The Technomancer

The Technomancer, a 2016 Action RPG, presents an interesting case study for the Intel Core Ultra 7 265K and AMD Radeon RX 7700 combination. The benchmark data reveals a system that is highly capable at mainstream resolutions but begins to show its limitations as pixel count increases. This analysis breaks down the measured performance across various settings and resolutions, interpreting what the frame rates indicate about the balance between the CPU and GPU in this specific title.

Resolution Scaling

The measured FPS data shows a clear and predictable decline in performance as resolution increases from 1920x1080 to 3840x2160. At High settings, the average frame rate drops from 117 FPS at 1080p to 77 FPS at 1440p, and finally to 42 FPS at 4K. This represents a 64% drop in average FPS from 1080p to 4K. The scaling pattern is consistent with a GPU-bound workload at higher resolutions, where the rendering load on the graphics card increases exponentially with pixel count.

The transition from 1080p to 1440p shows a 34% performance loss (from 117 to 77 FPS at High settings), while the jump from 1440p to 4K results in a 45% loss (from 77 to 42 FPS). This steeper decline at higher resolutions suggests that the AMD Radeon RX 7700 is becoming the primary limiting factor as the resolution increases. The data indicates that at 1080p, the system may be partially CPU-limited, but by 4K, the GPU is definitively the bottleneck.

Examining the Low settings preset provides further insight into the scaling behavior. At 1080p Low, the system achieves 179 FPS, which drops to 117 FPS at 1440p and 64 FPS at 4K. The 1080p to 1440p drop of 35% is nearly identical to the High preset's 34% reduction, but the 1440p to 4K drop of 45% is the same as High. This consistency across presets suggests that the resolution scaling penalty is largely independent of the graphical settings, reinforcing the notion that the GPU's fill-rate and bandwidth are the determining factors at higher resolutions.

GPU Role

The AMD Radeon RX 7700 is built on the RDNA 3.0 architecture with a Navi 32 chip and is manufactured on a 5 nm process. It features 16 GB of GDDR6 memory on a 256-bit bus, providing a bandwidth of 624.1 GB/s. The GPU has a base clock of 1900 MHz, a game clock of 2041 MHz, and a boost clock of 2459 MHz. With 2560 shading units, 160 TMUs, and 96 ROPs, the card is configured to deliver 25.18 TFLOPS of FP32 compute.

The GPU's performance percentile of 58 places it in the middle of the pack among all tested graphics cards. Its nearest rivals include the AMD Radeon RX 9060, which scores 1% higher, and the NVIDIA GeForce RTX 3060 Ti, which scores 1.7% higher. The RX 7700 sits just 0.1% above the AMD Radeon R9 370X in average benchmark score, though this is a misleading comparison given the generational gap.

In The Technomancer, the GPU's role is clearly defined by the 4K results. At Ultra settings and 3840x2160, the system only manages 33 FPS on average, which is below the threshold for smooth gameplay. Even at High settings, the 4K average of 42 FPS is marginal. The 16 GB of VRAM is likely sufficient for this title, as the game's release date predates the high-resolution texture packs common in modern titles. The memory bandwidth of 624.1 GB/s appears to be a more critical factor, as the frame rate drops significantly when the resolution increases and the demand on memory throughput rises.

FAQ

Q: What is the average frame rate at 2560x1440 with Medium settings?

A: The system achieves an average of 90 FPS at 1440p with Medium settings, with a minimum of 76 FPS and a maximum of 103 FPS recorded in the measured data.

Q: How does the system perform at 4K with Ultra settings?

A: At 3840x2160 with Ultra settings, the average frame rate drops to 33 FPS. This is the lowest performance point in the measured dataset and is likely to be a poor gameplay experience due to the low frame rate.

Q: Is the system better at 1080p or 1440p for this game?

A: The data shows significantly higher frame rates at 1080p. For example, at High settings, the system achieves 117 FPS at 1080p compared to 77 FPS at 1440p. The 1080p results are above the typical 60 FPS target, while the 1440p results are also above that threshold for most presets.

Q: What is the FPS difference between Low and Ultra settings at 1080p?

A: The difference is substantial. At 1080p Low, the average FPS is 179, while at 1080p Ultra, it drops to 92 FPS. This represents a 48% reduction in performance when moving from the lowest to the highest settings preset.

Q: How does the system rank among all tested combinations for this game?

A: The Intel Core Ultra 7 265K and AMD Radeon RX 7700 combination ranks 1275 out of 2825 tested combos for The Technomancer. This places it in the 55th percentile of all tested systems.

Q: Does the game run better with Low settings at 4K compared to Ultra at 1440p?

A: According to the data, 4K Low achieves an average of 64 FPS, while 1440p Ultra achieves 60 FPS. The 4K Low preset actually provides slightly higher average performance than 1440p Ultra in this title.

How This Combo Ranks

The combination of the Intel Core Ultra 7 265K and AMD Radeon RX 7700 achieves a rank of 1275 out of 2825 tested combinations for The Technomancer. This places the system squarely in the middle of the overall distribution, indicating that while it is not a top-tier configuration for this specific title, it is also far from being a weak performer.

The rank relative to the total number of combos suggests that a significant portion of tested systems outperform this configuration, and an equally significant portion underperform it. The CPU itself is a high-end part, as evidenced by its 94th percentile ranking among all CPUs, but the GPU's 58th percentile ranking is more modest. This discrepancy suggests that the GPU is the limiting factor in this pairing, which aligns with the resolution scaling data that shows the system becoming more GPU-bound at higher resolutions.

The GPU's nearest rivals in terms of average benchmark score include the AMD Radeon RX 9060, which is 1% faster, and the NVIDIA GeForce RTX 3060 Ti, which is 1.7% faster. These small deltas indicate that the RX 7700 is competitive with its immediate peers. The CPU's nearest rival, the Intel Core i7-14700KF, scores 1% higher on average, while the AMD Ryzen 7 9700F scores 1.3% higher. These marginal differences in synthetic benchmarks may not translate to significant real-world performance differences in this game.

CPU Role

The Intel Core Ultra 7 265K is a 20-core, 20-thread processor based on the Arrow Lake architecture, manufactured on a 3 nm process by TSMC. It has a base clock of 3.90 GHz and a boost clock of 5.50 GHz. The CPU features a substantial cache hierarchy with 192 KB of L1 per core, 3 MB of L2 per core, and 30 MB of shared L3 cache. It supports DDR5 memory on a dual-channel bus, providing a memory bandwidth of 102.4 GB/s.

The CPU's benchmark results are impressive, with a Cinebench R23 multi-core score of 35850 and a single-core score of 2020. Its Geekbench multi-core score is 23085, and the single-core score is 2713. These numbers place the processor in the 94th percentile of all CPUs, indicating it is a top-tier performer in general compute tasks.

In The Technomancer, the CPU's role is less prominent than the GPU's due to the game's age and likely lower thread utilization. The high single-thread performance, as indicated by the Passmark single-thread score of 4928, likely prevents the CPU from bottlenecking the GPU at 1080p, where frame rates are highest. The measured 1080p Low average of 179 FPS suggests that the CPU can drive the GPU to high frame rates without being a limiting factor. However, as the resolution increases and the GPU workload becomes more demanding, the CPU's importance diminishes, and the frame rates become more dependent on the GPU's capabilities.

Measured FPS Breakdown

At 1920x1080, the system delivers the highest frame rates across all settings. With Low settings, the average FPS is 179. Medium settings reduce the average to 137 FPS, with a minimum of 117 and a maximum of 158. High settings yield an average of 117 FPS, and Ultra settings drop to 92 FPS on average. All 1080p results are well above the 60 FPS threshold for smooth gameplay, indicating that this resolution is the sweet spot for this hardware combination.

Moving to 2560x1440, the performance remains strong but shows a clear step down. Low settings achieve an average of 117 FPS, Medium settings hit 90 FPS with a minimum of 76 and maximum of 103, High settings average 77 FPS, and Ultra settings average 60 FPS. The 1440p results are still playable across all presets, though Ultra settings sit exactly at the 60 FPS mark, which may not be ideal for all users.

At 3840x2160, the performance drops significantly. Low settings average 64 FPS, Medium settings average 49 FPS with a minimum of 42 and maximum of 57, High settings average 42 FPS, and Ultra settings average 33 FPS. The 4K results are the weakest, with only the Low preset managing to stay above the 60 FPS target. The Medium, High, and Ultra presets at 4K all fall below this threshold, indicating that 4K gaming with high visual fidelity is not practical with this setup.

Settings Recommendations

Based on the measured FPS data, the optimal experience for this hardware combination depends heavily on the target resolution. For 1920x1080, all settings presets are viable, but Ultra settings provide the best visual quality while still maintaining an average of 92 FPS. The Ultra preset is the recommended choice at this resolution, as it offers the highest fidelity without sacrificing playability.

At 2560x1440, the High settings preset is the recommended choice. It achieves an average of 77 FPS, which is comfortably above the 60 FPS target, while Medium settings only improve this to 90 FPS at the cost of visual fidelity. The Ultra preset at 1440p, while averaging 60 FPS, may dip below this threshold in demanding scenes, making High the safer choice for a consistent experience.

For 3840x2160, the data suggests that the Low settings preset is the only playable option, with an average of 64 FPS. The Medium preset at 49 FPS and High preset at 42 FPS are likely to feel sluggish, and the Ultra preset at 33 FPS is not recommended for serious gameplay. Users who prioritize 4K resolution should accept the Low settings preset, while those who prioritize visual quality should consider playing at 1440p with High or Ultra settings instead.