Any articles on HBM memory, + why 4gb video mem is suddenly ok for 4k?

[D.P.]

Am I right in thinking that this gen of card will be able to utilise the vram from the second card in x fire?

No, because the data would have to be transferred over the PCI-E bus which is way slower.

What DX12 would allow is say 1 texture to be in 1 card and 1 in another and you could get the first GPU to render a triangle with the fist texture and the 2nd GPU to render a triangle with the 2nd texture. Currently both textures would have to be in both cards memory even if only 1 card needs it.

The thing is it is pretty much impossible to know which textures would be needed by which GPU exclusively and in most cases both GPUs will need all assets. because both GPUs will be sharing the rendering of the whole scene.

 

[wunkley]

Right, that's it, I'm staying off the internet until the 24th June. Speculation overload.

Best post yet. **** the Internet. It's bobbins. End thread?

 

[Kaapstad]

Am I right in thinking that this gen of card will be able to utilise the vram from the second card in x fire?

Not a chance

PCI-E 3.0 is way too slow to allow it.

 

[Mauller]

Am I right in thinking that this gen of card will be able to utilise the vram from the second card in x fire?

The way they talk about utilising all of the ram is misleading at times. What they mean is that they no longer have to mirror ram like when using AFR. So the ram on each card can be used individually when using an alternate graphics mode, such as compute on one card and graphics on another, or using some other form of multi gpu rendering that is not AFR. but one card would not use another cards ram, its far too slow and would effect performance.

 

[Stanners]

A bit like the non existent negative effects of that 1/2gb slower access memory on the 970 I guess.....

Why are you trying to derail the thread.

 

[Stanners]

I'm pretty sure I remember articles about the first generation of HBM being limited to 4GB while the 2nd generation with 8GB is slated for late 2015.
So if Fury is a beast but shows signs of memory limits, you just wait for the next generation to be available.

1. Wait for the benchmarks
2. Decide if the memory is limited for your application
3a. Buy the Fury / Buy the 980ti / Wait for the 8GB Fury
3b. Buy nothing because you are just striking while the irons hot to troll the forum

You have to much sense in that post for this forum

 

[Silent_Scone]

You have to much sense in that post for this forum

Not really as Gen 1.0 HBM isn't limited to 4gb as he has said, it's just limited to 1gb per stack.

There's nothing stopping you using more stacks on an interconnect, it'll just take up valuable space. AMD obviously worked with what they could given the die and interposer area with the limited quantity they had/have. If 8GB versions are coming, they'll still likely be on Gen 1.0, it'll just be that supply has picked up mainly.

 

[eyetrip]

Not pointing any fingers, but lots of wishful thinking, ignorance, idiocy doing the rounds over all this.

From both sides.

Why couldn't amd have reviews out earlier to put an end to all this?

Think legend has the right idea...

 

[eyetrip]

Edit: double post

 

[-Mike-]

Why are you trying to derail the thread.

Nice try but I'm not. No need to start stirring.

It was a simple statement in reply to someone saying that the 4gb is a massive limitation. It is not known currently AT ALL whether the 4gb will cause issues. Only reviews will confirm/deny this fact.

 

[TheMorningStar]

Does anyone know if removing the RAM from the PCB allowed them to cut out a PCB layer or anything like that? Just curious, haven't seen it mentioned.

 

[Insanties_birth]

I don't care about then I care about now.. and 4gb is not enough these days hence why I will keep my 980 ti order.

So in other words no graphics card short of a 980 ti / titan x is good enough for serious gaming very stupid logic we've got gong here and i'm sure a lot of the Nvidia fans stupid statements that basically condemn the 980 and 970 owners as poor cards is something they're not willing to outright state and it's only ever getting mentioned against AMD cards.

Lets get real, memory requirements are going up and it is a concern if you MUST have everything maxed out, with no compromise etc. but then nearly every card on the market short of the 980 ti and titan x have the same issue. AMD are in the same boat as Nvidia were just a few months ago (as Titan was never really a great option for majority of gamers and became redundant shortly after the 980ti). We're dealing with a single card (980 ti as no developers are going to take the tx that seriously in regards to making sure they go past 6gb vram just for that redundant card) which has had poor availability being the sole card that really trumps the others for vram. Most devs will be smart enough to make sue there games work for 99% of the market rather than 1%. It's going to be a small issue and if it becomes a big one then AMD will have a new card out next year with more Vram but there will be more excuses for why it can't be used then.

 

[Redwarrior5544]

4gb will be ample for a while yet, 12gb cards come out and somehow 4 & 6 no longer enough, lol.

 

[Freddie1980]

As title. Anyone got any good links? I'm a tad confused to be honest with the recent Fury X announcement. Is HBM totally shrouded in mystery as to how it works? Can 4gb of HBM somehow provide the same performance/ bandwidth/ whatever as 8gb ddr5 VRAM, for example?

For months (years?) we've had people banging on about VRAM and its lack of becoming an issue. You need at least 6gb for 4k yadda yadda.....

Does HBM memory turn this convention on its head?

It's not straight forward, a lot can depend on how a particular game is coded and handles it's assets, it can also depend on how the driver has been written. If someone who actually knew what they were talking about did write an article (like a GPU designer or game designer and not some opinionated enthusiast) I reckon it would be rather dry and difficult to read due to all the technicalities.

Your best is to wait for the benchmarks to hit and see for yourself.

 

[Twirlywoos]

I wonder if system requirements will be updated on games based on HBM memory. Will we see games like Arkham Knight state 4GB GDDR5 or 2GB HBM for Ultra system requirements? If anything I would have expected games AMD partner with to start showing this information if getting 4k Ultra requires above 4GB GDDR5.

 

[Kaapstad]

I wonder if system requirements will be updated on games based on HBM memory. Will we see games like Arkham Knight state 4GB GDDR5 or 2GB HBM for Ultra system requirements? If anything I would have expected games AMD partner with to start showing this information if getting 4k Ultra requires above 4GB GDDR5.

4gb is 4gb regardless

Games are written to use memory in a certain way and that is not going to change with HBM.

AMD will change though, look out for 8gb Fury cards appearing faster than greased lightning.

 

[Greebo]

4gb is 4gb regardless

Games are written to use memory in a certain way and that is not going to change with HBM.

AMD will change though, look out for 8gb Fury cards appearing faster than greased lightning.

that will need v2 of the memory and not available until December.

 

[Final8y]

@Insanties_birth.
Well put.

 

[ubersonic]

AMD will change though, look out for 8gb Fury cards appearing faster than greased lightning.

that will need v2 of the memory and not available until December.

Can't they just put 8x1GB HBM1 chips on the die? looked like the was space /shrug.

If the 4GB Fury is priced against the 980 and does beat it on performance then AMD would be able to position an 8GB model in between the 980ti/Titan-X and sell well, easily covering the additional cost o VRAM.

 

[Jono8]

I strongly suspect that 4gb was the maximum they could put on the card using HBM at the moment, and of course using HBM was the only way they could hit back at Nvidia on performance per watt. I suspect 8gb of HBM ( if it would have even been possible at this stage) would have also meant they would have had to have charged more than $649.

So basically for all AMD's bluster, no I don't think 4gb will be enough in some games at 4k as I think 4gb was a complete compromise.

Obviously only benchmarks and reviews will show us what 4gb of hbm is really capable of but I have my suspicions.