The Technomancer

# The Technomancer with Intel Core i5-12600KF + Intel Arc B370

The Intel Core i5-12600KF paired with the Intel Arc B370 produces a constrained experience in The Technomancer, with the GPU clearly acting as the primary bottleneck across all tested resolutions. The data shows a combination that struggles to maintain playable frame rates at higher settings, though lower presets at 1080p offer a functional path forward. This pairing ranks 2603 out of 2825 tested combinations in this game, placing it in the lower percentile of system performance.

Settings Recommendations

The measured FPS data points to a clear hierarchy of playable configurations. At 1920x1080, the Low preset delivers an average of 71 FPS, which is the only tested setting that comfortably exceeds the 60 FPS threshold. Medium at 1080p drops to 55 FPS average, with a minimum of 47 FPS and maximum of 63 FPS — this is still usable for most gameplay scenarios, though it sacrifices the headroom seen at Low. High at 1080p falls to 47 FPS, and Ultra drops further to 37 FPS.

At 2560x1440, the picture becomes more constrained. Low produces 47 FPS average, which is playable but leaves little margin for demanding scenes. Medium averages 36 FPS with a range of 30 to 41 FPS, while High falls to 31 FPS and Ultra to 24 FPS. At 3840x2160, all settings fail to reach playable territory: Low averages 26 FPS, Medium 20 FPS, High 17 FPS, and Ultra just 13 FPS.

For the best experience per the measured rows, the Low preset at 1080p is the only configuration that provides both smooth gameplay and a safety margin above 60 FPS. If visual fidelity is prioritized over frame rate, Medium at 1080p offers a reasonable compromise at 55 FPS, though the 47 FPS minimum might cause noticeable stutter in dense scenes. At 1440p, Low is the only realistic option for acceptable performance, while 4K should be avoided entirely — even the lowest preset cannot reach 30 FPS.

GPU Role

The Intel Arc B370 is an integrated graphics solution based on the Xe3-LPG architecture, built on Intel's 3 nm process. It features 1280 shading units, 40 texture mapping units, and 20 raster output units. The GPU's clock speeds range from a 300 MHz base to a 2400 MHz boost, with pixel rate of 48.00 GPixel/s and texture rate of 96.00 GTexel/s. Floating-point performance is rated at 6.144 TFLOPS for FP32 and 12.29 TFLOPS for FP16.

Critically, the Arc B370 uses system shared memory — there is no dedicated VRAM allocation. Memory bandwidth is listed as system dependent, which means the GPU competes with the CPU for memory access. This architecture explains why the GPU's performance percentile sits at just 5, ranking it among the weakest GPUs in the database. Its nearest rivals include the ATI Mobility Radeon HD 5570, ATI Radeon HD 5770, AMD Radeon HD 7650M, and AMD FirePro M2000 — all older, lower-tier parts.

In The Technomancer, the GPU's limited compute and memory bandwidth become the defining constraint. The game's demands scale steeply with resolution and settings, and the Arc B370's integrated nature means it cannot sustain the workload at higher presets. The 25 W TDP and lack of dedicated power connectors further underscore its position as an entry-level part. The data shows the GPU's 3DMark Steel Nomad DX12 score of 1184, which places it within 0.2% of the ATI Mobility Radeon HD 5570 and 0.5% of the ATI Radeon HD 5770 — indicating performance parity with decade-old discrete parts.

Resolution Scaling

The FPS drop from 1080p to 4K reveals the GPU-bound nature of this pairing. At Low settings, the average frame rate falls from 71 FPS at 1080p to 47 FPS at 1440p — a 33.8% reduction — and then to 26 FPS at 2160p, representing a 63.4% drop from the 1080p baseline. At Medium settings, the progression goes from 55 FPS at 1080p to 36 FPS at 1440p (34.5% lower) to 20 FPS at 4K (63.6% lower). High settings follow a similar pattern: 47 FPS at 1080p, 31 FPS at 1440p, and 17 FPS at 4K, with the 4K figure being 63.8% below the 1080p result. Ultra settings show 37 FPS at 1080p, 24 FPS at 1440p, and 13 FPS at 4K — a 64.9% reduction from 1080p to 4K.

The consistency of these percentage drops across all settings — roughly one-third from 1080p to 1440p and roughly two-thirds from 1080p to 4K — indicates that the limiting component is the GPU rather than the CPU. If the CPU were the bottleneck, we would expect the relative drop from 1080p to 4K to be smaller at lower settings, where the GPU has less work per frame. Instead, the uniform scaling pattern suggests that the Arc B370's rendering capabilities are saturated at every resolution, and the additional pixel count at higher resolutions directly translates into proportional frame rate losses.

The resolution scaling also highlights the GPU's memory bandwidth constraints. With system shared memory, the GPU must access main system memory for both frame buffers and texture data, and as resolution increases, the memory traffic grows substantially. This explains why even the Low preset at 4K cannot approach 30 FPS — the memory subsystem simply cannot feed the GPU fast enough to maintain frame times.

Measured FPS Breakdown

At 1920x1080, the measured averages across settings are as follows: Low delivers 71 FPS, Medium 55 FPS with a 47-63 FPS range, High 47 FPS, and Ultra 37 FPS. The gap between Low and Medium is 16 FPS (29.1% faster at Low), while the gap from Medium to High is 8 FPS, and from High to Ultra is 10 FPS. This suggests that each settings tier imposes a roughly 15-20% performance penalty, with diminishing returns as settings increase.

At 2560x1440, Low averages 47 FPS, Medium 36 FPS with a 30-41 FPS range, High 31 FPS, and Ultra 24 FPS. The transition from Low to Medium costs 11 FPS, from Medium to High costs 5 FPS, and from High to Ultra costs 7 FPS. The 1440p results show that only Low maintains a frame rate above 40 FPS, and even that is 24 FPS below the 1080p Low result.

At 3840x2160, Low averages 26 FPS, Medium 20 FPS with a 17-23 FPS range, High 17 FPS, and Ultra 13 FPS. None of these configurations reach the 30 FPS threshold commonly considered the minimum for playable performance. The relative differences between settings narrow at this resolution — from Low to Ultra, the spread is just 13 FPS, suggesting that the GPU is so heavily constrained that settings changes have limited impact on overall throughput.

Across all resolutions, the Medium setting consistently shows the tightest min-max range (e.g., 47-63 FPS at 1080p, 30-41 FPS at 1440p, 17-23 FPS at 4K), which may indicate more consistent frame pacing at this preset. The Low and High settings do not have reported min/max values in the data, so no conclusions can be drawn about their frame time consistency.

How This Combo Ranks

The Intel Core i5-12600KF and Intel Arc B370 combination ranks 2603 out of 2825 tested combos in The Technomancer, placing it in the bottom 8% of all system configurations. This ranking reflects the GPU's severe performance limitation — the CPU is not the constraining factor in this pairing.

The CPU itself is a strong performer in isolation. The Core i5-12600KF features 10 cores and 16 threads, with a base clock of 3.70 GHz and boost clock of 4.90 GHz. Its benchmark scores are respectable: Cinebench R23 multicore reaches 23391, single-core 3302, and Geekbench multicore 12137 with single-core 2157. The CPU's percentile vs. all CPUs is 79, and its average benchmark score of 27799 places it within 0.3% of the Intel Core i9-10900K, 0.3% of the AMD Ryzen 5 8500GE, and 0.3% of the AMD Ryzen 7 5800X3D.

In contrast, the GPU's percentile vs. all GPUs is just 5, with an average benchmark score of 1184. The massive disparity between the CPU's 79th percentile ranking and the GPU's 5th percentile ranking explains why this combo sits so low in the game's ranking — the GPU drags down what would otherwise be a capable system. The data suggests that pairing this CPU with a more capable GPU would dramatically improve the in-game ranking, but as configured, the Arc B370 is the decisive limiting factor.

FAQ

Q: Is the Intel Core i5-12600KF bottlenecked by the Intel Arc B370 in The Technomancer?

A: Yes. The CPU performs at the 79th percentile among all CPUs with an average benchmark score of 27799, while the GPU sits at the 5th percentile with an average score of 1184. The resolution scaling data shows uniform FPS drops from 1080p to 4K, indicating the GPU is the primary constraint.

Q: What is the best resolution and settings combination for this system?

A: The only configuration that averages above 60 FPS is 1920x1080 with Low settings, which delivers 71 FPS. At 1440p, Low averages 47 FPS, and at 4K, even Low cannot exceed 26 FPS.

Q: How does the Arc B370 compare to its nearest GPU rivals?

A: The Arc B370's average benchmark score of 1184 is within 0.2% of the ATI Mobility Radeon HD 5570 (1186), 0.5% of the ATI Radeon HD 5770 (1190), and 0.7% of the AMD Radeon HD 7650M (1192). It is 1.4% faster than the AMD FirePro M2000 (1168).

Q: Does the Core i5-12600KF hold up well against similar CPUs?

A: The CPU's average benchmark score of 27799 is 0.3% below the Intel Core i9-10900K (27872), 0.3% above the AMD Ryzen 5 8500GE (27712), and 0.3% below both the AMD Ryzen 7 6800U (27887) and AMD Ryzen 7 5800X3D (27896).

Q: Can this system play The Technomancer at 4K?

A: No. At 3840x2160, the highest average frame rate is 26 FPS at Low settings, with Medium at 20 FPS, High at 17 FPS, and Ultra at 13 FPS. None of these configurations are playable.

Q: What is the frame rate range at Medium settings?

A: At 1080p Medium, the range is 47-63 FPS with a 55 FPS average. At 1440p Medium, the range is 30-41 FPS with a 36 FPS average. At 4K Medium, the range is 17-23 FPS with a 20 FPS average.

CPU Role

The Intel Core i5-12600KF is an Alder Lake-S desktop processor with 10 cores and 16 threads, based on Intel's 10 nm process. Its base clock of 3.70 GHz can boost to 4.90 GHz, and it carries a 125 W TDP. The cache hierarchy includes 80 KB of L1 per core, 1.25 MB of L2 per core, and 20 MB of shared L3 cache. The CPU supports DDR4 and DDR5 memory in a dual-channel configuration, and it offers Gen 4 PCIe with 20 lanes.

In The Technomancer, the CPU's role is secondary to the GPU. The benchmark data shows that the CPU's single-thread performance is strong — Cinebench R15 single-core scores 332, R20 single-core 1386, and R23 single-core 3302. Multi-threaded performance is equally robust, with Cinebench R23 multicore reaching 23391 and Passmark multithread scoring 27575. These figures place the CPU comfortably in the upper tier of processors, with an average benchmark score of 27799.

However, the game's performance is not CPU-limited at any tested configuration. The consistent FPS drops across resolutions — approximately 33% from 1080p to 1440p and 63% from 1080p to 4K — indicate that the GPU's rendering capacity is the bottleneck. At 1080p Low, the CPU could theoretically push higher frame rates, but the Arc B370 cannot deliver them. The CPU's 16 threads provide ample headroom for the game's logic, AI, and physics processing, but this headroom goes unused because the GPU saturates first.

The CPU's performance relative to its nearest rivals reinforces this analysis. It sits within 0.3% of the Intel Core i9-10900K, AMD Ryzen 5 8500GE, AMD Ryzen 7 6800U, and AMD Ryzen 7 5800X3D in average benchmark score. None of these comparisons suggest any CPU deficiency that would explain the low in-game ranking. The data is clear: the Core i5-12600KF is a capable processor, but in this pairing, it is held back by the Arc B370's limited graphics capability.