The Technomancer

The Technomancer is a 2016 Action RPG that stresses the AMD Ryzen 7 5700X and AMD Radeon RX 5700 XT combination in a predictable way: the GPU is the primary bottleneck at higher resolutions, while the CPU’s 8-core/16-thread design ensures consistent frame pacing at 1080p. The measured data shows a system that is well-balanced for 1440p gaming, but struggles to maintain playable frame rates at 4K on higher presets. This analysis breaks down the exact performance figures, the role of each component, and the optimal settings for this specific pairing.

FAQ

Q: What is the best resolution for this CPU/GPU combo in The Technomancer?

A: The data shows 2560x1440 is the sweet spot. At High settings, the average FPS is 63, which is right at the standard 60 FPS target. 1920x1080 offers much higher headroom (90.1 FPS on High), but 3840x2160 drops below 31 FPS on the same preset, making it unsuitable for smooth play.

Q: How much performance is lost when moving from Low to Ultra settings at 1080p?

A: The average FPS drops from 142.5 on Low to 74.5 on Ultra at 1920x1080. This 68 FPS difference represents a 47.7% reduction in performance, indicating that the Ultra preset demands significantly more GPU resources than Low on this RDNA 1.0 card.

Q: Does the Ryzen 7 5700X bottleneck the RX 5700 XT at any resolution?

A: Based on the data, no. At 1080p Low settings, the system hits 142.5 FPS, which is high enough to suggest CPU overhead is not limiting the GPU. The CPU’s 3dmark 16-thread score of 6858 and single-thread score of 921 support its ability to feed the GPU frames without becoming the primary constraint.

Q: What is the frame rate difference between High and Medium presets at 1440p?

A: At 2560x1440, the High preset averages 63 FPS, while Medium averages 70.6 FPS. The 7.6 FPS gain from dropping from High to Medium is modest, but it provides a more comfortable buffer above 60 FPS, making Medium a safer choice for maintaining consistent performance.

Q: Is the 8 GB VRAM of the RX 5700 XT sufficient for The Technomancer?

A: The data suggests yes. While the game’s memory usage is not directly measured, the GPU’s 8 GB GDDR6 memory with 448.0 GB/s bandwidth does not appear to cause catastrophic frame drops at any tested setting. The performance scaling from Low to Ultra is consistent, which would not be the case if VRAM capacity were being exceeded.

Q: How does this combo rank against all other tested configurations?

A: This specific pairing ranks 1241 out of 1656 total combinations tested for The Technomancer. This places it in the lower-middle portion of the database, which is consistent with the GPU being older hardware (release date 2019) and the CPU being a mid-range 2022 part.

GPU Role

The AMD Radeon RX 5700 XT is the defining component for The Technomancer’s performance envelope. Its 8 GB of GDDR6 memory on a 256-bit bus provides 448.0 GB/s of bandwidth. This memory subsystem is sufficient for the game’s requirements, as evidenced by the smooth scaling of frame rates across presets. The GPU’s boost clock of 1905 MHz and game clock of 1755 MHz are the primary drivers of its compute throughput, which is rated at 9.754 TFLOPS FP32. This raw compute power is what determines the frame rate at any given resolution and settings combination.

The GPU’s 68th percentile ranking among all GPUs and its average benchmark score of 24731 (nearly identical to the NVIDIA RTX A5000 Mobile at 24763) illustrate its mid-range standing. In The Technomancer, this translates to a card that can handle 1080p and 1440p with ease but is outclassed at 4K. The PassMark DirectX 11 score of 116 and DirectX 12 score of 64 are particularly relevant here. The Technomancer, being a 2016 title, likely relies heavily on DirectX 11, where the card shows relative strength. The gap between these scores also suggests that the game may not fully utilize the GPU’s newer features, making the raw pixel and texture fill rates (121.9 GPixel/s and 304.8 GTexel/s) more important than architectural efficiency.

The data clearly shows the GPU is the limiting factor at 3840x2160. At the Ultra preset, the average FPS collapses to 26.5, which is below the playable threshold. Even at Low settings, 4K only reaches 50.1 FPS. This is a clear indication that the GPU’s shading units (2560) and ROPs (64) are simply not enough to process the pixel count at 4K with high-quality effects. The card is better utilized at 1440p, where it can maintain a 63 FPS average on High settings, suggesting that the game’s visual effects and resolution are well-matched to this GPU’s capabilities at that level.

Resolution Scaling

The measured FPS data reveals a steep performance cliff as resolution increases, which is a classic sign of a GPU-bound workload. At 1080p High, the system averages 90.1 FPS. Moving to 1440p High drops this to 63 FPS, a 30.1% reduction. Going from 1440p to 2160p High sees an even more drastic drop to 30.9 FPS, a 50.9% reduction from the 1440p figure. This exponential scaling is directly tied to the number of pixels being rendered: 4K has 2.25 times the pixels of 1440p, and the GPU’s performance halves accordingly.

This pattern holds across all settings. For instance, on the Low preset, the system goes from 142.5 FPS at 1080p to 90.5 FPS at 1440p (a 36.5% drop), and then to 50.1 FPS at 4K (a 44.6% drop from 1440p). The consistency of these percentage drops across settings indicates that the resolution is the dominant variable, not the complexity of the graphical effects. This is a clear sign that the RX 5700 XT’s pixel processing capabilities are exhausted at higher resolutions, and the Ryzen 7 5700X is not the constraint.

The data also shows that the gap between 1080p and 1440p narrows as settings increase. At Low, the difference is 52 FPS (142.5 vs 90.5). At Ultra, the difference is 24.3 FPS (74.5 vs 50.2). This suggests that at lower settings, the GPU is more capable of keeping up with the 1440p pixel count, but at higher settings, the added shading and texture work becomes the bottleneck, making the resolution jump relatively less impactful. The CPU’s role is more apparent at 1080p Low, where the 142.5 FPS result hints at the upper limit of what the 8-core processor can deliver in this game, though it still does not become a hard limit.

Measured FPS Breakdown

The complete set of measured average frame rates provides a full picture of this combo’s performance.

At 3840x2160, the results are mostly unplayable. The Low preset averages 50.1 FPS, which is borderline playable but not smooth. Medium drops to 36.4 FPS, High falls to 30.9 FPS, and Ultra is a slideshow at 26.5 FPS. None of these settings offer a consistent 60 FPS experience, and only the Low preset avoids being completely unresponsive.

At 2560x1440, the system finds its footing. The Low preset is very smooth at 90.5 FPS. Medium averages 70.6 FPS, providing a solid experience. High averages exactly 63 FPS, which is standard for a 60 Hz monitor but leaves no headroom for dips. Ultra drops to 50.2 FPS, which is a significant step down and feels less fluid than the other presets.

At 1920x1080, the combo is fully unleashed. The Low preset averages 142.5 FPS, which is excellent for high-refresh-rate monitors. Medium hits 110.4 FPS, High achieves 90.1 FPS, and even the demanding Ultra preset maintains a very respectable 74.5 FPS. This resolution is where the RX 5700 XT’s capabilities are fully realized, and the CPU’s 16 threads provide enough headroom to avoid any stuttering.

Settings Recommendations

For the best balance of visual fidelity and smooth gameplay, the High preset at 2560x1440 is the recommended configuration. It delivers exactly 63 FPS on average, which matches the standard 60 FPS display refresh rate. This setting likely provides a good mix of texture quality and shadow detail without the severe performance penalty of the Ultra preset, which costs 12.8 FPS (from 63 to 50.2) for what is likely a marginal visual improvement.

If you have a 144 Hz monitor, the Medium preset at 1920x1080 is the best choice, as it produces 110.4 FPS, which is well above the refresh rate threshold for a fluid experience. This is a better option than the High preset at 1080p (90.1 FPS) because it provides a larger frame rate buffer to absorb any complex scenes that might cause dips.

At 4K, the data offers no good recommendation. The Low preset at 3840x2160 (50.1 FPS) is the only playable option, but it requires sacrificing most graphical features. Given the steep drop from 1440p, users with a 4K display should strongly consider lowering the resolution to 1440p for a better overall experience, as the difference between 50.1 FPS at 4K Low and 63 FPS at 1440p High is substantial.

CPU Role

The AMD Ryzen 7 5700X serves as a capable and balanced partner to the RX 5700 XT in The Technomancer. Its 8 cores and 16 threads, based on the Zen 3 architecture, provide ample parallelism for a game from this era. The CPU’s benchmark scores reinforce this: a Cinebench R23 multicore score of 22620 and a single-core score of 3193 indicate strong overall throughput. More importantly, the 3dmark 16-thread score of 6858 is nearly identical to the max-thread score of 6850, suggesting that the CPU scales well with additional threads and does not have a performance ceiling that would bottleneck the GPU.

The data does not show any scenario where the CPU becomes the limiting factor. At 1080p Low, the system produces 142.5 FPS, which is a high frame rate that would typically expose CPU limitations in less optimized titles. The fact that the GPU still appears to be the constraint at this setting (as evidenced by the consistent scaling when lowering resolution) indicates that the 5700X’s 3.40 GHz base and 4.60 GHz boost clocks are sufficient to feed the GPU. The CPU’s 32 MB of shared L3 cache and dual-channel DDR4 memory support (51.2 GB/s bandwidth) are also adequate for the game’s data streaming needs.

The CPU’s 83rd percentile ranking among all CPUs, with an average benchmark score of 26214, places it slightly ahead of the Intel Core i9-11900KF (26196, 0.1% faster) and roughly on par with the AMD Ryzen 5 7600X (26272, 0.2% slower). This indicates that the 5700X is a strong mid-range processor that will not hold back the RX 5700 XT in this title. The system’s overall rank of 1241 out of 1656 is dragged down almost entirely by the GPU’s 4K performance, not by any CPU deficiency. In summary, the Ryzen 7 5700X provides all the compute headroom this game needs, allowing the RX 5700 XT to operate as the sole determinant of frame rates.