The Technomancer

The Technomancer, a 2016 action RPG, presents a demanding workload that scales dramatically with resolution and quality settings. Benchmarked with an AMD Ryzen 9 9900X processor and an AMD Radeon RX 5700 XT graphics card, the data reveals a system that is consistently capable at 1080p but quickly becomes constrained at higher resolutions. This combination, ranked 1238th out of 1656 tested configurations, demonstrates a clear performance ceiling defined by the graphics card, while the processor's headroom becomes apparent only at lower resolutions.

Resolution Scaling

The performance drop from 1080p to 4K is steep and consistent across all quality presets, clearly identifying the GPU as the primary limiting factor. At High settings, the average frame rate falls from 92 FPS at 1920x1080 to 58.9 FPS at 2560x1440, a 36% reduction, before halving to 33.9 FPS at 3840x2160. This pattern intensifies with the Ultra preset, where the 4K result of 25.7 FPS represents a 65% decrease from the 1080p figure of 72.8 FPS.

The scaling behavior indicates that the RX 5700 XT's rendering pipeline is saturated as pixel count increases. The transition from 1440p to 4K is particularly punishing, with the High preset losing 25 FPS compared to the 33.1 FPS drop seen when moving from 1080p to 1440p. This suggests that the GPU's memory bandwidth and fillrate, while adequate for 1080p and playable at 1440p, are insufficient for the raw pixel throughput demanded by 4K.

Interestingly, the gap between Low and Ultra settings widens at higher resolutions. At 1080p, the difference between the 142.5 FPS Low and 72.8 FPS Ultra results is 69.7 FPS. At 4K, that spread compresses to 25.5 FPS (51.2 vs 25.7). This compression indicates that at 4K, the GPU is bottlenecked by rasterization and memory limits rather than shader complexity, making quality preset adjustments less impactful for recovering frame rate.

CPU Role

The Ryzen 9 9900X provides substantial computational headroom that is rarely stressed in this title. With 12 cores and 24 threads based on the Zen 5 architecture, the processor's multi-threaded capabilities are far beyond what The Technomancer's engine can utilize. Benchmark results show a Cinebench R23 multi-core score of 46438 and a single-core score of 6555, placing it in the 94th percentile against all CPUs. This raw throughput ensures that the processor never becomes a bottleneck, even at 1080p where frame rates approach 142.5 FPS.

The CPU's clock behavior supports this analysis. With a base clock of 4.40 GHz and a boost clock of 5.60 GHz, the processor can rapidly adjust to the game's single-threaded demands. The Geekbench single-core score of 3341 and Passmark single-thread score of 4672 both indicate strong per-core performance. In a game like The Technomancer, which relies primarily on a few threads for gameplay logic, this responsiveness prevents CPU-induced frame pacing issues.

The data suggests that the CPU is effectively idle in this configuration. The 3DMark 16-thread score of 12552 and max-thread score of 13929 are impressive, but The Technomancer does not scale to fully exploit them. At 1080p Ultra, where the GPU produces 72.8 FPS, the CPU could likely sustain far higher frame rates if the graphics card were not the limiting factor. This is evidenced by the 1080p Low result of 142.5 FPS, which approaches the practical limit for the GPU without being capped by processor performance.

GPU Role

The Radeon RX 5700 XT is the decisive component in this pairing. Built on the RDNA 1.0 architecture with a Navi 10 chip, the GPU features 8 GB of GDDR6 memory on a 256-bit bus, providing 448.0 GB/s of bandwidth. Its boost clock of 1905 MHz and game clock of 1755 MHz drive 2560 shading units, yet the card's 9.754 TFLOPS of FP32 performance is modest by modern standards, landing it in the 68th percentile of all GPUs.

The 8 GB VRAM capacity is a critical constraint at higher settings. At 4K Ultra, the average frame rate collapses to 25.7 FPS, suggesting the card is both compute-bound and memory-limited. The 448.0 GB/s bandwidth, while respectable for its generation, struggles to feed the render targets and texture data required at 3840x2160. This is reflected in the benchmark scores, where the Passmark G3D score of 16277 and 3DMark Steel Nomad DX12 score of 2134 indicate mid-range performance.

The GPU's memory pressure becomes evident when comparing resolution scaling. At 1080p, the Medium preset achieves 109.8 FPS, but at 4K that drops to 39 FPS. The incremental cost of each quality tier increases with resolution, confirming that the GPU's shading units and ROPs are overwhelmed. The card's pixel rate of 121.9 GPixel/s and texture rate of 304.8 GTexel/s are simply insufficient for 4K Ultra, where the game's visual effects tax every subsystem.

How This Combo Ranks

This specific combination of the Ryzen 9 9900X and RX 5700 XT ranks 1238th out of 1656 tested configurations in The Technomancer, placing it in the lower third of all pairings. This ranking reflects the GPU's age relative to the processor, as the 9900X is a modern, high-end CPU while the 5700 XT is an end-of-life product from 2019. The data shows that the GPU's nearest rivals—the NVIDIA RTX A5000 Mobile, Intel Arc A350M, and NVIDIA GeForce RTX 5060 Mobile—have average benchmark scores within 0.9% of the RX 5700 XT, indicating that this card's performance class is now comparable to mobile and entry-level desktop parts.

The rank disparity is stark when considering the CPU's positioning. The Ryzen 9 9900X sits in the 94th percentile of all CPUs, with an average benchmark score of 54450. Its nearest rivals, the Ryzen 9 9900X3D and Intel Core i7-14700F, are within 0.7% of its score. This top-tier processing capability is effectively wasted in this pairing, as the combo rank demonstrates that the GPU drags the overall system performance down to a level consistent with much weaker processors.

The measured FPS data confirms this imbalance. The 4K Ultra result of 25.7 FPS is below the threshold for smooth gameplay, while the 1080p Low result of 142.5 FPS shows the GPU can deliver high frame rates when not burdened by resolution and quality demands. The rank of 1238 suggests that many other combinations, likely pairing the same GPU with less powerful CPUs, would achieve nearly identical results, as the bottleneck is so firmly on the graphics side.

Measured FPS Breakdown

At 1920x1080, the system delivers playable to excellent performance across all presets. The Low setting produces an average of 142.5 FPS, while Medium achieves 109.8 FPS and High reaches 92 FPS. The Ultra preset, at 72.8 FPS, remains fluid for most displays. The scaling from Low to Ultra represents a 49% performance loss, indicating that the GPU has enough headroom at this resolution to accommodate significant visual enhancements.

Moving to 2560x1440, performance remains respectable but the GPU's limitations become apparent. The Low preset yields 91.2 FPS, which is still smooth, but the Medium setting drops to 72.2 FPS and High to 58.9 FPS. The Ultra preset falls to 46.6 FPS, which is borderline for fast-paced action. The transition from Low to Ultra at this resolution costs 44.6 FPS, a slightly smaller absolute drop than at 1080p but a larger percentage loss.

At 3840x2160, the system struggles to maintain acceptable frame rates. The Low preset produces 51.2 FPS, which is playable, but Medium drops to 39 FPS and High to 33.9 FPS. The Ultra preset delivers only 25.7 FPS, making it unsuitable for smooth gameplay. The data shows a clear pattern: at 4K, even the Low preset cannot reach 60 FPS, confirming that this GPU is not designed for such demanding resolutions in this title.

The complete dataset reveals a performance profile where 1080p is the sweet spot, 1440p is playable with reduced settings, and 4K is only viable at Low quality. The 1080p High result of 92 FPS and 1440p Medium result of 72.2 FPS represent the best balance of visual fidelity and smoothness for this combination.