New to VR - Nvidia or AMD

lulu2608

lulu2608

lulu2608

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7 Oct 2023
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England
Hi,

I'm getting a new pc and want to get into VR. I posted elsewhere my draft spec, but a couple of replies thought Nvidia is better than AMD for VR and suggested I post the query here. I have looked through previous posts and it seems that is the case so any comments on my total draft spec would be appreciated. Looking at max £2k.

  • 1x Kolink Void Rift ARGB Midi Tower Gaming Case - Black
  • 1x AMD Ryzen 7 7700 Eight Core 5.30GHz (Socket AM5) Processor - Retail
  • 1x Kingston FURY Beast EXPO RGB 32GB (2x16GB) DDR5 PC5-44800C36 5600MHz Dual Channel Kit (KF556C36BBEAK2-32)
  • 1x Sapphire Radeon RX 6750 XT Pulse Gaming OC 12GB GDDR6 PCI-Express Graphics Card
  • 1x WD Black SN770 1TB SSD M.2 2280 NVME PCI-E Gen4 Solid State Drive (WDS100T3X0E)
  • 1x Samsung 1TB 870 QVO SSD 2.5" SATA 6Gbps 64 Layer 3D V-NAND Solid State Drive (MZ-77Q1T0BW)
  • 1x Build Stock Microsoft Windows 11 Home Advanced - System
GPU alternatives suggested:

MSI GeForce RTX 4070 Ventus 3X OC 12GB GDDR6X PCI-Express Graphics Card (SKU: GX-394-MS)
Zotac GeForce RTX 4070Ti Trinity 12GB GDDR6X PCI-Express Graphics Card (SKU: GX-13M-ZT)

I'd prefer Ryzen 9 if I could get it on the site and I couldn't find a motherboard selection or PSU but the following have been suggested:

Asus ROG Strix B650E-F Gaming WIFI (Socket AM5) DDR5 ATX Motherboard (SKU: MB-6JX-AS)
MSI B760 Gaming Plus WIFI (LGA 1700) DDR5 ATX Motherboard (SKU: MB-37M-MS)

Seasonic Focus GX-750 750W 80+ Gold Modular Power Supply (SKU: CA-06U-SS)
MSI MAG A750GL 750W 80 Plus Gold ATX 3.0 PCIE5 Modular Power Supply (SKU: CA-013-MS)

TIA
 
Asus ROG Strix B650E-F Gaming WIFI (Socket AM5) DDR5 ATX Motherboard
MB-6JX-AS
£230 (incl. VAT)
Find out more
MSI B760 Gaming Plus WIFI (LGA 1700) DDR5 ATX Motherboard
MB-37M-MS
£150 (incl. VAT)
£140 (incl. VAT)
Find out more
MSI MAG A750GL 750W 80 Plus Gold ATX 3.0 PCIE5 Modular Power Supply
CA-013-MS
£90 (incl. VAT)
Find out more
It's difficult to get information on this, I struggled with the same issue myself. I have a 7900xt and it works well on the quest 2 over wired.

Yes I can't use h265 encoding. But other than that it's good.

I would have course have liked a 4090 and that is a beast, but I think I'd rather the 7900xt than a 4070 which is barely faster than last generation's 3080.
 
Last I knew nVidia cards were still better for VR overall than AMD but this was for the last gen (6xxx amd and 3xxx nvidia).
I dont know about the current gen.
 
Ravenger said:
For Meta headsets that use encoded video over USB or WiFi then Nvidia are definitely better as their encoders are better.
Click to expand...

If you see my other thread a few weeks back though, I tested the 7900xt. So in what way are the Nvidia encoders better because I can't seem to find a quantifiable rationale for it? It seems to be one of the things people say but I'm not sure it's actually true. I can't use h265 wired though, not tried wireless.
 
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If you want a sure thing, then you're stuck on NV.

My 2c is that the AMD 7000 series are likely to be far better for VR than prior gens due to their good AV1 encoder. Benchmarks of AMD vs. NV AV1 hardware show only slightly worse image quality but higher throughout. This should mean lower latency encoding, but who knows...

We'll only know for sure come Tuesday, but AV1 is definitely the future of wireless VR, so a 4000 series or 7000 series is a good shout
 
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MSI MAG B650 Tomahawk WIFI (Socket AM5) DDR5 ATX Motherboard
MB-375-MS
£180 (incl. VAT)
£160 (incl. VAT)
Find out more
Kingston FURY Beast EXPO RGB 32GB (2x16GB) DDR5 PC5-44800C36 5600MHz Dual Channel Kit (KF556C36BBEAK2-32)
MY-29S-KS
£100 (incl. VAT)
Find out more
AMD Ryzen 7 7800X3D Eight Core 5.00GHz (Socket AM5) Processor - Retail
CP-3DT-AM
£480 (incl. VAT)
FREE DELIVERY
Find out more
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So 3 things I'd recommend:

1. be warned that some headsets only support Nvidia, off the top of my head its Varjo & Pimax

2. if you want features like Dynamic Foveated Rendering these often rely on VRS VRSS which I'm not sure if AMD fully supports

3. if your preferred VR headset is going to be high end, I'd recommend you opt for a 4090 otherwise a 4080 should be fine
 
danlightbulb said:
If you see my other thread a few weeks back though, I tested the 7900xt. So in what way are the Nvidia encoders better because I can't seem to find a quantifiable rationale for it? It seems to be one of the things people say but I'm not sure it's actually true. I can't use h265 wired though, not tried wireless.
Click to expand...

The Nvidia/AMD encoder debate doesn't just concern VR headsets and it's very true. It's been known for a long time in the video side of things that Nvidia's encoders are better, especially their H.264 encoders. AMD have been improving all the time, their H.264 encoders are still poor but their H.265 encoders are almost as good as Nvidia's now. The main problem now is drivers and that tendency of AMD to break their encoders with every new driver release.

Their are many threads about this in various forums. The Virtual desktop discord has had many discussions on this. And speaking of Virtual desktop, Guy Godin the developers says that Nvidia is still a better choice for Virtual Desktop as their encoders are faster and have better image quality.
 
lulu2608 said:
Hi,

I'm getting a new pc and want to get into VR. I posted elsewhere my draft spec, but a couple of replies thought Nvidia is better than AMD for VR and suggested I post the query here. I have looked through previous posts and it seems that is the case so any comments on my total draft spec would be appreciated. Looking at max £2k.
Click to expand...

At your budget the choice is between the 7900XT and the 4070Ti. To be honest, both are bad value cards. The whole stack of cards this time around is bad value. Any chance you could hold off until Back Friday? Maybe there might be some deals?

If I had to pick one of them though, I would pick the 4070Ti. It's the better card for VR.
 
melmac said:
The Nvidia/AMD encoder debate doesn't just concern VR headsets and it's very true. It's been known for a long time in the video side of things that Nvidia's encoders are better, especially their H.264 encoders. AMD have been improving all the time, their H.264 encoders are still poor but their H.265 encoders are almost as good as Nvidia's now. The main problem now is drivers and that tendency of AMD to break their encoders with every new driver release.

Their are many threads about this in various forums. The Virtual desktop discord has had many discussions on this. And speaking of Virtual desktop, Guy Godin the developers says that Nvidia is still a better choice for Virtual Desktop as their encoders are faster and have better image quality.
Click to expand...
Can you quantify it - in what way are Nvidia's encoders 'better'?

Because like I said, I can't see any issues with my 7900XT's h264 encoding in the Q2.
 
melmac said:
At your budget the choice is between the 7900XT and the 4070Ti. To be honest, both are bad value cards. The whole stack of cards this time around is bad value. Any chance you could hold off until Back Friday? Maybe there might be some deals?
Click to expand...
I was disappointed to see the 7900XT is back up to £800+. The OCUK offer a few months back for £699 was where the pricing should be, and what happened when they offered that price? They sold units.
 
danlightbulb said:
Can you quantify it - in what way are Nvidia's encoders 'better'?

Because like I said, I can't see any issues with my 7900XT's h264 encoding in the Q2.
Click to expand...
Faster encoding and better picture quality. That's it in a nutshell.

You might not notice any problems with your 7900XT using H.264. It depends on the game been played and you. Years ago, AMD's H.264 encoding was terrible. Now, with RDNA 3, it's ok. Not great but much better than before. AMD seems to have put much more effort into getting H.265 encoding right.

Just count yourself lucky you can't see any problems. Play your games and be happy.

danlightbulb said:
I was disappointed to see the 7900XT is back up to £800+. The OCUK offer a few months back for £699 was where the pricing should be, and what happened when they offered that price? They sold units.
Click to expand...

Not sure they could keep that offer going as I don't think it was from AMD.

danlightbulb said:
Because of the encoding? Or does it have better raster performance?
Click to expand...

Raster Performance is about the same, only a few % in it. You could pick a few games and prove that either card was way faster. As for encoding, he didn't say what headset he was getting, just that it was for VR. So encoding might not be a factor at all. No, just for the extra features. DLSS, Better Ray Tracing, Better VR performance, Better VR compatibility, VRS VRSS etc.

If they are both the same price, the only reason to get the 7900XT would be for the extra VRAM.

Based on all that, I would pick the 4070Ti. But as I said already, I would actually buy neither unless I got them at a better price.
 
melmac said:
But as I said already, I would actually buy neither unless I got them at a better price.
Click to expand...
Oh yeah for sure, I wasn't planning on upgrading but then the £699 offer came along which I thought was decent. It was definitely a worthwhile upgrade, as I have mentioned previously I can get around 80fps in MSFS. But yeah, still would benefit from more raster power.

melmac said:
aster encoding and better picture quality. That's it in a nutshell.

You might not notice any problems with your 7900XT using H.264. It depends on the game been played and you. Years ago, AMD's H.264 encoding was terrible. Now, with RDNA 3, it's ok. Not great but much better than before. AMD seems to have put much more effort into getting H.265 encoding right.

Just count yourself lucky you can't see any problems. Play your games and be happy.
Click to expand...
I still haven't got to the bottom of why I cant use H265. Can't find any information on why it doesn't work. But H264 works great and I can't see any compression artifacts when 200+ on the bitrate.

Interested to see how the AV1 codec works though. I updated my Oculus software today in preparation but there is no AV1 codec available in debug tool.
 
I just went through this article grabbing the values off the charts for three tested games: https://www.tomshardware.com/news/amd-intel-nvidia-video-encoding-performance-quality-tested

SVreKdI.png



So the 7900XTX is quite a bit faster in all three codecs.

So why the consensus says otherwise? And why H265 doesn't work on my PCVR?
 
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danlightbulb said:
I just went through this article grabbing the values off the charts for three tested games: https://www.tomshardware.com/news/amd-intel-nvidia-video-encoding-performance-quality-tested

SVreKdI.png



So the 7900XTX is quite a bit faster in all three codecs.

So why the consensus says otherwise? And why H265 doesn't work on my PCVR?
Click to expand...

I will quote the title of the Article.

Video Encoding Tested: AMD GPUs Still Lag Behind Nvidia, Intel​

Click to expand...

Do I really need to say anything else?

As for your H.265 problem. I don't know. Have you changed anything in the Oculus Debug tool? Are you trying to use 120Hz? What bitrate are you using?
 
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