Nvidias new way of using VRAM?

D1craig · 11 Jun 2015 at 17:16

When the 900 series of cards where released it was said by Nvidia that these cards will be able to handle the needs of more VRAM because of the way they use it... Or something along them lines.

Now it's been over 6 months since the release I have not seen one case where 4GB on a AMD card is less valuable than 4GB on a Nvidia card. What happened to this?

Will probably come to light that I have misunderstood something along the way lol.

Gregster · 11 Jun 2015 at 17:21

D1craig said:
When the 900 series of cards where released it was said by Nvidia that these cards will be able to handle the needs of more VRAM because of the way they use it... Or something along them lines.

Now it's been over 6 months since the release I have not seen one case where 4GB on a AMD card is less valuable than 4GB on a Nvidia card. What happened to this?

Will probably come to light that I have misunderstood something along the way lol.

Yer, I think you have misunderstood and it was the way the 256bit bus coped with memory compression. It wouldn't actually mean using less VRAM, just a better way of dealing with compression.

AMD do the same as well.

Edit:

This article explains it far better than I could

http://www.anandtech.com/show/8526/nvidia-geforce-gtx-980-review/3

Scroll down to Colour Compression.

Kaapstad · 11 Jun 2015 at 17:30

D1craig said:
When the 900 series of cards where released it was said by Nvidia that these cards will be able to handle the needs of more VRAM because of the way they use it...

Have you not heard about the GTX 970 !!!

I think I will get my coat.

Twirlywoos · 11 Jun 2015 at 17:33

Sure you're not getting confused with nvlink? That's a Pascal feature.

Diddums · 11 Jun 2015 at 17:34

Well they managed to squeeze 4gb in to a 3.5gb package

africanos23 · 11 Jun 2015 at 17:43

4GB HBM = 12GB GDDR5 that's all I know

D1craig · 11 Jun 2015 at 17:47

Kaapstad said:
Have you not heard about the GTX 970 !!!

I think I will get my coat.

I own one and tbh not used that much vram anyway.

Kaapstad · 11 Jun 2015 at 17:50

D1craig said:
I own one and tbh not used that much vram anyway.

+1

The whole GTX 970 business was totally over the top.

The proof is the cards are still selling in their thousands.

r7slayer · 11 Jun 2015 at 17:54

3.5 GB gddr 5 enough but 4GB HBM not enough lol

varkanoid · 11 Jun 2015 at 17:57

Lost my vram then found it behind the fridge.

D1craig · 11 Jun 2015 at 19:47

Gregster said:
Yer, I think you have misunderstood and it was the way the 256bit bus coped with memory compression. It wouldn't actually mean using less VRAM, just a better way of dealing with compression.

AMD do the same as well.

Edit:

This article explains it far better than I could

http://www.anandtech.com/show/8526/nvidia-geforce-gtx-980-review/3

Scroll down to Colour Compression.

a few words in your post made alarm bells go off in my head and then i thought oh yeah that is what it said.

David Bisset · 11 Jun 2015 at 19:54

Kaapstad said:
+1

The whole GTX 970 business was totally over the top.

The proof is the cards are still selling in their thousands.

The proof is the cards still perform well - lots of people buying something don't make it technically good, just good from a business standpoint

(I agree it was overblown!)

Rroff · 11 Jun 2015 at 19:58

Kaapstad said:
+1

The whole GTX 970 business was totally over the top.

The proof is the cards are still selling in their thousands.

Proof the average consumer is a mug

That said for <4K gaming 3GB is generally adequate though I get quite close to maxing it out sometimes.

Mayh3M · 11 Jun 2015 at 20:00

africanos23 said:
4GB HBM = 12GB GDDR5 that's all I know

nashathedog · 11 Jun 2015 at 20:23

r7slayer said:
3.5 GB gddr 5 enough but 4GB HBM not enough lol

Your comapinrg a 3.5gb 1080p card to a 4 gb 4k card so yeah big difference.

r7slayer · 11 Jun 2015 at 20:30

Who said its specifically a 4k card? The 900 series were marketed just as much as 4k cards as the fury currently and will be.

r7slayer · 11 Jun 2015 at 20:33

r7slayer said:
Who said its specifically a 4k card? The 900 series were marketed just as much as 4k cards as the fury currently and will be.

In fact 900 series were considered better 4k cards than 290x cards so why are they now only 1080p? Coz of tx and ti? Funny how goal posts move when it's suited to certain ppl.

Boomstick777 · 11 Jun 2015 at 20:39

Kaapstad said:
Have you not heard about the GTX 970 !!!

I think I will get my coat.

Diddums said:
Well they managed to squeeze 4gb in to a 3.5gb package

Haha

Silent_Scone · 11 Jun 2015 at 20:39

Lossless colour compression is a technology that improves bandwidth efficiency arguably refuting the need for more memory bandwidth. How well it worked in the case of the 980GTX (and 970GTX) is questionable. It doesn't reduce the amount of memory used.

This content filtering is handled by the middleware and the developers for a large part.

Also the 980GTX was never marketed as a 4K card, if that's what some are saying here

r7slayer · 11 Jun 2015 at 20:50

Silent_Scone said:
Also the 980GTX was never marketed as a 4K card, if that's what some are saying here

Will you stop trying to correct me... Just look at the description on the cards here at ocuk

GeForce GTX 980 and 970 cards support tear-free, super-fast NVIDIA G-Sync monitor display technology including 4k. Together, these technologies provide the most immersive and competitive gaming experiences possible.

Just one example. Sure if u look on nvidia website it will tell u more. Also remember nvidia peeps saying 980 cards were better for 4k than 290x 8gb cards lol. Ark at that.
And before you pick up on the support bit fury will only say the same supports 4k so like I said marketed only the same.