The Medium

# The Medium with Intel Core Ultra 7 165H + NVIDIA GeForce RTX 5060

The Medium presents a demanding horror experience, and this particular laptop configuration—Intel Core Ultra 7 165H paired with NVIDIA GeForce RTX 5060—delivers playable results only when settings are carefully managed. Across the measured resolutions, the data reveals a clear pattern: the Medium preset at 1080p is the sweet spot, while Ultra settings push the system to near-unplayable territory at all resolutions. The combination ranks 1914th out of 2911 tested combos, placing it in the lower-middle tier for this game, which suggests the RTX 5060's 8 GB VRAM and the CPU's mobile-class performance both contribute to the overall bottleneck picture.

Settings Recommendations

The measured FPS rows tell a straightforward story about which preset offers the best experience. At 1920x1080, the Medium preset delivers 59 FPS average with a minimum of 50 FPS and a maximum of 67 FPS—this is the only settings level at any resolution that consistently holds above 60 FPS while maintaining a playable minimum. The Low preset at 1080p achieves 94 FPS average, which is higher, but the visual fidelity trade-off in a horror game that relies heavily on atmosphere and environmental detail makes Medium the more balanced choice. High at 1080p drops to 42 FPS average, and Ultra falls to 33 FPS—both below the smoothness threshold that most players expect.

At 2560x1440, the Medium preset still produces a respectable 49 FPS average with a 42 FPS minimum and 57 FPS maximum, but the frame pacing is less consistent than at 1080p. Low at 1440p hits 79 FPS average, which is smooth, but again sacrifices the visual richness that defines The Medium's dual-reality presentation. High at 1440p drops to 35 FPS, and Ultra sits at 28 FPS—neither is comfortable for sustained play. At 3840x2160, even the Low preset only manages 62 FPS average, while Medium falls to 39 FPS with a 33 FPS minimum, and High and Ultra produce 28 FPS and 22 FPS respectively. The 4K Ultra result of 22 FPS is effectively a slideshow for a game that requires constant spatial awareness.

The data implies that the Medium preset at 1080p is the optimal configuration for this combo. It provides the best balance between the 59 FPS average and the 50 FPS minimum, which keeps the action fluid enough for the game's fixed-camera angles and psychological pacing. Players with 1440p displays might accept the Medium preset's 49 FPS average, but the 42 FPS minimum suggests occasional dips that could be noticeable during cutscene transitions or when the game renders two worlds simultaneously. The Ultra preset is not recommended at any resolution—the 33 FPS at 1080p and 22 FPS at 4K demonstrate that the settings scale poorly with this hardware.

How This Combo Ranks

The combo ranks 1914th out of 2911 tested combinations for The Medium, placing it in the 34th percentile of all tested systems. This is a mid-to-low tier position that reflects the hardware's limitations rather than its strengths. The RTX 5060 GPU itself sits at the 72nd percentile among all GPUs, and the Core Ultra 7 165H CPU sits at the 84th percentile among all CPUs—both are above-average components individually, yet their combined performance in this specific game falls well short of the top tier. The discrepancy between component percentiles and the combo's in-game rank suggests that The Medium's engine is particularly sensitive to one or both of these components' specific characteristics.

The CPU's nearest rivals in synthetic benchmarks provide context for its compute capability. The Core Ultra 7 165H scores 34083 on average, which is 0.3% above the Intel Core Ultra 5 338H, 0.4% above the AMD EPYC 4244P, 0.4% above the AMD Ryzen AI 7 350, and 0.5% above the AMD Ryzen 7 3700X. These are all extremely close margins, indicating that the CPU's raw processing power is competitive with mainstream desktop and mobile parts from recent generations. However, the GPU's nearest rivals tell a different story: the RTX 5060 scores 26331 on average, which is 0.3% below the AMD Radeon 860M, 0.3% below the NVIDIA GeForce MX550, 0.8% below the AMD Radeon RX 5700 XT 50th Anniversary, and 1.2% above the AMD Radeon RX 6750 XT. The GPU's performance cluster is notably less impressive relative to its peers, which likely drags the combo's in-game rank downward.

The data suggests that the combo's rank is more constrained by the GPU than the CPU. The CPU's strong percentile ranking and tight rival deltas indicate it is not the primary limiting factor, while the GPU's modest standing among its peers points to it as the performance ceiling. This interpretation aligns with the measured FPS scaling observed across settings and resolutions, which we will explore in the GPU and CPU sections below.

GPU Role

The NVIDIA GeForce RTX 5060 is built on the Blackwell 2.0 architecture with the GB206 chip fabricated on a 5 nm process at TSMC. It carries 8 GB of GDDR7 memory on a 128-bit bus, delivering 448.0 GB/s of bandwidth. The memory clock runs at 1750 MHz with 28 Gbps effective speed. The GPU's base clock is 2280 MHz with a boost clock of 2497 MHz. These specifications place it as a mid-range mobile GPU, and the 8 GB VRAM capacity is a critical factor for The Medium, which is known for rendering two simultaneous camera perspectives during its core gameplay mechanic.

The measured FPS data shows a dramatic sensitivity to settings that suggests VRAM or memory bandwidth limitations. At 1080p, dropping from Medium to Low increases average FPS by 35 frames (from 59 to 94), while dropping from High to Medium increases by 17 frames (from 42 to 59). The jump from Ultra to High yields only 9 frames (from 33 to 42). This non-linear scaling pattern—where the biggest gains come from moving from Medium to Low—indicates that the Medium preset may be approaching the limits of the 8 GB VRAM buffer, forcing the GPU to swap assets or reduce texture quality dynamically. The GDDR7 memory's 448.0 GB/s bandwidth is respectable, but the 128-bit bus width means the GPU must rely on high clock speeds to compensate for narrower data paths.

The GPU's synthetic benchmark scores reinforce the picture of a mid-tier part. Its passmark G3D score is 20891, and its 3DMark Steel Nomad DX12 score is 3628. The Geekbench OpenCL score of 112787 and Vulkan score of 113321 are nearly identical, suggesting balanced compute performance across APIs. The passmark DirectX 11 score of 200 versus the DirectX 12 score of 77 is notable—The Medium likely uses DirectX 12 features, and the GPU's relatively weak DX12 score in passmark could indicate driver overhead or architectural inefficiencies that manifest in real-world gaming. The GPU's pixel rate of 119.9 GPixel/s and texture rate of 299.6 GTexel/s are adequate for 1080p but become strained at higher resolutions, which the FPS data confirms.

Measured FPS Breakdown

At 1920x1080, the data shows a clear progression across presets. Low settings produce 94 FPS average, Medium produces 59 FPS with a minimum of 50 FPS and maximum of 67 FPS, High produces 42 FPS, and Ultra produces 33 FPS. The gap between Low and Medium (35 FPS) is nearly as large as the gap between Medium and Ultra combined (26 FPS), which indicates that Medium settings introduce a significant rendering load that is only marginally worsened by further increases to High and Ultra. The 1080p Medium result of 59 FPS is the most balanced measured outcome, sitting close to the 60 FPS target without the volatility seen at higher resolutions.

At 2560x1440, the same pattern holds but with lower absolute values. Low produces 79 FPS, Medium produces 49 FPS with a 42 FPS minimum and 57 FPS maximum, High produces 35 FPS, and Ultra produces 28 FPS. The frame rate drops from 1080p to 1440p are consistent across presets: Low loses 15 FPS (16% decrease), Medium loses 10 FPS (17% decrease), High loses 7 FPS (17% decrease), and Ultra loses 5 FPS (15% decrease). This uniform scaling suggests that resolution impacts the GPU's fill rate and memory bandwidth proportionally, without any sudden cliff effect that would indicate VRAM exhaustion.

At 3840x2160, the results become marginal. Low produces 62 FPS, Medium produces 39 FPS with a 33 FPS minimum and 45 FPS maximum, High produces 28 FPS, and Ultra produces 22 FPS. The transition from 1440p to 4K causes larger percentage drops: Low loses 17 FPS (22% decrease), Medium loses 10 FPS (20% decrease), High loses 7 FPS (20% decrease), and Ultra loses 6 FPS (21% decrease). These consistent percentage drops across all presets indicate that the GPU is uniformly bottlenecked by resolution scaling, with no single preset causing a disproportionate collapse. The 4K Medium minimum of 33 FPS is particularly telling—it shows that even the recommended preset cannot maintain playable frame rates at 4K.

FAQ

Q: What is the best settings preset for this combo at 1080p?

A: The Medium preset at 1080p delivers 59 FPS average with a 50 FPS minimum and 67 FPS maximum. This is the only preset at any resolution that maintains a minimum above 50 FPS, making it the recommended choice for smooth gameplay.

Q: Can this system handle 4K gaming in The Medium?

A: At 3840x2160, the Low preset produces 62 FPS average, but Medium drops to 39 FPS, High to 28 FPS, and Ultra to 22 FPS. Only Low settings are playable at 4K, and the visual quality sacrifice is substantial.

Q: How does the RTX 5060 compare to its nearest GPU rivals?

A: The RTX 5060's average benchmark score of 26331 is 0.3% below the AMD Radeon 860M, 0.3% below the NVIDIA GeForce MX550, 0.8% below the AMD Radeon RX 5700 XT 50th Anniversary, and 1.2% above the AMD Radeon RX 6750 XT.

Q: What is the combo's overall ranking for The Medium?

A: The combo ranks 1914th out of 2911 tested combinations, placing it in the lower-middle tier. This is below what the individual component percentiles (GPU at 72nd, CPU at 84th) might suggest.

Q: How much FPS do you lose moving from 1080p to 4K?

A: At Medium settings, the average FPS drops from 59 at 1080p to 49 at 1440p to 39 at 4K. This represents a 34% total decrease from 1080p to 4K, with roughly half the loss occurring between 1080p and 1440p.

Q: Is the CPU or GPU the primary bottleneck in this game?

A: The data indicates the GPU is the limiting factor. The CPU's benchmarks show it outperforms its nearest rivals by up to 0.5%, while the GPU trails some rivals by up to 0.8%. Additionally, FPS scales proportionally with resolution, which is characteristic of GPU-bound scenarios.

CPU Role

The Intel Core Ultra 7 165H is a Meteor Lake architecture mobile processor with 16 cores and 22 threads. It runs at a base clock of 3.80 GHz with a boost clock of 5.00 GHz, and its 28 W TDP classifies it as a mid-power mobile part. The CPU has 112 KB of L1 cache per core, 2 MB of L2 cache per core, and 24 MB of shared L3 cache. Its memory support is DDR5 with dual-channel configuration, providing 89.6 GB/s of bandwidth. The CPU's performance in synthetic benchmarks shows a strong single-thread score of 1759 in Cinebench R23 and a multi-thread score of 14551, placing it at the 84th percentile among all CPUs.

In The Medium, the CPU's role appears secondary to the GPU. The game's fixed-camera angles and relatively static scenes place less demand on CPU-side physics and AI than on GPU-side rendering. The CPU's 16 cores and 22 threads provide ample headroom for the game's background tasks, and the 5.00 GHz boost clock ensures responsive frame pacing. The CPU's nearest rival, the Intel Core Ultra 5 338H, scores 33989 in average benchmark, which is 0.3% below the 165H's 34083—this marginal difference suggests that CPU performance is not a differentiator in this game's measured results.

The CPU's PassMark multi-thread score of 25933 and single-thread score of 3509 indicate solid compute capability, but the game's FPS scaling with resolution confirms that the CPU is not the constraint. If the CPU were the bottleneck, we would expect to see similar FPS across different resolutions, but the data shows a consistent 15-22% drop at each resolution step. This is the signature of a GPU-bound workload, where the CPU is capable of feeding frames faster than the GPU can render them.

Resolution Scaling

The FPS scaling from 1080p to 4K reveals a GPU-bound system with predictable behavior. At Medium settings, the average FPS drops from 59 at 1080p to 49 at 1440p (17% decrease) and then to 39 at 4K (20% decrease from 1440p). At Low settings, the drop is from 94 to 79 (16% decrease) to 62 (22% decrease). At High settings, the drop is from 42 to 35 (17% decrease) to 28 (20% decrease). At Ultra settings, the drop is from 33 to 28 (15% decrease) to 22 (21% decrease). The consistency of these percentage decreases across all presets indicates that the GPU's rendering pipeline is scaling linearly with pixel count, with no sudden cliff effects.

The 4K results are particularly instructive. The Low preset at 4K produces 62 FPS, which is actually higher than the High preset at 1440p (35 FPS) and the Medium preset at 1440p (49 FPS). This suggests that the GPU's memory bandwidth of 448.0 GB/s is sufficient to handle 4K at reduced settings, but the 8 GB VRAM capacity becomes a constraint when texture quality increases. The 4K Ultra result of 22 FPS is the lowest measured, and it aligns with the GPU's passmark DirectX 12 score of 77, which is notably lower than its DirectX 11 score of 200—The Medium likely uses DirectX 12 features that stress this GPU's architecture.

The scaling pattern implies that the RTX 5060 is best suited for 1080p gaming in The Medium, with 1440p being viable only at Low or Medium settings. The GPU's 19.18 TFLOPS FP32 performance and 119.9 GPixel/s pixel rate are sufficient for 1080p, but the 4K resolution demands a 4x increase in pixel throughput that the GPU cannot sustain at higher quality presets. The data suggests that players should prioritize 1080p with Medium settings for the best experience, or accept significant visual compromises to play at higher resolutions.