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4GB VRAM isn't cutting it anymore says AMD
Well, if AMD says it. In my reviews I've been telling for a year or two now that 4 GB VRAM on graphics cards is barely enough in this day and age, and only up-to a gaming resolution of 1920x1080. AMD just posted a blog where they feel the age of a 4GB graphics card has passed.
AMD on its blog calls it in a writeup 'Game Beyond 4 GB', where they conclude testing their 4 GB RX 5500XT & 8 GB RX 5500XT to see how much of a difference VRAM can make on gaming performance. Tested on multiple games and 1080p high/ultra settings an 8 GB card performs almost 20% better than its 4 GB counterpart, which is not unheard of if you tick all the game setting boxes, textures eat memory.
-- AMD -- A few of the newer AAA games benefit greatly from having more VRAM available to store assets needed, play at higher resolutions, and to enable the latest visual effects. For those looking at making sure they have enough Graphics memory for games that are pushing the limits of 4GB, AMD RadeonTM RX graphics cards provide a wide set of solutions in 6GB or 8GB capabilities that include: RadeonTM RX 570, RX 580, RX 590, and RX 5000 Series GPUs.
Recent releases have shown marked performance increases when switching from a RadeonTM 5500 XT 4GB to a RadeonTM 5500 XT 8GB. In DOOM Eternal, the 8GB card runs the game at Ultra Nightmare settings at 75FPS (1080p), while the 4GB card can’t apply the graphics settings with that level of VRAM1. Looking at titles such as Borderlands 3, Call of Duty Modern Warfare, Forza Horizon 4, Ghost Recon Breakpoint, and Wolfenstein 2: The New Colossus, there is a performance improvement on average of up to 19% across these games when using the same card and increasing the amount of VRAM from 4GB to 8GB2. AMD is leading the industry at providing gamers with high VRAM graphics solutions across the entire product offering. Competitive products at a similar entry level price-point are offering up to a maximum of 4GB of VRAM, which is evidently not enough for todays games. Go Beyond 4GB of Video Memory to Crank Up your settings. Play on RadeonTM RX Series GPUs with 6GB or 8GB of VRAM and enjoy gaming at Max settings.
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dampflokfreund
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#5797024 Posted on: 06/08/2020 01:30 PM
6-8 GB is going to be the standard going into next generation games. But I don't think games will be unplayable on 4 GB cards, they might be fine at lower resolutions and settings. Cross gen games will still run with 2-3 GB cards because they are developed with the old consoles in mind, however next gen I expect a minimum requirement of 4 GB. Assuming you have a NVMe SSD. HDDs could significantly increase RAM and VRAM requirements.
IDTech is a weird case though, the texture pool streaming setting just regulates how much of a fixed streaming budget the engine has. There is actually zero differences in texture quality between high and ultra nightmare, so you can set that to Ultra and everything else to Ultra-Nightmare and you basically have Ultra Nightmare settings on a 6 GB card.
6-8 GB is going to be the standard going into next generation games. But I don't think games will be unplayable on 4 GB cards, they might be fine at lower resolutions and settings. Cross gen games will still run with 2-3 GB cards because they are developed with the old consoles in mind, however next gen I expect a minimum requirement of 4 GB. Assuming you have a NVMe SSD. HDDs could significantly increase RAM and VRAM requirements.
8gb vram even for 1080p. Doom Eternal cant be maxed out on a 6gb card.
IDTech is a weird case though, the texture pool streaming setting just regulates how much of a fixed streaming budget the engine has. There is actually zero differences in texture quality between high and ultra nightmare, so you can set that to Ultra and everything else to Ultra-Nightmare and you basically have Ultra Nightmare settings on a 6 GB card.
sbacchetta
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#5797033 Posted on: 06/08/2020 01:50 PM
There is 2 questions here. Do you need more than 4gb at 1080p today ? Not really. Should you buy a 4gb card today ? Personally, I would not, why ? A few years back, I bought a 6950 1gb version, it was 30USD cheaper than the 2gb one and to this day they're the worst 30 bucks I saved in my life...
There is 2 questions here. Do you need more than 4gb at 1080p today ? Not really. Should you buy a 4gb card today ? Personally, I would not, why ? A few years back, I bought a 6950 1gb version, it was 30USD cheaper than the 2gb one and to this day they're the worst 30 bucks I saved in my life...
Silva
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Posts: 1992
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#5797050 Posted on: 06/08/2020 02:08 PM
And here I am sitting on a budget RX580 with just 4Gb. Most games don't even hit 3Gb, little ones get close to 3.5Gb and I could just lower one or two settings and I'm good.
For my next GPU I'll make sure to get 8Gb, but for now: 4Gb is enough for 1080p.
PS: There's literally no difference between High and Ultra textures at 1080p. I don't care about bragging rights so, why pay more?
And here I am sitting on a budget RX580 with just 4Gb. Most games don't even hit 3Gb, little ones get close to 3.5Gb and I could just lower one or two settings and I'm good.
For my next GPU I'll make sure to get 8Gb, but for now: 4Gb is enough for 1080p.
PS: There's literally no difference between High and Ultra textures at 1080p. I don't care about bragging rights so, why pay more?
Fox2232
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#5797054 Posted on: 06/08/2020 02:17 PM
It is not important if you can't distinct Max textures vs 2nd max textures on given resolution.
While 4GB vs 8GB 5500 XT is good academical example of card running out of VRAM before rendering capabilities. And while it shows that 8GB/s and 16GB/s PCIe bandwidth to system memory does not really help in such scenario.
It is still easily fixed by reducing setting that is not even making reasonable visual difference.
8gb vram even for 1080p. Doom Eternal cant be maxed out on a 6gb card.
It is not important if you can't distinct Max textures vs 2nd max textures on given resolution.
While 4GB vs 8GB 5500 XT is good academical example of card running out of VRAM before rendering capabilities. And while it shows that 8GB/s and 16GB/s PCIe bandwidth to system memory does not really help in such scenario.
It is still easily fixed by reducing setting that is not even making reasonable visual difference.
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As far as Vram goes it depends on what you are playing with it and what settings you are playing with. I agree that 4GB cards are getting long in the tooth now a days just like using 8GB of system RAM in a PC. Now a days you might need at least 6GB of Vram at minimum and for those who like the eye candy probably need 8GB+. Just like with system RAM if you using a program like Google Chrome you are going to need more than 8GB and even more than 16GB thanks for that program being a huge RAM hog with a lot of tabs open.