Yes, Lisa...you DO need 8 or 12 VRAM on your next card purchase!

[Sesquashtoo 2,846]

VRAM holds much more than merely textures, and other things you take for granted....it holds frame buffer, color and light shadow maps, 

 

This was one of the best VRAM-How much do you need  video explanations, that I have have viewed to date.  

 

We have so many comments on AVSIM, that P3D and FSX do not use more VRAM on their card, so a 4GB or 6GB card will suffice.

 

Not actually so, if you wish to fully open up, your flight sim...  Many of your visual headaches,  texture popping, stuttering, just-can't seem-to-get-AA-to-my-visual requirements...can BE, because you simply do not have enough fast VRAM for your GPU to pull off of, store off of...and this results in visual constrictions.

 

I found this out, very , very much with my upgrade from a 2GB card, to an 8GB VRAM card.   The on-screen performance has literally exploded across the screen (smile).  So much so, that I have no pressure, whatsoever, to need to upgrade my 7 year old i7-975 Extreme CPU.  None, whatsoever.  All my flight sims have internal maxed out feature sets. 

 

This video pretty well, explains to myself at least, WHY this has partly happened, without the need to upgrade my CPU as well.

 

In a nutshell,  my new EVGA 1070 FTW 8 GB  video card, can now store in real-time, all the rasters, frame buffer information,  color maps,  shadow and light maps, ...it needs to immediately access, for to render to the present video frame demand.  That could be the source of my staggering increase in FPS and AA performance, with being paired to my same CPU.

 

Anyway, enough preamble.   Watch the video to the end...and it should make it apparent, that an 8 GB, or 12 GB  VRAM card is much preferable in not only current games, but anything else coming over the horizon, and even long-in-the-tooth FSX and P3D. Absolutely for XP 64 bit!

 

Cheers,

 

Ses

 

[simmerhead 885]

We have so many comments on AVSIM, that P3D and FSX do not use more VRAM on their card, so a 4GB or 6GB card will suffice.

 

I found this out, very , very much with my upgrade from a 2GB card, to a 8GB VRAM card.   The on-screen performance has literally exploded across the screen (smile).  

 

Well, the proof would be if you upgraded from a GTX 1070 4GB card to a 6 or 8GB card and saw a big difference, not throwing out an older card with a much newer one that had insufficient VRAM in the first place. Also the PCIe and CPU pipeline makes a big difference. That's why a new, but slower CPU, can make things run faster at slower clock speeds (at least in theory).

 

That said, I'm no tech expert, but can't you monitor VRAM usage with GPU-Z? Wouldn't GPU-Z show if you used all of the 6-8GB of VRAM on your card?

[Sesquashtoo 2,846]

Well, the proof would be if you upgraded from a GTX 1070 4GB card to a 6 or 8GB card and saw a big difference, not throwing out an older card with a much newer one that had insufficient VRAM in the first place. Also the PCIe and CPU pipeline makes a big difference. That's why a new, but slower CPU, can make things run faster at slower clock speeds (at least in theory).

 

That said, I'm no tech expert, but can't you monitor VRAM usage with GPU-Z? Wouldn't GPU-Z show if you used all of the 6-8GB of VRAM on your card?

I guess it could, but really what resonated with me, is that as games and hopefully, newer flight sim engines come on line...they will require a card with at least 8 GB's of VRAM. I CAN tell you that the present XP 10.51rc 64 bit flight sim...right now...WILL use just around 6.8-9 GB's of VRAM with every feature, set to maximum value, as well as 3rdP mesh, etc, and that blows me away.  I can now run 3rdP tuber and business class cockpits at an easy 33 FPS, and this with the rest of the sim full on...as well as SMP and other add-on's. 

 

Sure, it is also due to Pascal GPU'ness onboard...but after watching this video, I would'nt even consider anything less than 8GB's onboard for a future purchase.  Just sayin'...

[simmerhead 885]

Agree.

 

The GPU has become a computer of it's own and I would never consider anything but top of the line cards for flight simming when buying a new computer. 

[Sesquashtoo 2,846]

Agree.

 

The GPU has become a computer of it's own and I would never consider anything but top of the line cards for flight simming when buying a new computer. 

Totally, on the same page, with the above!