The Technomancer

The Technomancer, a 2016 Action RPG, presents a mixed bag of performance demands when paired with the AMD Ryzen 9 9900X3D and AMD Radeon RX 6750 XT. The benchmark data reveals a configuration that is powerful enough for high-refresh-rate 1080p gaming but begins to strain under the load of higher resolutions and maximum quality settings. This analysis breaks down the measured FPS across various presets and resolutions, contextualizes the results within the broader combo ranking, and details the specific roles of the CPU and GPU in shaping the gameplay experience.

Settings Recommendations

Based on the measured FPS data, the optimal experience for this pairing depends heavily on the target resolution. At 1920x1080, the High preset delivers an average of 117 FPS, which is excellent for smooth gameplay. However, the data shows that the Ultra preset at this resolution yields 92 FPS, while the Medium preset achieves 138 FPS. For players with high-refresh-rate monitors, the High preset offers a strong balance, but the Medium preset is the clear winner for maximizing frame rates, providing a 21 FPS improvement over High while likely still retaining acceptable visual fidelity.

At 2560x1440, the performance curve shifts. The High preset produces a very playable average of 77 FPS. Dropping to Medium yields a substantial improvement to 90 FPS, making it the recommended preset for competitive or fast-paced action. The Ultra preset, while hitting exactly 60 FPS, is a viable option for those prioritizing visual quality on a 60Hz display, but the data shows it is only 13 FPS faster than the 4K High preset, indicating a steep cost for its settings. The Low preset at 1440p, at 117 FPS, demonstrates the headroom available when visuals are sacrificed.

For 3840x2160, the situation becomes more constrained. The High preset manages an average of 42 FPS, which is borderline for smooth play. The Medium preset is the best recommendation here, as it provides a more stable experience with an average of 49 FPS and a recorded minimum of 42 FPS. The Ultra preset falls to an average of 33 FPS, which is not recommended for a playable experience. The Low preset at 64 FPS is the only way to approach a comfortable 60 FPS at 4K, but it requires significant visual compromises. The data suggests that for a balanced 4K experience, Medium is the ceiling, while 1440p High or Medium offers the best combination of visuals and performance.

FAQ

Q: Is the AMD Ryzen 9 9900X3D a bottleneck for the AMD Radeon RX 6750 XT in The Technomancer?

A: The data indicates the CPU is not a primary bottleneck at most settings. At 1080p Low, the combination reaches 179 FPS, a very high frame rate that shows the CPU can feed the GPU effectively. However, the scaling from 1080p to 4K shows a significant FPS drop (e.g., from 117 FPS to 42 FPS on High), which suggests the GPU becomes the limiting factor as resolution increases.

Q: What is the best resolution to play The Technomancer with this hardware for a 60 FPS target?

A: For a consistent 60 FPS experience, 2560x1440 on the Ultra preset achieves exactly 60 FPS. For a more stable average with headroom, 2560x1440 on High (77 FPS) or Medium (90 FPS) are better choices. At 3840x2160, only the Low preset (64 FPS) is able to exceed the 60 FPS target.

Q: How does the combo rank compared to other tested configurations?

A: This specific CPU and GPU combination ranks 1262 out of 2825 tested combos for The Technomancer. This places it in the upper half of all tested systems, indicating a solid, if not top-tier, performance level.

Q: Does the Ultra preset provide a worthwhile performance increase over High?

A: No, the data shows the opposite. At all three tested resolutions, the Ultra preset delivers lower average FPS than the High preset. For example, at 1920x1080, High achieves 117 FPS while Ultra drops to 92 FPS. The performance cost of the Ultra preset is significant, and the High preset is generally the more efficient choice.

Q: Is there any data on frame time consistency or 1% lows?

A: The measured FPS data includes minimum FPS values only for the Medium preset at each resolution. At 1920x1080 Medium, the minimum is 117 FPS; at 2560x1440 Medium, it is 76 FPS; and at 3840x2160 Medium, it is 42 FPS. No min or max FPS data is provided for the Low, High, or Ultra presets.

Q: How does the CPU's strong multi-threaded performance translate to this game?

A: The Ryzen 9 9900X3D has a Cinebench R23 multicore score of 47737 and a 3DMark max threads score of 13795. While The Technomancer is not a new title, the high frame rates at 1080p (179 FPS on Low) suggest the CPU's substantial processing power is sufficient to avoid bottlenecking the GPU at lower resolutions.

CPU Role

The AMD Ryzen 9 9900X3D is a 12-core, 24-thread processor based on the Zen 5 architecture, with a base clock of 4.40 GHz and a boost clock of 5.50 GHz. Its benchmark scores are formidable, including a Geekbench single-core score of 3041 and a multi-core score of 22884. This processing power is reflected in the game's performance at lower resolutions. At 1920x1080 with Low settings, the system reaches an average of 179 FPS, a figure that demonstrates the CPU's capability to drive high frame rates.

The data shows that the CPU's role becomes less critical as resolution increases. The performance drop from 1080p Low (179 FPS) to 4K Low (64 FPS) is a 115 FPS reduction, which is a dramatic scaling that points directly to the GPU being the limiting factor. Even at 1440p, the High preset (77 FPS) is 40 FPS lower than the 1080p High preset (117 FPS), further confirming that the rendering load is shifting to the graphics card. The 128 MB of L3 cache and high single-thread performance (Cinebench R20 single-core score of 2830) ensure that the game logic and draw calls are handled efficiently, but the sheer pixel count at higher resolutions overwhelms the GPU first.

The CPU's percentile ranking against all CPUs is 91, and its average benchmark score is 54762. Its nearest rival, the Intel Core Ultra 5 245KF, has an average score of 55093, a delta of -0.6%, meaning the AMD part is essentially on par with that competitor. This level of CPU performance is clearly more than adequate for a game of this era, as evidenced by the high frame rates achieved at 1080p, and it provides a stable platform for the GPU to operate without CPU-induced stutters.

How This Combo Ranks

The combination of the AMD Ryzen 9 9900X3D and the AMD Radeon RX 6750 XT ranks 1262 out of 2825 tested combos in The Technomancer. This places it in the 55th percentile of all tested systems, which is a solidly mid-to-upper-tier result. The ranking suggests that while this is a capable system, there are many other combinations that deliver higher frame rates in this specific title.

The ranking is likely influenced by the GPU's position in the market. The RX 6750 XT has a percentile ranking of 71 against all GPUs. Its average benchmark score is 26011, and its nearest rivals, such as the AMD Radeon R9 M395X (deltaPct 0.5) and the NVIDIA GeForce RTX 3080 Ti Mobile (deltaPct 1.1), are within a 1.1% performance margin. This indicates the GPU is a solid mainstream performer, but it is not a high-end part that would push the combo into the top tiers of the rankings.

The CPU's high performance (91st percentile) is somewhat neutralized by the GPU's more modest standing (71st percentile). The data shows that the system's overall ranking is a product of this pairing. The CPU ensures the system never feels starved for processing power, but the GPU's limits are what ultimately define the average FPS at higher resolutions. A combo with a more powerful GPU would likely rank significantly higher, while a weaker CPU would have a minimal impact on this game's results given the GPU's role as the primary bottleneck.

Resolution Scaling

The FPS data reveals a classic pattern of GPU-bound scaling. As resolution increases from 1920x1080 to 3840x2160, the average frame rate drops significantly across all settings presets. For the High preset, the average FPS goes from 117 at 1080p, to 77 at 1440p, and finally to 42 at 4K. This represents a 64% decrease in performance from 1080p to 4K.

This steep decline is a clear indicator that the AMD Radeon RX 6750 XT is the limiting component in this configuration. The GPU must render an exponentially larger number of pixels as resolution increases. For instance, 4K (3840x2160) has four times the pixels of 1080p (1920x1080). The fact that the FPS does not drop to exactly one-quarter (which would be ~29 FPS for the High preset) suggests there are some efficiencies, but the trend is unmistakable.

The scaling from 1440p to 4K is particularly punishing. The High preset drops from 77 FPS to 42 FPS, a 35 FPS loss. Similarly, the Medium preset drops from 90 FPS to 49 FPS. This indicates that the GPU's memory bandwidth and processing power are saturated at 4K. The 12 GB of VRAM and 432.0 GB/s bandwidth are sufficient, but the raw compute power of the GPU is not enough to maintain high frame rates at that resolution. In contrast, the scaling from 1080p to 1440p is more moderate, showing that the GPU has more headroom at these lower pixel counts. The data strongly suggests that for optimal performance, 1440p is the practical ceiling for this GPU in this game, with 1080p being the best for high-refresh-rate displays.

Measured FPS Breakdown

At 1920x1080, the system performs admirably. The Low preset yields the highest average FPS at 179. The Medium preset averages 138 FPS, with a minimum of 117 FPS and a maximum of 158 FPS. The High preset delivers a solid 117 FPS average. The Ultra preset, while visually demanding, still manages an average of 92 FPS.

Moving to 2560x1440, performance scales down as expected. The Low preset maintains a high average of 117 FPS. The Medium preset averages 90 FPS, with a minimum of 76 FPS and a maximum of 103 FPS. The High preset produces a playable 77 FPS average. The Ultra preset hits an average of 60 FPS exactly, which is the minimum for a smooth experience on a standard 60Hz monitor.

At 3840x2160, the GPU is heavily taxed. The Low preset provides the only average above 60 FPS, at 64 FPS. The Medium preset averages 49 FPS, with a minimum of 42 FPS and a maximum of 57 FPS. The High preset drops to an average of 42 FPS. Finally, the Ultra preset is the most demanding, yielding an average of 33 FPS, which is not ideal for gameplay.

GPU Role

The AMD Radeon RX 6750 XT is a RDNA 2.0 architecture GPU with 2560 shading units and a boost clock of 2600 MHz. It has 12 GB of GDDR6 memory on a 192-bit bus, providing a bandwidth of 432.0 GB/s. These specifications position it as a capable 1440p-class graphics card, and the benchmark results in The Technomancer confirm this assessment.

The GPU's role is clearly the primary determinant of performance at higher resolutions. While the CPU provides a strong foundation, the GPU's compute power, rated at 13.31 TFLOPS FP32, is what struggles as the resolution increases. The data shows a clear performance ceiling at 4K, where even the High preset fails to maintain a smooth 60 FPS. The 12 GB VRAM is not a limiting factor at these settings, but the GPU's raw shading and texturing capabilities are.

Its benchmark scores, such as a 3DMark Steel Nomad DX12 score of 2548 and a Passmark G3D score of 20700, reflect its mainstream performance level. It ranks in the 71st percentile of all GPUs, and its nearest rivals are within a 1.1% performance delta, indicating it is a solid, predictable performer. In The Technomancer, its role is to render the game's environments and effects, and it does so effectively up to 1440p. Beyond that, the demands of 4K rendering expose its limitations, making it the clear bottleneck in this pairing. The data suggests that for this game, the GPU is the component to upgrade first to achieve higher resolutions and frame rates.