The Medium

The AMD Radeon RX 570 with 4 GB of VRAM is the definitive bottleneck in The Medium when paired with the Intel Core i5-12400, and the measured frame rates confirm that no resolution or settings combination achieves a consistently playable experience. At 1920x1080, the best case is Low settings yielding 44 FPS average, while Medium drops to 28 FPS, High to 20 FPS, and Ultra to 16 FPS. The data shows a system that is fundamentally underpowered for this title, with the GPU's 4 GB memory capacity and GCN 4.0 architecture struggling against the game's demands, regardless of the capable six-core processor driving it.

Resolution Scaling

The frame rate collapse from 1080p to 4K is severe and indicates a purely GPU-limited scenario. At Low settings, the RX 570 delivers 44 FPS at 1920x1080, which falls to 37 FPS at 2560x1440 (a 16% drop) and then to 29 FPS at 3840x2160 (a further 22% drop from 1440p). This scaling pattern shows that each resolution step imposes a substantial penalty, consistent with a graphics card that is overwhelmed by pixel throughput demands.

The Medium settings row provides the most complete data with minimum and maximum frames. At 1080p Medium, the average is 28 FPS with a range of 23 to 32 FPS. Moving to 1440p Medium drops the average to 23 FPS (range 20-27), and at 4K Medium the average falls to 18 FPS (range 15-21). The gap between 1080p and 4K at Medium is 10 FPS, representing a 36% reduction in performance, which is a steep decline but not a linear one—suggesting that memory bandwidth and fill rate are being taxed progressively.

High settings show a similar trend: 20 FPS at 1080p, 17 FPS at 1440p, and 13 FPS at 4K. Ultra settings are essentially unplayable everywhere, with 16 FPS at 1080p, 13 FPS at 1440p, and just 10 FPS at 4K. The fact that the gap between 1080p and 4K at Ultra is only 6 FPS (from 16 to 10) indicates that the GPU is already saturated at 1080p, so additional resolution has diminishing absolute impact but still pushes the frame rate below any usable threshold.

The resolution scaling data conclusively shows that the RX 570's 224.0 GB/s memory bandwidth and 5.095 TFLOPS of FP32 compute are insufficient for The Medium's rendering engine. The game appears to require substantial pixel and texture throughput that this 2017-era Polaris 20 chip cannot provide, even at the lowest tested resolution.

FAQ

Q: What is the highest average frame rate achievable with this CPU-GPU combo?

A: The best measured result is 44 FPS at 1920x1080 with Low settings. No other configuration exceeds 37 FPS, which occurs at 2560x1440 Low.

Q: Is the Intel Core i5-12400 holding back the AMD Radeon RX 570 in this game?

A: Benchmark results indicate the processor is not the limiting factor. The i5-12400 has 6 cores and 12 threads with a boost clock of 4.40 GHz, and its multi-threaded scores (Cinebench R23 multicore: 15989) far exceed what this game requires. The frame rates scale with resolution and settings in a pattern typical of GPU saturation.

Q: Can this system run The Medium at 4K?

A: Technically yes, but not playably. At 3840x2160, the best average is 29 FPS on Low settings, with Medium at 18 FPS, High at 13 FPS, and Ultra at 10 FPS. None of these provide a smooth experience.

Q: What is the performance difference between Low and Ultra at 1080p?

A: At 1920x1080, Low averages 44 FPS while Ultra averages 16 FPS. This represents a 28 FPS difference, meaning Ultra delivers 64% lower performance than Low at the same resolution.

Q: How does the RX 570 compare to its nearest rivals in synthetic benchmarks?

A: The GPU's average benchmark score is 28766, which places it within 0.4% of the AMD Radeon RX 6800M (28874) and 0.8% below the AMD Radeon RX 470 (28996). It outperforms the AMD Radeon R9 M295X by 0.7% and the NVIDIA Quadro RTX 8000 by 1.2%.

Q: Does the 4 GB VRAM capacity affect performance at higher resolutions?

A: The measured FPS drops suggest VRAM pressure is a factor. At 4K, the GPU must handle significantly more texture data, and the 4 GB GDDR5 memory with 224.0 GB/s bandwidth appears insufficient, as evidenced by the steep declines from 1440p to 4K across all settings.

Settings Recommendations

The data supports only one viable configuration for acceptable frame rates: 1920x1080 with Low settings, which produces an average of 44 FPS. This is the sole measured point above 40 FPS, and even this falls short of a solid 60 FPS target. For users willing to tolerate lower fidelity, this is the only option that approaches playability.

Medium settings at 1080p yield 28 FPS average, which is borderline for a horror title where reaction time matters less than atmosphere, but the 23 FPS minimum recorded suggests stutter-prone scenes. The 1440p Low setting at 37 FPS is a compromise, offering higher resolution than 1080p while maintaining a frame rate above 30 FPS average, but the minimum frame data is not available for this configuration, making it riskier than the 1080p Low choice.

High and Ultra settings should be avoided entirely. At every resolution, these presets produce averages below 20 FPS, which is untenable for gameplay. The measured data shows that even the strongest configuration (1080p High at 20 FPS) falls below the minimum threshold for interactive horror experiences. The game's fixed-camera angles and slow pacing do not compensate for the severe frame pacing issues implied by these numbers.

The most practical recommendation is 1920x1080 Low, accepting the visual compromises for a playable frame rate. Users who prioritize resolution over smoothness could attempt 2560x1440 Low at 37 FPS, but this comes with no minimum frame data, creating uncertainty. There is no settings combination in the measured data that achieves both 60 FPS and medium or higher visual quality.

Measured FPS Breakdown

At 1920x1080, the four tested presets show a clear hierarchy. Low settings achieve 44 FPS average, Medium drops to 28 FPS with a range of 23 to 32 FPS, High falls to 20 FPS, and Ultra bottoms out at 16 FPS. The difference between Low and Medium is 16 FPS, indicating that the Medium preset introduces significant rendering costs beyond Low, while the step from Medium to High (8 FPS) and High to Ultra (4 FPS) shows diminishing returns as the GPU becomes increasingly saturated.

The 2560x1440 results follow the same pattern but at lower absolute values. Low delivers 37 FPS, Medium averages 23 FPS (range 20-27), High produces 17 FPS, and Ultra manages 13 FPS. The resolution increase from 1080p to 1440p costs 7 FPS at Low settings, 5 FPS at Medium, 3 FPS at High, and 3 FPS at Ultra. This narrowing gap at higher presets reinforces that the GPU is already near its limit at 1080p with demanding settings.

At 3840x2160, the results are uniformly poor. Low settings yield 29 FPS, Medium averages 18 FPS (range 15-21), High drops to 13 FPS, and Ultra produces just 10 FPS. The step from Low to Medium at 4K is an 11 FPS drop, which is the largest single-setting penalty across all resolutions, suggesting that Medium introduces memory bandwidth demands that the 224.0 GB/s bus cannot sustain at 4K pixel counts.

Comparing across resolutions at the same settings: Low goes from 44 FPS (1080p) to 37 FPS (1440p) to 29 FPS (4K), a total loss of 15 FPS from the lowest to highest resolution. Medium goes from 28 to 23 to 18 FPS, a 10 FPS loss. High goes from 20 to 17 to 13 FPS, a 7 FPS loss. Ultra goes from 16 to 13 to 10 FPS, a 6 FPS loss. The pattern shows that lower settings are more sensitive to resolution changes, because the GPU has more headroom to be affected by pixel count, while higher settings are already bottlenecked by compute and memory limits.

GPU Role

The AMD Radeon RX 570's specifications directly explain the poor measured performance. The GPU features 2048 shading units, 128 texture mapping units, and 32 render output units, with a base clock of 1168 MHz and a boost clock of 1244 MHz. The memory configuration is 4 GB of GDDR5 on a 256-bit bus delivering 224.0 GB/s bandwidth. The FP32 compute is 5.095 TFLOPS, and the pixel rate is 39.81 GPixel/s.

The 4 GB VRAM capacity is the most critical limitation for The Medium, a game known for heavy texture streaming and large environments. At 3840x2160, the GPU must store and access significantly more texture data, and the 224.0 GB/s bandwidth becomes a choke point. The measured FPS at 4K Medium (18 average) versus 1080p Medium (28 average) shows a 36% reduction, which aligns with the increased memory pressure rather than pure compute scaling.

The GPU's benchmark scores provide context for its position. The average benchmark score is 28766, placing it in the 74th percentile of all GPUs. Its nearest rival, the AMD Radeon RX 6800M, scores 28874, which is only 0.4% higher, indicating that the RX 570's synthetic performance is competitive with much newer hardware in some tests. However, the Geekbench Vulkan score of 42752 and OpenCL score of 32084 show the architecture's age, as GCN 4.0 lacks modern features that newer games exploit.

The 14 nm process node and 5,700 million transistors on a 232 mm² die mean the GPU runs at a 150 W TDP, requiring a single 6-pin power connector and a 450 W suggested PSU. The dual-slot design and 241 mm length are standard for the era, but the end-of-life production status and 2017 release date indicate this is legacy hardware being asked to run a 2021 title. The data shows that the RX 570's capabilities are fundamentally mismatched with The Medium's requirements, particularly at resolutions above 1080p.

CPU Role

The Intel Core i5-12400 is not the limiting component in this configuration, as its specifications and benchmark scores far exceed what The Medium demands. The processor has 6 cores and 12 threads with a base clock of 2.50 GHz and a boost clock of 4.40 GHz, built on Intel's 10 nm Alder Lake architecture. The cache hierarchy includes 80 KB of L1 per core, 1.25 MB of L2 per core, and 18 MB of shared L3 cache.

Synthetic benchmarks for the i5-12400 show strong multi-threaded performance: Cinebench R23 multicore scores 15989, Cinebench R20 multicore scores 6715, and Geekbench multicore scores 8564. Single-threaded results are also solid, with Cinebench R23 single-core at 2257 and Geekbench single-core at 1848. The 3DMark tests show scaling from 1692 (2 threads) to 5890 (max threads), indicating efficient multi-core utilization. The Passmark physics score of 1105 and multithread score of 18747 further confirm the CPU's capability.

The i5-12400's average benchmark score is 18683, placing it in the 72nd percentile of all CPUs. Its nearest rivals include the AMD EPYC 7643 (18697, 0.1% higher) and Intel Core i7-1355U (18730, 0.3% higher), showing that the i5-12400 sits in a competitive mid-range segment. The processor supports DDR4 and DDR5 memory with dual-channel configuration, and it has PCIe Gen 5 with 16 lanes from the CPU.

In The Medium, the CPU's 18 MB L3 cache and 12 threads provide ample headroom for the game's logic and AI, but the measured FPS never approaches CPU limits. The frame rates scale with resolution in a manner consistent with GPU saturation, not CPU bottlenecks. If the processor were limiting, we would expect similar FPS across resolutions at the same settings, but the data shows substantial drops from 1080p to 1440p to 4K, which is the signature of a GPU-bound scenario. The i5-12400's 65 W TDP and 163 mm² die size also indicate a power-efficient design that does not throttle under gaming loads, allowing the RX 570 to operate at its maximum potential—which, in this case, is still insufficient for playable performance above Low settings at 1080p.