VRAM - AMD/Nvidia, why does it differ?

Marine-RX179 · 21 Dec 2013 at 11:51

Rusty0611 said:
To be fair mate, low FPS is much more tolerable in 3D Vision than not. I can't find my quote but I said that to me, minimums of under 80 FPS I can notice (in BF4) but in 3D Vision the minimums only bother me below 30.

That's fine. If that's the case that sound fair enough I will accept that.

But was I actually "wrong" for me to say people should ideally have two GTX780Ti instead of one, when the frame rate of Metro LL in 3D Vision with a single GTX780Ti was only around minimum 29fps and max of 40fps ish? Would you consider having only such frame rate in 3D Vision is actually "running sweet" in your opinion?

Sorry about going off-topic but I genuinely want to know. I keep hearing people saying how great 3D Vision is (TriDef 3D is kinda mere to me used a few times and not bothered after because gaming on 120Hz is much better, not to mention the texture details etc seem to get washed out when in 3D). I am currently considering building another system Nvidia based next year to play with 3D Vision, G-sync etc.

Edited: Actually nevermind, I'll see if there are separate topics which I can look up for info.

Rusty0611 · 21 Dec 2013 at 12:06

Marine-RX179 said:
That's fine. If that's the case that sound fair enough I will accept that.

But was I actually "wrong" for me to say people should ideally have two GTX780Ti instead of one, when the frame rate of Metro LL in 3D Vision with a single GTX780Ti was only around minimum 29fps and max of 40fps ish? Would you consider having only such frame rate in 3D Vision is actually "running sweet" in your opinion?

Sorry about going off-topic but I genuinely want to know. I keep hearing people saying how great 3D Vision is (TriDef 3D is kinda mere to me used a few times and not bothered after because gaming on 120Hz is much better, not to mention the texture details etc seem to get washed out when in 3D). I am currently considering building another system Nvidia based next year to play with 3D Vision, G-sync etc.

Edited: Actually nevermind, I'll see if there are separate topics which I can look up for info.

I don't know if you're wrong or not as everyone's perception of what is playable FPS is different

.

andrewohare · 21 Dec 2013 at 12:23

For me as long as It looks awsome and plays smooth I'm happy anything over 60fps is nice

Gregster · 21 Dec 2013 at 12:49

Marine-RX179 said:
I don't know what has that got anything to do with here other than pointless attempt to drag something unrelated here to say "Marine, you don't know jacks about what you talking about"?

Well that comes from you telling us that recommending 2GB cards is wrong but seems that you were wrong to recommend going SLI 780Ti's and could potentially cost someone who takes your advice, a lot of money. SLI and CF are not big markets and most people would prefer to avoid it because of issues of noise/heat/SLI profiles/New PSU needed/New mobo needed.

Marine-RX179 said:
Also that discussion was regarding Metro LL with 3D vision...you said it's running sweet on the 780Ti despite it has only like what...minimum frame rate of 29fps and a max frame rate of 40fps ish if I remember correctly? What's "wrong" about stating my opinion of people should ideally have two GTX780Ti instead of one for that (Metro LL with 3D vision)?

Again, you are wrong and I showed my results for 3D testing on a Titan with very conservative clocks. The 780Ti will be faster than my Titan and will give even more fps. As you can see, my average is 49 fps and the low of 29 fps didn't feel to be 29 fps to me and the whole test (which was very long) felt very smooth. Great game in 3D. For sure if you couldn't accept them frames in your gaming experience, that is fair enough but I like to give my thoughts only on what I felt whilst gaming. Here is my results if you missed them.

http://forums.overclockers.co.uk/showthread.php?t=18564579

Marine-RX179 said:
I think most people (myself include) can't get their head around how having less than 30fps on minimum frame rate is "running sweet".

Well again, you are saying "I think most people" but I wonder how many people are aware of how many fps they are getting when gaming and when a big explosion or something big happens on screen kicks in, what their fps are or care. I have read here on so many occasions that "The game plays really well on my "Card X", but we know "Crad X" to be less than the top tier and know what lows they will be getting but that doesn't make for a bad gaming experience. With an average of 49 fps in MetroLL, it didn't feel anything other than smooth to me but for that, you will have to take my word on it.

It strikes me as you want to prove a point but have nothing to show and tell. You said Skyrim with lots of mods will breach 2GB easy but if they are anything like me, they don't play Skyrim or if they did, I would recommend them a card with the most memory and at their price range. Have you seen how Skyrim plays on CF out of curiosity?

humbug · 21 Dec 2013 at 13:33

You guys are asking for proof where 2GB is not enough, ignore the proof when its shown and then ask again 15 posts later.

I have demonstrated how turning up the settings in BF4 will choke 2GB resulting in stuttering.

A quick Google brings up results others complaining about finding the same thing.

http://forums.evga.com/tm.aspx?m=2049934
http://linustechtips.com/main/topic/83792-bf4-stuttering-hardware-problem/page-2#entry1149979
http://forums.guru3d.com/showpost.php?p=4668302&postcount=8

2GB is not enough VRAM for cards at the £200 + level.

GoogalyMoogaly · 21 Dec 2013 at 13:39

humbug said:
2GB is not enough VRAM for cards at the £200 + level.

Why £200+?
Why not £150+?
The only thing I can see is that AMD do 2GB card between £150 and £200 while Nvidia do 2GB that cost more than £200. I may be wrong, but it seems like an arbitrary figure that was picked to make Nvidia look bad and AMD look good.

86JR · 21 Dec 2013 at 13:42

Gregster said:
@ Marine, I am not sure what your point is or even if anything you are saying is valid. I asked twice to show me where 2GB isn't enough and you just keep on about how wrong we are to recommend a 2GB card.

You told someone they needed SLI 780Ti's for 3D Vision, which I proved is clearly not the case but at least if I recommend a card, it is geared to what current prices are and what they are wanting out of a GPU.

I say again, show me a vanilla game that 2GB isn't enough for 1080P or give it a rest.

Afterburner shows me hitting my 2GB per core vram limit in Dayz quite a bit, and Bf4 on occasion. Both are alpha's though really.

86JR · 21 Dec 2013 at 13:46

Gregster said:
Well that comes from you telling us that recommending 2GB cards is wrong but seems that you were wrong to recommend going SLI 780Ti's and could potentially cost someone who takes your advice, a lot of money. SLI and CF are not big markets and most people would prefer to avoid it because of issues of noise/heat/SLI profiles/New PSU needed/New mobo needed.

Again, you are wrong and I showed my results for 3D testing on a Titan with very conservative clocks. The 780Ti will be faster than my Titan and will give even more fps. As you can see, my average is 49 fps and the low of 29 fps didn't feel to be 29 fps to me and the whole test (which was very long) felt very smooth. Great game in 3D. For sure if you couldn't accept them frames in your gaming experience, that is fair enough but I like to give my thoughts only on what I felt whilst gaming. Here is my results if you missed them.

http://forums.overclockers.co.uk/showthread.php?t=18564579

Well again, you are saying "I think most people" but I wonder how many people are aware of how many fps they are getting when gaming and when a big explosion or something big happens on screen kicks in, what their fps are or care. I have read here on so many occasions that "The game plays really well on my "Card X", but we know "Crad X" to be less than the top tier and know what lows they will be getting but that doesn't make for a bad gaming experience. With an average of 49 fps in MetroLL, it didn't feel anything other than smooth to me but for that, you will have to take my word on it.

It strikes me as you want to prove a point but have nothing to show and tell. You said Skyrim with lots of mods will breach 2GB easy but if they are anything like me, they don't play Skyrim or if they did, I would recommend them a card with the most memory and at their price range. Have you seen how Skyrim plays on CF out of curiosity?

Lol...don't criticise the guy for assuming something and then go on to assume something yourself

I think nearly everyone with a good system has tried Skyrim from the amount of hype it has...I did and I didn't like it, it bored me after 2 days! But was still 2 days of fun!

Gregster · 21 Dec 2013 at 13:52

humbug said:
You guys are asking for proof where 2GB is not enough, ignore the proof when its shown and then ask again 15 posts later.

I have demonstrated how turning up the settings in BF4 will choke 2GB resulting in stuttering.

A quick Google brings up results others complaining about finding the same thing.

http://forums.evga.com/tm.aspx?m=2049934
http://linustechtips.com/main/topic/83792-bf4-stuttering-hardware-problem/page-2#entry1149979
http://forums.guru3d.com/showpost.php?p=4668302&postcount=8

2GB is not enough VRAM for cards at the £200 + level.

First thread is 1440P and we have users here including me who has had no problem playing with 2GB at 1440P, so I feel something else is at play.

Second thread seemed to be cured by stopping programs in the background running and pointed towards system RAM as the problem.

Third thread is 1440P as well.

I can go through your posts and point out how you told me you had no problems and frames were good at full ultra on your 7870, so not sure why you would want to change your mind. If something is wrong now, I would look to your system, as it was playing well (according to you).

Edit:

There is a thread asking for people experience of what happens when they run out of VRAM. I would like for people to give their experience of what happens and I will happily put my hands up and say I was wrong (like I always do) but I ran BF4 at 1440P on a 2GB 6970 and frames were rubbish <25 fps but nothing was stuttering or freezing like what happened when I did run out of VRAM on my 680's at 5760x1080.

Marine-RX179 · 21 Dec 2013 at 13:54

Gregster said:
Well that comes from you telling us that recommending 2GB cards is wrong but seems that you were wrong to recommend going SLI 780Ti's and could potentially cost someone who takes your advice, a lot of money. SLI and CF are not big markets and most people would prefer to avoid it because of issues of noise/heat/SLI profiles/New PSU needed/New mobo needed.

It strikes me as you want to prove a point but have nothing to show and tell. You said Skyrim with lots of mods will breach 2GB easy but if they are anything like me, they don't play Skyrim or if they did, I would recommend them a card with the most memory and at their price range. Have you seen how Skyrim plays on CF out of curiosity?

First of all, I didn't "recommend" or "advise" the OP of that thread "to go buy two GTX780Ti"...he said he's decided on getting a single GTX780Ti and I said nothing against that, I was merely commenting on the performance as you brought up 3D Vision. What I said was something along the line of "ideally two GTX780Ti are needed for getting reasonable frame rate/performance playing Metro LL in 3D"...and I made this comment based having seen the review of performance of the single GTX780Ti being just enough to get fairly comfortable frame rate at 1920 res without AA in non-3D, and then factoring the performance hit by playing in 3D Vision. Anyway that discussion is long done, so leave that out of of this thread.

As for the 2GB argument, if people wanted to be shortsighted and made their purchase base on their own belief 2GB would be sufficient then fair play it is their choice and their own money it doesn't hurt anyone else; however they kept preaching 2GB will still be perfectly fine in the near future and advised people making purchase decisions that; now just about 6 months has passed since the launch of GTX770, they've already changed their tone and no longer recommend 2GB. Giving advise to people should be presenting the full picture and the range of choices available and let the people seeking advise to decide for themselves which product to go for, but far too often people were happy forcing their own beliefs onto others as fact telling half the story, and making the decisions for them. They were like going full-throttle downplaying the benefit of the extra 1GB vram and extra memory bandwidth insisting they are not needed.

andrewohare · 21 Dec 2013 at 13:58

I found Skyrim stutter like hell on crossfire.. Not tried sli with it yet

Gregster · 21 Dec 2013 at 14:01

@ Marine - All cool.

In fairness, the only cards I have recommended recently, has been the 780 or the 290. Great prices and great cards, so it is mainly irrelevant anyways. I was never a fan of the 770 or the 280X in truth, as they are both cheeky rebrands and nothing new at all. At least the 780 sorted out the VRAM bus and gave a proper gamers 384bit bus, as opposed to the poor 256bit of the 770/680.

humbug · 21 Dec 2013 at 14:12

Gregster said:
First thread is 1440P and we have users here including me who has had no problem playing with 2GB at 1440P, so I feel something else is at play.

Second thread seemed to be cured by stopping programs in the background running and pointed towards system RAM as the problem.

Third thread is 1440P as well.

I can go through your posts and point out how you told me you had no problems and frames were good at full ultra on your 7870, so not sure why you would want to change your mind. If something is wrong now, I would look to your system, as it was playing well (according to you).

Edit:

There is a thread asking for people experience of what happens when they run out of VRAM. I would like for people to give their experience of what happens and I will happily put my hands up and say I was wrong (like I always do) but I ran BF4 at 1440P on a 2GB 6970 and frames were rubbish <25 fps but nothing was stuttering or freezing like what happened when I did run out of VRAM on my 680's at 5760x1080.

So 2GB is enough as long as your not running more than 1080P, thats not a blanket "2GB is enough" is it?

As to your response to me in my test, I told you to turn the Res percentage up just as i did, you ignored it. your 6970 doesn't have the muscle to run BF4 at those settings anyway, its 3 generations out of date. i can run those settings, so can a GTX 670 / 680 and 770 owner, except me and they, really, we can't, we don't have enough VRAM.

Kaapstad · 21 Dec 2013 at 14:28

humbug said:
So 2GB is enough as long as your not running more than 1080P, thats not a blanket "2GB is enough" is it?

As to your response to me in my test, I told you to turn the Res percentage up just as i did, you ignored it. your 6970 doesn't have the muscle to run BF4 at those settings anyway, its 3 generations out of date. i can run those settings, so can a GTX 670 / 680 and 770 owner, except me and they, really, we can't, we don't have enough VRAM.

Must give BF4 a go on my HD 5970s (4 generations out of date) at xmas when I am a bit less than sober.

Gregster · 21 Dec 2013 at 14:28

humbug said:
So 2GB is enough as long as your not running more than 1080P, thats not a blanket "2GB is enough" is it?

As to your response to me in my test, I told you to turn the Res percentage up just as i did, you ignored it. your 6970 doesn't have the muscle to run BF4 at those settings anyway, its 3 generations out of date. i can run those settings, so can a GTX 670 / 680 and 770 owner, except me and they, really, we can't, we don't have enough VRAM.

If you don't have enough VRAM, maybe time to upgrade?

humbug · 21 Dec 2013 at 14:31

Kaapstad said:
Must give BF4 a go on my HD 5970s (4 generations out of date) at xmas when I am a bit less than sober.

lol, playing while off your face is so much fun.

Gregster said:
If you don't have enough VRAM, maybe time to upgrade?

It is, yes.

Kaapstad · 21 Dec 2013 at 14:33

Gregster said:
If you don't have enough VRAM, maybe time to upgrade?

I recon he should go for a second hand Titan as they should be priced quite reasonably with all the 780ti's about.

Kaapstad · 21 Dec 2013 at 14:34

humbug said:
lol, playing while off your face is so much fun.

I am so useless at the game it does not make much difference.

humbug · 21 Dec 2013 at 14:37

Kaapstad said:
I recon he should go for a second hand Titan as they should be priced quite reasonably with all the 780ti's about.

It would have to cost less than a new 290. not that i'm sure i can afford one of those

Kaapstad said:
I am so useless at the game it does not make much difference.

Join the club. i think i play better when i'm drunk.....

Gregster · 21 Dec 2013 at 15:28

Out of curiosity. I ran BF4 at 1440P with Ultra settings and that slider thing upto 200% and wow.

That is almost touching the 4GB mark. Never mind 2GB not being enough, 4GB isn't enough either.