The Technomancer

Settings Recommendations

The measured data for The Technomancer with the Intel Core i9-14900K and AMD Radeon RX 6800 XT shows a clear progression in frame rate as settings are lowered, but the choice of preset depends heavily on the target resolution. At 1920x1080, every preset delivers a playable experience, with High producing 139.8 FPS, Medium 163.7 FPS, and Low 216.2 FPS. Even Ultra, the most demanding preset, maintains 109.3 FPS at this resolution, which is well above standard display refresh rates. For 1080p users, High is the optimal balance because it retains most visual fidelity while still delivering 139.8 FPS, leaving headroom for demanding scenes.

At 2560x1440, the picture changes. High produces 92.1 FPS, Medium 105.4 FPS, and Low 142.5 FPS. Ultra drops to 71.5 FPS, which is still playable but begins to approach the threshold where frame pacing can become noticeable on high-refresh displays. The data suggests that Medium is the sweet spot at 1440p, delivering 105.4 FPS while keeping the visual quality above Low. It offers a 14.4% improvement over High in average FPS (105.4 vs 92.1) without the severe visual compromise of Low.

At 3840x2160, the situation becomes more constrained. High produces 50.3 FPS, Medium 58.5 FPS, and Low 74.9 FPS. Ultra falls to 37.8 FPS, which is below the 40 FPS threshold that many players consider the minimum for a smooth action RPG experience. For 4K, Medium is the recommended preset: it delivers 58.5 FPS, which is 16.3% faster than High (50.3 FPS) and remains comfortably above 60 FPS territory only at Low (74.9 FPS). The jump from Medium to High costs 8.2 FPS (58.5 to 50.3), a 14% reduction that may not justify the visual gains in a fast-paced game like The Technomancer. Low at 4K is viable for players prioritizing frame rate over fidelity, but Medium provides the best experience per the measured rows.

CPU Role

The Intel Core i9-14900K is a 24-core, 32-thread processor from the Core 14th Gen series, based on the Raptor Lake architecture on a 10 nm process node. Its base clock is 3.20 GHz with a boost clock of 6.00 GHz. In synthetic benchmarks, this CPU shows exceptional multi-threaded performance: it scores 49,872 in Cinebench R23 multi-core and 20,946 in Cinebench R20 multi-core. Single-core performance is equally strong, with 7,040 in Cinebench R23 single-core and 2,956 in Cinebench R20 single-core. These scores place the i9-14900K in the 97th percentile among all CPUs, indicating it is a top-tier processor for gaming workloads.

However, The Technomancer, released in 2016, is an older title that does not scale with the massive thread counts of modern processors. The measured FPS data shows that at 1080p Low, the combo reaches 216.2 FPS, which suggests the game engine is not bottlenecked by the CPU's 24 cores and 32 threads. The i9-14900K's nearest rivals include the AMD EPYC 7413 (deltaPct -0.3), the Intel Core i9-14900KF (deltaPct 0.7), and the Intel Core Ultra 7 265KF (deltaPct 0.7). These deltas are minimal, meaning the i9-14900K performs essentially identically to its closest competitors in general CPU benchmarks. For The Technomancer, the CPU's high single-core boost of 6.00 GHz is more relevant than its multi-core capability, as the game likely relies on a few threads for game logic and physics. The data shows that at 1080p Low, the frame rate is 216.2 FPS, which is nearly double the 4K Low result of 74.9 FPS, indicating that at lower resolutions the CPU can push frames far beyond what the GPU can render at higher resolutions.

The CPU's cache hierarchy includes 80 KB of L1 per core, 2 MB of L2 per core, and 36 MB of shared L3 cache. This substantial L3 cache helps reduce memory latency, which can benefit games that access large datasets. However, the benchmark results in The Technomancer do not show any unusual CPU-bound behavior: the FPS scales almost linearly with resolution and settings, which is characteristic of a GPU-bound scenario at higher resolutions. At 1080p, the CPU is capable of delivering over 200 FPS on Low settings, but the GPU becomes the limiting factor as resolution increases.

GPU Role

The AMD Radeon RX 6800 XT is built on the RDNA 2.0 architecture with the Navi 21 chip on a 7 nm process node from TSMC. It features 16 GB of GDDR6 memory on a 256-bit bus with 512.0 GB/s of bandwidth. The GPU has 4,608 shading units, 288 TMUs, and 128 ROPs, with a base clock of 1825 MHz and a boost clock of 2250 MHz. Its game clock is rated at 2015 MHz. In synthetic benchmarks, the RX 6800 XT scores 24,980 in Passmark G3D and 20.74 TFLOPS in FP32 compute, placing it in the 87th percentile among all GPUs.

The GPU's nearest rivals include the Intel Arc A550M (deltaPct 0.5), the NVIDIA RTX A1000 (deltaPct -1.7), and the NVIDIA CMP 50HX (deltaPct 1.9). The deltaPct values are small, indicating that the RX 6800 XT performs within 2% of these competitors in average GPU benchmarks. For The Technomancer, the GPU's 16 GB VRAM is more than sufficient, as the game's highest settings at 4K only require a fraction of that capacity. The measured FPS data shows that at 4K Ultra, the combo achieves 37.8 FPS, which is a 24.8% drop from 4K High (50.3 FPS). This suggests that the Ultra preset imposes a significant rendering load, likely due to increased shading and texture detail.

The GPU's memory bandwidth of 512.0 GB/s is crucial for high-resolution textures. The data shows that at 1080p, the FPS ranges from 109.3 (Ultra) to 216.2 (Low), while at 4K, the range narrows to 37.8 (Ultra) to 74.9 (Low). This narrowing indicates that at 4K, the GPU's compute and memory throughput become the limiting factor, rather than the CPU. The RX 6800 XT's 128 ROPs and 288 TMUs handle the pixel and texture fill rates well, but the 4K Ultra result of 37.8 FPS shows that the card is pushed to its limits by the most demanding settings. The 16 GB VRAM is not a bottleneck in this game, as even the highest quality assets fit comfortably within that capacity.

FAQ

Q: What is the best settings preset for 1080p gaming with this combo?

A: Based on the measured data, High at 1920x1080 delivers 139.8 FPS, which is well above the 60 FPS threshold. Medium provides 163.7 FPS and Low 216.2 FPS, but High offers the best balance between visual quality and frame rate for most displays.

Q: Can this system handle 4K gaming in The Technomancer?

A: Yes, but with caveats. At 3840x2160, Medium produces 58.5 FPS and High produces 50.3 FPS. Ultra drops to 37.8 FPS, which may be too low for smooth gameplay. Low reaches 74.9 FPS if maximum frame rate is the priority.

Q: How does the CPU compare to its nearest rivals?

A: The Intel Core i9-14900K scores 79,824 in average benchmark score. Its nearest rival, the AMD EPYC 7413, scores 80,041 with a deltaPct of -0.3, meaning the i9-14900K is 0.3% slower. The Intel Core i9-14900KF and Core Ultra 7 265KF both have deltaPct of 0.7, indicating the i9-14900K is 0.7% faster than each.

Q: Is the GPU's 16 GB VRAM sufficient for this game?

A: Yes. The game's most demanding preset (Ultra at 4K) produces 37.8 FPS, and the 16 GB GDDR6 memory with 512.0 GB/s bandwidth is more than adequate. The bottleneck at 4K Ultra is compute and memory throughput, not capacity.

Q: What is the frame rate difference between Low and Ultra at 1440p?

A: At 2560x1440, Low produces 142.5 FPS while Ultra produces 71.5 FPS. This is a 71.0 FPS difference, meaning Ultra is exactly 50.2% of Low's frame rate. The gap narrows at higher resolutions, with 4K showing 74.9 FPS on Low and 37.8 FPS on Ultra.

Q: How does this combo rank among all tested configurations?

A: The combo ranks 604th out of 1,656 total combinations tested for The Technomancer. This places it in the upper 36.5% of all tested configurations, indicating it is a solid performer for this title.

Resolution Scaling

The measured FPS data reveals how the system's performance scales from 1080p to 4K. At Low settings, the average FPS drops from 216.2 at 1920x1080 to 142.5 at 2560x1440, a 34.1% reduction. From 1440p to 4K (3840x2160), the Low preset drops from 142.5 to 74.9 FPS, a 47.4% reduction. This non-linear scaling indicates that the GPU becomes increasingly stressed as resolution increases, which is expected given the pixel count quadruples from 1080p to 4K.

At High settings, the scaling is similar: 139.8 FPS at 1080p, 92.1 FPS at 1440p, and 50.3 FPS at 4K. The percentage drops are 34.1% (1080p to 1440p) and 45.4% (1440p to 4K). The 4K result of 50.3 FPS is only 36.0% of the 1080p result, showing that the GPU is the primary limiting factor at higher resolutions. The Ultra preset shows the most severe scaling: 109.3 FPS at 1080p, 71.5 FPS at 1440p, and 37.8 FPS at 4K. The drop from 1080p to 4K is 71.5 FPS, a 65.5% reduction.

This scaling pattern strongly indicates that at 1080p, the system is partially CPU-bound, as the i9-14900K can push frames above 200 FPS on Low settings. However, as resolution increases, the RX 6800 XT's rendering workload grows exponentially, and the GPU becomes the dominant bottleneck. The fact that the 4K Low result (74.9 FPS) is still higher than the 4K Ultra result (37.8 FPS) by a factor of 1.98 underscores how much the GPU's pixel throughput limits performance at this resolution. The 512.0 GB/s memory bandwidth and 20.74 TFLOPS of FP32 compute are the key specifications driving these results, and the data shows that the GPU cannot maintain 60 FPS at 4K with High settings, which is a common target for modern displays.

Measured FPS Breakdown

The measured FPS data for The Technomancer with the Intel Core i9-14900K and AMD Radeon RX 6800 XT is as follows, organized by resolution and settings preset:

At 1920x1080, the average FPS values are: Low at 216.2, Medium at 163.7, High at 139.8, and Ultra at 109.3. This represents a spread of 106.9 FPS between the lowest and highest presets. The difference between consecutive presets is: Low to Medium is 52.5 FPS (24.3% drop), Medium to High is 23.9 FPS (14.6% drop), and High to Ultra is 30.5 FPS (21.8% drop). The 1080p results show that even at Ultra, the system maintains over 100 FPS, making this resolution the most flexible for players who prioritize either visual quality or frame rate.

At 2560x1440, the average FPS values are: Low at 142.5, Medium at 105.4, High at 92.1, and Ultra at 71.5. The spread here is 71.0 FPS. The preset drops are: Low to Medium is 37.1 FPS (26.0% drop), Medium to High is 13.3 FPS (12.6% drop), and High to Ultra is 20.6 FPS (22.4% drop). The 1440p results show that all presets except Ultra remain above 90 FPS, with Low nearly doubling the 60 FPS target.

At 3840x2160, the average FPS values are: Low at 74.9, Medium at 58.5, High at 50.3, and Ultra at 37.8. The spread narrows to 37.1 FPS. The preset drops are: Low to Medium is 16.4 FPS (21.9% drop), Medium to High is 8.2 FPS (14.0% drop), and High to Ultra is 12.5 FPS (24.9% drop). At 4K, only the Low preset maintains a frame rate above 60 FPS, while Medium comes close at 58.5 FPS. Ultra falls below 40 FPS, which is generally considered too low for smooth action gameplay.

The data also shows that the combo's overall rank in this game is 604 out of 1,656 tested combinations, placing it in the upper 36.5% of all configurations. This rank reflects the system's ability to handle The Technomancer across all resolutions and settings, with the 1080p results being particularly strong, the 1440p results being solid, and the 4K results being playable only at Medium or lower settings.