The Medium

The Medium places heavy demands on both processor and graphics card, and the pairing of the Intel Core i5-12400F with the AMD Radeon RX 6650 XT produces a performance profile that is highly sensitive to settings and resolution. The measured data reveals a system that can deliver smooth gameplay at lower presets but struggles to maintain high frame rates at maximum quality, particularly at higher resolutions. This analysis breaks down the specific performance characteristics of this combination.

Resolution Scaling

The frame rate drop from 1080p to 4K is steep and consistent across all settings, clearly identifying the GPU as the primary limiting factor in this configuration. At Low settings, the average frame rate falls from 95.3 FPS at 1920x1080 to 80.1 FPS at 2560x1440, a reduction of 15.2 FPS, and then drops further to 62.2 FPS at 3840x2160. This scaling pattern shows that even at the least demanding preset, the graphics card is struggling to keep pace as pixel count increases.

The situation becomes more pronounced at higher quality presets. At High settings, performance declines from 45.3 FPS at 1080p to 38.9 FPS at 1440p and finally to 29.9 FPS at 4K. The Ultra preset shows the most dramatic degradation, starting at 35.8 FPS at 1080p, falling to 26.2 FPS at 1440p, and bottoming out at 24.9 FPS at 4K. The gap between 1080p and 4K at Ultra settings is 10.9 FPS, representing a 30.4% performance loss.

What is particularly telling is the relationship between resolution scaling and settings. At Low, the 1080p to 4K drop is 33.1 FPS, while at Ultra it is only 10.9 FPS. This indicates that at higher presets, the GPU is already so heavily loaded at 1080p that additional resolution has diminishing absolute impact. The data suggests that the Core i5-12400F has sufficient headroom at lower resolutions, as the frame rate scales almost linearly with pixel count, but the RX 6650 XT becomes the bottleneck well before 4K is reached, especially with more demanding graphical features enabled.

GPU Role

The AMD Radeon RX 6650 XT is the dominant component in this pairing, and its 8 GB of GDDR6 memory on a 128-bit bus with 280.3 GB/s of bandwidth appears to be a limiting factor at higher resolutions and settings. The card's boost clock of 2635 MHz and game clock of 2410 MHz provide the computational foundation, but the memory subsystem seems strained, as evidenced by the sharp performance cliffs between Medium and High settings.

At 4K, the data shows a particularly interesting pattern. The jump from Medium (36.7 FPS) to High (29.9 FPS) costs 6.8 FPS, while the jump from High to Ultra (24.9 FPS) costs another 5.0 FPS. This suggests that the Ultra preset may be exceeding the card's memory capacity or bandwidth, causing additional performance penalties beyond just raw shader work. The 32 ray accelerators on the RDNA 2.0 architecture are present, but The Medium's use of fixed camera angles and pre-rendered elements may not fully utilize them, making the traditional rasterization performance more critical.

The card's 2048 shading units and 64 ROPs deliver a peak FP32 throughput of 10.79 TFLOPS, which is adequate for 1080p gaming but insufficient for 4K at high quality. The performance data bears this out: at 1080p High, the card produces 45.3 FPS, which is playable but not smooth, while at 4K High it drops to 29.9 FPS, which is below the threshold for comfortable gameplay. The 176 W TDP and dual-slot cooler design suggest a card that is thermally capable, but the data shows that raw power is not the issue—it is the memory bandwidth and capacity that hold back performance at higher settings.

How This Combo Ranks

In the database of tested combinations, this specific pairing of the Core i5-12400F and Radeon RX 6650 XT ranks 1054 out of 1689 combos for The Medium. This places it in the lower-middle portion of the field, which aligns with the measured frame rates that are generally below 60 FPS except at the lowest settings. The rank reflects that while the components are individually capable, their combination does not produce top-tier results in this particular game.

The CPU's nearest rivals in the benchmark database include the Intel Core i7-8700K, which scores 19210 on average, a delta of 0.1% from the i5-12400F's 19221 average. This near-identical performance suggests that the six-core, twelve-thread configuration of the i5-12400F is well-matched against older high-end processors. Interestingly, the AMD Ryzen 5 7533HS scores 19364, which is 0.7% higher, while the AMD EPYC 7773X scores 18979, 1.3% lower. These small deltas indicate that the CPU is not the bottleneck in this system.

On the GPU side, the RX 6650 XT has an average benchmark score of 29024, with its nearest rival being the AMD Radeon RX 6800M at 29011, a delta of 0%. The AMD Radeon RX 470 scores 28996, just 0.1% lower, while the Intel Arc A370M scores 29175, 0.5% higher. This clustering of scores within a narrow range suggests that the RX 6650 XT performs at a level consistent with mid-range graphics cards, and its 72nd percentile ranking among all GPUs confirms this positioning. The combo rank of 1054 out of 1689 indicates that while this system is not at the bottom, it is firmly in the middle of the pack for this game.

Settings Recommendations

Based on the measured frame rates, the Low preset is the only configuration that consistently delivers smooth gameplay above 60 FPS across all resolutions. At 1080p Low, the system achieves 95.3 FPS, which drops to 80.1 FPS at 1440p and 62.2 FPS at 4K. This makes Low the only viable option for 4K gaming, as it stays above the 60 FPS threshold, albeit barely.

The Medium preset offers a compromise between visual quality and performance. At 1080p, it delivers 62.7 FPS, which is playable, but at 1440p it falls to 51.4 FPS, and at 4K it drops to 36.7 FPS. For users with 1080p displays, Medium is a reasonable choice, providing a 17.4 FPS improvement over High while still maintaining playable frame rates. However, the jump from Low to Medium costs 32.6 FPS at 1080p, which is a significant penalty for the visual upgrade.

The High preset is problematic, as it fails to reach 60 FPS at any resolution. At 1080p it manages 45.3 FPS, at 1440p 38.9 FPS, and at 4K 29.9 FPS. The Ultra preset is even more demanding, with 35.8 FPS at 1080p, 26.2 FPS at 1440p, and 24.9 FPS at 4K. Given these results, the data suggests that users should prioritize either Low for maximum smoothness or Medium for a balanced experience, while avoiding High and Ultra unless they are willing to accept sub-30 FPS performance at higher resolutions.

Measured FPS Breakdown

At 1920x1080, the system's performance ranges from a high of 95.3 FPS at Low settings to a low of 35.8 FPS at Ultra. The Medium preset produces 62.7 FPS, while High delivers 45.3 FPS. This represents a spread of 59.5 FPS between the lowest and highest quality settings, demonstrating the significant impact that graphical presets have on this configuration at 1080p.

Moving to 2560x1440, the frame rates decline across all settings. Low remains the fastest at 80.1 FPS, followed by Medium at 51.4 FPS, High at 38.9 FPS, and Ultra at 26.2 FPS. The performance gap between Low and Ultra narrows to 53.9 FPS, indicating that the GPU is becoming more constrained as resolution increases.

At 3840x2160, the system's performance is severely limited. Low settings produce 62.2 FPS, which is the only preset to exceed 60 FPS. Medium drops to 36.7 FPS, High to 29.9 FPS, and Ultra to 24.9 FPS. The difference between Low and Ultra at 4K is just 37.3 FPS, showing that the GPU is the overwhelming bottleneck at this resolution. The data across all resolutions and settings paints a clear picture: this combo is best suited for 1080p gaming at Medium or lower settings, with 1440p and 4K requiring significant compromises to achieve playable frame rates.