48%), while High and Ultra are nearly identical, suggesting that the GPU hits a hard memory or compute wall beyond Medium settings.

At 3840x2160, the values are: Low 27.6 FPS, Medium 17.7 FPS, High 11.6 FPS, and Ultra 8.9 FPS. The 4K Low result is the only 4K configuration exceeding 20 FPS, and even that is marginal for a horror game requiring precise timing.

Comparing across resolutions, the 1080p Low result (45.2 FPS) is 1.6x faster than 1440p Low (38.9 FPS) and 1.6x faster than 4K Low (27.6 FPS). The Ultra preset shows the most dramatic resolution scaling: 16.3 FPS at 1080p drops to 15.2 FPS at 1440p (7% loss) and then to 8.9 FPS at 4K (45% loss from 1440p), indicating that 4K Ultra pushes the GPU far beyond its usable envelope.

How This Combo Ranks

This configuration ranks 1637th out of 1689 tested combos for The Medium, placing it in the bottom 3.1% of all systems. This ranking is almost entirely attributable to the GPU, as the Ryzen 9 5950X's 93rd percentile CPU ranking and 49062 average benchmark score are among the best in the database. The GPU's 74th percentile ranking and 30158 average score, while not catastrophic on synthetic tests, translate to poor real-world performance in this specific title.

The delta between the CPU's strong standing and the combo's weak ranking highlights a severe imbalance: the 5950X provides 16 Zen 3 cores with 4.90 GHz boost capability, yet the RX 570's 5.095 TFLOPS and 224.0 GB/s bandwidth cannot leverage this processing power. Users of this configuration would see no meaningful FPS improvement from upgrading the CPU; instead, the data indicates that replacing the GPU would yield substantial gains, as the CPU has ample headroom to support a significantly faster graphics card.

The ranking also contextualizes the measured FPS values within the broader database: even the best result (1080p Low at 45.2 FPS) is likely below the median for other combos at similar settings, given that 1637 other configurations outperform this one. For players seeking a smooth The Medium experience, this combo is not recommended above Low settings at 1080p, and even then, the 45.2 FPS average leaves little margin for demanding scenes.