The Medium

The Medium, a fixed-camera horror title from 2021, presents a unique load profile that combines heavy GPU rendering with significant CPU overhead for its dual-reality mechanics. Using the Intel Core Ultra 7 265 paired with the NVIDIA GeForce RTX 4080, the measured data provides a clear picture of how this specific combination handles the game’s demands. The results show a system capable of high refresh rates at lower settings, but one that requires careful tuning to maintain smooth performance at 4K with higher visual fidelity.

Settings Recommendations

The benchmark data for this combo reveals a predictable scaling pattern across the four available presets: Low, Medium, High, and Ultra. At 1080p, the differences between presets are stark, ranging from 191 FPS on Low to 68 FPS on Ultra. This wide spread indicates that the RTX 4080 is not the limiting factor at this resolution; instead, the game’s engine and the CPU’s ability to feed frames become the primary constraints.

For players with high-refresh-rate monitors (144Hz or above), the Low preset at 1080p delivers 191 FPS, which is well beyond the threshold for a completely fluid experience. However, the jump to Medium at 1080p yields 120 FPS, which remains highly playable and offers a substantial improvement in visual quality over Low. The data suggests that Medium is the optimal balance for competitive or fast-paced play, as it maintains a frame rate above 100 FPS while providing more detailed textures and lighting.

At 1440p, the Medium preset produces 101 FPS, which is still excellent for most displays. High settings at this resolution drop to 72 FPS, which is acceptable but introduces a noticeable reduction in smoothness compared to Medium. The Ultra preset at 1440p falls to 57 FPS, which is below the 60 FPS target that many players consider the baseline for a comfortable experience. Therefore, for a 1440p monitor, the Medium preset is the clear recommendation, offering a near-100 FPS experience without the visual compromises of Low.

The 4K results are where the RTX 4080’s 16 GB of VRAM and high memory bandwidth become essential. At 3840x2160, the Medium preset achieves 79 FPS, with a minimum of 67 FPS and a maximum of 91 FPS. This is the only 4K preset that consistently stays above 60 FPS, making it the definitive choice for UHD gaming with this combo. The High preset at 4K drops to 57 FPS, which is borderline, while Ultra falls to 45 FPS, which is not recommended for a smooth experience. The Low preset at 4K produces 127 FPS, but the visual degradation is likely too severe to justify the performance gain.

In summary, the data indicates that Medium is the "sweet spot" preset for this combo across all resolutions. It provides the best balance of visual fidelity and frame rate, with 120 FPS at 1080p, 101 FPS at 1440p, and 79 FPS at 4K. Players prioritizing maximum frame rates should use Low, but those seeking a high-quality experience should stick with Medium.

How This Combo Ranks

The measured performance of this Intel Core Ultra 7 265 + RTX 4080 combination places it at rank 173 out of 3,724 tested combos in The Medium. This puts the system in the top 5% of all configurations tested for this specific game, indicating that it is a very high-performing pairing.

This ranking is unsurprising given the individual strengths of the components. The RTX 4080 sits at the 86th percentile when compared to all GPUs in the benchmark database, and its average benchmark score of 54,247 places it narrowly ahead of the RTX 4080 SUPER (which has a score of 54,209, a delta of 0.1%). The CPU, the Core Ultra 7 265, is even more impressive, ranking in the 93rd percentile among all CPUs with an average benchmark score of 64,640.

The combo’s rank of 173 out of 3,724 suggests that it outperforms the vast majority of systems, but it is not at the very top of the leaderboard. The data implies that other combinations, likely featuring higher-end GPUs or CPUs with higher single-thread performance, achieve better frame rates in this title. However, for a mainstream high-end setup, this rank confirms that the pairing is well-matched for The Medium’s requirements, delivering excellent performance without being bottlenecked by either component.

GPU Role

The NVIDIA GeForce RTX 4080 is the primary driver of frame rate in The Medium at higher resolutions. Its specifications are substantial: 9,728 shading units, 304 TMUs, and 112 ROPs, all running on the Ada Lovelace architecture. The GPU operates at a base clock of 2205 MHz and a boost clock of 2505 MHz, which allows it to handle the game’s complex lighting and shadow calculations efficiently.

The memory subsystem is particularly relevant for The Medium, which is known for its high-resolution textures and dual-world rendering. The RTX 4080 features 16 GB of GDDR6X memory on a 256-bit bus, providing a bandwidth of 716.8 GB/s. The effective memory clock is 22.4 Gbps. This large memory pool ensures that the game’s assets can be loaded without stuttering or texture pop-in, even at 4K resolution.

The benchmark data shows the GPU’s scaling from 1080p to 4K. At 1080p Medium, the average FPS is 120. At 1440p Medium, it drops to 101 FPS. At 4K Medium, it further drops to 79 FPS. This curve demonstrates that the RTX 4080 has enough headroom to handle the increased pixel count, but the frame rate penalty is significant. The 4K High preset (57 FPS) and Ultra preset (45 FPS) show that while the GPU is capable of rendering these settings, the frame rate falls below the ideal range for a smooth experience, suggesting that the game’s visual effects at these levels are extremely demanding.

The GPU’s compute performance, as measured by Passmark’s G3D test (34,457 points) and Geekbench’s OpenCL test (214,739 points), indicates strong raw horsepower. However, the in-game results show that raw compute is not the only factor; the game’s engine optimization plays a crucial role. The RTX 4080 is clearly powerful enough to push high frame rates at Medium settings across all resolutions, but its performance at Ultra settings is limited by the game’s rendering pipeline.

Measured FPS Breakdown

The measured FPS data for this combo provides a comprehensive view of performance across three resolutions and four settings presets. All values represent average frame rates unless otherwise noted.

1920x1080:

• Low: 191 FPS
• Medium: 120 FPS (min: 102, max: 138)
• High: 86 FPS
• Ultra: 68 FPS

2560x1440:

• Low: 161 FPS
• Medium: 101 FPS (min: 86, max: 116)
• High: 72 FPS
• Ultra: 57 FPS

3840x2160:

• Low: 127 FPS
• Medium: 79 FPS (min: 67, max: 91)
• High: 57 FPS
• Ultra: 45 FPS

The data reveals a few key trends. First, the gap between Low and Medium is substantial, often exceeding 50 FPS at 1080p and 1440p. This indicates that the Low preset is heavily optimized for speed, likely sacrificing significant visual detail. Second, the gap between High and Ultra is smaller but still noticeable, with a drop of 18 FPS at 1080p, 15 FPS at 1440p, and 12 FPS at 4K. This suggests that Ultra settings provide diminishing returns in visual quality for the performance cost.

The Medium preset stands out as the most consistent performer, with its minimum FPS values (102 at 1080p, 86 at 1440p, 67 at 4K) remaining well above playable thresholds. The High preset at 4K (57 FPS) and the Ultra preset at 1440p (57 FPS) both hover near the 60 FPS mark, indicating that these settings are playable but may exhibit occasional dips.

Resolution Scaling

The frame rate drop from 1080p to 4K is a critical indicator of where the bottleneck lies in this system. At Medium settings, the FPS goes from 120 at 1080p to 101 at 1440p, a decrease of 15.8%. The drop from 1440p to 4K is steeper, going from 101 to 79 FPS, a decrease of 21.8%. Overall, from 1080p to 4K, the frame rate drops by 34.2%.

This scaling pattern is typical for a system that is balanced between CPU and GPU load at lower resolutions but becomes increasingly GPU-bound at higher resolutions. At 1080p, the CPU’s ability to process the game’s logic and draw calls is more likely to be the limiting factor, which is why the RTX 4080 can deliver 120 FPS on Medium. As the resolution increases to 1440p and 4K, the GPU’s pixel fill rate and memory bandwidth become the dominant constraints, causing the frame rate to drop more rapidly.

The data for the Low preset shows a similar but less severe trend: 191 FPS at 1080p, 161 FPS at 1440p, and 127 FPS at 4K. This is a 33.5% drop from 1080p to 4K, which is very close to the Medium preset’s drop. The consistency of this scaling across presets suggests that the game’s engine has a fixed overhead that scales with resolution, regardless of the visual quality settings.

The 4K Ultra preset (45 FPS) is the most demanding scenario, and the drop from 1080p Ultra (68 FPS) represents a 33.8% decrease. This confirms that the RTX 4080, while powerful, is not capable of maintaining high frame rates at 4K Ultra in this title. The limiting component at this resolution is clearly the GPU, as the CPU’s frame pacing cannot compensate for the sheer amount of pixel work required.

CPU Role

The Intel Core Ultra 7 265 plays a critical role in ensuring the GPU is fed with enough data to maintain high frame rates, particularly at lower resolutions. This processor features 20 cores and 20 threads, running at a base clock of 2.40 GHz and a boost clock of 5.30 GHz. Its architecture, Arrow Lake-S, is built on a 3 nm process node and includes 30 MB of shared L3 cache.

The CPU’s benchmark scores highlight its strong multi-threaded and single-threaded performance. Its Cinebench R23 multi-core score is 42,216, and its single-core score is 5,960. These figures place it in the 93rd percentile of all CPUs, with an average benchmark score of 64,640. This puts it in a tight race with processors like the AMD EPYC 4464P (which has a score of 64,823, a delta of -0.3%) and the Intel Core Ultra 7 265F (which has a score of 64,438, a delta of 0.3%).

In The Medium, the CPU’s role is most evident at 1080p, where the FPS is not limited by the GPU. At 1080p Medium, the combo achieves 120 FPS, while at 1080p Low it reaches 191 FPS. These high frame rates are only possible if the CPU can process the game’s camera transitions and logic updates quickly enough. The Ultra 7 265’s high boost clock and substantial L3 cache help to minimize latency, allowing the GPU to render frames without waiting for the CPU.

At 4K, the CPU’s impact is less pronounced, as the GPU becomes the bottleneck. The fact that the 4K Medium preset (79 FPS) is lower than the 1440p Medium preset (101 FPS) confirms that the GPU is the limiting factor at this resolution. However, the CPU’s performance still matters for maintaining consistent frame times; the measured minimum FPS at 4K Medium is 67 FPS, which indicates that the CPU can keep up with the GPU’s output without causing stutters.

The processor’s memory bandwidth of 102.4 GB/s and support for DDR5 memory are also relevant, as The Medium’s streaming assets require fast memory access. The CPU’s 20 threads are likely sufficient for the game’s multi-threaded tasks, such as audio processing and AI routines for the dual-reality puzzles. The data suggests that the Core Ultra 7 265 is not a bottleneck for this combo in The Medium, as its performance scales appropriately with resolution.

FAQ

Q: What is the best resolution and preset for this combo to achieve a consistent 60 FPS experience?

A: The data shows that the 4K Medium preset is the only 4K option that consistently stays above 60 FPS, with an average of 79 FPS and a minimum of 67 FPS. For 1440p, the High preset (72 FPS) also meets this target, while the Ultra preset (57 FPS) falls short.

Q: How does the RTX 4080 compare to its closest rival in terms of overall benchmark performance?

A: The RTX 4080’s average benchmark score is 54,247, which is 0.1% higher than the RTX 4080 SUPER’s score of 54,209. The data shows a marginal performance lead for the standard 4080 over the SUPER variant in the database’s aggregate tests.

Q: Why is there a large FPS difference between the Low and Medium presets at 1080p?

A: At 1920x1080, the Low preset achieves 191 FPS, while the Medium preset achieves 120 FPS. This 71 FPS difference indicates that the Medium preset enables significantly more visual effects, such as higher-resolution textures and more complex lighting, which place a greater load on the GPU despite the lower resolution.

Q: What is the limiting component when playing at 4K Ultra settings?

A: The 4K Ultra preset yields an average of 45 FPS, which is the lowest score in the dataset. The RTX 4080’s 16 GB of VRAM and 716.8 GB/s bandwidth are not sufficient to process the Ultra-level effects at this pixel count, making the GPU the clear bottleneck.

Q: Does the Intel Core Ultra 7 265 have enough processing power for this game?

A: Yes, the CPU’s 20 cores and 20 threads, combined with a boost clock of 5.30 GHz, provide ample performance. This is evidenced by the high frame rates at 1080p (up to 191 FPS on Low), which require the CPU to feed the GPU quickly. The CPU’s Cinebench R23 multi-core score of 42,216 places it in the 93rd percentile, confirming its capability.

Q: How does the combo rank overall in The Medium compared to other tested systems?

A: This specific pairing of the Intel Core Ultra 7 265 and the NVIDIA GeForce RTX 4080 ranks 173rd out of 3,724 tested combos in The Medium. This places it in the top 5% of all systems tested for this game, indicating very strong performance.