HL2 and D3 are gonna suck for alot of people

[otispunkmeyer]

i was wandering round pc world the other day an i saw a fair few people eyeing Nvidia Gforce 5600's and 9600non pros both with 256mb ram.......i think that for the most part, alot of people are going to be sorely disappointed with HL2 and D3 when their mega much0 256mb card jus cant hack it.

alot of people simply have no idea that its the gpu and not the memory size that dictates performance....i stood behind a guy in the que who handed over more than about £100 for a powercolour 9600 non pro 256mb! i felt sorry for him!

i wish graphics companies would stop selling graphics card emphasizing memory size......i have a few friends who nearly succumbed to this.....i nearly punched him when he told me thats got more memory therfore that card is better.........9700pro 128 vs 9600 256......no contest!

that or games developers put on the cover of their games what you wil need for best performance....i mean i looked at the back of Nascar racing 2003 from papyrus.....and it jus says DX8.1 compliant graphics card, with hardware T&L with 32mb memory.....thats it.....they see 32mb memory....think oh i have 256 therefore i will run this game at max everything!......in reality my 9500pro 128 cant run nascar 2003 at full everything at 1024x768...with a full 43 car field its bordering a slide show!

 

[eastvillager]

^^^^

Fortunately, you're missing the point.



You see some of these games, they have these things called TEXTURES. The more of them your card can hold in its memory at the same time, the better.

You won't see the benefit of that memory in a synthetic benchmark tailored upon FPS. If you make one the specifically targets using more textures than a 128meg card can hold at once, the difference will be obvious.

If you want to test real world, I suggest you compare a 32meg card vs. a 256 meg card in something like dark age of camelot+expansions, during RvR, where you've got lots and lots and lots of textures to deal with.

 

[LTC8K6]

256megs of video memory is only useful on the high end cards. There is little reason at all to have it on anything less than a 9800Pro/XT or 5900/5950ultra. Even on these cards, the performance gain is small.

I don't know of any testing that has been done on the new gen of cards, but most of them are going to have 256megs anyway.

The question will come up again when the 512meg gaming cards come out.

A card with 32megs of ram is likely to have a much weaker GPU than a 256meg card, so the comparison seems pointless to me. Now, if you could disable some of the video ram on a 5900 to make it a 32meg card, then I'd like to see a few comparisons.

 

[otispunkmeyer]

i am hinting towards the cards such as thr 5200 and 5600 and the 9600's which i mention.....non of these are top cards and none of these are goin to be able to make use of 256mb are they..yes COD gets an increase in performance at 1600x1200 with AA and AF.....but do u think the above cards can manage that with resorting to a powerpoint presentation?

no didnt thinks so..

yet these are the cards being sold in pc world.....they dont stock 9800xts and x800's they stock mid range if that, and for those who dont know bout this stuff then those mid range cards appear to be the best you can buy.........hell i used to be like this i thought the measure of memory on a card directly = performance....more memory more performance......i was shocked when my gf4 mx 440 couldnnt do half the 3d mark tests.......but i bought it coz i had 64mb DDR in nice shiny sticker on the front......

i hate seeing ppl get duped and fleeced!!! i mean 100 quid for a 9600 non pro!

 

[otispunkmeyer]

basically jus sayin how these things are sold to the majority on the basis of memory size thats all....it misleading i think

 

[Delorian]

Back a while ago, the more memory did make all the difference in the world, I remember going from a 1 MB PCI video card to a 4 MB PCI video card. That was a measurable difference in speed more due to the available Vram than GPU differences. Nowadays ram has increased to measures beyond the scope of reason. Yes for a midrange card 64-128MB should be fine (better off w/128 but 64 still isn't horrible IN THAT RANGE) as far as high-end 256 is much better, but nobody at those stores really know that high-end needs it due to limitations at that extreme and with a slower GPU, you really are bottlenecked by gpu performance not by shortage of extra memory. Unfortunately it's a selling point and these retailers will use that to their every whim to get a extra moolah out of the deal.

EastV - why does a 5200 w/a slow GPU and only a 64/128 bit memory bus warrant double the price for twice the ram that it doesn't need. Yes textures need VRam but if the GPU can't process the textures fast enough in the first place, the extra ram is useless. It's like trying to buy a supercharger for a golf cart, the deal may LOOK good but in the end you still only get the speed of a golf cart.

 

[imported_obsidian]

256MB of ram on a 5200 or 9600 is a marketing gimmick. No other way to explain it. I don't care if you have a lot of textures, those cards aren't going to be moving around and rendering 256MB of textures at anywhere close to playable framerates. Also, considering the ram on these cards is usually cheaper, slower versions than the 128MB counterparts the card will end up running slower.

 

[biostud]

Originally posted by: LTC8K6

The question will come up again when the 512meg gaming cards come out.

rumors says ATi will have one around x-mas, and it has been hinted that the unreal3 engine currently under development would require 1Gb of video memory, but that's still some years down the road

 

[RussianSensation]

Originally posted by: biostud666

rumors says ATi will have one around x-mas, and it has been hinted that the unreal3 engine currently under development would require 1Gb of video memory, but that's still some years down the road

Yeha but no one in their right mind is expecting to play Unreal 3 with any current hardware. The release date for that game is 2006. That means at least 1 full generation of videocards, and p5 and K9s with 2x the cpu speed as today. Hopefully 512mb cards will push the 256 ones $100 less in price. And considering 512 wont make a difference for a while, I suppose, considering 256 mb old generation didn't; but who knows.

 

[Dustswirl]

Originally posted by: RussianSensation

Originally posted by: biostud666

rumors says ATi will have one around x-mas, and it has been hinted that the unreal3 engine currently under development would require 1Gb of video memory, but that's still some years down the road

Yeha but no one in their right mind is expecting to play Unreal 3 with any current hardware. The release date for that game is 2006. That means at least 1 full generation of videocards, and p5 and K9s with 2x the cpu speed as today. Hopefully 512mb cards will push the 256 ones $100 less in price. And considering 512 wont make a difference for a while, I suppose, considering 256 mb old generation didn't; but who knows.

+64bits apps

 

[imported_jediknight]

Doesn't help that the people selling these things:
a) Don't know $hit OR
b) Are trying to con unsuspecting buyers

Kid at Futureshop (Canadian version of Best Buy etc.) tried to convince me my 64MB GeForce4 MX440SE would run Doom3 just fine... at 1024x768... (64MB should be enough, he says..)

 

[selfbuilt]

Reality of the marketing world: memory = cheap and abundant, high-end GPUs = scarce and expensive ... conclusion = sell low-end GPUs with extra memory to sucker ill-informed consumers. Not going to change any time soon.

 

[Acanthus]

Originally posted by: jediknight
Doesn't help that the people selling these things:
a) Don't know $hit OR
b) Are trying to con unsuspecting buyers

Kid at Futureshop (Canadian version of Best Buy etc.) tried to convince me my 64MB GeForce4 MX440SE would run Doom3 just fine... at 1024x768... (64MB should be enough, he says..)

It will, at the lowest detail settings. With no shadows. Probably looking like the original doom.

Carmack said itll run on a Geforce 256.

 

[otispunkmeyer]

Originally posted by: Acanthus

Originally posted by: jediknight
Doesn't help that the people selling these things:
a) Don't know $hit OR
b) Are trying to con unsuspecting buyers

Kid at Futureshop (Canadian version of Best Buy etc.) tried to convince me my 64MB GeForce4 MX440SE would run Doom3 just fine... at 1024x768... (64MB should be enough, he says..)

It will, at the lowest detail settings. With no shadows. Probably looking like the original doom.

Carmack said itll run on a Geforce 256.

think we''l have to wait an see for that one.......i really hope someone does bench with a geforce 256.......jus to check out his claim

 

[Lawranch]

Lots of people are perfectly happy with their Xbox or PS2.
Lower your resolution to 640x480 and run it through a TV, and Doom 3 will run and look ok.

 

[zephyrprime]

Fortunately, you're missing the point.

You see some of these games, they have these things called TEXTURES. The more of them your card can hold in its memory at the same time, the better.

I think you're the one who's missing the point. More textures equals higher image quality but it also means things get slower because more memory bandwidth is needed. The only time that more memory equals more speed is if a game was using too much memory and AGP memory had to be used.

 

[Keysplayr]

Originally posted by: RussianSensation

Originally posted by: biostud666

rumors says ATi will have one around x-mas, and it has been hinted that the unreal3 engine currently under development would require 1Gb of video memory, but that's still some years down the road

Yeha but no one in their right mind is expecting to play Unreal 3 with any current hardware. The release date for that game is 2006. That means at least 1 full generation of videocards, and p5 and K9s with 2x the cpu speed as today. Hopefully 512mb cards will push the 256 ones $100 less in price. And considering 512 wont make a difference for a while, I suppose, considering 256 mb old generation didn't; but who knows.

Actually, Epic demonstrated the Unreal 3 engine and alpha demo on a 6800Ultra saying that it was the first card capable of running it well. If I can find the link I will post it. I was very impressed as were the gents from Epic.

 

[mb]

Pssh, my laptop with 32mb video ram could play the doom3 beta2 fine. Granted it'll be better when I do get a desktop with a 6800 or x800

 

[RussianSensation]

Originally posted by: keysplayr2003

Originally posted by: RussianSensation

Originally posted by: biostud666

rumors says ATi will have one around x-mas, and it has been hinted that the unreal3 engine currently under development would require 1Gb of video memory, but that's still some years down the road

Yeha but no one in their right mind is expecting to play Unreal 3 with any current hardware. The release date for that game is 2006. That means at least 1 full generation of videocards, and p5 and K9s with 2x the cpu speed as today. Hopefully 512mb cards will push the 256 ones $100 less in price. And considering 512 wont make a difference for a while, I suppose, considering 256 mb old generation didn't; but who knows.

Actually, Epic demonstrated the Unreal 3 engine and alpha demo on a 6800Ultra saying that it was the first card capable of running it well. If I can find the link I will post it. I was very impressed as were the gents from Epic.

Yeah but didnt they say the X800XT was actually running slightly faster than Nvidia's hardware? And also I remember someone noting that the framerate was like 25-30FPS average ....?

 

[PrayForDeath]

Originally posted by: Acanthus
It will, at the lowest detail settings. With no shadows. Probably looking like the original doom.
Carmack said itll run on a Geforce 256.

lol :laugh:

ID software's engines always work well with slow rigs, and they're well known for their genius programming, so what he said might be true

 

[otispunkmeyer]

Originally posted by: eastvillager
^^^^

Fortunately, you're missing the point.



You see some of these games, they have these things called TEXTURES. The more of them your card can hold in its memory at the same time, the better.

You won't see the benefit of that memory in a synthetic benchmark tailored upon FPS. If you make one the specifically targets using more textures than a 128meg card can hold at once, the difference will be obvious.

If you want to test real world, I suggest you compare a 32meg card vs. a 256 meg card in something like dark age of camelot+expansions, during RvR, where you've got lots and lots and lots of textures to deal with.

comparing a 32mb card to a 256mb card......that like comparing a fiat punto to a ferrari, for starters the card with 32mb is gonna be a$$ slow......tnt2, ati 7000, the 256mb could well be a 5200 non ultra, but in them terms the 5200 is gonna win obviously..........IMO a 256mb 9600 NON PRO vs a 128mb NON pro the 256 will be slower..because the 256 version has slower ram.

 

[Triforceofcourage]

my 9600 pro 128 ownz you all!!