The Medium

The Medium, a fixed-camera horror title built on Unreal Engine 4, presents a unique stress profile that combines heavy GPU load with demanding CPU-driven scene transitions. When paired with the Intel Core Ultra 9 290K Plus and NVIDIA GeForce RTX 5080, the benchmark data reveals a configuration that scales predictably across resolutions and settings, though its performance peaks at 1080p, where the system’s raw throughput is most evident. The measured frames per second across all twelve tested configurations show a consistent hierarchy, with the Medium preset acting as the practical midpoint between visual fidelity and fluidity, while the Ultra preset pushes the GPU to its limits at higher resolutions.

FAQ

Q: What is the highest average frame rate achieved by this combo in The Medium?

A: The maximum recorded average is 198 FPS at 1920x1080 with Low settings. This is the only configuration in the dataset that breaks the 190 FPS barrier, indicating the system’s headroom when graphical loads are minimized.

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

A: The Intel Core Ultra 9 290K Plus with RTX 5080 ranks 95th out of 2,911 tested combos in The Medium. This places it in the top 3.3% of all recorded systems, showing that while it is not the absolute fastest, it is a top-tier performer in the database.

Q: What is the minimum FPS recorded in the entire dataset?

A: The lowest average FPS is 47, achieved at 3840x2160 with Ultra settings. This is the only sub-50 FPS result, and it occurs at 4K with maximum graphical presets, highlighting the extreme load this resolution and settings combination places on the RTX 5080.

Q: Are there any configurations where the combo delivers exactly 60 FPS or higher?

A: Yes, nine out of twelve tested configurations deliver an average of 59 FPS or higher. The only exceptions are the 4K Ultra (47 FPS) and 4K High (59 FPS) presets, with the 1440p Ultra result also hitting exactly 59 FPS.

Q: What is the delta between the CPU’s average benchmark score and its nearest rival?

A: The Core Ultra 9 290K Plus scores 84,003 on average, which is 0.2% higher than the Intel Core Ultra 9 285K’s 83,807. This is the closest rival, with the AMD EPYC 4584PX trailing by 1.1% and the EPYC 9135 by 1.2%.

Q: How does the GPU’s average benchmark score compare to its closest competitor?

A: The RTX 5080 averages 56,083 in benchmarks, which is 0.6% higher than the AMD Radeon 8060S at 55,757. The Radeon RX 6750 GRE 12 GB is nearly identical at 55,698, just 0.7% behind.

GPU Role

The NVIDIA GeForce RTX 5080 is the primary driver of frame rate in The Medium, with its 16 GB of GDDR7 memory on a 256-bit bus providing 960.0 GB/s of bandwidth. This memory configuration is critical for a game that renders dual-world scenarios simultaneously, as the fixed-camera angles often require loading two full scenes into VRAM. The 16 GB capacity ensures that even at 3840x2160 with Ultra settings, the GPU does not run out of memory, though the 47 FPS average at that preset suggests the compute units are saturated rather than memory-bound.

The GPU’s clock behavior further explains the scaling. With a base clock of 2295 MHz and a boost of 2617 MHz, the RTX 5080 maintains high sustained clocks under load, but the benchmark results show that the gap between settings grows as resolution increases. At 1080p, the difference between Low (198 FPS) and Ultra (70 FPS) is 128 FPS, but at 4K, the same settings gap is only 84 FPS (131 vs 47). This compression indicates that at 4K, the GPU’s 10752 shading units and 112 ROPs are the limiting factor, whereas at 1080p, the CPU’s ability to feed frames becomes more relevant.

The RTX 5080’s 84 RT cores and 336 tensor cores are present in the silicon, but The Medium does not heavily utilize ray tracing in the benchmark data. Instead, the GPU’s raw rasterization performance, measured at 56.28 TFLOPS FP32, is what drives the results. The 879.3 GTexel/s texture rate and 293.1 GPixel/s pixel rate are the specifications that matter most for this title’s fixed-camera rendering, which relies on high-resolution textures and complex lighting effects.

The GPU’s 87th percentile ranking among all GPUs in the database, with an average benchmark score of 56,083, places it in the upper tier of graphics cards. Its nearest rivals, including the AMD Radeon 8060S and RX 6750 GRE 12 GB, are within 0.7% in synthetic benchmarks, but in The Medium’s measured FPS, the RTX 5080 demonstrates a clear advantage at lower resolutions, where it achieves 198 FPS at 1080p Low, a figure that rivals cannot match in this dataset.

Settings Recommendations

The Medium preset offers the best balance between visual quality and performance across all three resolutions in the measured data. At 1920x1080, Medium produces 124 FPS average with a minimum of 105 FPS and a maximum of 143 FPS, which is a substantial improvement over High’s 89 FPS while still maintaining a 60 FPS minimum. The jump from Medium to High costs 35 FPS at 1080p, while the jump from Medium to Low gains 74 FPS, but Low’s 198 FPS is excessive for most displays and sacrifices too much visual fidelity.

At 2560x1440, Medium delivers 104 FPS average with a minimum of 89 FPS, which remains well above the 60 FPS threshold even in the most demanding scenes. This is the only 1440p preset that stays above 100 FPS, making it the recommended choice for high-refresh-rate monitors. High at 1440p drops to 75 FPS, which is playable but leaves less headroom for frame-time spikes, while Ultra at 59 FPS is borderline for smooth gameplay.

At 3840x2160, Medium is the only preset that maintains a comfortable margin above 60 FPS, with an average of 82 FPS and a minimum of 70 FPS. This is a critical finding, as 4K High falls to 59 FPS, barely missing the 60 FPS mark, and 4K Ultra plunges to 47 FPS, which is not suitable for a horror game that relies on atmosphere. The 131 FPS at 4K Low is technically smooth, but it defeats the purpose of 4K resolution by reducing graphical detail.

For the best experience, Medium is the clear winner. It provides a minimum of 70 FPS at 4K and 89 FPS at 1440p, ensuring that the game never stutters during the frequent fixed-camera transitions. The data suggests that Ultra is only viable at 1080p, where 70 FPS average is acceptable, but even then, Medium offers a 77% performance increase for a modest visual downgrade.

How This Combo Ranks

The combination of the Intel Core Ultra 9 290K Plus and NVIDIA GeForce RTX 5080 achieves a rank of 95 out of 2,911 tested combos in The Medium. This places the system in the 96.7th percentile of all recorded configurations, meaning it outperforms the vast majority of systems tested for this game. The rank reflects the synergy between the CPU and GPU, where the 24-core, 24-thread processor with a 5.80 GHz boost clock provides enough single-thread performance to keep the GPU fed at lower resolutions.

The CPU’s 96th percentile ranking among all processors, with an average benchmark score of 84,003, contributes to this high combo rank. Its nearest rival, the Core Ultra 9 285K, scores 83,807, a 0.2% difference, but in game performance, the 290K Plus’s higher boost clock and larger L3 cache (36 MB shared) likely provide an edge in The Medium’s CPU-bound scenes. The AMD EPYC 7F72, which scores 85,072 (1.3% higher), is a server-class chip that does not appear in this game’s test pool, making the 290K Plus the top consumer option in its immediate vicinity.

The GPU’s 87th percentile ranking is slightly lower than the CPU’s, but the combination still lands in the top 3.3% of all combos. This suggests that while the RTX 5080 is a strong performer, the CPU’s exceptional single-thread capabilities are what push this pairing into the top 100. The 95th rank out of 2,911 is particularly impressive for a game released in 2021, as newer GPUs like the GeForce 60-series (listed as the successor) have not yet been tested in this dataset.

Resolution Scaling

The FPS drop from 1080p to 4K reveals a clear GPU-bound scenario at higher resolutions, with the CPU’s influence diminishing as pixel count increases. At Medium settings, the average FPS drops from 124 at 1920x1080 to 104 at 2560x1440, a 16% reduction, and then to 82 at 3840x2160, a further 21% reduction. This scaling is not linear, indicating that the RTX 5080’s memory bandwidth (960.0 GB/s) becomes a limiting factor at 4K, where the higher pixel count demands more data throughput.

At Low settings, the scaling is more dramatic: 198 FPS at 1080p drops to 167 FPS at 1440p (16% reduction) and then to 131 FPS at 4K (22% reduction). This steeper decline at Low settings suggests that when the GPU is not fully utilized by graphical effects, the CPU’s frame generation capability is exposed at 1080p, but the GPU quickly becomes the bottleneck as resolution increases. The 198 FPS figure at 1080p Low is likely near the CPU’s maximum frame rate for this game, given the fixed-camera engine’s draw call limitations.

At Ultra settings, the drop is less steep in percentage terms: 70 FPS at 1080p, 59 FPS at 1440p (16% reduction), and 47 FPS at 4K (20% reduction). This indicates that at Ultra, the GPU is already heavily loaded at 1080p, so the additional pixel load at higher resolutions has a relatively smaller impact. The 47 FPS at 4K Ultra is the only result below 50 FPS, confirming that this preset is not viable at 4K, while the 59 FPS at 1440p Ultra is marginal.

The data shows that the Intel Core Ultra 9 290K Plus is not the limiting component at any resolution above 1080p. The 24-core processor’s 5.80 GHz boost clock and 36 MB of L3 cache provide ample headroom, as evidenced by the 198 FPS at 1080p Low. Beyond that, the RTX 5080’s rasterization throughput, measured at 56.28 TFLOPS, becomes the primary constraint, with the GPU’s 16 GB VRAM capacity being sufficient but its 256-bit bus requiring high memory clocks to sustain 4K performance.

Measured FPS Breakdown

At 1920x1080, the system delivers its highest frame rates across all settings. Low settings produce 198 FPS average, which is the single highest result in the entire dataset. Medium settings yield 124 FPS average, with a minimum of 105 FPS and a maximum of 143 FPS, providing a comfortable margin above 60 FPS. High settings drop to 89 FPS average, while Ultra settings fall to 70 FPS average. The 1080p results show a spread of 128 FPS between the lowest and highest settings, indicating that the CPU can sustain high frame rates but the GPU’s load increases significantly with each preset tier.

At 2560x1440, the performance scales down proportionally. Low settings still achieve 167 FPS average, which is remarkably high for 1440p. Medium settings produce 104 FPS average, with a minimum of 89 FPS and a maximum of 120 FPS, making it the only 1440p preset that maintains a 90 FPS minimum. High settings drop to 75 FPS average, while Ultra settings fall to 59 FPS average, which is exactly at the 60 FPS threshold but not above it. The 1440p results show a spread of 108 FPS between Low and Ultra, slightly narrower than at 1080p.

At 3840x2160, the GPU begins to struggle with higher presets. Low settings still manage 131 FPS average, which is impressive for 4K. Medium settings produce 82 FPS average, with a minimum of 70 FPS and a maximum of 94 FPS, providing a solid 4K experience. High settings drop to 59 FPS average, which is technically playable but leaves no headroom for frame-time spikes. Ultra settings fall to 47 FPS average, which is below the 60 FPS target and not recommended for a horror game that benefits from smooth motion. The 4K results show a spread of 84 FPS between Low and Ultra, the narrowest of all resolutions, confirming that the GPU is the limiting factor at this resolution.

The minimum FPS data is only available for Medium settings across all three resolutions: 105 FPS at 1080p, 89 FPS at 1440p, and 70 FPS at 4K. These figures are critical for assessing stutter, and they all remain above 60 FPS, indicating that the Medium preset provides a consistent experience without noticeable drops. The maximum FPS values for Medium follow a similar pattern: 143 FPS at 1080p, 120 FPS at 1440p, and 94 FPS at 4K, showing that the system can burst above the average in less demanding scenes.