$250 video card upgrade.. what to get?

[Silverforce11]

We still haven't got any proof of why BF3 will use more vram if you have it. What is it doing, pre-loading textures/models for higher minimum fps? Is it using higher detail (LOD) textures/model at further view distance depending on your vram?

But if you can run 1080p ultra without a problem with 1gb vram, then 1gb is all you need. Whether the extra vram is boosting IQ or minimum fps.. no benches.

 

[happy medium]

~1015mb out of 1024mb at high settings 4xAA with my 560 Ti, IIRC

Thats sounds right, thanks. It will peak at 1gb but it will not go over it.
The game streams memory as needed.

 

[happy medium]

We still haven't got any proof of why BF3 will use more vram if you have it. What is it doing, pre-loading textures/models for higher minimum fps? Is it using higher detail (LOD) textures/model at further view distance depending on your vram?

But if you can run 1080p ultra without a problem with 1gb vram, then 1gb is all you need. Whether the extra vram is boosting IQ or minimum fps.. no benches.

The guys from Dice in the video on Anandtechs front page explained it all in there video.

 

[3DVagabond]

Thats sounds right, thanks. It will peak at 1gb but it will not go over it.
The game streams memory as needed.

Is there somewhere that explains what/why it's doing this? Link?

Edit: N/M just saw your last post.

 

[Termie]

It uses every bit bro. 980mb @1080p ultra 4xmsaa.


No crashes yet, dont jinks me.

~1015mb out of 1024mb at high settings 4xAA with my 560 Ti, IIRC

All right, that makes sense. I do think that 1920x1200 might put 4xAA over the edge, though.

The biggest problem for me was task-switching. I'd crash out of the game when I'd switch to the desktop during gaming, since it was trying to use VRAM that was already allocated, I presume.

 

[lehtv]

Thats sounds right, thanks. It will peak at 1gb but it will not go over it.
The game streams memory as needed.

It is similar in this respect as Crysis 2 which on high settings uses 1GB VRAM no matter what situation. On a GPU with more VRAM, it'd use even more VRAM. Perhaps this has something to do with deferred rendering...? Some games crash if VRAM is used to max capacity, but not C2 or BF3.

 

[happy medium]

We still haven't got any proof of why BF3 will use more vram if you have it

Dude I was talking to a guy running 3 gtx580 3gb cards in surround and he said he was using 2.8gb of memory.

And another guy with 3 6970's was using 1.9gb in the same resolution with no major slowdowns..

Thats when I knew, the game streams memory. This was before the Anandtech/Dice video.

 

[Termie]

Is there somewhere that explains what/why it's doing this? Link?

Edit: N/M just saw your last post.

Here's the link that Happy is referring to, I think: http://www.anandtech.com/show/5011/nvidiaea-posts-battlefield-3-graphics-tech-talk

 

[3DVagabond]

The guys from Dice in the video on Anandtechs front page explained it all in there video.

Can you direct me to the vid? I can't find it. I'm just curious what it's doing with this VRAM it's caching. If it doesn't need it, I'd rather it didn't use resources for no reason. If it is making some use for it, then it makes sense to have cards with enough mem to make full use of this "feature".

 

[happy medium]

One thing is for certain 2 gtx460 768 cards will not run BF3 in 1080p ultra 4xaa. Thats the memory limitation I have found to be true.

And it makes sense , the game stores 500mb of texture memory, and 250 mb of object memory (I forget what its called) @ ultra settings. 768mb's is not enough even while streaming.

 

[happy medium]

Here's the link that Happy is referring to, I think: http://www.anandtech.com/show/5011/nvidiaea-posts-battlefield-3-graphics-tech-talk

Thanks, and goodnight fellas.:thumbsup:

 

[3DVagabond]

Here's the link that Happy is referring to, I think: http://www.anandtech.com/show/5011/nvidiaea-posts-battlefield-3-graphics-tech-talk

Do you know which vid? I don't feel like watching the whole library if I don't have to.

Thanks, and sorry if I'm being painful.

 

[Termie]

Thanks, and goodnight fellas.:thumbsup:

Yup - first video. Here's a direct link: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=KMaL6j7Ry6c&feature=player_embedded

Starting at around minute 7, he starts talking about memory use. At 8:20 he puts up a slide that says the following:

100-250MB of streamed object meshes
1.3-1.5GB of streamed object textures

Texture pool for various settings:
(1) Low - 150MB
(2) Medium - 200MB
(3) High - 300MB
(4) Ultra - 500MB

I'm not sure what that all means, so best to check out the video for yourselves. At 10:35, he says that ultra was designed for cards with 1.5GB or more.

 

[Silverforce11]

7:40 he talks about streaming textures and models to reduce memory footprint on lower end cards but also it can do the opposite, so that it boosts IQ the more vram you have.

It's like a very aggressive LoD culling in other games based on draw distance, but here its based on vram limits. It sounds like it loads better quality datasets with more vram so you can have better IQ in a bigger view distance if the gpu can handle it.

Edit: 10:20 The settings themselves determine the limits of the vram usage for streaming. Lower settings do not necessarily lower IQ at short distance, it will stream better IQ texture/mesh closer to you, and load low IQ data further away. Actually a very clever setup. Putting it on ULTRA it will use a lot of vram if you have it to improve IQ of the entire scene.

Edit2: This actually will have ramifications to the way people perform benches. They put it on high/ultra and just wait for the fps counter but ignore whats happening. In a given scenario, identical card, 1gb vs 2gb vram, the 1gb card will be limited on whats its rendering with lower IQ object mesh/textures while the 2gb card has to render more high IQ object/textures. The 2gb card will suffer and perform worse but giving better IQ. Setting things on HIGH should cap out at 1gb max and not enable additional streaming for cards which have more vram.

 

[3DVagabond]

Yup - first video, starting at around minute 7. He starts talking about memory use.

Thanks. :thumbsup:

Interesting. He says the game is designed for 1.5GB cards and operates at reduced IQ if you don't have that. So, to get back on topic, best $250 card, for BF3 anyway, would be the 6950 2Gig.

 

[Silverforce11]

Everything about BF3 is scalability, terrain, terrain decorations, objects, meshes, textures, all scalable based on your IQ preset and vram, and its done based on the area you are at, distance from the camera in a radius.

I would like to see a gtx560ti/6950 1gb vs 2gb running same speed on high and ultra (without MSAA to prevent vram limitations for streaming). If it is streaming higher IQ data on ultra, the 2gb card should run slower.

 

[cmdrdredd]

but reviewers can!



says the AMD boys because they cant use it ,not the reviews.

If I had SLI GTX 580s overclocked, I would still turn off MSAA. I do not like the look, period.