1920x1200 on 512mb? Upgrade Needed?

[Ares202]

The real problem with Anands reviews are that they dont show minimum framerates, i guess my average on grid is around 40-45 but often drops to 10fps which isnt represented

 

[Schmide]

Originally posted by: Ares202
The real problem with Anands reviews are that they dont show minimum framerates, i guess my average on grid is around 40-45 but often drops to 10fps which isnt represented

xbitlabs 4870 1gb vs gtx260 896mb includes a 512mb card and minimum frame rates.

Are you searching for the answer you want?

 

[rpglord]

This issue can't really be seen on bencmarks for several reasons.
First,fps drops wont happen as soon as you start the game.You need to play a little before card runs out of video ram. Most benchmarks are not done that way.
Second,issue is only present with AA used,because AA uses a lot of video ram. If you dont use AA,then no,there is no game currently available which needs more then 512mb
And third,there is only handfull of games which needs more then 512mb. I am pretty sure these 3 games can't be run with 512 mb card and 1920 resolution with 8 AA,even 4x AA can cause problems :
Far Cry 2 , Fallout 3, Neverwinter nights 2
Fallout 3 is the worst. If you dont belive me,try running fallout 3 with max details and 8X AA with 512mb card and you wil be getting 5-10 fps randomly when entering vats system or just walking in the wasteland. Then drop down to 4x or disable AA and suddenly you get smooth 60 fps...so like I said 500 % difference.
And no,before you say its fallout 3 bug,I get same results in neverwinter nights 2 too. Far Cry 2...you need to play more...about an hour
Before you say it's my pc,I have tested this on my friend's pc's too.
Trust me,I know what I am talking about. Everything is fine if you dont run out of video ram. In the links you posted, Schmide, they didn't run out of video ram. That's why there is no big difference. They didn't use AA. And they didn't use games which are most video ram hungry ( I mentioned the 3 games I found to really cant work properly with 512 mb card )
Most peculiar thing is that Crysis seems to work just fine with 512mb. And it's for sure more hardware demanding then fallout 3,and especially then neverwinter nights 2. It just goes to show it doesn't even matter how demanding game is,just how well it's video ram usage is optimised

 

[SlowSpyder]

Touching on what rpglord said, I recently started playing NWN2 (I bought it way back when it launched, but it was too buggy to play in my opinion, just got back into it) and was suprised at it's poor performance at 1920x1200. I'd have to double check, but I believe I have it set to 2xAA in the game graphics options, everything else at the highest settings/reflections on, etc. with the exception of shadows which I have set to medium as with that turned up performance was very poor. From what I remember reading, the game just uses an updated version of the engine that NWN1 used, which is a fairly old engine. But with my card/CPU, while most areas I've been to so far in the game, the performance is acceptable, some maps are quite choppy.

Does anyone know why a game that uses such an old (though updated) engine requires so much graphical resource? In chapter one, going through the Highcliff Castle ruins, the frame rate is pretty low compared to other areas, yet that area doesn't look very visually impressive.

I can't help but think a 4870 should have enough 'umph' though I believe 512MB of frame buffer might be on the low end for my resolution, especially with AA. Again though, it's not all that impressive looking graphically and uses a tweaked version of an old engine, it just seems odd to me that it needs so much horsepower. Any one have any insight to offer?

 

[crisium]

512MB is enough for 1920x1200 without AA in pretty much anything. With AA some games start to lose performance. Especially the minimum suffers. See the GTS 250 cards:

http://images.hardwarecanucks....5770/XFX-HD5770-35.jpg

And at higher res with AA, 512MB goes from worse to bad:

http://images.hardwarecanucks....5770/XFX-HD5770-37.jpg

In future, more demanding games, that will be the 1920 performance. But for now, as long as you don't always demand AA you'll be fine. Even with AA for many games still there's no need. I would not recommend a 512MB 4870 as a buy, but you don't need to hop on the upgrade ship yet.

 

[rpglord]

Crisium,thanks for the links. That caught fps drops pretty good,but like I said,it gets worse more you play the game
Also,if only they used 8X AA with 1920 res they would get same fps drop they got with higher res and 4x AA
SlowSpyder,I already offered insight 🙂 NWN2 is one of the few games which uses more then 512mb ram . You cant expect to run that game decently with higher resolutions and AA with 512 mb card.
When I had 512 mb card in my system I ran Crysis at 1920 4x AA and got 25-30 fps..I ran NWN2 at same settings and got 15 fps ! Then I ran fallout 3 and got 10 fps !!!!
Then I put exactly same card from my friend,with 1 gb of ram. Results : Crysis still ran at 25-30 fps... nwn2 ran at 35 fps ! Fallout ran at 60...
However when I disabled AA both games ran at same speed they would ran with 1 gb card..so its clear it's video memory issue..
You best bet is just to disable AA with nwn2...or buy a new card 🙂

 

[Krakn3Dfx]

Running a Diamond 4870 XOC 512MB as of a few days ago while my GTX 260 is with EVGA being RMA'd. I've run some benchmarks in Assassin's Creed, Batman, L4D2, UT3, Furmark, and 3D Mark at 1920x1080, which is what my 25" LCD maxes out at. Even with the 400MB VRAM deficit, it pretty much tromps my 260 at 1920. Have also spent some time in OFP😀R and Battlefield 2 at max settings, and it runs awesomely.

Dunno if I'll keep the card once my GTX260 comes back, it's horribly loud, but moving from 896MB to 512MB didn't seem to have any sort of negative affect on my performance, even after 2 and a half hours of playing 2 hours of Assassin's Creed, which seems be a pretty demanding game maxed from a texture standpoint.

That will probably change at some point, but I think 99% of the stuff out there now running at 1920 or below on 512MB is probably running as well is it's going to for the most part, give or take 3-4 fps.

 

[SlowSpyder]

Originally posted by: rpglord
Crisium,thanks for the links. That caught fps drops pretty good,but like I said,it gets worse more you play the game
Also,if only they used 8X AA with 1920 res they would get same fps drop they got with higher res and 4x AA
SlowSpyder,I already offered insight 🙂 NWN2 is one of the few games which uses more then 512mb ram . You cant expect to run that game decently with higher resolutions and AA with 512 mb card.
When I had 512 mb card in my system I ran Crysis at 1920 4x AA and got 25-30 fps..I ran NWN2 at same settings and got 15 fps ! Then I ran fallout 3 and got 10 fps !!!!
Then I put exactly same card from my friend,with 1 gb of ram. Results : Crysis still ran at 25-30 fps... nwn2 ran at 35 fps ! Fallout ran at 60...
However when I disabled AA both games ran at same speed they would ran with 1 gb card..so its clear it's video memory issue..
You best bet is just to disable AA with nwn2...or buy a new card 🙂

Yea, I know you said NWN2 likes video memory, my own testing/playing confirms that. I guess I was asking more along the lines of 'why' a game that looks so unspectacular and uses an older engine would require so much vram... is it just the coding being inefficient?

 

[rpglord]

Yeah,that's exactly the reason. Game is not optimised very well. Actually,it's not optimsed at all 🙂