Polaris 10 benchmarks...

[Glo.]

With memory compression it is not a big deal. It should do what it is supposed to do for next 2-3 years in 1080p and 1440p. Biggest problem for longevity of this GPUs, and I mean all of the 14/16 nm GPUs so far is 256 Bit bus. 4K is still not reliable, unless you go dual GPU setup.

 

[sm625]

I have heard the same story since the last decade in gaming. Not that long ago 2GB was sufficient for 1080p gaming.

It still is!

http://www.techspot.com/review/1114-vram-comparison-test/

Wow with all this misinformation is it any wonder so many people are willing to pay 70% more than what they need just for a brand name?

Notice how the 960 2GB does relatively better than the 380 2GB. It looks like memory compression is worth an extra 500MB maybe more. But neither are far behind their 4GB cousins at 1080p anyway. For the most part, going from 2GB to 4GB is useless. With memory compression, 4GB would then be worth 5GB and the next generation of memory compression might put that up near 6GB. 4GB cards should be fine for 1080p for the next 4 years. They should be fine until 16GB consoles launch.

 

[therealnickdanger]

RAM packages from suppliers are getting larger and larger, so I'm not going to complain about getting 8GB on budget/mainstream cards when offered - just like I didn't complain when budget/mainstream cards had 4GB. When I want to play a simple, yet texture-heavy game at 4K (Minecraft/Skyrim mods, etc.), it's nice to have the extra space if needed.

On the other hand, games that "require" more VRAM like Doom's Nightmare Graphics Mode, can still be played pretty damn well with 3.5GB:
https://youtu.be/6gZ7XqraaIc

As the adage goes - I'd rather have it and not need it than need it and not have it. The actual retail prices usually don't differ much.

 

[Enigmoid]

It still is!

http://www.techspot.com/review/1114-vram-comparison-test/

Wow with all this misinformation is it any wonder so many people are willing to pay 70% more than what they need just for a brand name?

Notice how the 960 2GB does relatively better than the 380 2GB. It looks like memory compression is worth an extra 500MB maybe more. But neither are far behind their 4GB cousins at 1080p anyway. For the most part, going from 2GB to 4GB is useless. With memory compression, 4GB would then be worth 5GB and the next generation of memory compression might put that up near 6GB. 4GB cards should be fine for 1080p for the next 4 years. They should be fine until 16GB consoles launch.

I don't know why this is still going on.

Memory compression is for bandwidth NOT actual VRAM capacity.

4 GB is 4 GB. Does not matter what kind of compression is used.

100 GB/s can function as effectively 100+ GB/s with memory bandwidth compression.

 

[Magic Carpet]

Yeah, I'd avoid 4GB "gaming" cards today. AMD or NV. Newer games can use all avaialble space, extra memory is always handy (e.g. RoTR).

 

[Ma_Deuce]

Absolutely nothing points to this. In the leaked 3Dmark scores, 1070 is ~27% over the highest Polaris 10 bin.

Also its the 4GB version being 199$.

You have seen benchmarks of the highest Polaris 10 bin? Link?

 

[tonyfreak215]

Unless someone is really committed to running intense 3rd party graphics mods 4GB shouldn't be a major concern for 1080P at least. If someone really wants 8GB it should be $30-50 more, still well below 1070 stated MSRP. For the giant pool of 1080P users the performance of 480 will be pretty solid.

Based on the lifespan of AMD GCN Cards, the 4GB might be an issue by the time the 480 is obsolete.

 

[ShintaiDK]

You have seen benchmarks of the highest Polaris 10 bin? Link?

http://videocardz.com/60253/amd-radeon-r9-480-3dmark11-benchmarks

That's what this thread is based on.

 

[mohit9206]

Dual 480s in Xfire for $400 would completely destroy a single $400 1070 right?
But Xfire and SLI are dead since game companies hardly ever put any effort in optimizing games for dual gpu setup so no point considering Xfire or SLI these days.

Yeah, I'd avoid 4GB "gaming" cards today. AMD or NV. Newer games can use all avaialble space, extra memory is always handy (e.g. RoTR).

Yeah you're right.Although i am currently playing ROTR on a GT730 1gb gddr5 card and getting nice smooth 20fps on lowest settings at 1600*900.:'(

 

[tential]

Dual 480s in Xfire for $400 would completely destroy a single $400 1070 right?
But Xfire and SLI are dead since game companies hardly ever put any effort in optimizing games for dual gpu setup so no point considering Xfire or SLI these days.

Yeah you're right.Although i am currently playing ROTR on a GT730 1gb gddr5 card and getting nice smooth 20fps on lowest settings at 1600*900.:'(

Not sure where this whole "Crossfire/SLI is dead" thing got started on. Lots of games still support crossfire/sli... Sometimes you have to wait for a profile.

 

[MrTeal]

4GB is likely to be a limiting factor in games within the next few years, and you won't be able to max out textures with the lower tier of cards. That being said, it remains to be seen if that ends up being an issue in practice. This is still a $200 card, and even at 1080p you will be making some compromises in settings in AAA games in a couple years to get playable framerates anyway whether you have 4GB or 8GB, just like you do now even if you chose a 4GB GTX960.

I definitely wouldn't choose a 4GB card for CF though.

 

[n0x1ous]

Not sure where this whole "Crossfire/SLI is dead" thing got started on. Lots of games still support crossfire/sli... Sometimes you have to wait for a profile.

with DX12 not supporting "traditional" driver based AFR stuff I think there is an assumption that developers will not put in the effort for multi-adapter. They are not used to having to the do the work for it since it was all driver based by AMD and Nvidia before so I think its a reasonable assumption (with exceptions of course like DICE)

 

[ShintaiDK]

with DX12 not supporting "traditional" driver based AFR stuff I think there is an assumption that developers will not put in the effort for multi-adapter. They are not used to having to the do the work for it since it was all driver based by AMD and Nvidia before so I think its a reasonable assumption (with exceptions of course like DICE)

It really boils down to time and money the developer need to add as extra cost.

 

[maddie]

Dual 480s in Xfire for $400 would completely destroy a single $400 1070 right?
But Xfire and SLI are dead since game companies hardly ever put any effort in optimizing games for dual gpu setup so no point considering Xfire or SLI these days.

Yeah you're right.Although i am currently playing ROTR on a GT730 1gb gddr5 card and getting nice smooth 20fps on lowest settings at 1600*900.:'(

My view is that multi GPU whether SLI, XFire or something else is about to experience a renaissance.

It is the expressed desire of AMD to facilitate the transition to a multi-GPU world as stated by Koduri, and they have started the process.

Game engines.
Game developers.
Automated tools for simplifying the process.

Quote:
"With changes in Moore’s Law and the realities of process technology and processor construction, multi-GPU is going to be more important for the entire product stack, not just the extreme enthusiast crowd. Why? Because realities are dictating that GPU vendors build smaller, more power efficient GPUs, and to scale performance overall, multi-GPU solutions need to be efficient and plentiful. The “economics of the smaller die” are much better for AMD (and we assume NVIDIA) and by 2017-2019, this is the reality and will be how graphics performance will scale. Getting the software ecosystem going now is going to be crucial to ease into that standard.

 

[Hitman928]

with DX12 not supporting "traditional" driver based AFR stuff I think there is an assumption that developers will not put in the effort for multi-adapter. They are not used to having to the do the work for it since it was all driver based by AMD and Nvidia before so I think its a reasonable assumption (with exceptions of course like DICE)

Doesn't dx12 support implicit multi-gpu? I think explicit is being pushed as the superior solution but I believe implicit is still available if a dev wants to go that route.

 

[RussianSensation]

You are comparing different timelines. Do you think 4GB is enough 2-3 years from now? 4GB was fine, 2 years ago. 4GB is unlikely to be fine 2 years from now.

AMD sold 8GB 390/390X next to 4GB Fiji. 2 tunges

Useless comparison. Even ROTTR uses dynamic VRAM allocation. 780Ti 3GB does just fine in reference to an R9 290 4GB in this game.
http://www.guru3d.com/articles_pages/msi_geforce_gtx_1080_gaming_x_8g_review,13.html

Considering your vicious defending of 960/950 2GB cards against R9 380 4GB/R9 280 3GB/R9 280X 3GB/R9 380X 4GB, your opinion about 4GB not being sufficient for 2016-2018 for 1080p 60Hz gaming is laughable all things considered. This is how it's going to go in the real world:

$199 RX 480 4GB = perfect for 2 years @ 1080p 60hz for the vast majority of i3/i5/FX users. If they have fear, they will have access to pay $30 more for the RX 480 8GB if they so desire.

vs.

$379 GTX 1070 8GB = spend $179 more, be CPU bottlenecked in many games unless one has i7 4790K/Skylake @ 4.5Ghz.

The RX 480 4GB user can sell the card for $100 in 2 years, take $179 savings and buy him/herself a $279 card in 2018 that smashes 1070.

Right now, there isn't a single game I am aware off that is 4GB of VRAM bottlenecked at 1080p. Chances are that by the time such game comes out, RX 480's performance won't be fast enough. I can totally back 1070/1080 having 8GB of VRAM since they are aimed at 1440p and when in SLI great for 4K gaming.

I can already see why the usual suspects are crapping on the 4GB model since it's just justification right now to discredit the amazing value this card has. The reason we recommended R9 390 8GB over 970 3.5GB wasn't because of 8GB of VRAM but because it was as fast or faster at 1440p (better longevity), had superior DX12 architecture and had at least 4GB of fast GDDR5. If R9 390/390X was available with only 4GB of VRAM, I'd recommend people save their $ and get that over the 8GB model.

What's going to happen is predictable. NV fans will attack 4GB cards but once 1060 6GB comes out, suddenly it'll be the sweetspot for 1080p 60Hz?

This is you and your crew from 2012-2016:

2012 = 670 2GB / 680 2GB vs. 7950 /7970 3GB = no, no 2GB, it's FINE! Don't get AMD cards they suck.

2013 =
770 2GB vs. R9 280X 3GB = 2GB is fine!
780 3GB vs. R9 290 4GB = 3GB is fine for 1440p
780Ti 3GB vs. R9 290X 4GB = 3GB is fine for 1440p
Don't get AMD cards they suck.

2014 =
970 3.5GB vs. R9 290 4GB = 3.5GB is fine for 1440p
980 SLI for 1440p/4K 4GB = 4GB is fine even in 980 SLI
Don't get AMD cards they suck.

2015 =
960 2GB vs. R9 380 4GB/R9 380X 4GB/R9 280/280X 3GB = 2GB is fine for 1080p!!!
970 3.5GB vs. R9 390 8GB = 3.5GB is fine for 1080p
980 4GB vs. R9 390X 8GB = 4GB is fine for 1440p
970 SLI 3.5GB = 3.5GB is fine for 1440p!

Then, Fury X 4GB comes out vs. 980Ti 6GB. Overnight = 6GB = perfect for 4K but 4GB not enough. Still no one is discussing how 3.5-4GB isn't enough for 1440p. Not a single benchmark online showing Fury X being bottlenecked by 4GB HBM at 1440p while having sufficient GPU horsepower to get playable FPS.

Your tune: Don't get AMD cards they suck.

2016 =
No announcement from AMD repeat everything from 2015 regarding VRAM requirements = 4GB not enough for 4K, 3.5-4GB is enough up to 1440p, 2GB still defended for 1080p. 6GB is now a sweetspot for 4K since 980Ti has it!

Don't get AMD cards they suck.

BAM, Pascal comes out with 8GB cards. All of a sudden 8GB is the minimum for 1440p. Ok fair enough for 2016-2018, I can roll with that if someone is spending $400-700 US. :thumbsup:

BAM, weeks later RX 480 comes out with 4GB/8GB models and suddenly:

RX 480 4GB isn't enough for 1080p 60Hz gaming!!! Wait for 1060 6GB or pay $180 extra for 1070 8GB, it's well worth it, you'll want it!

Don't get AMD cards they suck.

----

Same tune, year after year, goal posts shifting. Whatever it takes to recommend NV over AMD. How about recommending $280 after-market R9 290 4GB over 960 2-4GB for the entire 2015? No? Why do that when like a good NV customer one can buy a $200 960 2-4GB, then throw it into the garbage in 2016 and get a $200 1060 6GB? Everyone is happy (NV shareholders are for sure!). What kind of an idiot would pay $50-80 more for an R9 290 when it's better to enjoy a 960 and spend yet another $200 just to get a card slightly faster than a 290 in 2016 and pay another $200? What kind of an idiot would pay the same price for a faster R9 280X/380X 3-4GB over a 960 4GB when those cards require a 600W PSU to run them? VRAM future-proofing, stupid! That's YOU literally for all of 2015.

$199 RX 480 4GB is the best card for $150-300 mainstream/performance gaming and NV has nothing out to counter it. No, $379 1070 isn't the answer at all.

Plus, keep evading how $379-449 1070 is still a massive 52-80% more expensive than a $229-249 RX 480 8GB. Keep digging as your reputation on these forums is more or less equivalent to a non-paid NV focus group member. Fact is you NEVER recommended any AMD cards that had more VRAM in 2012-2016 until RX480 laid the smack down on NV's entire line-up right now. So it's impossible to take anything you say about VRAM recommendations seriously since you showed blatant BIAS for 4 years straight. Oh, and BTW, how are those 680 2GB and 980 4GB cards you bought doing nowadays? Both are garbage relative to their competitors. Just more proof you can't even provide good graphics card advice for gamers in the first place; so why should anyone listen to you? :sneaky:

 

[Squeetard]

SLI and xfire suck. Suck suck suck. I've ran one or the other since the early aught's. Because there wasn't a single card solution to max out games. Basically I fell for it. First off, just about every AAA game ever never supported either very well on release. had to wait for a fix. Second, it is crap technology poorly implemented with an inadequate bus (both! xfire and sli). They just threw this together to get people to buy another card and then forgot about it.

I currently have 2 7970's in xfire. The last 3 games I've played have yet to support xfire still. Tomb raider, the division and Elder scrolls online. The last one has been out for over 2 years now. And guess what. If you can get it to work by forcing a mode, it sucks. Micro stutter all the time. 40 fps in single card feels way smoother than 80 fps in xfire.

Ima buy a 1080 and never ever go multi gpu again. even this new sli bus is still a stupid solution. Think about it. why in the hell aren't they designed to pool resources, like behave like a 5280 thread 16gb ram single unit? Instead you have each card holding identical resources and just trading odd frames, over a shitty bus.

Grah, my second rant today. I haven't upgraded in like 3 years, used to jones for the latest tech and every 6 months something new would come that I just had to have. The 1080 is the first thing to come along in that time that I really want. Too bad the displays these days are crap, see my other rant.

Edit: Why are people stuck thinking that vram is only for the frame buffer and base their calcs off that? Your card holds geometry and textures and all kinds of stuff in memory.

 

[RussianSensation]

A 980 has noticeably more raw power than 390.

Ya, who cares what it has on paper. 390 is almost as fast as a 980 in modern games now for $230 less than a 980 cost. Worse yet, after-market 290X was selling for ~$260-270 USD and R9 295X2 was selling for $600-650 when 980 was $550.

980 never outlasted an R9 290X for modern gaming but was more like a waste of $280-290 straight into the toilet.

You cannot be serious trying to recommend a $379-449 1070 for 1080p 60Hz gaming over a $199-249 videocard not only because 1070 will have a far inferior price/performance (a huge metric for mainstream/performance buyers) but because most gamers never cross-shop a $380-450 videocard with a $200-250 one.

Mainstream buyers with i3/i5/FX CPUs can turn off GimpWorks gimmicks and use this card just fine for the next 2 years. Spending 60-80% more for 1080p 60Hz on a 1070 is a nice way to waste $ right there for these gamers because chances are most of them aren't playing everything on Ultra with 4xMSAA and GimpWorks turned on. That's why 85%+ of all PC gamers don't spend more than $350 on dGPUs.

If someone wants 60 fps minimums + everything cranked to the max and has a solid overclocked i5/i7 Skylake/Haswell, sure 1070 is a great card. But last time I checked no one recommended Fury X/980Ti for 1080p 60Hz gaming. Most gamers will find a $199 RX 480 4GB a solid 2-3X improvement in performance over their 750/750Ti/GTX760/950/960 2GB. :thumbsup:

 

[R0H1T]

Ya, who cares what it has on paper. 390 is almost as fast as a 980 in modern games now for $230 less than a 980 cost. Worse yet, after-market 290X was selling for ~$260-270 USD and R9 295X2 was selling for $600-650 when 980 was $550.

980 never outlasted an R9 290X for modern gaming but was more like a waste of $280-290 straight into the toilet.

You cannot be serious trying to recommend a $379-449 1070 for 1080p 60Hz gaming over a $199-249 videocard not only because 1070 will have a far inferior price/performance (a huge metric for mainstream/performance buyers) but because most gamers never cross-shop a $380-450 videocard with a $200-250 one.

Mainstream buyers with i3/i5/FX CPUs can turn off GimpWorks gimmicks and use this card just fine for the next 2 years. Spending 60-80% more for 1080p 60Hz on a 1070 is a nice way to waste $ right there for these gamers because chances are most of them aren't playing everything on Ultra with 4xMSAA and GimpWorks turned on. That's why 85%+ of all PC gamers don't spend more than $350 on dGPUs.

If someone wants 60 fps minimums + everything cranked to the max and has a solid overclocked i5/i7 Skylake/Haswell, sure 1070 is a great card. But last time I checked no one recommended Fury X/980Ti for 1080p 60Hz gaming. Most gamers will find a $199 RX 480 4GB a solid 2-3X improvement in performance over their 750/750Ti/GTX760/950/960 2GB. :thumbsup:

RS $trikes again, this should be a meme on VC&G

Just like me though I'm looking at p11 atm since it'd be a direct upgrade at similar TDP i.e. under 75W.

 

[maddie]

I keep seeing mention of the 6GB 1060. Why is no one mentioning the 3GB one. Use that against the 4GB RX480 and tell us your recommendations.

 

[Bacon1]

The only yikes is that you compare 4GB to 8GB and ignore the rest. Plus lets see how this Polaris 10 actually performs. Real world seems to be below 3Dmark so far.

Its also quite clear that perf/watt is completely lost for AMD with Polaris. So now we wait for Vega to perhaps fix this.

Where are your watt #'s coming from? Or are you just taking the 6 pin + board that maxes out at 150w as its normal usage? What happened to "lets see how it actually performs" that you wrote right above your jab?

 

[thilanliyan]

You are comparing different timelines. Do you think 4GB is enough 2-3 years from now? 4GB was fine, 2 years ago. 4GB is unlikely to be fine 2 years from now.

AMD sold 8GB 390/390X next to 4GB Fiji. 2 tunges

See here:
http://forums.anandtech.com/showpost.php?p=38125789&postcount=4

"I have a GTX980 in 1 box, GTX680 in another. There is still no time where the GTX680 is VRAM limited in terms of playable settings for its performance."

You said that only 2 months ago. So if 2GB is still fine now FOUR YEARS AFTER release, according to you, why won't 4GB be enough on a RX480 for the next couple of years?

 

[Thinker_145]

Ya, who cares what it has on paper. 390 is almost as fast as a 980 in modern games now for $230 less than a 980 cost. Worse yet, after-market 290X was selling for ~$260-270 USD and R9 295X2 was selling for $600-650 when 980 was $550.

980 never outlasted an R9 290X for modern gaming but was more like a waste of $280-290 straight into the toilet.

You cannot be serious trying to recommend a $379-449 1070 for 1080p 60Hz gaming over a $199-249 videocard not only because 1070 will have a far inferior price/performance (a huge metric for mainstream/performance buyers) but because most gamers never cross-shop a $380-450 videocard with a $200-250 one.

Mainstream buyers with i3/i5/FX CPUs can turn off GimpWorks gimmicks and use this card just fine for the next 2 years. Spending 60-80% more for 1080p 60Hz on a 1070 is a nice way to waste $ right there for these gamers because chances are most of them aren't playing everything on Ultra with 4xMSAA and GimpWorks turned on. That's why 85%+ of all PC gamers don't spend more than $350 on dGPUs.

If someone wants 60 fps minimums + everything cranked to the max and has a solid overclocked i5/i7 Skylake/Haswell, sure 1070 is a great card. But last time I checked no one recommended Fury X/980Ti for 1080p 60Hz gaming. Most gamers will find a $199 RX 480 4GB a solid 2-3X improvement in performance over their 750/750Ti/GTX760/950/960 2GB. :thumbsup:

Meh I never suggested that the 980 was a good card, certainly one of the worst Nvidia flagship in recent memory.

Your entire point ignores the fact that people upgrade their CPU eventually, if someone doesn't then they are not the sort of gamers I am talking to.

I bought a 7850 when I had a core 2 quad CPU but I knew I'll upgrade it eventually and I did.

Sent from my HTC One M9 using Tapatalk

 

[Armsdealer]

Just out of curiosity regarding the videocardz benchmarks, have we figured out if the numbers in that graph are overclocked or not? Remember there are two sets of data and vcz only graphed the better set.

 

[ShintaiDK]

See here:
http://forums.anandtech.com/showpost.php?p=38125789&postcount=4

"I have a GTX980 in 1 box, GTX680 in another. There is still no time where the GTX680 is VRAM limited in terms of playable settings for its performance."

You said that only 2 months ago. So if 2GB is still fine now FOUR YEARS AFTER release, according to you, why won't 4GB be enough on a RX480 for the next couple of years?

Not sure why you skipped the important part. It was mention twice and you even axed the first one.

More memory only makes sense if you can utilize it performance wise.

There is still no time where the GTX680 is VRAM limited in terms of playable settings for its performance.

Or if you want it simplified. The GTX680 isn't fast enough to use more memory.

Not to mention we are entering a time where VRAM is available in great volume. And that will be used and abused. Would I buy a 4GB card in 2016? Nope.

2012 2GB
2014 4GB
2016 8GB