The Medium

# The Medium with Intel Core Ultra 9 290K Plus + NVIDIA GeForce RTX 5070 Ti

The Intel Core Ultra 9 290K Plus paired with the NVIDIA GeForce RTX 5070 Ti delivers a compelling but resolution-sensitive experience in The Medium, a horror title that clearly scales its rendering load with both quality presets and pixel count. Measured frame rates across 1080p, 1440p, and 4K resolutions reveal a system that is GPU-bound at higher settings but demonstrates substantial headroom at lower presets, with the combination ranking 209th out of 2911 tested configurations in this game.

Resolution Scaling

The data shows a pronounced drop in average frame rates as resolution increases, which indicates that The Medium's rendering pipeline places heavy demands on the graphics processor. At 1080p with Medium settings, the system achieves 113 FPS average, dropping to 95 FPS at 1440p and further to 74 FPS at 4K. This represents a 34.5% reduction from 1080p to 1440p, and a 22.1% further reduction from 1440p to 4K, suggesting that the GPU's pixel throughput becomes increasingly limiting at higher resolutions.

Examining the Low preset reveals the most dramatic resolution scaling behavior. At 1080p Low, the system produces 180 FPS average, which falls to 152 FPS at 1440p and 119 FPS at 4K. The 4K Low result being 33.9% lower than the 1080p Low figure indicates that even at minimal quality settings, the pixel count at 4K imposes a substantial penalty. This pattern suggests that the RTX 5070 Ti's 96 ROPs and 235.4 GPixel/s pixel rate are the primary constraints at 4K, rather than the CPU or memory subsystem.

The High preset shows a similar scaling trend but with lower absolute values. From 81 FPS at 1080p, the average drops to 68 FPS at 1440p (a 16.0% decrease) and then to 53 FPS at 4K (a 22.1% decrease from 1440p). The Ultra preset follows the same pattern: 64 FPS at 1080p, 54 FPS at 1440p, and 42 FPS at 4K. The consistent reduction across all presets when moving to 4K confirms that the GPU's raw fillrate and memory bandwidth (896.0 GB/s) are the determining factors at this resolution.

Interestingly, the delta between 1080p and 1440p is smaller for High and Ultra presets compared to Low and Medium. For High, the drop is 16.0%; for Ultra, it is 15.6%. Meanwhile, Low and Medium show 15.6% and 15.9% drops respectively. This relatively uniform scaling pattern across presets suggests that The Medium does not exhibit a sudden shift in bottleneck behavior; rather, the GPU remains the limiting component throughout, with the CPU's 24 cores and 24 threads providing sufficient headroom even at 1080p.

Settings Recommendations

Based on the measured frame rates, the Medium preset offers the most balanced experience across all three resolutions. At 1080p, Medium produces 113 FPS with a minimum of 96 FPS and maximum of 130 FPS, providing smooth gameplay with only a 15.0% reduction compared to Low. At 1440p, Medium delivers 95 FPS with a minimum of 81 FPS, which remains comfortably above standard 60 FPS display refresh rates. Even at 4K, Medium achieves 74 FPS with a minimum of 63 FPS, ensuring that the game stays playable during demanding scenes.

The High preset does provide a visual upgrade, but the performance cost is significant. At 1080p, High yields 81 FPS, which is 28.3% lower than Medium. At 1440p, High drops to 68 FPS, and at 4K it falls to 53 FPS. For users prioritizing frame rate stability over visual fidelity, High may be acceptable at 1080p and 1440p, but the 4K result of 53 FPS may introduce noticeable stutter in a horror game where smooth camera movement is essential.

Ultra settings are the most demanding and produce the lowest frame rates in the dataset. The 4K Ultra result of 42 FPS average is below the 60 FPS threshold that many players consider the minimum for a responsive experience. Even at 1080p, Ultra only reaches 64 FPS, which is 43.4% lower than Medium. Given that the Medium preset provides a 76.6% higher frame rate than Ultra at 4K, the performance-to-quality tradeoff strongly favors Medium for this configuration.

Low settings are only recommended for competitive or high-refresh-rate scenarios. The 1080p Low result of 180 FPS and 1440p Low result of 152 FPS could benefit users with 144 Hz or 165 Hz monitors, but the visual compromises in a atmospheric horror title may detract from the intended experience. The 4K Low result of 119 FPS is respectable, but Medium's 74 FPS at 4K offers a better balance of image quality and smoothness.

FAQ

Q: Can this system run The Medium at 60 FPS in 4K?

A: Yes, but only at Medium settings. The measured 4K Medium average is 74 FPS with a minimum of 63 FPS, which stays above 60 FPS. At High settings, the 4K average drops to 53 FPS, and at Ultra it falls to 42 FPS, both below the 60 FPS target.

Q: Which resolution provides the best performance headroom?

A: The 1080p Low preset delivers the highest measured average at 180 FPS, followed by 1440p Low at 152 FPS. For a more balanced experience, 1080p Medium at 113 FPS offers substantial headroom above 60 FPS while maintaining better visual quality.

Q: Is the CPU or GPU the limiting factor in this game?

A: The data indicates the GPU is the primary constraint. Across all settings, frame rates scale consistently with resolution and quality preset changes, while the Intel Core Ultra 9 290K Plus provides 24 cores and 24 threads with a 5.80 GHz boost clock, which is more than sufficient for this title.

Q: How does the Medium preset compare to High in terms of frame rate?

A: The Medium preset provides significantly higher frame rates than High at every resolution. At 1080p, Medium delivers 113 FPS versus 81 FPS for High (a 39.5% advantage). At 1440p, the difference is 95 FPS versus 68 FPS (39.7% advantage), and at 4K it is 74 FPS versus 53 FPS (39.6% advantage).

Q: What is the lowest frame rate recorded in the dataset?

A: The lowest average is 42 FPS at 4K with Ultra settings. The lowest minimum frame rate recorded is 63 FPS at 4K Medium, indicating that even the most demanding Medium preset configuration stays above 60 FPS.

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

A: The combination ranks 209th out of 2911 tested combos in The Medium, placing it in the top 7.2% of all configurations tested for this game.

Measured FPS Breakdown

At 1920x1080, the system produces its highest frame rates across all presets. The Low preset achieves 180 FPS average, representing the absolute peak performance in the dataset. Medium follows at 113 FPS with a minimum of 96 FPS and maximum of 130 FPS, providing a stable experience. High drops to 81 FPS, and Ultra is the lowest at 64 FPS. The spread from Low to Ultra at 1080p is 116 FPS, indicating that quality settings have a massive impact on performance at this resolution.

Moving to 2560x1440, the frame rates decrease across the board. Low delivers 152 FPS, which is 15.6% lower than the 1080p result. Medium produces 95 FPS with a minimum of 81 FPS and maximum of 109 FPS. High falls to 68 FPS, and Ultra reaches 54 FPS. The gap between Low and Ultra at 1440p is 98 FPS, slightly narrower than at 1080p due to the increased pixel load.

At 3840x2160, the system shows its most constrained performance. Low still manages 119 FPS, demonstrating the GPU's capability even at 4K with minimal settings. Medium achieves 74 FPS with a minimum of 63 FPS and maximum of 86 FPS, which is the only 4K preset that maintains a minimum above 60 FPS. High drops to 53 FPS, and Ultra falls to 42 FPS. The Low-to-Ultra spread at 4K is 77 FPS, showing that resolution scaling compresses the performance differences between presets.

The Medium preset's minimum frame rates are only recorded for this quality level, providing additional insight into frame time consistency. At 1080p, the 96 FPS minimum represents an 85.0% of the average, indicating reasonably stable performance. At 1440p, the 81 FPS minimum is also 85.3% of the average. At 4K, the 63 FPS minimum is 85.1% of the average. This consistent ratio suggests that the game's frame pacing remains stable across resolutions when using the Medium preset.

How This Combo Ranks

The combination of Intel Core Ultra 9 290K Plus and NVIDIA GeForce RTX 5070 Ti ranks 209th out of 2911 tested combos in The Medium, placing it in the 92.8th percentile of all configurations. This high ranking reflects the substantial performance headroom provided by both components, though the specific game's optimization and the GPU's 86th percentile ranking among all GPUs suggest that the graphics card is the more influential component for this title.

The CPU's average benchmark score of 84003 places it in the 96th percentile of all CPUs, with nearest rivals including the Intel Core Ultra 9 285K at a 0.2% higher score and the AMD EPYC 4584PX at 1.1% higher. This positions the 290K Plus as a top-tier processor, but in The Medium, the game's rendering demands appear to shift the bottleneck toward the GPU, especially at higher resolutions and quality settings.

The GPU's average benchmark score of 49957 places it in the 86th percentile of all GPUs. Its nearest rivals in terms of average score include the AMD Radeon RX Vega 64 at 0.1% lower, the Intel Arc A550M at 0.4% higher, and the AMD Radeon RX 6900 XT at 2.0% higher. This clustering indicates that the RTX 5070 Ti performs competitively within a narrow performance band, though its 16 GB of GDDR7 memory and 896.0 GB/s bandwidth provide advantages in memory-intensive scenarios.

The combination's rank of 209 out of 2911 suggests that while the individual components are high-performing, there may be other configurations with better optimization for this specific game. The fact that the GPU's percentile (86th) is lower than the CPU's (96th) implies that the graphics card is the more likely bottleneck in The Medium, and users seeking higher frame rates would benefit more from a GPU upgrade than a CPU upgrade.

CPU Role

The Intel Core Ultra 9 290K Plus features 24 cores and 24 threads, a configuration that provides substantial parallel processing capability for games that can utilize multiple threads. The base clock of 3.70 GHz and boost clock of 5.80 GHz ensure that single-threaded performance is also strong, as evidenced by the Cinebench R23 single-core score of 7303 and multi-core score of 51731.

In The Medium, the CPU's role appears to be secondary to the GPU. The consistent frame rate scaling with resolution changes indicates that the CPU is not the primary limiter, as a CPU-bound scenario would show similar frame rates across resolutions. The 1080p Low result of 180 FPS demonstrates that the CPU can feed the GPU at high rates, and the fact that frame rates increase proportionally with lower resolutions suggests ample CPU headroom.

The processor's 36 MB of shared L3 cache and 115.2 GB/s memory bandwidth provide sufficient data throughput for the game's streaming requirements. The 3 nm process node from TSMC, with 17,800 million transistors on a 243 mm² die, indicates efficient power management within the 125 W TDP. The PassMark multi-thread score of 60860 and single-thread score of 4823 further confirm the CPU's capability to handle both multi-threaded background tasks and the primary game logic.

The CPU's nearest rival, the Intel Core Ultra 9 285K, has nearly identical average scores (0.2% difference), suggesting that the 290K Plus does not provide a meaningful advantage in this game. The AMD EPYC processors with higher average scores (1.1% and 1.2% above) are server-class parts that would not typically be used in gaming systems, indicating that the 290K Plus is already at the upper echelon of consumer gaming CPUs.

GPU Role

The NVIDIA GeForce RTX 5070 Ti is the dominant component in this configuration for The Medium. With 8960 shading units, 280 TMUs, and 96 ROPs, the GPU provides substantial compute and pixel processing capabilities. The 16 GB of GDDR7 memory on a 256-bit bus delivers 896.0 GB/s of bandwidth, which is critical for high-resolution textures and the game's fixed-camera horror environments that may load large assets.

The GPU's clock speeds, with a base of 2295 MHz and boost of 2452 MHz, contribute to its 43.94 TFLOPS of FP32 performance. The pixel rate of 235.4 GPixel/s and texture rate of 686.6 GTexel/s directly impact the game's ability to render at high resolutions, explaining why the 4K results show significant drops compared to 1080p. The 5 nm process node from TSMC, with 45,600 million transistors on a 378 mm² die, allows for this high performance within a 300 W TDP.

The GPU's benchmark results show a PassMark G3D score of 32974 and a 3DMark Steel Nomad DX12 score of 6604, reflecting strong DirectX 12 performance that aligns with The Medium's rendering requirements. The Geekbench Vulkan score of 225122 indicates that the GPU handles modern graphics APIs effectively. However, the GPU's percentile ranking of 86th among all GPUs, with nearest rivals including the Radeon RX 6900 XT (2.0% higher) and Radeon RX 6800 XT (3.1% lower), suggests that there are faster options available for users seeking higher frame rates in The Medium.

The measured frame rates demonstrate the GPU's scaling behavior. At 4K Medium, the 74 FPS average with a 63 FPS minimum shows that the GPU can maintain playable frame rates with moderate settings. The 4K Ultra result of 42 FPS indicates that the game's highest quality settings exceed the GPU's capabilities at this resolution. The GPU's memory capacity of 16 GB is sufficient for the game's assets, as evidenced by the fact that even the 4K Medium preset with a minimum of 63 FPS does not appear to suffer from texture loading issues that would indicate memory pressure.