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** 2GB GFX RAM VS 1GB GFX RAM IN BF3 (560Ti 1GB VS 560Ti 2GB) TESTING RESULTS!

As a matter of fact, looking at this a bit more closely, the 2Gb version doesn't even maintain 30fps consistently. So basically what we've got here are two cards which can't run BF3 on ultra on a 64 man server. That's all that you can draw from these graphs - not that 2Gb is a real deal maker and that 1Gb is a deal breaker.

Again, I'd really like to see benchmarks for how these cards do without MSAA and perhaps on high instead of ultra. I would bet that there's not much difference between the two at all.

I would play a game that held 30fps most of the time given no choice. i would not play a game at all that only held 15fps most of the time.

Which would defeat the purpose of more vram over another because Vram is not about GPU power so of course if you lower setting for the same GPU Vram becomes less of an issue, thread is about Ultra .

The purpose of the thread is to show that Vram really is having an effect and most likely that even when you start to lower setting to get better frame rates, its clear that you wont have to drop as much with the 2GB card before it becomes playable.

And so what if there is not much difference between the settings, what about the next game that may have a very noticeable difference between settings, a cards life is more than one game no matter if it was bought because of a game, people should think further than their nose and the game that's currently on the screen for the sake of a round of drinks.
 
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What was the testing methodology for this? I find the results very difficult to believe as I only have 1GB and have never seen anything close to what was posted. I don't think I've ever gone below 30fps even in the most heavy firefights.
 
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About the 64 man server variable. I personally don't play the 64 man servers as there too hectic with not much team play and not much fun. 32 player servers are much easier to play and enjoy with better team play. So for technical reasons i guess you did the 64 man server test but I and my mates play on the 32 player servers or 24 ones and if that is the norm which i dunno if it is or not then the 64 man server variable is mute. If most ppl like 64 man servers then disregard this post.
 
what would you say I would need to run high etc 1650x1080 with a core i5 750 @ say 4ghz and 8gb ram ? am i looking at a 2gb vram card minimum ?
 
what would you say I would need to run high etc 1650x1080 with a core i5 750 @ say 4ghz and 8gb ram ? am i looking at a 2gb vram card minimum ?

BF3 used at least 3GB of Ram by itself.

Right! atm system 2GB used 6 GB free.
When i play BF3 5.5GB used 2.5GB free.
BF3.exe itself used 3250MB.
 
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Is there a definitive answer that more RAM will decrease lag?

My 5870 has 1GB VRAM. My PC has an additional 4gb of RAM. I have read that by increasing my RAM, it will smooth out the game as it will use the normal RAM as VRAM when it runs out.

Any truth in this as if there is, I am going to get 8GB as seen some Corsair Vengeance Low Profile going for a silly price.
 
What was the testing methodology for this? I find the results very difficult to believe as I only have 1GB and have never seen anything close to what was posted. I don't think I've ever gone below 30fps even in the most heavy firefights.

depends on settings dosnt really

your card would probably be close to 30 if not slightly under at highest settings.

i did one minute bench runs with fraps to do min max and avg on my 5850 and it defintley dipped a bit under 30 fps on highest settings . thats why i upgraded my card. i wouldnt play on 30 fps min in bf3 i play with 60 min difference is night and day
 
U need to close the web browser and disable aero when runnig BF3 and u'll be down to about 1200MB (unless ur using the 2.5GB cards in which case, open as many browsers as u like :D).

Cleeecooo is using 2.5GB cards, using 2GB 6950>70 xfire myself, I don't need/have/want to disable/muck about with settings and close web browsers, I just click play and that's it!
 
As i noted earlier in the thread, whilst interesting someone needs to test the difference between 1.25/2.5GB 570's and 1.5/3GB 580's. I'd bet the difference is MUCH less and with the 580 (@1080) negligible.

I'd still suggest that 1GB cards (560ti etc) would be fine for high settings in BF3 with windows aero disabled (saves hundreds of MB of vRAM).
 
ive been saying it for ages now 1gb wont cut it in most of the newer games unless you dont mind turning aa off, it makes almost 0 sense to buy a 1gb card now, last year most games were only using around 800mb of memory with 4xaa @ 1080p
ths year most are hovering around 950-1gb+ next year its only likely to stay the same or go higher

Huh? I thought you said for ages that 2 x 1 Gb GTX 560 tis in SLI were 'overspecified' for gaming and BF3? :p
 
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Is there a definitive answer that more RAM will decrease lag?

My 5870 has 1GB VRAM. My PC has an additional 4gb of RAM. I have read that by increasing my RAM, it will smooth out the game as it will use the normal RAM as VRAM when it runs out.

Any truth in this as if there is, I am going to get 8GB as seen some Corsair Vengeance Low Profile going for a silly price.

Yes. It gives you more ram for caching shared video memory and other stuff.

The advantages of more that 4 Gb Vram dont show up on the normal ram usage box, but underneath it where it says 'Cached':

ramcache.png


Any additional Vram data goes into your ram cache (my PC has 3 Gb system ram allocated as shared video memory for a total of 4 Gb graphics ram). This doesnt cause any lag or stutter when my Vram use would be going over 1 Gb, it goes into the system ram, with which the difference in performance between having more dedicated Vram is <5 FPS.

Having said that, a 2 Gb GTX 560 ti at £195 is a fantastic buy. Prior to this they used to cost over £230, with the 1 Gb version around £175, which definitely wasnt worth it for the extra Vram.
 
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Any additional Vram data goes into your ram cache (my PC has 3 Gb system ram allocated as shared video memory for a total of 4 Gb graphics ram). This doesnt cause any lag or stutter when my Vram use would be going over 1 Gb, it goes into the system ram, with which the difference in performance between having more dedicated Vram is <5 FPS.

Thanks for the response.

Do I need to set this up for it to work or just stick it in, as such?

Noticed my RAM usage nearly maxing out whilst playing BF3 so have now disabled aero and close my browser once the game boots up. Still, whilst ram is cheap going to upgrade to 8gb from 4. Ordered it last night.
 
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I'd still suggest that 1GB cards (560ti etc) would be fine for high settings in BF3 with windows aero disabled (saves hundreds of MB of vRAM).

We all know that 1Gb cards are more than capable @ high settings.

Having said that, a 2 Gb GTX 560 ti at £195 is a fantastic buy. Prior to this they used to cost over £230, with the 1 Gb version around £175, which definitely wasnt worth it for the extra Vram.

All year I have been slated on numerous occasions for telling folks to buy a £200 2Gb card over a £185 1Gb card as it was a waste of money/not needed, the 6950 2Gb's have been available for most of the year for £200.

Although there will be some people happy to dial the settings back and quite happily live with it, there will be some very unhappy people now changing their gpu's for 2Gb cards!(even though they should wait for the very soon to be released 7 series/kepler/fermi's).
 
I would play a game that held 30fps most of the time given no choice. i would not play a game at all that only held 15fps most of the time.

It doesn't hold 30fps most of the time. It holds around 25 most of the time and has a minimum of less than 20fps. If you are happy to play with that kind of performance then more power to you but I guarantee that most people would not be happy with that.

So again, show me a graph or some benchmarks which show the 2Gb version performing at 50-60fps consistently and the 1Gb version not able to keep up and I'll hold my hands up and say 2Gb is really worth it.

But all this graph proves at the minute is that neither version of the 560Ti is capable of running BF3 on ultra on a 64 man server in HD.

The 3Gb 580 plays Metro better at 1600p and the 1.5Gb version gets a laughable 1fps, but does that mean anything? No. Because in all real-world, playable situations the 1.5Gb can do exactly what the 3Gb version can do.

d8d9bc94-e59c-496e-b941-43f3ea4b918f.jpg
 
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It doesn't hold 30fps most of the time. It holds around 25 most of the time and has a minimum of less than 20fps. If you are happy to play with that kind of performance then more power to you but I guarantee that most people would not be happy with that.

If it held 25 most of the time then the Avg would say 25 and not 35, even without reading the clear as day 35 text written i can see that most is in-between the 30 and 40.
 
1)So again, show me a graph or some benchmarks which show the 2Gb version performing at 50-60fps consistently and the 1Gb version not able to keep up and I'll hold my hands up and say 2Gb is really worth it.

2)But all this graph proves at the minute is that neither version of the 560Ti is capable of running BF3 on ultra on a 64 man server in HD.
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1) Matter of opinion, many people are happy to play below that.

2) The graph shows that the 2GB version is giving twice as many fps than 1GB version.

Off to work.
 
If it held 25 most of the time then the Avg would say 25 and not 35, even without reading the clear as day 35 text written i can see that most is in-between the 30 and 40.

No, sorry that's not true. 'Holding' and 'average' are two very different things. Holding is to do with the baseline performance, i.e. the troughs on the graph. It's hitting around the 25fps mark every 5-10 seconds if you look at the graph. So that means that even if the average is 35fps you will be dealing with 25fps every 5-10 seconds, and would you be happy with that? I wouldn't.

Would be great if Gibbo could scale back settings until he's getting 60fps on the 2Gb 560Ti and then check to see what the 560Ti gets on the same settings. That would settle this debate...
 
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