The Medium

The Intel Core Ultra 5 135H pairs a 14-core, 18-thread Meteor Lake design with a 3.60 GHz base clock and a 4.60 GHz boost clock in this mobile configuration. The CPU’s architecture, built on Intel’s 7 nm process, places it in the 81st percentile of all tested processors, with an average benchmark score of 29093. That score puts it statistically level with the AMD Ryzen 7 5800X, which trails by just 0.1%, and the AMD Ryzen 5 5600XT, which leads by 0.5%. In practical terms, the benchmark results indicate the processor is not the limiting factor in The Medium at most settings, as the game’s fixed-camera horror presentation rarely stresses more than a few threads. The 18 MB of shared L3 cache and dual-channel DDR5 memory support provide adequate bandwidth for feeding the GPU, but the data suggests that the CPU’s role here is primarily to maintain consistent frame pacing rather than to push raw frame rates. The Cinebench R23 multicore score of 11875.5 and single-core score of 1700 confirm a balanced part, one that can handle the game’s background simulation tasks without bottlenecking the RTX 4070. Notably, the 135H’s nearest rival, the Intel Core i5-13500HX, scores 29270, a 0.6% advantage that is negligible in gaming workloads. For The Medium, which relies more on GPU throughput for its dual-reality rendering trick, the CPU’s 28 W TDP and efficient Meteor Lake design mean it can sustain boost clocks without thermal throttling, keeping frame delivery smooth even in the game’s more complex scenes.

Settings Recommendations

The measured FPS data for this combo shows a clear hierarchy across presets, and the sweet spot is Medium at 1080p. At 1920x1080 with Medium settings, the combo delivers an average of 68 FPS, with a minimum of 58 FPS and a maximum of 78 FPS. That is the only preset in the dataset that maintains an average above 60 FPS while also keeping the minimum above 58 FPS, which is crucial for a horror title where sudden frame dips can break immersion. High settings at 1080p drop the average to 49 FPS, which is playable but not ideal for a game that benefits from consistent motion. Low settings at 1080p push the average to 108 FPS, but the visual compromise is severe for a game that relies heavily on atmospheric lighting and shadow work. Ultra at 1080p is the worst value, yielding only 39 FPS on average, which is below the threshold for smooth gameplay. The data indicates that Medium is the optimal balance, as it leverages the RTX 4070’s capabilities without triggering the performance cliff seen at High and Ultra. At 1440p, Medium drops to 57 FPS average with a 49 FPS minimum, which is borderline; users with 1440p displays should accept this as the playable ceiling. For 4K, no preset achieves a consistent 60 FPS, so the recommendation is to stick with 1080p Medium for the best measured experience. The absence of min/max data for Low and High presets suggests those runs were less stable, further reinforcing Medium as the most reliable choice.

Resolution Scaling

The FPS drop from 1080p to 4K reveals a GPU-bound scenario at higher resolutions, but with an interesting twist at Low settings. At 1080p Low, the combo averages 108 FPS; at 1440p Low, it drops to 91 FPS, a 15.7% decrease; and at 4K Low, it falls to 72 FPS, a 33.3% decrease from 1080p. This scaling pattern indicates the RTX 4070 is the primary limiter, as the CPU can feed frames fast enough at lower resolutions. However, at Medium settings, the drop is more pronounced: 68 FPS at 1080p, 57 FPS at 1440p (16.2% decrease), and 45 FPS at 4K (33.8% decrease). The consistency of these percentage drops across presets suggests the GPU’s 12 GB of GDDR6X memory and 192-bit bus are handling the texture loads, but the raw compute power is insufficient to maintain high frame rates as pixel count grows. At High settings, the scaling is steeper: 49 FPS at 1080p, 41 FPS at 1440p (16.3% decrease), and 32 FPS at 4K (34.7% decrease). This shows that the game’s higher visual fidelity options, likely including volumetric effects and ray-traced shadows, disproportionately tax the GPU. The 4K Ultra result of 25 FPS confirms that this combo is not designed for 4K gaming in The Medium; the 1080p to 4K drop of 76.9% (from 108 to 25 FPS at Low to Ultra respectively) is a clear sign that the GPU runs out of headroom. The benchmark results indicate that at 1080p, the CPU has spare capacity, as the frame rate scales almost linearly with GPU load. At 4K, the GPU is fully saturated, and any additional setting increase results in diminishing returns. This analysis points to a system where the Intel Core Ultra 5 135H is never the bottleneck, but the RTX 4070’s 200 W TDP and 29.15 TFLOPS FP32 compute are the ceiling for this title.

How This Combo Ranks

The combination of the Intel Core Ultra 5 135H and NVIDIA GeForce RTX 4070 ranks 1525 out of 2911 tested combos in The Medium, placing it in the 52nd percentile of all configurations. That mid-pack ranking is surprising given the individual component scores, but it reflects the game’s particular optimization quirks. The CPU sits in the 81st percentile of all processors, and the GPU also sits in the 81st percentile of all GPUs, yet the combo lands below the median. This suggests that The Medium does not scale well with high-end hardware, likely due to its fixed-camera angles and pre-rendered elements that limit the benefits of raw compute. Compared to other combos, this pairing is more capable than the 48th percentile of systems, but it is outclassed by combos featuring higher-tier GPUs. The RTX 4070’s nearest rival, the RTX 4080 Mobile, scores 1.3% higher in aggregate benchmarks, but in this game, that margin may translate to a few extra frames at 1440p. The AMD Radeon RX Vega 56, which trails the RTX 4070 by 0.4% in average score, would likely perform similarly in The Medium, given the game’s moderate GPU demands. The rank of 1525 indicates that roughly 1386 other combos deliver better frame rates in this specific title, many of them likely using desktop-class GPUs. However, for a mobile platform, this combo is respectable, offering playable frame rates at 1080p Medium without requiring the user to dial settings down to Low. The data shows that this combo is not a top-tier performer for The Medium, but it is far from the bottom, and the mid-pack ranking is more a reflection of the game’s engine than a flaw in the hardware itself.

GPU Role

The NVIDIA GeForce RTX 4070 is the dominant component in this combo for The Medium, as evidenced by the resolution scaling data. With 12 GB of GDDR6X memory on a 192-bit bus, the GPU delivers 504.2 GB/s of bandwidth, which is sufficient for the game’s texture streaming but not excessive. The 5888 shading units and 46 RT cores provide the compute headroom for the game’s dual-world rendering, where two scenes are often composited simultaneously. The boost clock of 2475 MHz, up from a 1920 MHz base, allows the GPU to maintain high throughput under load, but the 200 W TDP and 16-pin power connector suggest this is a power-hungry part for a laptop. In benchmark tests, the RTX 4070 achieves a Passmark G3D score of 26927 and a 3DMark Steel Nomad DX12 score of 3854, placing it in the 81st percentile of all GPUs. Its nearest rivals include the Tesla P4 (0.1% higher score) and the RX Vega 56 (0.4% lower), but in The Medium, the GPU’s real-world performance is defined by the measured FPS. The 4K Medium result of 45 FPS, with a minimum of 38 FPS, shows that the GPU is working hard but not enough for a locked 60 FPS at that resolution. At 1080p Low, the 108 FPS average indicates the GPU has plenty of headroom, but the drop to 39 FPS at Ultra shows how quickly the Ada Lovelace architecture’s advantages are consumed by the game’s high-end settings. The 35,800 million transistors on TSMC’s 5 nm process give the GPU a 294 mm² die, and the 29.15 TFLOPS FP32 compute is the theoretical peak that the game rarely approaches. The VRAM capacity is adequate for 4K, as the game does not appear to hit memory limits, but the compute throughput is the limiting factor. In this title, the RTX 4070 behaves like a mainstream high-end part: excellent at 1080p, good at 1440p, and marginal at 4K, which aligns with its 81st percentile ranking.

Measured FPS Breakdown

At 1920x1080, the combo’s performance is solid across presets, with Low delivering 108 FPS average, Medium at 68 FPS (min 58, max 78), High at 49 FPS, and Ultra at 39 FPS. The jump from Medium to High is a 19 FPS loss, a 27.9% drop, which is steep for the visual gains. Moving from High to Ultra costs another 10 FPS, a 20.4% drop, making Ultra the least efficient preset. The 1080p data suggests that Medium is the intended sweet spot, as it is the only preset that stays above 60 FPS on average while maintaining a minimum above 58 FPS.

At 2560x1440, the pattern holds but with lower absolute numbers. Low delivers 91 FPS, Medium drops to 57 FPS (min 49, max 66), High falls to 41 FPS, and Ultra bottoms out at 32 FPS. The Medium preset at 1440p is the only one that approaches playable territory, but the 49 FPS minimum means there will be noticeable stutters in heavy scenes. The drop from 1080p Medium to 1440p Medium is 11 FPS, a 16.2% reduction, which is consistent with the GPU-bound scaling observed.

At 3840x2160, the results are mostly for reference. Low yields 72 FPS, which is surprisingly playable, but Medium drops to 45 FPS (min 38, max 52), High falls to 32 FPS, and Ultra is unplayable at 25 FPS. The 4K Low result of 72 FPS is notable because it shows that the GPU can handle the pixel count if the visual fidelity is reduced enough, but the game’s atmospheric quality suffers at Low. The 4K Medium result of 45 FPS is the best quality-to-performance tradeoff at that resolution, but it is still below the 60 FPS target. The difference between 1080p Low (108 FPS) and 4K Low (72 FPS) is 36 FPS, a 33.3% drop, which is the expected scaling for a GPU of this class. Across all resolutions, the Medium preset provides the most consistent frame delivery, with the smallest gap between average and minimum FPS, making it the recommended choice for this combo. The Ultra preset is only viable at 1080p, and even then, the 39 FPS average is too low for a horror game that relies on smooth camera movements to build tension. The data confirms that this pairing is best utilized at 1080p Medium, where it delivers a solid 68 FPS experience without compromising stability.