GTA IV and Graphics Card Memory

[The Halk]

Due to the way Crossfire and SLI work you only get 1/2 the total ram for 2 cards, 1/3 for 3 etc.

Edit : There isn't a card that exists that can play the game at max detail 1920x1200 as far as I'm aware.

 

[1kiwi]

Thats because with a 4870X2 you only effectively have 1GB of ram. You have 1GB that is cloned in virtual memory so they run in parallel

 

[Stonedofmoo]

Yes, you have a x2 card. That's 2x 4870 cards with 1Gb RAM each on a single board.

So each 4870 GPU has access to 1Gb of RAM each, it's not shared as it's not a shared design. So the game is reading the memory correctly.

 

[1kiwi]

I have a PowerColour HD 4870x2 2GB GDDR5 and it only recognises 1gb of my GPU ram, any ideas ?



It runs nice when it doesn't crash, even when I change my settings so it doesn't use too much GPU memory resource, I still get a 'REC10' out of memory crash every now and then !


OS: Vista Premium 64bit
MB: Gigayte GA-EP35-DS3R
RAM: 6GB DDR2 Crucial Ballistix (3x 2GB)
CPU: Intel Quad Q6660 2.4Ghz (OC'd to 3.24Ghz)
GFX: PowerColour HD 4870x2 2GB GDDR5
LCD: Hanns G 28" 1920x1200

What settings are you using and does it crash when you leave the case open? How severely is your card OCed?

 

[camdean]

Yes, you have a x2 card. That's 2x 4870 cards with 1Gb RAM each on a single board.

So each 4870 GPU has access to 1Gb of RAM each, it's not shared as it's not a shared design. So the game is reading the memory correctly.

I thought this was the case, or hoped so after buying it for the 2gb feature.

What settings are you using and does it crash when you leave the case open? How severely is your card OCed?

I have not touched my cards OC settings.

Settings in game are lower than the auto settings it puts me on, my native is 1920x1200 and the game puts it on that, High/high with 32 draw distance (I change to 26 to make the resource go green) and 60 detail distance.

I lowered the draw distance to make the memory usage go green in the settings, as it only shows 1GB, I can only use a little better than the console settings but it does look really nice.

 

[Chimerical]

Is this game running bad because of poor coding or because its particularly intensive? (Or both)

Sounds like Crysis runs better than GTA4....

And GTA4 doesn't look that great.

 

[camdean]

Is this game running bad because of poor coding or because its particularly intensive? (Or both)

Sounds like Crysis runs better than GTA4....

And GTA4 doesn't look that great.

I hate to say it because I love rockstar but it looks like some bad coding, or bad testing.

It does look really good when it runs, it can be for a few hours or 20 minutes, it doesn't look like crysis but then theres a lot more happening so it's using a lot of CPU and memory as far as I can tell.

I phoned Rockstar and was told to try lower settings, it looks ok but then suddenly buildings dissapear for a milisecond, its better if I play it on the high settings and just save it a lot because it crashes sooner or later.

I used a command line to force the game to show 2gb VRAM but it still crashes and makes no difference apart from showing 2048mb of resources in the options.