8GB VRAM not enough (and 10 / 12)

[BFG10K]

8GB

• Dying Light 2, Battlefield 2042, Avatar Frontiers of Pandora, Call of Duty Modern Warfare 3, Starfield, Forza Horizon 5, Horizon Forbidden West, Alan Wake 2, The Last of Us, Tekken 8, FC 24, Detroit Become Human, Death Stranding, Alone in The Dark, Overwatch 2
  3060 12GB higher 1% low than 4060 8GB https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=gIfz57wmywg
• Cyberpunk 2077, Diablo 4, Hogwarts Legacy, Horizon Zero Dawn, Microsoft Flight Sim 2020, Witcher 3, Watch Dogs Legion skip to 4K + DLSS for each game https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=tPiaWWd0xGc
• Ratchet & Clank, Plague Tale Requiem, Last Of Us, Jedi Survivor, Far Cry 6, Hogwarts Legacy, Forza Horizon 5, Cyberpunk 2077 https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Wr3MckDxMfE&pp=ygUTMTZnYiB2cyA4Z2IgNDA2MCB0aQ==
• Far Cry 6, Godfall, Hogwarts Legacy, Forza Horizon 5, Forspoken, Doom Eternal, Watchdogs Legion https://youtu.be/fJc--C01P90?t=268
• Last Of Us, Resident Evil 4, Callisto Protocol, Plague Tale Requiem, Halo Infinite, Forspoken https://youtu.be/2_Y3E631ro8?t=429
• Last Of Us, Hogwarts Legacy, Resident Evil 4, Forspoken, Plague Tale Requiem, Callisto Protocol https://youtu.be/Rh7kFgHe21k?t=288
• Hogwarts Legacy, Last Of Us, Spider Man Remastered, Doom Eternal, Forza Horizon 5 https://youtu.be/R943CbDTq_s?t=1473
• Horizon Forbidden West 4060 has issues @ 1080p + DLSS unless you switch off frame generation and reduce settings to high https://youtu.be/3AyKvI23VGw?t=233
• Horizon Forbidden West 3070 requires reducing textures 2 notches https://youtu.be/xTwEGy6HHKo?t=351
• Deathloop https://youtu.be/lu_XHyO-6zY?t=918
• Ghost Recon Breakpoint https://youtu.be/iUGppQVpXzU?t=529
• Resident Evil 2 https://youtu.be/Aa-gsgRjMII?t=796
• Talos Principle 2 https://youtu.be/K6FATQAuEwI?t=337
• Spider Man Remastered https://youtu.be/vRVR_plVSlc?t=1060
• Witcher 3 https://youtu.be/vRVR_plVSlc?t=1240

Horizon Forbidden West 3060 is faster than the 2080 Super despite the former usually competing with the 2070. Also 3060 has a better 1% low than 4060 and 4060Ti 8GB.

Spoiler

Resident Evil Village 3060TI/3070 tanks at 4K and is slower than the 3060/6700XT when ray tracing:

Spoiler

Company Of Heroes 3060 has a higher minimum than the 3070TI:

Spoiler

10GB / 12GB

• Plague Tale Requiem 3080 10GB tanks if you enable ray tracing, would be fast enough if it had more VRAM because if you stop moving, the framerate stabilizes to >60FPS https://youtu.be/7zjrMww3fAc?t=496
• Hogwarts Legacy 4K + RT, 4060Ti 16GB is faster than 4070 12GB https://youtu.be/X-h_R488Mq8?t=191

Reasons why still shipping 8GB since 2014 isn't NV's fault.

Spoiler

1. It's the player's fault.
2. It's the reviewer's fault.
3. It's the developer's fault.
4. It's AMD's fault.
5. It's the game's fault.
6. It's the driver's fault.
7. It's a system configuration issue.
8. Wrong settings were tested.
9. Wrong area was tested.
10. Wrong games were tested.
11. 4K is irrelevant.
12. Texture quality is irrelevant as long as it matches a console's.
13. Detail levels are irrelevant as long as they match a console's.
14. There's no reason a game should use more than 8GB, because a random forum user said so.
15. It's completely acceptable for the more expensive 3070/3070TI/3080 to turn down settings while the cheaper 3060/6700XT has no issue.
16. It's an anomaly.
17. It's a console port.
18. It's a conspiracy against NV.
19. 8GB cards aren't meant for 4K / 1440p / 1080p / 720p gaming.
20. It's completely acceptable to disable ray tracing on NV while AMD has no issue.
21. Polls, hardware market share, and game title count are evidence 8GB is enough, but are totally ignored when they don't suit the ray tracing agenda.

According to some people here, 8GB is neeeevaaaaah NV's fault and objective evidence "doesn't count" because of reasons(tm). If you have others please let me know and I'll add them to the list. Cheers!

 

[DAPUNISHER]

How are the subtitles? His voice just hurts my brain so could only watch on mute with subtitles.

Click on the 3 dots ... and click show transcript. You can read what interests you.

 

[BFG10K]

He says an nVidia insider confirmed to him nVidia is aware 8GB is garbage. So it's obvious they did this on purpose. They put the smallest amount of VRAM they could get away with, while charging as much as possible,

 

[jpiniero]

GameGPU tested the latest patch for TLOU and the situation appears to be much better for nVidia 8 GB cards. There are limitations of course... there's still a perf hit at 1440p Max though not as bad as before the patch.

 

[SteveGrabowski]

GameGPU tested the latest patch for TLOU and the situation appears to be much better for nVidia 8 GB cards. There are limitations of course... there's still a perf hit at 1440p Max though not as bad as before the patch.

I guess 16GB of system RAM is killing me on this because my experience isn't matching these benchmarks. I'm getting low gpu usage, guessing because of the RAM.

The Last of Us Part I v. 1.0.2.0 тест GPU/CPU | Action / FPS / TPS | TEST GPU

В нашем свежем обзоре мы провели детальное тестирование видеокарт и процессоров на высоких и максимальных настройках графики, чтобы показать вам, как новый патч для The Last of Us Part I v1.0.2.0 повлиял на производительность и качество графики игры.

gamegpu.com

 

[Hitman928]

I guess 16GB of system RAM is killing me on this because my experience isn't matching these benchmarks. I'm getting low gpu usage, guessing because of the RAM.

The Last of Us Part I v. 1.0.2.0 тест GPU/CPU | Action / FPS / TPS | TEST GPU

В нашем свежем обзоре мы провели детальное тестирование видеокарт и процессоров на высоких и максимальных настройках графики, чтобы показать вам, как новый патч для The Last of Us Part I v1.0.2.0 повлиял на производительность и качество графики игры.

gamegpu.com

GameGPU historically has been one of the worst benchmarkers in terms of representative results. Often their benchmarks are walking around empty areas.

 

[SteveGrabowski]

GameGPU historically has been one of the worst benchmarkers in terms of representative results. Often their benchmarks are walking around empty areas.

I watched the video on their site to see the exact area they benchmarked and my performance isn't matching up to theirs in that exact area. Guessing maybe it's the RAM.

 

[kondziowy]

The Last of Us, Resident Evil 4, Hogwarts, Forspoken, Plague Tale Requiem, The Callisto Protocol, all unplayeable on 8GB, or if playable - textures are popping in and out constantly. Seems like TLOU 1.0.2.0 is still not fixed despite people saying it's better, we can also see 8GB cards dropping like a rock on max settings 1440p in gamegpu test.

 

[igor_kavinski]

Guessing maybe it's the RAM.

Is your ram usage maxed out while running TLOU?

 

[DAPUNISHER]

The Last of Us, Resident Evil 4, Hogwarts, Forspoken, Plague Tale Requiem, The Callisto Protocol, all unplayeable on 8GB, or if playable - textures are popping in and out constantly. Seems like TLOU 1.0.2.0 is still not fixed despite people saying it's better, we can also see 8GB cards dropping like a rock on max settings 1440p in gamegpu test.

TLDW - The 6800 can outperform the 3070 even with ray tracing in some of the newest AAA games because of the VRAM limitations. Image quality is often hugely better. That's not hyperbole, we are talking textures not loading, popping in and out, and the kind of frame pacing issues that are well beyond playable. The only answer to which, is to turn down the settings, when on the 6800 you don't have to. There was even an instance where DLSS providing 720p internal rendering couldn't save it.

On a related note: Steve's testing methodology for this comparison addressed every grIevance I have expressed in my running 3yr diatribe 😝 concerning game testing by reviewers. Pointing out that his trusty bar graphs could be misleading. Showing how everything looks fine for 30 seconds of test run, but once the frame buffer filled up, the gameplay became a hot mess. Analysing the image quality in a scene for issues, that the bar graphs would hide. Making it seem like performance on that card is fine, when textures aren't loading properly or at all. Best of all, showing the gameplay footage for a change, so you can see everything for yourself. Including the terrible frame pacing issues. I would like to see more of that level of detailed testing from him in the future. It's what I usually only find on smaller channels that don't have to constantly churn out content to maximise revenue.

 

[IEC]

The crazy part is the 6800 is outperforming the 3070 with RT enabled simply due to having adequate vRAM vs inadequate 8GB...

HWL fixed the crashing issue when running out of vRAM, but texture popping is horrendous and it's still a stuttery mess with 8GB vRAM even with DLSS enabled (i.e. rendering at 720p and upscaling).

These games are just the harbinger of what is to come - the days of optimizing for 8GB vRAM are ending. 8GB is relegated to entry level. Even 10-12GB are on borrowed time. Enthusiasts should not buy anything under 16GB of vRAM if they intend to play games coming out in 2024 and 2025.

 

[VirtualLarry]

These games are just the harbinger of what is to come - the days of optimizing for 8GB vRAM are ending. 8GB is relegated to entry level. Even 10-12GB are on borrowed time. Enthusiasts should not buy anything under 16GB of vRAM if they intend to play games coming out in 2024 and 2025.

Agree wholeheartedly. Dropped $630 + TAX just now on an ASRock RX 6950XT 16GB GDDR6 card. Hope it serves me well for the next few years. (Main RAM is 64GB.)

 

[SteveGrabowski]

The crazy part is the 6800 is outperforming the 3070 with RT enabled simply due to having adequate vRAM vs inadequate 8GB...

HWL fixed the crashing issue when running out of vRAM, but texture popping is horrendous and it's still a stuttery mess with 8GB vRAM even with DLSS enabled (i.e. rendering at 720p and upscaling).

These games are just the harbinger of what is to come - the days of optimizing for 8GB vRAM are ending. 8GB is relegated to entry level. Even 10-12GB are on borrowed time. Enthusiasts should not buy anything under 16GB of vRAM if they intend to play games coming out in 2024 and 2025.

Yeah makes me wish I would have sprung the extra $100 for an RX 6800 instead of a 6700 XT. Oh well, at least didn't get completely screwed with a 3060 Ti.

 

[BFG10K]

It's actually shocking how bad the 3070 performs in some of those tests. The fact that AMD beats them at their own game (ray tracing) while delivering visibly better image quality is delicious irony. Even the "ten sore" cores can't stop the trainwreck we're witnessing.

Even fails at 1080p upscaled which is basically 720p. We were told 3070 isn't a 4K or even a 1440p Ultra card, so I guess now it isn't a 1080p / 720p card either. It must be a 480p card! That's right folks, 12 months ago during the pandemic you paid up to $1400 so you could game at a VGA resolution of 640 x 480, just like a Voodoo 1 back in the day.

Certain individuals on the internet claimed patches "fixed" the issues but in reality the games simply don't load full textures now. Expect "Dee El Ess Ess" 4.0 any minute now, which shrinks textures and then uses "aye eye" to scale them back up. nVidia redefined what resolution and frames mean, so there's no reason they can't redefine what a texture is.

Today 12GB cards are right at the edge just like 8GB cards were 18 months ago, and history will repeat. If 4060/4060Ti aren't both well under $300, they're DOA. nVidia puts the bare minimum VRAM they can get away with because certain fanbois will just give them more money to "upgrade".

Jensen: "You see this here [planned obsolescence]? It just works!"

 

[jpiniero]

I watched the video on their site to see the exact area they benchmarked and my performance isn't matching up to theirs in that exact area. Guessing maybe it's the RAM.

Makes sense... TLOU is presumably putting the textures that are flushed in system memory in case it needs to put it back. If there's room of course. I wonder if it would be the uncompressed version or not.

Certain individuals on the internet claimed patches "fixed" the issues but in reality the games simply don't load full textures now. Expect "Dee El Ess Ess" 4.0 any minute now, which shrinks textures and then uses "aye eye" to scale them back up. nVidia redefined what resolution and frames mean, so there's no reason they can't redefine what a texture is.

Again, the real solution is DirectStorage if devs can get parity with the consoles. If that's not possible then who knows.

 

[SteveGrabowski]

Is your ram usage maxed out while running TLOU?

TLOU is a mess. Sometimes I'm only showing 10GB RAM usage, other times it'll be over 15GB in the same area. Game is always run with everything else closed though. I'll probably be upping my RAM to 32GB in the next week or two anyways since I'm scared of RAM shooting up in price if I don't upgrade soon since RAM always seems like it's either really cheap or really expensive and we're in the really cheap time, at least with DDR4.

 

[DAPUNISHER]

I'll probably be upping my RAM to 32GB in the next week or two anyways since I'm scared of RAM shooting up in price if I don't upgrade soon since RAM always seems like it's either really cheap or really expensive and we're in the really cheap time, at least with DDR4.

As I've mentioned, I grabbed a couple of 32GB kits of 3600 myself. I read demand for it continues to fall, so it may drop another $5-$10 soon. Now is still a great time to buy of course.

 

[Saylick]

The crazy part is the 6800 is outperforming the 3070 with RT enabled simply due to having adequate vRAM vs inadequate 8GB...

HWL fixed the crashing issue when running out of vRAM, but texture popping is horrendous and it's still a stuttery mess with 8GB vRAM even with DLSS enabled (i.e. rendering at 720p and upscaling).

These games are just the harbinger of what is to come - the days of optimizing for 8GB vRAM are ending. 8GB is relegated to entry level. Even 10-12GB are on borrowed time. Enthusiasts should not buy anything under 16GB of vRAM if they intend to play games coming out in 2024 and 2025.

@Kepler_L2 had the best take on that video imo.

 

[BFG10K]

OP has been updated, including 4 new reasons(tm) why none of this is nVidia's fault.

 

[DAPUNISHER]

OP has been updated, including 4 new reasons(tm) why none of this is nVidia's fault.

You are getting a little cheeky with that list, but it is well deserved IMO.

 

[DAPUNISHER]

I dig the Gru meme format. I like quite a few SpongeBob formats too.



fixed it to vram.

 

[fleshconsumed]

It's actually shocking how bad the 3070 performs in some of those tests. The fact that AMD beats them at their own game (ray tracing) while delivering visibly better image quality is delicious irony. Even the "ten sore" cores can't stop the trainwreck we're witnessing.

That's the AMD's "fine wine" in the works. To be accurate, that phrase was always a misnomer, it's not that AMD cards improved with age, it's just that they fared better relative to nvidia cards because nvidia historically either stopped optimizing for older architectures or gimped their cards with not enough VRAM (960 2GB and 1060 3GB for example, and now 30 and 40 series).

 

[DAPUNISHER]

That's the AMD's "fine wine" in the works. To be accurate, that phrase was always a misnomer, it's not that AMD cards improved with age, it's just that they fared better relative to nvidia cards because nvidia historically either stopped optimizing for older architectures or gimped their cards with not enough VRAM (960 2GB and 1060 3GB for example, and now 30 and 40 series).

I'd add to that, by stating AMD usually releases a new architecture before it's fully baked. And it takes 6 months or more of driver polish to be the product that should have launched.

 

[BFG10K]

 

[fleshconsumed]

I'd add to that, by stating AMD usually releases a new architecture before it's fully baked. And it takes 6 months or more of driver polish to be the product that should have launched.

I specifically did not mention that because I don't think that's a real factor. Yes, AMD does work on drivers delivering improved performance, but so does nvidia. From what I've seen both nvidia and AMD deliver performance improvement throughout product lifetime so the performance gap between nvidia and AMD stays about the same. That is until nvidia stops optimizing, which typically happens a lot faster than AMD, or until nvidia runs out of VRAM, which again, has been a sore point with nvidia going back a decade.

 

[DAPUNISHER]

I specifically did not mention that because I don't think that's a real factor. Yes, AMD does work on drivers delivering improved performance, but so does nvidia. From what I've seen both nvidia and AMD deliver performance improvement throughout product lifetime so the performance gap between nvidia and AMD stays about the same. That is until nvidia stops optimizing, which typically happens a lot faster than AMD, or until nvidia runs out of VRAM, which again, has been a sore point with nvidia going back a decade.

Maybe I'm splitting hairs? Or worse yet extending my own experience too far? I pre-ordered a RX 5700XT and it was the worst experience I had with a GPU since the early 2000s. Only GPU I ever sent back. I kept checking the owner's thread to see when it was good enough to buy. But there were so many complaints months later, that I caved in and ended up with a 2060 super and 2070 super.

Besides whitelisting Forza Horizon 5 for ReBAR I can't remember the last time Nvidia had a big boost in a game months after it was out. With AMD, a considerable improvement in performance months or even years later, seems more common place.

On topic: Yeah, they have been stingy with VRAM for a long time. 8GB has hit the wall much harder than low VRAM cards usually do.