The Medium

The AMD Ryzen 9 8945HX and NVIDIA GeForce RTX 4090 Mobile combination delivers a high-end mobile gaming experience in The Medium, a horror title that demands both strong multi-threaded CPU performance and substantial GPU headroom. The data places this specific pairing at rank 802 out of 3724 tested combos, placing it comfortably in the top quarter of all systems benchmarked. This page breaks down how each component contributes to the measured performance, how the combo scales across resolutions, and answers common questions about the system's behavior in this specific game.

CPU Role — cores, clocks, and how they relate to this game's results

The AMD Ryzen 9 8945HX is a 16-core, 32-thread processor based on the Zen 4 architecture, using the Dragon Range codename. It operates with a base clock of 2.50 GHz and a boost clock of 5.40 GHz, which gives it substantial single-thread headroom for games that rely on fewer cores. The processor has a 64 MB L3 cache, which is organized as 1 MB of L2 cache per core, and it supports DDR5 memory over a dual-channel bus, achieving a memory bandwidth of 83.2 GB/s. The CPU is built on a 5 nm process at TSMC, with 13,140 million transistors spread across a 2x 71 mm² die size. It is unlocked for multiplier adjustments, which is notable for a mobile part.

In terms of raw processing power, the 8945HX achieves a Cinebench R23 multicore score of 42713 and a single-core score of 6030. This places the CPU in the 95th percentile of all processors tested. Its average benchmark score is 76212, which puts it in very close competition with the Intel Core Ultra 9 285HX, which scores 76155, representing a negligible 0.1% difference. It also trades blows with the AMD EPYC Embedded 8224P and AMD Ryzen Threadripper PRO 9945WX, both of which are within 0.4% of the 8945HX's average score. The AMD Ryzen 9 9950X3D is the nearest rival on the other side, scoring 75779, which is 0.6% lower.

For The Medium, this CPU configuration is more than adequate. The game is not known for being extremely CPU-bound at high settings, but the 16-core layout ensures that any background tasks or game engine threads have ample resources. The high boost clock of 5.40 GHz means that in scenes that do rely on a single thread, the processor can push through quickly. The benchmark results show that at 1080p with Low settings, the combo achieves 150 FPS, which is the highest FPS recorded across all settings and resolutions. This suggests that at lower graphical loads, the CPU is capable of feeding the GPU enough data to reach very high frame rates. The Cinebench R20 single-core score of 2532 and R15 single-core score of 607 further support the notion that this processor has the single-threaded muscle necessary for older or less-optimized game engines.

When looking at the Passmark results, the 8945HX shows a multithread score of 51405 and a single-thread score of 3907. The integer math score is 195180, and floating-point math is 117453, indicating strong general-purpose compute. The data compression score of 677755 and encryption score of 40836 show that the CPU is also well-suited for tasks beyond gaming, but in the context of The Medium, these numbers correlate with the ability to handle game logic, physics, and streaming assets without bottlenecking the GPU.

GPU Role — VRAM, clocks, and how they relate to this game's results

The NVIDIA GeForce RTX 4090 Mobile is the flagship mobile GPU from the 40-series, based on the AD103 chip and Ada Lovelace architecture. It has a base clock of 1335 MHz and a boost clock of 1695 MHz. The memory operates at 2250 MHz, which translates to 18 Gbps effective, across a 256-bit bus. This provides a memory bandwidth of 576.0 GB/s, which is substantial for a mobile part. The GPU is equipped with 16 GB of GDDR6 memory, which is a large pool for any laptop, and is more than enough for The Medium at any settings.

The GPU has 9728 shading units, 304 texture mapping units, and 112 raster output units. It also features 76 ray tracing cores and 304 tensor cores, making it fully capable of handling the game's ray-traced effects, if enabled. The pixel rate is 189.8 GPixel/s, and the texture rate is 515.3 GTexel/s, allowing for very high fill rates. The FP32 performance is 32.98 TFLOPS, which is a strong indicator of raw shader power. The GPU supports DirectX 12 Ultimate, OpenGL 4.6, and Vulkan 1.4, ensuring broad compatibility with modern APIs.

In the Passmark suite, the RTX 4090 Mobile scores 27212 in the G3D test and 12347 in the GPU compute test. Its average benchmark score is 43667, placing it in the 84th percentile of all GPUs. Its nearest rivals are interesting: the NVIDIA Quadro M6000 scores 43301, just 0.8% lower, and the GeForce RTX 5050 Mobile scores 43268, which is 0.9% lower. On the higher end, the NVIDIA RTX A6000 scores 44075, which is 0.9% higher than the 4090 Mobile. This indicates that the 4090 Mobile is a top-tier performer, but the gap between it and the next-best mobile part is not as large as one might expect, showing that the mobile segment has become very competitive at the high end.

For The Medium, the GPU is the primary driver of performance at higher resolutions. The data shows that at 4K Ultra settings, the average FPS drops to 35, which is the lowest recorded value. This is a direct result of the GPU being pushed to its limits with the game's most demanding visual settings. Conversely, at 1080p Low, the GPU has much less work to do, allowing the CPU to push the frame rate to 150 FPS. The 16 GB of VRAM is a critical asset here; the game can load high-resolution textures without swapping to system memory, which prevents stutters and frame time spikes. The memory bandwidth of 576.0 GB/s ensures that the GPU can feed its 9728 shading units efficiently, even at 4K resolution.

How This Combo Ranks — use comboRankInGame vs other tested combos

This specific pairing of the AMD Ryzen 9 8945HX and the NVIDIA GeForce RTX 4090 Mobile achieves a rank of 802 out of 3724 tested combinations in The Medium. This places it in the 78th percentile of all combos, meaning that roughly 78% of the tested systems are slower, and 22% are faster. This is a strong result, but it is not at the absolute top of the charts, which suggests that there are other CPU/GPU pairings that can extract slightly more performance from this game.

The rank of 802 implies that while the components are individually very powerful, the combination is not necessarily the most optimal for The Medium. The CPU is in the 95th percentile, and the GPU is in the 84th percentile, but the combo lands slightly lower than the GPU's percentile alone, which could indicate a mild bottleneck or that other configurations with different CPU choices yield slightly better results. However, the rank is still high, and the difference between rank 802 and the top of the list is likely to be small in terms of actual FPS.

Given that the CPU's average benchmark score is nearly identical to the Intel Core Ultra 9 285HX, it is plausible that a combo with that CPU and the same GPU would perform very similarly. The deltaPct values in the nearestRivals are all within 0.9%, which shows that the performance landscape is extremely tight at this level. The data shows that the 8945HX is a capable partner for the 4090 Mobile, but it is not the single best CPU for this GPU in this specific game. The rank reflects a system that can run The Medium very well, but it is not a record-breaking combination.

Measured FPS Breakdown — resolution by resolution, settings by settings, exact numbers

The measured FPS data provides a clear picture of how this combo scales with graphical demands. At 1920x1080, the results are as follows:

• Low: 150 FPS average
• Medium: 94 FPS average, with a minimum of 80 and a maximum of 108
• High: 67 FPS average
• Ultra: 53 FPS average

The 1080p Low result is the highest FPS in the entire dataset, showing that the system has plenty of headroom at lower settings. Stepping up to Medium drops the frame rate by 56 FPS, which is a significant jump, indicating that the Medium preset introduces a substantial increase in GPU load. High settings reduce the FPS to 67, and Ultra brings it down to 53. This progression shows that the game is quite sensitive to settings changes at 1080p.

Moving to 2560x1440, the results are:

• Low: 127 FPS average
• Medium: 79 FPS average, with a minimum of 67 and a maximum of 91
• High: 57 FPS average
• Ultra: 45 FPS average

At 1440p, the Low preset still delivers a very playable 127 FPS, which is only 23 FPS lower than at 1080p. The Medium preset drops to 79 FPS, which is a 48 FPS decrease from Low. High settings at 1440p yield 57 FPS, which is a 10 FPS drop from the 1080p High result. Ultra at 1440p is 45 FPS, an 8 FPS drop from 1080p Ultra. The delta between 1080p and 1440p for each setting is relatively consistent, ranging from 8 to 23 FPS, showing that the GPU is scaling with resolution as expected.

At 3840x2160, the results are:

• Low: 99 FPS average
• Medium: 62 FPS average, with a minimum of 53 and a maximum of 71
• High: 45 FPS average
• Ultra: 35 FPS average

The 4K Low setting is still above 60 FPS, which is impressive for a mobile GPU. However, the Medium preset drops to 62 FPS, just barely above the 60 FPS threshold. High settings at 4K produce 45 FPS, and Ultra drops to 35 FPS, which is not ideal for a smooth experience. The minimum and maximum FPS data is only available for the Medium preset at each resolution, which shows a consistent range: at 1080p Medium, the range is 80 to 108; at 1440p Medium, it is 67 to 91; and at 4K Medium, it is 53 to 71. This indicates that frame pacing is relatively stable, with the range being roughly 20 FPS wide across all resolutions.

Resolution Scaling — how FPS drops from 1080p to 4K and what it says about the limiting component

The resolution scaling data reveals the nature of the bottleneck in this system. From 1080p to 4K, the FPS drops at each setting are as follows:

• Low: 150 to 99, a 34% drop
• Medium: 94 to 62, a 34% drop
• High: 67 to 45, a 33% drop
• Ultra: 53 to 35, a 34% drop

The percentage drop is remarkably consistent across all settings, hovering around 33-34%. This consistency is a strong indicator that the GPU is the primary limiting factor when resolution increases. If the CPU were the bottleneck, we would expect to see a smaller percentage drop at lower settings (where the CPU is more likely to be the limit) and a larger drop at higher settings (where the GPU becomes more stressed). The fact that the drop is nearly identical across all settings suggests that the GPU is being utilized at a high level in all cases, and the CPU is not preventing the GPU from reaching its potential.

The 1080p Low result of 150 FPS shows that the CPU can push the frame rate very high when the GPU has less work. However, the jump from Low to Medium at 1080p is a 56 FPS drop, which is more significant than the resolution drop from 1080p to 1440p at Low (23 FPS). This indicates that the game's Medium settings introduce a large increase in GPU load, such as more complex lighting or particle effects. The 4K Low result of 99 FPS is still higher than the 1080p Ultra result of 53 FPS, which further demonstrates that the GPU is the main driver of performance, and the CPU has little trouble keeping up.

The data suggests that for this combo, the RTX 4090 Mobile is the limiting component at higher resolutions and settings. The CPU has enough headroom to support the GPU, but the GPU's raw processing power determines the final FPS. For users aiming for 4K gaming, the GPU will need to be paired with settings that are not maxed out to achieve high frame rates, as the Ultra preset at 4K drops to 35 FPS. The consistency of the resolution scaling also means that there is no sudden cliff where performance collapses, which is a sign of a well-balanced system, albeit one where the GPU is the clear performance ceiling.

FAQ

Q: What is the best settings preset for 4K gaming on this combo?

A: Based on the data, the Medium preset at 3840x2160 delivers an average of 62 FPS, which is above the 60 FPS target for smooth gameplay. The High preset drops to 45 FPS, and Ultra drops to 35 FPS, so Medium is the highest setting that maintains a playable frame rate at 4K.

Q: How does this combo perform at 1080p for high-refresh-rate monitors?

A: At 1920x1080, the Low preset achieves 150 FPS, which is suitable for a 144Hz display. The Medium preset hits 94 FPS, which is also above 60 FPS and acceptable for most monitors. The Ultra preset at 1080p produces 53 FPS, so lowering settings is necessary for very high refresh rates.

Q: Is the CPU or GPU the main bottleneck in this system?

A: The resolution scaling shows a consistent 33-34% FPS drop from 1080p to 4K across all settings, indicating that the GPU is the primary limiting factor. The CPU is capable of delivering high frame rates at lower settings, as shown by the 150 FPS result at 1080p Low.

Q: How does this GPU compare to its nearest rivals in terms of benchmark scores?

A: The RTX 4090 Mobile has an average benchmark score of 43667. The NVIDIA Quadro M6000 scores 43301, which is 0.8% lower, and the GeForce RTX 5050 Mobile scores 43268, which is 0.9% lower. The NVIDIA RTX A6000 scores 44075, which is 0.9% higher.

Q: What are the minimum and maximum FPS recorded for this combo?

A: The data includes minimum and maximum FPS only for the Medium preset. At 1080p Medium, the range is 80 to 108 FPS. At 1440p Medium, it is 67 to 91 FPS. At 4K Medium, it is 53 to 71 FPS.

Q: How does the CPU's benchmark score compare to its nearest rival?

A: The AMD Ryzen 9 8945HX has an average benchmark score of 76212. The Intel Core Ultra 9 285HX scores 76155, which is 0.1% lower. The AMD EPYC Embedded 8224P scores 76492, which is 0.4% higher, and the AMD Ryzen 9 9950X3D scores 75779, which is 0.6% lower.