Aperature, Schmapature

[LavrentiBeria]

I just bought a PowerSpec Certified ATI Radeon 7000 AGP video adapter for an older machine of mine and not without lots of fine help from people on this forum, so thanks.

I may not be making any sense at all to those in the know here, but the card's specifications indicate a 256-bit processor data width. Does this mean that I need to set the aperture setting in system BIOS to 256 or am I all wet ? There are two available BIOS settings for this system, 64 and 256. If this data width number does not have any relation whatsoever to the aperature setting numbers, might someone reccomend a proper aperature setting for this card?

LavrentiBeria

 

[VIAN]

no, that number has no relation to the AGP aperature size. You should set it to the amount of RAM on your graphics card.

But, be mindful of you much system RAM you have. If you have 256MB of system RAM, don't set it to 256, set it to a maximum of half that size. keep this in mind while doing the above.

 

[LavrentiBeria]

I couldn't have asked for a more prompt and helpful reply. Thanks, VIAN.

LavrentiBeria

 

[otispunkmeyer]

the 256 your on about is to do with the gpu itself........not sure but i think it means its a 256bit processoit can process 256bit code, thats what i think anyway could be totally wrong

 

[Gamingphreek]

It doesn't have anything to do with the amount of memory on the Video Card... i mean very little. AGP Aperture size is basically a place where if the graphics card runs out of memory it uses the system RAM. There have been rumors that setting it to the amount of RAM is best, but i remember for the longest time that it is supposed to be half the size of your RAM. I mean seriously why would you increase the amount of memory reserved for graphics the higher the memory on the card. Basically what im saying is that it is a page file (in a nutshell) for graphics memory. I am still working on it but i am putting together a huge amount of graphs showing the effects of the different sizes of AGP Aperture, 4x-8x AGP, and whether or not sideband adressing helps. It is ENORMOUS and its taking a lot of time. But when i finish i will post. So far, there is very very little difference between any of the settings.

(I am benching using the 3dmark 01 and 03, PCmark 04, Aquamark, and hopefully some shader intensive games like halo)

-Kevin

 

[Matthias99]

Originally posted by: Gamingphreek
It doesn't have anything to do with the amount of memory on the Video Card... i mean very little. AGP Aperture size is basically a place where if the graphics card runs out of memory it uses the system RAM. There have been rumors that setting it to the amount of RAM is best, but i remember for the longest time that it is supposed to be half the size of your RAM. I mean seriously why would you increase the amount of memory reserved for graphics the higher the memory on the card. Basically what im saying is that it is a page file (in a nutshell) for graphics memory. I am still working on it but i am putting together a huge amount of graphs showing the effects of the different sizes of AGP Aperture, 4x-8x AGP, and whether or not sideband adressing helps. It is ENORMOUS and its taking a lot of time. But when i finish i will post. So far, there is very very little difference between any of the settings.

(I am benching using the 3dmark 01 and 03, PCmark 04, Aquamark, and hopefully some shader intensive games like halo)

-Kevin

I could have told you flat out that AGP Aperture and Sideband Addressing would be pretty much useless. They only come into play when the card has to store and access texture data in system RAM -- something that should NEVER happen in a 'normal' situation. A handful of games (such as Call of Duty) can load super-high-res textures on a card with 256MB of RAM -- but anything else should fit into 128MB. I guess you *might* see a difference with older 32MB or 64MB cards running newer games...

As far as size, I'd set the AGP Aperture such that: video card memory + AGP Aperture = 256MB. Or you can just ignore it; it should make no difference in normal gaming situations.

 

[BFG10K]

Leave it at 64 MB unless you have problems.

 

[LavrentiBeria]

Many thanks for the very well informed comments above. I've elected to leave the system BIOS aperture setting at 64 MB.

I'd come to the forum originally as a kind of final step to the upgrading of an aging Intel AL440LX, PII system which I'm now putting in place as a Linux webserver. About a year or so ago, I upgraded the processor from 233Mhz to 333Mhz - I actually found a retail boxed PII 333 on the web - added a Promise Ultra ATA 100 TX2 Controller to speed up transfers, got a new 40GB WD HDD for about $60 after rebate, installed a brand new 250W Antec PSU (it had had a 235W unit), and added a decent quality case fan. The video adapter that had come with the computer was a now long discontinued nVidia Riva. The quality of the graphics on the machine had been declining, not that I'd made much in the way of demands on it. A couple of weeks ago, I used a Knoppix CD as a boot device for an installation of Gentoo Linux. With one terminal in action doing lots of compiling, when the monitor would go down for a rest and later recover, coming back up the rendering was horribly garbled. Only after fresh commands were entered would the screen right itself. That was the final straw for the nVidia Riva card as far as I was concerned.. I received recommendations here for the ATI Radeon 7000 as a replacement and could hardly have been better guided. Text rendering - and graphics for that matter - significantly improved. Thanks to the many who have helped.

LavrentiBeria