The Medium

Resolution Scaling

The recorded data for The Medium with the Intel Core i7-14700KF and NVIDIA GeForce RTX 2060 shows a steep performance decline as resolution increases, which points directly to the GPU as the governing constraint. At 1920x1080 with Low settings, the combination produces 83 FPS average. Moving to 2560x1440 at the same settings drops the average to 70 FPS, a reduction of 13 FPS. At 3840x2160, the Low preset average falls to 55 FPS. This progression indicates that the RTX 2060's rendering throughput, not the CPU's computational headroom, is what limits frame rates across the tested resolutions.

The pattern becomes more pronounced when examining Medium settings, which is the only preset with complete min and max FPS data in the database. At 1920x1080 Medium, the average is 52 FPS with a minimum of 44 and maximum of 60. At 2560x1440 Medium, the average drops to 44 FPS with a minimum of 37 and maximum of 50. At 3840x2160 Medium, the average falls to 34 FPS with a minimum of 29 and maximum of 40. The scaling from 1080p to 1440p shows a 15.4% average FPS reduction, while the jump from 1440p to 4K shows a 22.7% reduction. These diminishing returns at higher resolutions are consistent with a GPU that is increasingly saturated by pixel count.

High settings tell a similar story. The average FPS at 1920x1080 is 37. At 2560x1440 it drops to 31. At 3840x2160 it falls to 25. The delta between 1080p and 1440p is 6 FPS, and between 1440p and 4K is another 6 FPS. Ultra settings show the most severe scaling: 30 FPS at 1080p, 25 FPS at 1440p, and 20 FPS at 4K. The Ultra preset at 4K produces an average that is 20 FPS below the Low preset at the same resolution, indicating that the game's highest quality settings impose a heavy load that the GPU cannot offset even with reduced pixel count.

The data implies that the i7-14700KF is not the bottleneck in any of these configurations. The CPU's 20 cores and 28 threads, with a boost clock of 5.60 GHz, provide ample processing power for the game's logic and streaming. The consistent FPS drops that track with resolution changes confirm that the RTX 2060, with its 6 GB of GDDR6 memory and 192-bit memory bus, is the limiting component. The 336.0 GB/s memory bandwidth becomes increasingly insufficient as the frame buffer grows with resolution, and the 2:1 ratio between 1080p and 4K pixel counts (roughly 4x the pixels) explains why the High preset delivers only 25 FPS at 4K versus 37 FPS at 1080p.

FAQ

Q: What is the highest average FPS recorded for this combination in The Medium?

A: The highest average FPS recorded is 83, achieved at 1920x1080 with the Low preset.

Q: How does the Ultra preset perform at 3840x2160 compared to Low at the same resolution?

A: At 3840x2160, the Ultra preset averages 20 FPS while the Low preset averages 55 FPS, a difference of 35 FPS.

Q: What are the minimum and maximum FPS values recorded at 2560x1440 Medium?

A: The recorded values are 37 FPS minimum and 50 FPS maximum, with an average of 44 FPS.

Q: Does the CPU or GPU limit performance in The Medium for this setup?

A: The data indicates the GPU is the limiting factor. Resolution-based FPS scaling shows consistent drops as pixel count rises, while the CPU's high core count and boost clock remain underutilized.

Q: What is the average FPS difference between 1920x1080 and 3840x2160 on the High preset?

A: The average FPS drops from 37 at 1920x1080 to 25 at 3840x2160, a reduction of 12 FPS.

Q: How many total combinations does the database rank for this game?

A: The database ranks 3,724 combinations for The Medium, and this specific CPU-GPU pairing holds the 2,948th position.

GPU Role

The NVIDIA GeForce RTX 2060 is the primary performer in this pairing, and its specifications explain the measured results. The GPU uses the TU106 chip built on a 12 nm process at TSMC, containing 10,800 million transistors on a 445 mm² die. Its base clock of 1365 MHz and boost clock of 1680 MHz provide the raw frequency headroom, but the 6 GB GDDR6 memory capacity and 192-bit bus width are the more consequential factors for The Medium's performance. The memory clock runs at 1750 MHz with 14 Gbps effective speed, yielding 336.0 GB/s of bandwidth.

The game's measured FPS values show that lower settings help substantially at every resolution. At 1920x1080, Low preset delivers 83 FPS versus 30 FPS on Ultra, a 53 FPS spread. At 2560x1440, the spread is 70 FPS versus 25 FPS, a 45 FPS gap. At 3840x2160, Low averages 55 FPS while Ultra averages 20 FPS, a 35 FPS gap. This narrowing gap at higher resolutions suggests that the GPU's fixed resources, particularly memory bandwidth and shading units, become the dominant constraint as resolution increases, and the settings menu's quality options have less relative impact.

The RTX 2060 has 1920 shading units, 120 texture mapping units, and 48 ROPs. Its pixel rate of 80.64 GPixel/s and texture rate of 201.6 GTexel/s are adequate for 1080p but struggle at 4K. The FP32 throughput of 6.451 TFLOPS and FP16 of 12.90 TFLOPS (2:1) place the GPU in a performance class that the database ranks at the 58th percentile of all GPUs. The passmark G3D score of 14,111 and 3DMark Steel Nomad DX12 score of 1,242 corroborate the gaming results seen in The Medium.

The GPU's 30 RT cores and 240 tensor cores are present in the silicon, but The Medium's measured FPS data does not indicate that ray tracing or DLSS features were enabled in the tested presets. The consistent FPS scaling across presets suggests that rasterization load, not RT workload, drives the observed performance. The 6 GB memory capacity is notable: at 3840x2160 with Ultra settings, the average FPS of 20 indicates the frame buffer is likely under heavy pressure, and the 192-bit bus cannot deliver sufficient data to maintain higher frame rates.

Settings Recommendations

The measured FPS rows provide a clear hierarchy of playable configurations. The Low preset at 1920x1080 delivers the highest average FPS at 83, which is well above the 60 FPS threshold that many games target for smooth motion. However, the Low preset at this resolution sacrifices visual fidelity. The Medium preset at 1920x1080 averages 52 FPS with a minimum of 44 and maximum of 60, making it the best balance between smoothness and quality among the tested options. The minimum of 44 FPS indicates that even in demanding scenes, the frame rate stays within a playable range.

At 2560x1440, the Low preset averages 70 FPS, which remains smooth, but the Medium preset drops to 44 FPS average with a 37 FPS minimum. The 37 FPS floor is below the 60 FPS target but still acceptable for a horror game where pacing and atmosphere matter more than competitive responsiveness. The High preset at 1440p averages 31 FPS, and Ultra averages 25 FPS, both of which fall into a range where motion may appear stuttery during camera pans.

At 3840x2160, only the Low preset achieves a playable average of 55 FPS. Medium averages 34 FPS, High averages 25 FPS, and Ultra averages 20 FPS. For 4K display users, the Low preset is the only realistic option based on the recorded data. The Medium preset at 4K has a minimum of 29 FPS, which could be tolerated in a slower-paced horror title, but the average of 34 FPS leaves little headroom.

The data suggests that the Medium preset at 1920x1080 is the recommended configuration: it provides a 44 FPS minimum, which avoids the worst frame-time spikes, and a 60 FPS maximum, which shows the GPU can reach smooth territory in lighter scenes. The 52 FPS average is 25% higher than the High preset at the same resolution and 22 FPS higher than Ultra. For users who prioritize frame rate over visuals, the Low preset at 1440p (70 FPS average) offers a better resolution-to-performance tradeoff than Medium at 1080p, but the gap in visual quality is substantial.

How This Combo Ranks

The database places this combination at rank 2,948 out of 3,724 tested combos for The Medium. This position, in the 79th percentile from the bottom, indicates that the Intel Core i7-14700KF and NVIDIA GeForce RTX 2060 pairing is among the lower-performing configurations for this game. The ranking is influenced heavily by the GPU's age and memory configuration relative to other tested systems. The RTX 2060's percentile of 58 among all GPUs, combined with the game's demanding rendering, explains why this combo sits below most modern pairings.

The CPU's individual standing is far stronger. The i7-14700KF ranks in the 94th percentile of all CPUs, with an average benchmark score of 70,163. Its nearest rivals include the AMD Ryzen 7 9700F (0.2% ahead), AMD Ryzen 9 7940HX (0.4% ahead), AMD Ryzen 9 7950X (0.9% ahead), and Intel Core Ultra 7 265K (1% behind). These deltas are negligible, meaning the CPU is not the source of the combo's low game ranking. The disparity between the CPU's high percentile and the combo's low game rank reinforces that the RTX 2060 is the limiting factor.

The GPU's own ranking tells a similar story. The RTX 2060 sits at the 58th percentile of all GPUs with an average benchmark score of 15,290. Its nearest rivals are the NVIDIA GeForce GTX 580 (0% delta), AMD Radeon 680M (0.1% ahead), NVIDIA GeForce RTX 3050 OEM (0.6% ahead), and AMD Radeon RX 7600 (0.8% ahead). These close scores in synthetic benchmarks do not translate to equal gaming performance in The Medium, where the 6 GB memory capacity and memory bandwidth become decisive.

The combo rank of 2,948 out of 3,724 means that roughly 776 tested combinations perform worse. This positions the pairing in the lower quartile of the database's tested configurations, consistent with a GPU that was released in 2019 and is now end-of-life. The CPU's performance ceiling is far above what this GPU can utilize in this title, leaving significant untapped potential in the system.

Measured FPS Breakdown

The database records 12 distinct measurement points for this combination, covering three resolutions and four settings presets. At 1920x1080, the Low preset averages 83 FPS, the Medium preset averages 52 FPS with a minimum of 44 and maximum of 60, the High preset averages 37 FPS, and the Ultra preset averages 30 FPS. The spread from Low to Ultra at 1080p is 53 FPS, showing that settings choices have a major impact at this resolution.

At 2560x1440, the Low preset averages 70 FPS, the Medium preset averages 44 FPS with a minimum of 37 and maximum of 50, the High preset averages 31 FPS, and the Ultra preset averages 25 FPS. The spread from Low to Ultra at 1440p is 45 FPS. The Medium preset's minimum of 37 FPS is the only sub-40 reading among the 1440p measurements, indicating that frame pacing remains consistent in the mid-range preset.

At 3840x2160, the Low preset averages 55 FPS, the Medium preset averages 34 FPS with a minimum of 29 and maximum of 40, the High preset averages 25 FPS, and the Ultra preset averages 20 FPS. The spread from Low to Ultra at 4K is 35 FPS. The Medium preset's minimum of 29 FPS at 4K is the lowest minimum recorded across all resolutions, suggesting that the GPU's memory bandwidth is severely taxed at this resolution.

Comparing across resolutions within the same settings, the Low preset shows the smallest absolute drop from 1080p to 4K (28 FPS), while the Ultra preset shows the smallest absolute drop (10 FPS). This is because the Ultra preset is already so low at 1080p that there is little room for further decline. The Medium preset drops by 18 FPS from 1080p to 4K, and the High preset drops by 12 FPS. These numbers quantify the GPU's resolution scaling behavior: the higher the settings, the less additional headroom exists for resolution increases.

CPU Role

The Intel Core i7-14700KF brings substantial processing resources to this pairing. It has 20 cores and 28 threads from the Raptor Lake architecture, fabricated on Intel's 10 nm process with a die size of 257 mm². The base clock is 3.40 GHz, and the boost clock reaches 5.60 GHz. The cache hierarchy includes 80 KB of L1 per core, 2 MB of L2 per core, and 33 MB of shared L3. The CPU supports DDR4 and DDR5 memory in a dual-channel configuration, with PCIe Gen 5 providing 16 lanes from the CPU.

The CPU's benchmark results show exceptional multi-threaded and single-threaded performance. Cinebench R23 scores are 44,167 multi-core and 6,235 single-core. Geekbench scores are 21,462 multi-core and 2,578 single-core. PassMark multithread score is 52,425, and single-thread score is 4,480. These numbers place the CPU in the 94th percentile of all CPUs, with an average benchmark score of 70,163. The nearest rival, AMD Ryzen 7 9700F, scores 69,996, a delta of only 0.2%.

In The Medium, the CPU's role is to handle game logic, entity updates, and streaming. The game's fixed-camera horror presentation relies on scripted sequences and atmospheric effects rather than large-scale physics simulations or massive NPC counts. The measured FPS data shows no evidence of CPU bottlenecks: the FPS drops are proportional to resolution increases, which is a GPU-bound signature. Had the CPU been the limiter, FPS would remain flat across resolutions or show erratic scaling patterns.

The CPU's 125 W TDP and unlocked multiplier indicate it is designed for high-performance desktop use. Its release date of October 2023, with a launch MSRP of $384, places it as a current-generation part. The gap between the CPU's capabilities and the GPU's output in this game is stark: the CPU could drive far higher frame rates if paired with a more powerful GPU, but the RTX 2060 caps the system's performance in The Medium. The thermal and power characteristics of the CPU do not factor into the measured FPS results, as the GPU's 160 W TDP and 450 W suggested PSU leave ample system headroom.