The Medium

FAQ

Q: How does the Intel Core Ultra 7 265 compare to its closest rival in CPU benchmarks?

A: The Intel Core Ultra 7 265 posts an average benchmark score of 64,640, which is 0.3% higher than the Intel Core Ultra 7 265F (64,438) and 0.7% higher than the AMD EPYC 7343 (64,202). It sits 0.3% below the AMD EPYC 4464P (64,823) and 0.7% below the AMD EPYC 9124 (65,104).

Q: What is the GPU's standing relative to its nearest rivals?

A: The AMD Radeon RX 9070 achieves an average benchmark score of 23,877, placing it 0.6% above the NVIDIA GeForce GTX TITAN Z (23,736) and 1.1% above the NVIDIA GeForce RTX 3080 Mobile (23,628). It trails the AMD Radeon RX 6800S (24,063) by 0.8% and the NVIDIA GeForce RTX 2080 SUPER (24,170) by 1.2%.

Q: What is the best average FPS this combo achieves at 1080p?

A: At 1920x1080 with Low settings, the system reaches an average of 141 FPS. The Medium preset delivers 88 FPS, High drops to 63 FPS, and Ultra falls to 50 FPS.

Q: Does the combo maintain playable frame rates at 4K?

A: At 3840x2160, the Medium preset yields 58 FPS average with a minimum of 50 FPS and maximum of 67 FPS. Low settings produce 93 FPS, while High drops to 42 FPS and Ultra falls to 33 FPS.

Q: How does this combo rank among all tested configurations for The Medium?

A: This pairing of the Intel Core Ultra 7 265 with the AMD Radeon RX 9070 ranks 797th out of 2,911 tested combos, placing it in the top 27% of all configurations tested for this game.

Q: What is the CPU's multi-threaded performance profile?

A: The Intel Core Ultra 7 265 scores 42,216 in Cinebench R23 multi-core and 5,960 in single-core. Its PassMark multithread score is 49,682, with a single-thread score of 4,689, and it holds a 93rd percentile ranking among all CPUs.

GPU Role

The AMD Radeon RX 9070 is built on the RDNA 4.0 architecture with a Navi 48 chip, manufactured on a 4 nm process at TSMC. It packs 53,900 million transistors across a 357 mm² die, with 3,584 shading units, 224 texture mapping units, and 128 ROPs. The GPU operates with a base clock of 1330 MHz, a game clock of 2070 MHz, and a boost clock of 2520 MHz.

Memory configuration is substantial: 16 GB of GDDR6 on a 256-bit bus yields 644.6 GB/s of bandwidth. The memory clock runs at 2518 MHz, translating to 20.1 Gbps effective. This capacity and bandwidth matter for The Medium, a game that relies on streaming large environmental assets and maintaining consistent texture detail across its dual-reality mechanic.

The GPU's raw compute capabilities include 36.13 TFLOPS of FP32 performance, a pixel rate of 322.6 GPixel/s, and a texture rate of 564.5 GTexel/s. With 56 ray tracing cores, the card can handle the game's lighting effects, though The Medium is primarily rasterization-focused. The 220 W TDP draws power through two 8-pin connectors, with a suggested PSU of 550 W.

Benchmark data shows the RX 9070 scoring 25,381 in PassMark G3D, 14,737 in GPU compute, and 131,539 in Geekbench OpenCL. Its Vulkan score reaches 58,705, while 3DMark Steel Nomad DX12 yields 6,290. The GPU holds a 69th percentile ranking among all GPUs, with an average benchmark score of 23,877.

DirectX 12 Ultimate (12_2) support ensures full compatibility with The Medium's rendering requirements, complemented by Vulkan 1.4 and OpenGL 4.6. The PCIe 5.0 x16 interface provides ample bandwidth for data transfer. Display outputs include one HDMI 2.1b and three DisplayPort 2.1a connectors.

The GPU's nearest rivals in benchmark scores are the NVIDIA GeForce GTX TITAN Z (0.6% lower), AMD Radeon RX 6800S (0.8% higher), NVIDIA GeForce RTX 3080 Mobile (1.1% lower), and NVIDIA GeForce RTX 2080 SUPER (1.2% higher). This places the RX 9070 in a competitive mid-to-high tier, though its performance in The Medium depends heavily on the CPU pairing.

Resolution Scaling

The measured FPS data reveals how this combo scales across resolutions. At 1080p with Medium settings, the system averages 88 FPS. Moving to 1440p drops that to 74 FPS, a 15.9% reduction. At 4K, the average falls to 58 FPS, a further 21.6% decline from 1440p. This scaling pattern indicates the GPU becomes increasingly the limiting factor as resolution rises.

Low settings tell a similar story. The 1080p result is 141 FPS, which drops to 119 FPS at 1440p (15.6% lower) and then to 93 FPS at 4K (21.8% lower). The proportional drops are consistent, suggesting the CPU maintains adequate headroom even at lower settings, with the GPU dominating the performance curve.

High settings show steeper degradation. At 1080p, the average is 63 FPS. At 1440p, it falls to 53 FPS (15.9% lower), and at 4K, it reaches 42 FPS (20.8% lower from 1440p). The gap between 1080p and 4K at High settings is 33.3%, which is more pronounced than the 34.0% drop at Medium and 34.0% at Low.

Ultra settings present the most challenging scenario. The 1080p average is 50 FPS, dropping to 42 FPS at 1440p (16.0% lower) and 33 FPS at 4K (21.4% lower from 1440p). The 4K Ultra result of 33 FPS falls below the 30 FPS threshold for playability, making this preset impractical at that resolution.

The resolution scaling analysis suggests that the Intel Core Ultra 7 265 with 20 cores and 20 threads provides sufficient processing power to avoid bottlenecking the RX 9070 at lower resolutions. The consistent percentage drops across settings indicate a GPU-bound scenario, where the graphics card's workload scales predictably with pixel count.

At 1080p, the CPU's performance headroom is evident: even at Ultra settings, the system maintains 50 FPS, which is respectable for a horror title. The 141 FPS at Low settings demonstrates that the CPU can feed the GPU efficiently at high frame rates without becoming a constraint.

Settings Recommendations

For The Medium, the measured data provides clear guidance on preset selection across resolutions. The Medium preset at 1080p delivers 88 FPS average with a minimum of 75 FPS and maximum of 101 FPS. This is the sweet spot: it maintains smooth gameplay with headroom for frame drops during intense scenes, while offering higher visual fidelity than Low.

At 1440p, the Medium preset yields 74 FPS average (minimum 63, maximum 85), which remains comfortably playable on most displays. The High preset at 1440p drops to 53 FPS, which is borderline for fast-paced sequences but acceptable for a slower-paced horror game. For players prioritizing visual quality over raw frame rate, High at 1440p is viable.

The 4K Medium result of 58 FPS (minimum 50, maximum 67) is the most balanced choice at this resolution. It stays above the 60 FPS target on average and never dips below 50 FPS, ensuring a consistent experience. High at 4K falls to 42 FPS, which may cause noticeable judder during camera pans, while Ultra at 4K at 33 FPS is not recommended.

For the best experience per the measured rows, Medium settings at 1080p offer the highest frame rate with a playable minimum. At 1440p and 4K, Medium remains the recommended preset, as it provides the best balance between visual quality and performance. Low settings at any resolution sacrifice too much visual fidelity for marginal frame rate gains, while Ultra settings only make sense at 1080p where the 50 FPS average is still acceptable.

The data shows diminishing returns beyond Medium: upgrading to High at 1080p costs 25 FPS (from 88 to 63), while upgrading from Low to Medium costs 53 FPS (from 141 to 88). The trade-off between visual quality and performance favors Medium as the optimal default preset.

How This Combo Ranks

The Intel Core Ultra 7 265 paired with the AMD Radeon RX 9070 ranks 797th out of 2,911 tested combos in The Medium. This places the configuration in the 72.6th percentile of all tested systems, meaning it outperforms roughly 72.6% of combinations while being surpassed by the top 27.4%.

This ranking is notable given the individual component performances. The CPU sits in the 93rd percentile among all CPUs, while the GPU ranks in the 69th percentile among all GPUs. The combo ranking is lower than the CPU's percentile but higher than the GPU's, reflecting that game performance in The Medium is more dependent on graphics than on processor power.

The CPU's nearest rivals in benchmark scores — the AMD EPYC 4464P, Intel Core Ultra 7 265F, AMD EPYC 7343, and AMD EPYC 9124 — all fall within 0.7% of its average score. This tight clustering suggests that swapping to any of these processors would yield similar results in The Medium, provided the GPU remains the same.

On the GPU side, the nearest rivals — NVIDIA GeForce GTX TITAN Z, AMD Radeon RX 6800S, NVIDIA GeForce RTX 3080 Mobile, and NVIDIA GeForce RTX 2080 SUPER — also cluster closely, with deltas between 0.6% and 1.2%. This indicates that the RX 9070's performance tier is well-established, and any of these alternatives would produce comparable frame rates in this game.

The 797th rank out of 2,911 combos suggests that while this system is not at the top tier, it is well above median performance. For The Medium specifically, the combination of the Ultra 7 265's strong multi-threaded performance (42,216 in Cinebench R23 multi-core) and the RX 9070's 16 GB VRAM capacity proves adequate for the game's demands at up to 1440p with high settings.

The ranking also implies that higher-performing combos exist, likely featuring more powerful GPUs such as flagship Radeon or GeForce models, which would push frame rates higher at 4K Ultra. However, within its price and performance class, this combo delivers a competitive experience.

Measured FPS Breakdown

1920x1080 (1080p):

• Low: 141 FPS average
• Medium: 88 FPS average, 75 FPS minimum, 101 FPS maximum
• High: 63 FPS average
• Ultra: 50 FPS average

2560x1440 (1440p):

• Low: 119 FPS average
• Medium: 74 FPS average, 63 FPS minimum, 85 FPS maximum
• High: 53 FPS average
• Ultra: 42 FPS average

3840x2160 (4K):

• Low: 93 FPS average
• Medium: 58 FPS average, 50 FPS minimum, 67 FPS maximum
• High: 42 FPS average
• Ultra: 33 FPS average

The complete dataset shows a clear progression: each resolution step down halves the pixel count, and the FPS scales accordingly. At 1080p, the system achieves playable frame rates across all settings, with even Ultra maintaining 50 FPS. At 1440p, Medium and Low are smooth, High is borderline, and Ultra is acceptable for slower gameplay. At 4K, only Low and Medium provide consistently playable experiences.

The Medium preset at each resolution shows the most complete data, with minimum and maximum values recorded. At 1080p, the 75 FPS minimum ensures no drops below smooth gameplay territory. At 1440p, the 63 FPS minimum keeps frame pacing stable. At 4K, the 50 FPS minimum is still within playable range, though players on 120 Hz displays will notice the sub-60 FPS average.

The gap between Low and Medium settings is substantial: at 1080p, the difference is 53 FPS (141 vs 88); at 1440p, it is 45 FPS (119 vs 74); at 4K, it is 35 FPS (93 vs 58). This indicates that Low settings reduce GPU load significantly, allowing the RX 9070 to operate well below its performance ceiling.

The transition from Medium to High costs 25 FPS at 1080p (88 to 63), 21 FPS at 1440p (74 to 53), and 16 FPS at 4K (58 to 42). The diminishing absolute drops at higher resolutions suggest that the GPU is already heavily loaded at Medium settings, and the additional visual features in High impose proportionally less overhead as resolution increases.

Ultra settings present the steepest penalties: from High, the drop is 13 FPS at 1080p (63 to 50), 11 FPS at 1440p (53 to 42), and 9 FPS at 4K (42 to 33). The 4K Ultra result of 33 FPS is the only measured configuration that falls below the 30 FPS playability floor, making it unsuitable for regular gameplay.