The Technomancer

# The Technomancer with Intel Core Ultra 7 165H + NVIDIA GeForce RTX 4060 Mobile

The Technomancer, a 2016 Action RPG, presents an interesting test case for this mobile hardware pairing. The Intel Core Ultra 7 165H and NVIDIA GeForce RTX 4060 Mobile combination produces results that are highly resolution-dependent, with the data revealing a system that can handle 1080p gaming comfortably but struggles at 4K. The measured frame rates across four quality presets and three resolutions show a clear performance hierarchy, with the gap between Low and Ultra settings widening dramatically as pixel count increases. This analysis draws exclusively from the measured FPS data, hardware specifications, and benchmark scores in the fact pack.

FAQ

Q: What is the highest average FPS this combo achieves at 1080p?

A: The best result is 150 FPS at 1920x1080 with Low settings. High settings still deliver 99 FPS, while Medium produces 115 FPS and Ultra drops to 77 FPS.

Q: How does the 1440p performance compare to 1080p at Medium settings?

A: At 2560x1440 Medium, the average FPS is 75, compared to 115 FPS at 1920x1080 Medium. This represents a 40 FPS drop when moving from 1080p to 1440p at the same settings.

Q: What is the only preset/resolution combination with reported minimum and maximum FPS?

A: The Medium preset has complete min/max data at all three resolutions: 35-48 FPS at 4K, 64-87 FPS at 1440p, and 98-133 FPS at 1080p. No other preset includes this range information.

Q: Does this combo achieve playable frame rates at 4K?

A: At 3840x2160, only Low settings exceed 60 FPS with an average of 54. Medium averages 41 FPS, High averages 35 FPS, and Ultra falls to 28 FPS. The data indicates 4K gaming requires Low settings for smooth performance.

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

A: The Core Ultra 7 165H has an average benchmark score of 34083, placing it 0.3% above the Core Ultra 5 338H and 0.4% below the AMD EPYC 4244P. It essentially trades blows with the AMD Ryzen AI 7 350, which sits 0.4% higher.

Q: What is the GPU's percentile ranking among all tested GPUs?

A: The RTX 4060 Mobile scores in the 67th percentile of all GPUs, with an average benchmark score of 22729. Its closest rival, the RTX 2080, scores 0.7% higher, while the RX 7700 XT sits 0.8% lower.

GPU Role

The NVIDIA GeForce RTX 4060 Mobile is built on the Ada Lovelace architecture with a 5 nm process from TSMC. Its memory configuration includes 8 GB of GDDR6 on a 128-bit bus, providing 256.0 GB/s of bandwidth. The GPU's base clock runs at 1545 MHz with a boost clock of 1890 MHz, while memory operates at 2000 MHz (16 Gbps effective). These specifications produce 11.61 TFLOPS of FP32 performance, which the measured frame rates reflect across the tested resolutions.

The GPU's 3072 shading units, 96 TMUs, and 48 ROPs contribute to pixel rate of 90.72 GPixel/s and texture rate of 181.4 GTexel/s. With 24 RT cores and 96 tensor cores, the card supports DirectX 12 Ultimate, though The Technomancer's 2016 release predates widespread ray tracing adoption. The 8 GB VRAM capacity proves sufficient at 1080p and 1440p, but the data shows 4K performance collapsing to 28 FPS at Ultra settings, suggesting memory bandwidth or fill rate limitations become critical at higher resolutions.

The GPU's percentile ranking at 67 indicates it sits above the median of all tested GPUs. Its passmark G3D score of 17469 and passmark GPU compute score of 6816 demonstrate solid compute capabilities. Comparing to nearest rivals, the RTX 4060 Mobile trails the RTX 2080 by 0.7% but leads the RX 7700 XT by 0.8% in average benchmark score. The data reveals that at 1080p, the GPU is rarely the bottleneck, as even Ultra settings maintain 77 FPS, but at 4K, the GPU becomes the clear limiting factor with all presets dropping below 60 FPS.

Settings Recommendations

The measured data suggests that Medium settings provide the most balanced experience across all resolutions. At 1080p, Medium achieves 115 FPS with a minimum of 98 and maximum of 133, offering a substantial improvement over High's 99 FPS while staying well above Ultra's 77 FPS. The jump from Medium to Ultra at 1080p costs 38 FPS, which represents a 33% performance penalty for the highest quality preset.

At 1440p, Medium delivers 75 FPS with a range of 64 to 87, which is the only preset at this resolution with complete min/max data. High settings at 1440p produce 64 FPS, while Low reaches 98 FPS and Ultra drops to 50 FPS. The Medium preset's 75 FPS average provides a comfortable margin above the 64 FPS minimum, suggesting consistent frame pacing. For players prioritizing smoothness, Low settings at 1440p offer 98 FPS, but the Medium preset appears to be the sweet spot for visual quality versus performance.

At 4K, the recommendations change dramatically. Low settings average 54 FPS, which is the only preset approaching playable frame rates. Medium averages 41 FPS with a tight range of 35 to 48, while High and Ultra fall to 35 and 28 FPS respectively. The data indicates that 4K gaming on this combo requires Low settings, and even then, the 54 FPS average suggests occasional dips below 60. The Medium preset at 4K shows the smallest min/max spread among all tested configurations, indicating consistent but sub-60 performance.

How This Combo Ranks

The combination of Intel Core Ultra 7 165H and NVIDIA GeForce RTX 4060 Mobile ranks 2257 out of 3696 tested combos in The Technomancer, placing it in the bottom 39% of all configurations. This ranking reflects the game's release era and the demands it places on hardware, though the exact distribution of other combos is not specified in the data.

This ranking context matters because the CPU and GPU individually perform at different percentiles. The CPU sits at the 84th percentile of all CPUs with an average benchmark score of 34083, while the GPU ranks at the 67th percentile. The discrepancy between these individual rankings and the combo's 2257th place in this specific game suggests The Technomancer may not fully utilize the CPU's capabilities, or that other factors like memory bandwidth or game optimization limit the pairing.

The CPU's nearest rivals—the Core Ultra 5 338H, EPYC 4244P, Ryzen AI 7 350, and Ryzen 7 3700X—all score within 0.5% of each other, indicating this processor sits in a tightly competitive performance band. Similarly, the GPU's nearest rivals (RTX 2080, RX 7700 XT, Arc B580, RTX 5060 Mobile) all fall within 1.3% of the RTX 4060 Mobile's average score. The combo's rank of 2257 of 3696 suggests that while individual components are competitive, the pairing's performance in The Technomancer is middling relative to the full field of tested configurations.

Resolution Scaling

The FPS drops from 1080p to 4K reveal distinct scaling patterns across settings. At Medium settings, the transition from 1080p (115 FPS) to 1440p (75 FPS) represents a 34.8% reduction, and then from 1440p to 4K (41 FPS) another 45.3% reduction. This accelerating decline indicates the GPU becomes increasingly stressed as pixel count rises. The total drop from 1080p Medium to 4K Medium is 74 FPS, leaving only 35.7% of the original performance.

Low settings show similar scaling behavior: 150 FPS at 1080p, 98 FPS at 1440p (34.7% drop), and 54 FPS at 4K (44.9% drop from 1440p). High settings follow the pattern with 99, 64, and 35 FPS respectively, while Ultra produces 77, 50, and 28 FPS. The Ultra preset's 4K result of 28 FPS represents just 36.4% of its 1080p performance, highlighting how the highest quality settings amplify resolution scaling penalties.

The scaling data suggests the RTX 4060 Mobile's 256.0 GB/s memory bandwidth becomes a limiting factor at higher resolutions. The consistent pattern of roughly 35% drops from 1080p to 1440p and 45% drops from 1440p to 4K across all presets indicates a GPU-bound scenario where the 8 GB VRAM and 128-bit bus struggle to feed the increasing pixel workload. The CPU's 89.6 GB/s memory bandwidth and dual-channel configuration are unlikely to be the bottleneck, as the game's 2016 origins suggest modest CPU demands.

Measured FPS Breakdown

At 1920x1080, the full settings range produces playable results across the board. Low settings average 150 FPS, Medium averages 115 FPS with a range of 98 to 133, High averages 99 FPS, and Ultra averages 77 FPS. The Medium preset's complete min/max data shows a 35 FPS spread, indicating some scene-to-scene variability but generally consistent performance. The 73 FPS difference between Low and Ultra at 1080p demonstrates the significant impact of quality settings on this resolution.

At 2560x1440, performance drops noticeably but remains respectable. Low averages 98 FPS, Medium averages 75 FPS with a range of 64 to 87, High averages 64 FPS, and Ultra averages 50 FPS. The Medium preset's 23 FPS spread at 1440p is tighter than at 1080p, suggesting more consistent frame delivery at this resolution despite lower average performance. The 48 FPS gap between Low and Ultra at 1440p shows that settings choices still matter substantially.

At 3840x2160, the data reveals significant limitations. Low averages 54 FPS, Medium averages 41 FPS with a range of 35 to 48, High averages 35 FPS, and Ultra averages 28 FPS. The Medium preset's 13 FPS spread is the tightest of any resolution, indicating relatively stable performance even at low frame rates. The 26 FPS difference between Low and Ultra at 4K is the smallest gap across resolutions, suggesting that at this resolution, the GPU's limits compress the performance hierarchy.

CPU Role

The Intel Core Ultra 7 165H features 16 cores and 22 threads with a base clock of 3.80 GHz and boost clock of 5.00 GHz. Its 24 MB of shared L3 cache, combined with 2 MB L2 and 112 KB L1 per core, provides substantial data storage for game workloads. The 7 nm Meteor Lake architecture with Intel BGA 2049 socket and 28 W TDP positions this as a mobile processor designed for balance between performance and efficiency.

Benchmark results show the CPU's capabilities: Cinebench R23 multicore score of 14551 and singlecore of 1759, with PassMark multithread score of 25933 and single thread of 3509. The 84th percentile ranking among all CPUs indicates strong overall performance. The nearest rival comparisons show the Core Ultra 7 165H essentially matching the Core Ultra 5 338H (0.3% higher), EPYC 4244P (0.4% lower), Ryzen AI 7 350 (0.4% lower), and Ryzen 7 3700X (0.5% lower).

In The Technomancer, the CPU's role appears secondary to the GPU based on the resolution scaling data. The consistent FPS patterns across resolutions suggest the GPU is the primary bottleneck, particularly at 4K where even Low settings fail to reach 60 FPS. The CPU's strong single-thread performance (1759 in Cinebench R23 singlecore) likely prevents it from being a limiting factor in this 2016 title, which would have been designed for the era's 4-core/8-thread mainstream processors. The 22 threads and 5.00 GHz boost clock provide ample headroom for the game's computational demands, making the GPU the clear performance constraint in this pairing.