VRAM Useage tests

[I Hunta x]

I7 970 @ 4ghz - 6gb DDR3 @ 2000Mhz 9-9-9-24 - GTX 580, @ 800 core 1600 Shader 2000 Mem.

Starcraft 2 @ 1080p - Ultra preset (highest option)

The guy didnt leave after i killed his hatchery so i let his spawning pool die from being off creep and surrounded it with stuff for lulz.

-----------------------------

GTA4 (Ballard of gay tony expansion benchmark) Is this game capped at 30FPS? in game? cause even on lower settings i was getting 30 FPS while the benchmark ran?

SETTINGS: (Max for everything)

MAX MEM I SAW:

 

[Rastalovich]

Being as I can remember decades ago programming graphics to resolutions, you never thought in terms of screens, just resolutions, and you have the same base to pick the graphics from each time. You don't load less cos you use a different resolution, that just didn't make sense. Making the jump from 1024x768 to even 1920x1200, the texture base should be the same, but the calculating and population of the bigger resolution takes more time. Conversely if the game is planned for 1920x1080 and you play at 1028x1024, the game works harder to cram the graphics in the smaller screen.

Always bothered me when players constantly posted in replies to members asking about buying new hardware "multiple screens ? you'll need over 3g for that!!" - without any basis.

If it was a perfect world and you could get everyone to play the same game, same settings, at different resolutions. You could calculate how much extra memory the resolution increase takes up. Windows uses as little as 91mb for desktop on a 1920x1200 - multiply that for buffering (cos you never produce graphics directly onto the screen you play on, or you shouldn't).

With the results we have so far for 2 games, we almost have enough to very loosely guesstimate for them.

 

[I Hunta x]

If/when i get a 2nd 580 if your still looking into this stuff ill be more than happy to retest on a 3x 1080p setup if the drivers dont bitch about them being different models (i remember reading it needs/doesnt like 3 different screens at some point), it wouldnt be useful for every day use as my 3 screens i have access to consist of a 24" tv, a 42" tv and a 22" monitor but it will be fine for just testing.

What do you plan to do with all the info? if you dont mind me asking?

 

[alicarve]

got my gtx 680 4gb yesterday and just tried bf3 on max settings 5760x1080 2493mb+ big difference to my sli 460s lol

 

[killablade]

Just got that in the mail, getting the rest of the parts and building the rig next week so I'll contribute when I have some games installed!

 

[Master&Puppet]

There's word around that Afterburner, depending on the version maybe, gets confused with xfire/sli memory counts. However, I've only heard of it reporting too-much as opposed to not enough. Weird.

Yea, AB reported upto 2gb on my setup (I had 2x 1gbs at the time

)

It's quite tricky to decide how much vRam is needed if the theory of the games filling up what it thinks might help is true. If only we could lock off amounts of vRam so we could see the effect on fps...

 

[aneesh99]

another interesting thing to note is that my friend who is running 2xGTX295s, which has 1GB of RAM per GPU can run BF3 at max settings when I somehow need 1.6GB to run it that high

Doesn't BF3s mem usage just keep on expanding depending on how much you have? I tried it on my 7870, was sitting at around 1.3, on my bro's 7970, it was at 2+

 

[Michaeljcox24]

Skyrim @ 1920 x 1080, with a stack of texture mods. 2003MB (and goes up to 2200MB in some areas).

 

[Big WigglyStyle]

Didn't see any ARMA 2 yet

well here you are

Game Engine - Real Virtuality 3

Game: ARMA 2 - Private military company (theres about 6 variants of ARMA 2 all are identical except the missions I own/play all)

Settings: all set to highest ( should be noted this game is terribly coded and is 15-20fps at these settings on my spec normally I play on mid settings for a solid 50fps no real visual impact)

AA-8x

Texture Quality - Very High

Video Memory - Very High ( not sure what this does or how it effects anything but saw no difference upon changing it)

Terrain - high ( no very high preset)

Shadows - Very high

Visibility - 10,000 (ranges from 500-10,000

Objects Detail - Very High

HDR - Very High

Postprocess Effects - Very High

VRAM usage 900-1000mb (never saw it go above 1,000)

GPU - 1x GTX 570 1.28gb

Resolution - 1920x1080

I still have no clue how to post sceenies so unfortunately can't provide visuals.

 

[Rastalovich]

Skyrim @ 1920 x 1080, with a stack of texture mods. 2003MB (and goes up to 2200MB in some areas).

I'm taking that as SLI 580 3G cards, Ultra Preset, correct me if I'm wrong matey.

 

[Rastalovich]

What do you plan to do with all the info? if you dont mind me asking?

Educate ourselves really. It's to be more informed when advising the countless people who ask almost everyday "which of these cards should I get.."

Usually we have to drag out of them what games they play, what resolutions - but we got to move away from the bandwagon answers of "you definitely need this-card and 6G", without really knowing. If the person asking doesn't go for certain games, a 680 4g or 7970 6g is an absolute waste, whereas they could get an SSD or whatever.

 

[Big WigglyStyle]

Being as I can remember decades ago programming graphics to resolutions, you never thought in terms of screens, just resolutions, and you have the same base to pick the graphics from each time. You don't load less cos you use a different resolution, that just didn't make sense. Making the jump from 1024x768 to even 1920x1200, the texture base should be the same, but the calculating and population of the bigger resolution takes more time. Conversely if the game is planned for 1920x1080 and you play at 1028x1024, the game works harder to cram the graphics in the smaller screen.

Always bothered me when players constantly posted in replies to members asking about buying new hardware "multiple screens ? you'll need over 3g for that!!" - without any basis.

If it was a perfect world and you could get everyone to play the same game, same settings, at different resolutions. You could calculate how much extra memory the resolution increase takes up. Windows uses as little as 91mb for desktop on a 1920x1200 - multiply that for buffering (cos you never produce graphics directly onto the screen you play on, or you shouldn't).

With the results we have so far for 2 games, we almost have enough to very loosely guesstimate for them.

I have a 1280x720 monitor I can't use it this weekend but on monday I will run the same games at the same settings I might have a second 1280x720 aswell that I can throw on but will be limited by the two so 2560x720 won't be very real world though. But we shall see if your theory is correct I'll especially focus on BF3 at 1280x720 this would really test the theory seeing as it probably optimized for 1920x1080/1200

 

[Rastalovich]

I have a 1280x720 monitor I can't use it this weekend but on monday I will run the same games at the same settings I might have a second 1280x720 aswell that I can throw on but will be limited by the two so 2560x720 won't be very real world though. But we shall see if your theory is correct I'll especially focus on BF3 at 1280x720 this would really test the theory seeing as it probably optimized for 1920x1080/1200

Do me/us another favour too, if you wouldn't mind - keep an eye on how much of your cpu is being used. I'll explain why, and I wish I'd thought of this at the beginning.

(I don't know, but AB may well have cpu usage % in the list of things you can display)

I'm thinking along the lines of, if you have enough vram for the game, your cpu use is what I'd expect - but if you go over the amount you have onboard, the computer's memory gets used and more cpu is used as a result.

That'd be kewl.

(Gonna play with AB now cos 2.2 has gone non-beta also)

 

[Michaeljcox24]

I'm taking that as SLI 580 3G cards, Ultra Preset, correct me if I'm wrong matey.

Yes, and for anyone that says skyrim is buggy as hell and keep freezing, it's got it's faults, but in the main, its the most vram hungry game out at the moment once it's made to look pretty. I was crashing every ten mins before I put these cards in. Since then, not one single freeze.

 

[Master&Puppet]

Do me/us another favour too, if you wouldn't mind - keep an eye on how much of your cpu is being used. I'll explain why, and I wish I'd thought of this at the beginning.

I don't know, but AB may well have cpu usage % in the list of things you can display

My version of AB doesn't have that option, I think it's still down to using rescourse manager or another monitor.

I was wondering, would you be able to put the data into a scatter graph so it's more easy to get a handle on the acutal usage? There are a lot of numbers there now!

 

[alicarve]

Crysis 2 max settings with dx11 and high res pack on 5760x1080 2710mb+ gtx680 4gb

 

[Big WigglyStyle]

OK I did BF3 on 1366x768 and with ultra settings I find myself using around 1200mb of VRAM on ultra preset with 2xAA on Metro indoors&outside just looking around spinning fast and such I also retested my 1920x1080 results on the same map for consistency and I was using what seemed to be a constant 1240mb of VRAM it was going from 1236-1240mb. So I would say your theory was correct the fps however on 1366x768 went up to about 110 average (I was alone in the server) compared to 50-60 on 1920x1080.

GPU - GTX 570 1.2gb

1366x768 - 1200mb average

1920x1080 - 1240mb average

 

[Vicey]

Educate ourselves really. It's to be more informed when advising the countless people who ask almost everyday "which of these cards should I get.."

Usually we have to drag out of them what games they play, what resolutions - but we got to move away from the bandwagon answers of "you definitely need this-card and 6G", without really knowing. If the person asking doesn't go for certain games, a 680 4g or 7970 6g is an absolute waste, whereas they could get an SSD or whatever.

Do you think based on my results that I should go for a 4GB GTX 680 or a 2GB model would do? I think I would be best served by a 4GB one considering some of the results here and my resolution appears to be the biggest tested so far.

 

[BKCXb]

LysOl , just run Fraps in the background, and press F10 when you want a screenshot to save , than you gotta upload those photos usally found at c:/Fraps/screenshots to a photo hosting site, once they are there the site will make a IMG code, just copy the IMG code and paste it into your post.

I use fraps because I find it to be the easiest

I use photobucket so host the photos, it resizes them automatically, but it does have a size limit.

 

[I Hunta x]

My version of AB doesn't have that option, I think it's still down to using rescourse manager or another monitor.

I was wondering, would you be able to put the data into a scatter graph so it's more easy to get a handle on the acutal usage? There are a lot of numbers there now!

Grab the beta version, that should have Vram usage in

LysOl , just run Fraps in the background, and press F10 when you want a screenshot to save , than you gotta upload those photos usally found at c:/Fraps/screenshots to a photo hosting site, once they are there the site will make a IMG code, just copy the IMG code and paste it into your post.

I use fraps because I find it to be the easiest

I use photobucket so host the photos, it resizes them automatically, but it does have a size limit.

Fraps only shows fps, so useless for vram monitoring, ive switched over to after burner for my fps monitoring aswell now as i can have temps, vram usage and fps all showing nice and pretty