The Medium

The Intel Core i7-14700KF paired with the NVIDIA GeForce RTX 4060 delivers a playable but demanding experience in The Medium, with performance heavily dependent on resolution and settings. The data shows this combination ranks 976th out of 1689 tested combos, placing it in the lower-middle tier of the database for this specific title. The 8 GB VRAM and 128-bit memory interface of the RTX 4060 create a clear bottleneck at higher resolutions, while the 20-core CPU remains largely underutilized in a game that appears to favor GPU throughput.

FAQ

Q: What is the best 1080p setting for this combo?

A: The Low preset at 1920x1080 yields 106.1 FPS, which is the highest average across all tested settings. Medium drops to 69.9 FPS, High to 47.7 FPS, and Ultra to 39.1 FPS. Low is the only preset that comfortably exceeds 100 FPS.

Q: How does the RTX 4060 compare to its nearest rivals in synthetic benchmarks?

A: The RTX 4060 scores 23181 in the average benchmark, which is 0.6% lower than the AMD Radeon RX 6600M (23321) and 0.7% lower than the NVIDIA GeForce GTX 780 Ti (23338). It is 0.7% ahead of the Intel Arc B580 (23021) and 0.8% ahead of the AMD Radeon 760M (22999).

Q: Does the CPU bottleneck the GPU at any resolution?

A: No. The i7-14700KF has 20 cores and 28 threads with a boost clock of 5.60 GHz, which is far more than needed for The Medium. The FPS drops from 106.1 (1080p Low) to 73 (4K Low) indicate the GPU is the limiting factor, not the CPU.

Q: Is 4K Ultra playable with this hardware?

A: No. At 3840x2160 with Ultra settings, the average FPS is 25, which is below the 30 FPS threshold typically considered the minimum for playable frame rates. Even 4K High only reaches 30.7 FPS.

Q: How does the CPU rank against all other processors?

A: The i7-14700KF sits in the 96th percentile versus all CPUs, with an average benchmark score of 70104. Its closest rival is the Intel Core i7-14700K with a score of 70074 (0% delta), while the AMD Ryzen 9 9950X scores 70420 (-0.4% delta).

Q: What is the FPS difference between 1080p and 4K at Medium settings?

A: At 1920x1080 Medium, the combo achieves 69.9 FPS. At 3840x2160 Medium, it drops to 42.8 FPS, representing a 38.8% reduction in average frame rate.

GPU Role

The NVIDIA GeForce RTX 4060 is the dominant component in this pairing for The Medium. Its 8 GB of GDDR6 memory on a 128-bit bus provides 272.0 GB/s of bandwidth, which becomes a critical constraint as resolution increases. The GPU's base clock is 1830 MHz with a boost of 2460 MHz, and it houses 3072 shading units alongside 24 RT cores and 96 tensor cores. These specifications place the card in the 66th percentile of all GPUs, with an average benchmark score of 23181.

The measured FPS data reveals a clear pattern: the RTX 4060's performance scales dramatically with settings. At 1080p, the difference between Low (106.1 FPS) and Ultra (39.1 FPS) is 67 FPS, indicating that the GPU's raw compute power (15.11 TFLOPS FP32) is sufficient for lower presets but gets overwhelmed by the visual fidelity demands of Ultra. The 4K results reinforce this — Ultra drops to 25 FPS, while Low maintains 73 FPS. This suggests the card's pixel rate of 118.1 GPixel/s and texture rate of 236.2 GTexel/s are adequate for less demanding settings but insufficient for high-resolution, high-detail workloads.

The VRAM capacity is a likely culprit for the steep drop-offs. With 8 GB, the card may be spilling into system memory at 4K Ultra, causing the significant FPS degradation from 42.8 (Medium) to 25 (Ultra). The memory clock of 2125 MHz (17 Gbps effective) further limits how quickly textures can be streamed, making the RTX 4060 a mid-range solution that struggles with The Medium's heavier presets.

Resolution Scaling

The FPS scaling from 1080p to 4K shows a consistent pattern of GPU-bound behavior. At Low settings, the average FPS drops from 106.1 at 1920x1080 to 93.4 at 2560x1440, then to 73 at 3840x2160. This represents a 31.2% reduction from 1080p to 4K at Low, which is less severe than the drop at higher presets. At High settings, 1080p yields 47.7 FPS, 1440p gives 38.9 FPS, and 4K falls to 30.7 FPS — a 35.6% decrease from 1080p to 4K.

The Medium preset shows a similar trend: 69.9 FPS at 1080p, 54.5 FPS at 1440p, and 42.8 FPS at 4K, a 38.8% drop. Ultra is the most punishing, going from 39.1 FPS at 1080p to 32.9 FPS at 1440p and finally 25 FPS at 4K, a 36.1% reduction. These percentage drops are relatively consistent across presets, which indicates that the limiting component is the GPU's memory bandwidth and fill rate rather than any CPU constraint.

The data implies that the RTX 4060's 128-bit bus is the primary bottleneck. Doubling the resolution roughly quadruples the pixel count, but the bandwidth only scales with the fixed 272.0 GB/s figure. This is why the 4K Low preset (73 FPS) still outperforms 1080p Ultra (39.1 FPS) — the settings have a larger impact on memory pressure than resolution alone, but both factors compound to degrade performance.

Settings Recommendations

For a balanced experience, the Medium preset at 1920x1080 delivers 69.9 FPS, which is within the smooth range for most displays without sacrificing too much visual quality. However, the data shows that Low at 1080p (106.1 FPS) is the only setting that fully utilizes high-refresh-rate monitors. At 1440p, Medium (54.5 FPS) is the highest playable option, while High (38.9 FPS) approaches the edge of acceptable frame pacing.

At 4K, the situation is more constrained. Low (73 FPS) is the only preset that maintains fluid motion, while Medium (42.8 FPS) is borderline and High (30.7 FPS) sits at the minimum threshold. Ultra at any resolution is not recommended: at 1080p it drops to 39.1 FPS, and at 4K it falls to 25 FPS, which is below the playable standard.

The optimal configuration for this combo appears to be 1080p with Medium settings, as it provides a 46.7% FPS improvement over High (47.7 FPS) while retaining most visual effects. Users prioritizing frame rate should choose Low at 1080p, but those wanting better visuals without severe FPS loss will find Medium the best compromise. The data does not support any Ultra preset as a viable option for this hardware.

How This Combo Ranks

Out of 1689 tested combinations, this pairing of the Intel Core i7-14700KF and NVIDIA GeForce RTX 4060 ranks 976th in The Medium. This places it in the bottom 42% of all tested combos, which is notable given the CPU's high standing. The i7-14700KF ranks in the 96th percentile of all CPUs, but the GPU's 66th percentile ranking drags the overall combo down significantly.

The rank suggests that The Medium is heavily GPU-bound, as the powerful CPU cannot compensate for the mid-range graphics card. The CPU's nearest rivals — the i7-14700K (0% delta) and AMD Ryzen 9 9950X (-0.4% delta) — would likely produce nearly identical results with the same GPU, confirming that processor choice has minimal impact on this game's performance. The GPU's nearest rivals, including the RX 6600M and GTX 780 Ti, show that the RTX 4060 is competitively positioned within its class, but that class is simply not strong enough for demanding 4K workloads.

Measured FPS Breakdown

At 1920x1080, the measured results are: Low 106.1 FPS, Medium 69.9 FPS, High 47.7 FPS, and Ultra 39.1 FPS. The gap between Low and Ultra is 67 FPS, highlighting the significant cost of high-detail settings.

At 2560x1440, the averages are: Low 93.4 FPS, Medium 54.5 FPS, High 38.9 FPS, and Ultra 32.9 FPS. The drop from 1080p to 1440p is most pronounced at Medium (22.1% decrease) and least at Ultra (15.9% decrease).

At 3840x2160, the numbers are: Low 73 FPS, Medium 42.8 FPS, High 30.7 FPS, and Ultra 25 FPS. The 4K Ultra result is 76.4% lower than the 1080p Low result, demonstrating the extreme sensitivity of this GPU to resolution and settings. The min and max FPS values are not provided in the data, so the analysis relies solely on average frame rates.

CPU Role

The Intel Core i7-14700KF is a 20-core, 28-thread processor based on Raptor Lake architecture, with a base clock of 3.40 GHz and a boost of 5.60 GHz. It has 33 MB of shared L3 cache and supports DDR4 and DDR5 memory, though The Medium's performance data does not indicate any memory bandwidth sensitivity. The CPU's benchmark scores are exceptional — 44557 in Cinebench R23 multi-core and 6290 in single-core — placing it in the 96th percentile of all CPUs.

In The Medium, the CPU's role is minimal. The FPS scaling across resolutions is consistent with GPU limitation, not CPU bottlenecking. At 1080p Low, the CPU could theoretically push higher frame rates, but the 106.1 FPS average is likely constrained by the GPU's rendering pipeline. The game's horror genre typically involves limited on-screen entities and modest physics calculations, which means the 20 cores are largely idle. The CPU's 125 W TDP and unlocked multiplier suggest it is designed for multi-threaded productivity tasks, not for gaming workloads that favor single-core performance. The data from the measured FPS confirms that upgrading or downgrading the CPU would have a negligible effect on this combo's ranking in The Medium.