The Technomancer

Resolution Scaling

The Technomancer presents a demanding workload that scales predictably with resolution, and the measured FPS data for this AMD Ryzen 9 9900X + Radeon RX 6800 XT combination reveals a clear GPU-bound trend at higher resolutions. At 1080p, the combo delivers 140.9 FPS on High settings, which drops to 91.6 FPS at 1440p and further to 48.1 FPS at 4K. That represents a 65.9% performance decline from 1080p to 4K on High settings, a steep drop that indicates the rendering pipeline is being stretched heavily by the pixel count increase.

The Low settings curve tells a similar story but with higher absolute numbers. At 1080p Low, the system produces 213.4 FPS, falling to 138.7 FPS at 1440p and 78.8 FPS at 4K. The gap between Low and High settings widens as resolution increases: at 1080p the difference is 72.5 FPS, at 1440p it is 47.1 FPS, and at 4K it narrows to 30.7 FPS. This compression of the settings gap at higher resolutions is a classic symptom of GPU saturation — the card is working near its limits, so reducing graphical fidelity yields diminishing returns.

Ultra settings push the system hardest, with 4K Ultra producing 38.3 FPS, which is below the threshold for smooth gameplay. The scaling from 1440p Ultra at 70.5 FPS to 4K Ultra at 38.3 FPS represents a 45.7% reduction, while the 1080p Ultra figure of 108.9 FPS shows the system has headroom at lower resolutions. The data suggests that at 4K, even Medium settings at 60.8 FPS are barely playable, while High and Ultra fall short of 60 FPS targets.

The overall pattern points to the RX 6800 XT as the primary limiter at 1440p and above. The CPU's strong single-thread performance, evidenced by its 3DMark single-thread score of 1286, is sufficient to feed the GPU at 1080p where frame rates exceed 200 FPS on Low settings. However, the GPU's 16 GB of VRAM and 512.0 GB/s bandwidth are taxed heavily by the game's rendering demands at higher resolutions, with the frame rate dropping more than 50% between 1080p and 4K across all settings presets.

CPU Role

The AMD Ryzen 9 9900X brings substantial compute resources to this pairing, with 12 cores and 24 threads based on the Zen 5 architecture. Its base clock of 4.40 GHz and boost clock of 5.60 GHz provide the kind of single-threaded responsiveness that older Action RPG titles like The Technomancer often rely upon. The CPU's 3DMark 2-thread score of 2519 and 4-thread score of 4886 indicate strong performance in lightly threaded workloads, which is relevant given that this 2016 title was designed before the era of heavily multithreaded game engines.

The CPU's multi-threaded capabilities are equally robust, with a Cinebench R23 multi-core score of 46438 and a 3DMark max-thread score of 13929. These figures place the processor in the 94th percentile against all CPUs, and its average benchmark score of 54450 sits within 0.4% of the AMD Ryzen 9 9900X3D, which scores 54681. The 9900X also leads the Intel Core i7-14700F by 0.7% (54097 vs 54450), though it trails the Intel Core Ultra 5 245K by 1.5% (55304) and the Core Ultra 5 245KF by 1.8% (55421).

In the context of this game, the CPU's 64 MB of shared L3 cache and 1 MB L2 cache per core reduce memory latency, which helps maintain consistent frame pacing. The 89.6 GB/s memory bandwidth over DDR5 dual-channel support ensures data flows smoothly to the GPU. The 1080p Low result of 213.4 FPS demonstrates that the CPU is not the bottleneck at lower resolutions — the frame rate is high enough that the GPU becomes the limiting factor even at 1080p. The 12-core design with 24 threads is overkill for a game of this era, but it ensures that no CPU-related stutters appear, even when background tasks compete for resources.

How This Combo Ranks

Within the database of tested combinations for The Technomancer, this CPU-GPU pairing achieves a combo rank of 606 out of 1656 tested combos, placing it in the upper-middle tier of all configurations. This ranking reflects a balance between the CPU's strong compute capabilities and the GPU's solid but not top-tier rasterization performance. The GPU's average benchmark score of 49982 positions it in the 87th percentile against all GPUs, and its nearest rivals include the Intel Arc A550M at 49737 (0.5% lower), the NVIDIA RTX A1000 at 50826 (1.7% higher), and the NVIDIA CMP 50HX at 49071 (1.9% lower). Notably, the NVIDIA GeForce RTX 4070 Ti SUPER trails by 2.6% with a score of 48704.

The combo's rank of 606 out of 1656 means that roughly 63% of tested configurations outperform it in this specific game. This is expected given that the RX 6800 XT is an end-of-life GPU (released in 2020) and newer cards with higher memory bandwidth and more advanced architectures will naturally achieve higher frame rates. However, the ranking also reflects the game's age — The Technomancer was released in 2016 and does not utilize newer rendering features like ray tracing, which means the RX 6800 XT's 72 ray accelerators are largely idle in this workload. The CPU's high percentile ranking (94th) does not fully compensate for the GPU's mid-tier position in the overall performance hierarchy.

Measured FPS Breakdown

The measured FPS data provides a complete picture of performance across three resolutions and four settings presets. At 1920x1080, the system achieves 213.4 FPS on Low, 166.4 FPS on Medium, 140.9 FPS on High, and 108.9 FPS on Ultra. These numbers indicate that 1080p gaming is exceptionally smooth at any settings level, with even Ultra settings maintaining frame rates well above 100 FPS. The 1080p Low result of 213.4 FPS approaches the refresh rate limits of most high-end monitors, suggesting the CPU and GPU combination has headroom for competitive play.

Moving to 2560x1440, the performance remains strong but shows the GPU beginning to strain. Low settings produce 138.7 FPS, Medium drops to 105.5 FPS, High yields 91.6 FPS, and Ultra falls to 70.5 FPS. The 1440p Ultra result is still playable, but the 31.1 FPS gap between Medium and Ultra indicates that the highest settings preset exacts a significant toll on frame rates. This resolution represents the sweet spot for this combination, balancing visual fidelity with performance.

At 3840x2160, the GPU's limitations become apparent. Low settings deliver 78.8 FPS, Medium drops to 60.8 FPS, High produces 48.1 FPS, and Ultra falls to 38.3 FPS. The 4K Low result is smooth enough for most players, and 4K Medium achieves a passable 60 FPS, but High and Ultra settings are not viable for consistent 60 FPS gameplay. The frame rate drop from 1080p Ultra (108.9 FPS) to 4K Ultra (38.3 FPS) represents a 64.8% reduction, highlighting the substantial GPU workload increase at 4K resolution.

GPU Role

The AMD Radeon RX 6800 XT is the defining component in this pairing's gaming performance. Built on the RDNA 2.0 architecture with the Navi 21 chip, this GPU features 4608 shading units, 288 texture mapping units, and 128 raster operation pipelines. Its base clock of 1825 MHz and boost clock of 2250 MHz, with a game clock of 2015 MHz, provide the raw compute throughput needed for demanding titles. The 20.74 TFLOPS of FP32 performance and 648.0 GTexel/s texture rate are substantial figures, though they are now several generations old.

The GPU's 16 GB of GDDR6 memory on a 256-bit bus provides 512.0 GB/s of bandwidth, which is sufficient for 1440p gaming but becomes a limiting factor at 4K with higher settings. The measured FPS data supports this interpretation: at 4K Ultra, the frame rate drops to 38.3 FPS, suggesting the memory subsystem and compute units are saturated. The GPU's 87th percentile ranking against all GPUs, with an average benchmark score of 49982, places it ahead of the Intel Arc A550M (49737) and NVIDIA CMP 50HX (49071), but behind the NVIDIA RTX A1000 (50826) and NVIDIA GeForce RTX 4070 Ti SUPER (48704).

The GPU's 300 W TDP and dual-slot design with 2x 8-pin power connectors indicate it draws significant power, but the performance characteristics in The Technomancer show that it handles 1080p and 1440p with ease while struggling at 4K Ultra. The 72 ray accelerators are present on the die, but this game does not utilize ray tracing, so those resources remain unused. The GPU's production status is end-of-life, having been succeeded by newer architectures, yet its 16 GB VRAM capacity remains relevant for modern games that are increasingly memory-hungry. In this specific title, the GPU's rasterization strength is the primary driver of frame rates, and the data shows it delivers playable performance up to 1440p Ultra and 4K Medium.