The Technomancer

The Technomancer, a 2016 Action RPG, presents an interesting study in hardware scaling. This analysis examines the performance of the Intel Core Ultra 5 225 paired with the AMD Radeon RX 7800 XT, using measured FPS data across three resolutions and four quality settings. The data reveals a configuration that is heavily GPU-bound at higher resolutions but shows signs of CPU limitation at 1080p, placing it in the 68th percentile of all tested combos for this title.

Resolution Scaling

The performance delta between 1080p and 4K is stark, illustrating a classic shift in bottleneck behavior. At 1080p with Low settings, the combo produces 210 FPS. Scaling to 1440p drops this to 137 FPS, a 35% reduction, and at 4K it falls further to 76 FPS, representing a 64% decrease from the 1080p figure. This aggressive drop at higher resolutions indicates that the rendering workload is expanding faster than the CPU can feed frames, placing the onus squarely on the GPU.

The scaling pattern becomes more nuanced when examining higher quality presets. With High settings, the frame rate goes from 138 FPS at 1080p to 90 FPS at 1440p, then 50 FPS at 4K. The 4K to 1440p ratio here is 0.56, meaning 4K delivers just over half the performance of 1440p. For Ultra settings, the numbers are 108, 70, and 39 FPS respectively, with the 4K result representing a 44% drop from the 1440p score.

The Medium preset, which is the only one with complete min/max data, shows a similar trend. At 1080p, the average is 162 FPS with a minimum of 137 and maximum of 186. At 1440p, the average drops to 106 FPS, with a minimum of 90 and maximum of 121. At 4K, the average is 58 FPS, with a minimum of 49 and maximum of 67. The consistency of these deltas across presets suggests the game's engine scales predictably with resolution, reinforcing that the RX 7800 XT's rendering throughput is the primary constraint once pixel count increases.

Interestingly, the gap between Low and Ultra settings widens as resolution decreases. At 4K, Low (76 FPS) is 95% faster than Ultra (39 FPS). At 1440p, that gap grows to 96%. At 1080p, Low (210 FPS) is 94% faster than Ultra (108 FPS). This indicates that the CPU has more headroom to push higher frame rates at lower resolutions, but the GPU work for Ultra settings still dominates, preventing the frame rate from scaling linearly with the reduced pixel count.

CPU Role

The Intel Core Ultra 5 225 is a 10-core, 10-thread processor based on the Arrow Lake architecture, built on a 3 nm process. Its base clock of 3.30 GHz and boost clock of 4.90 GHz provide substantial single-thread capability, as evidenced by a Cinebench R23 single-core score of 3655. Multi-core performance is also robust, with a Cinebench R23 multi-core score of 25891, placing the chip in the 85th percentile of all CPUs tested in the database.

In The Technomancer, the CPU's role becomes apparent when examining the 1080p Low preset. The 210 FPS result suggests the processor is capable of feeding the GPU with a high volume of draw calls and game logic updates. However, the scaling from 1080p to 1440p shows a 35% drop, which is more than what would be expected if the CPU were the sole bottleneck. This implies that while the Core Ultra 5 225 is strong, it still has limits in this older title, potentially due to its 10-core/10-thread configuration lacking hyper-threading.

The nearest rivals in CPU benchmark scores are instructive. The AMD Ryzen 5 5600F has an identical average score (0% delta), while the AMD Ryzen 5 5500X3D is 0.2% slower, the AMD Ryzen AI 7 PRO 450 is 0.4% slower, and the Intel Core i9-12900T is 0.5% slower. These differences are negligible, indicating that the Core Ultra 5 225 performs on par with these alternatives in general compute tasks. For a game like The Technomancer, which is not known for being heavily threaded, the single-core performance of 368 in Cinebench R15 and 891 in R20 are likely more relevant than the multi-core scores.

The processor's cache hierarchy includes 192 KB of L1 per core, 3 MB of L2 per core, and 20 MB of shared L3. This 20 MB L3 cache is a moderate size, which may help with the game's data locality. The PassMark data shows strong integer math (65345) and floating-point math (92038) scores, suggesting the ALUs and FPUs are well-suited for game physics and AI calculations. However, the benchmark results indicate that at 1080p High, the frame rate of 138 FPS is only 24% higher than the 4K High score, which still points to the GPU being the limiting factor in most scenarios.

GPU Role

The AMD Radeon RX 7800 XT is a substantial piece of hardware, featuring the Navi 32 chip built on a 5 nm process with 28,100 million transistors. It has a base clock of 1295 MHz and a boost clock of 2430 MHz, with a game clock of 2124 MHz. The 16 GB of GDDR6 memory on a 256-bit bus provides 624.1 GB/s of bandwidth, which is crucial for high-resolution textures and effects.

The GPU's raw compute power is significant, with 3840 shading units, 240 TMUs, and 96 ROPs. Its FP32 performance is rated at 37.32 TFLOPS, and it has 60 ray tracing cores. The pixel rate of 233.3 GPixel/s and texture rate of 583.2 GTexel/s are indicative of strong fill-rate capabilities. The 3DMark Steel Nomad DX12 score of 4157 and PassMark G3D score of 24176 reflect its position in the market, though its percentile rank of 51 places it in the middle of the database's GPU spectrum.

In The Technomancer, the GPU's performance is the dominant factor. At 4K Ultra, the combo manages only 39 FPS, which is below the 60 FPS target for smooth gameplay. Even at 4K Medium, the 58 FPS average is marginal. The 4K High result of 50 FPS confirms that this resolution is challenging for the card in this title. The only 4K setting that approaches playability is Low, with 76 FPS.

The GPU's nearest rivals in average benchmark score include the NVIDIA GeForce GTX 1660 (0.5% faster), AMD Radeon Pro 5500M (0.9% slower), NVIDIA Tesla K20c (1.3% slower), and AMD Radeon RX 6500 XT (1.8% faster). These deltas are minimal, suggesting that the RX 7800 XT's average score is clustered with these older or lower-tier cards, which is surprising given its modern architecture. However, the game's measured FPS suggests that the card's real-world performance in this specific title is more competitive.

The 16 GB VRAM capacity is a notable asset. While The Technomancer may not require that much memory, having ample VRAM ensures that texture streaming and geometry buffering do not cause stutter or frame drops. The memory bandwidth of 624.1 GB/s helps maintain consistent performance at 4K, as the data shows a steady progression from Low to Ultra without the frame rate collapsing entirely.

How This Combo Ranks

The combo of the Intel Core Ultra 5 225 and AMD Radeon RX 7800 XT ranks 900th out of 2825 tested combinations for The Technomancer. This places it in the 68th percentile, meaning it outperforms roughly two-thirds of all tested systems. This is a solid middle-tier result, indicating that while the hardware is capable, it is not in the top echelon for this particular game.

This ranking is influenced by the GPU's performance profile. Given that the RX 7800 XT's average benchmark score places it in the 51st percentile of all GPUs, the combo's 68th percentile ranking suggests that the CPU is helping to boost the overall performance. The Core Ultra 5 225's 85th percentile CPU ranking likely compensates for the GPU's mid-pack standing, allowing the system to achieve a better in-game result than the GPU alone would suggest.

The 900th rank also implies that there are 1925 other combos that perform better, which would include systems with higher-end GPUs like the RX 7900 XTX or RTX 4080, or perhaps those with more optimized CPU-GPU pairings. Conversely, the fact that it is not in the bottom quartile indicates that this setup is more than adequate for 1080p and 1440p gaming in this title.

The data suggests that the combo's ranking is consistent across resolutions, as the frame rates are proportionally similar. However, the gap between the combo's rank and the GPU's percentile suggests that the CPU is providing a performance uplift. If the GPU were the sole bottleneck, one would expect the combo to rank closer to the 51st percentile. The observed 68th percentile indicates a synergistic benefit from the Core Ultra 5 225's strong single-thread performance.

Measured FPS Breakdown

The measured FPS data provides a comprehensive view of performance across all settings. At 1920x1080, the combo delivers 210 FPS on Low, 162 FPS on Medium (with a 137-186 FPS range), 138 FPS on High, and 108 FPS on Ultra. These numbers show that the system is well-suited for high refresh-rate monitors at 1080p, even with maxed-out settings.

Moving to 2560x1440, the performance remains strong but shows the expected drop. Low settings yield 137 FPS, Medium averages 106 FPS (ranging from 90 to 121), High produces 90 FPS, and Ultra drops to 70 FPS. The 1440p results are all playable, with even Ultra maintaining a 70 FPS average, which is above the 60 FPS threshold.

At 3840x2160, the GPU begins to struggle with higher settings. Low settings still manage 76 FPS, Medium averages 58 FPS (with a 49-67 FPS range), High produces 50 FPS, and Ultra falls to 39 FPS. The 4K results clearly indicate that for a smooth 60 FPS experience, players would need to stick to Low or Medium settings, and even then, Medium's minimum of 49 FPS shows occasional dips.

The Medium preset is the only one with complete min/max data across all resolutions. At 1080p, the 162 FPS average has a 137 FPS minimum, which is a 15% drop from the average. At 1440p, the 106 FPS average has a 90 FPS minimum, a 15% drop. At 4K, the 58 FPS average has a 49 FPS minimum, a 16% drop. This consistency in frame time variance suggests that the game's performance is stable and not prone to severe stuttering.

FAQ

Q: Is this combo capable of playing The Technomancer at 4K with Ultra settings?

A: No. The measured FPS at 3840x2160 with Ultra settings is only 39 FPS average, which is below the 60 FPS threshold for smooth gameplay.

Q: What is the best resolution for this combo to achieve a 60+ FPS experience?

A: At 2560x1440, all settings produce an average FPS above 60, with Ultra yielding 70 FPS. At 1920x1080, even Ultra produces 108 FPS average.

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

A: The Intel Core Ultra 5 225 has an average benchmark score that is virtually identical to the AMD Ryzen 5 5600F (0% delta), and is slightly faster than the AMD Ryzen 5 5500X3D (-0.2%), AMD Ryzen AI 7 PRO 450 (-0.4%), and Intel Core i9-12900T (-0.5%).

Q: What is the GPU's memory configuration?

A: The AMD Radeon RX 7800 XT has 16 GB of GDDR6 memory on a 256-bit bus, with a bandwidth of 624.1 GB/s and a memory clock of 2438 MHz (19.5 Gbps effective).

Q: Does the combo rank higher than the GPU's individual percentile suggests?

A: Yes. The GPU is in the 51st percentile of all GPUs, but the combo ranks in the 68th percentile of all tested combos for this game, indicating the CPU provides a performance uplift.

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

A: At 2560x1440, Low settings produce 137 FPS, while Ultra settings produce 70 FPS. This represents a 96% performance penalty for using Ultra versus Low.