How Much VRAM is enough? - 1440p Gaming

Toggle sidebar Toggle sidebar
C

Christopher Gonzalez

Honorable
Jul 27, 2013
330
0
10,810
Hey Guys!

I'm debating the GTX 780 ti vs. the R9 290X (Pretty much whichever model of both that has the highest factory OC) because I'm worried that the 3 GB won't be enough for 1440p Gaming on next-gen titles. I know the 780 ti chip will crush the 290x, but the extra VRAM is very tempting considering I could Crossfire and make up the performance... I really want the features of Geforce experience, mainly shadowplay, but I'm willing to compromise. I'll probably SLI later down the road, either card I get.

i7 4770k, 16 GB 1866MHz, Any capable MOBO, 840 Pro, 1 TB Black, a big enough case, that's about it.
Will be getting 2560x1440 monitor upon purchase of card.

Upgrading from- Xeon, LOL Diamond Radeon 6450, 8 GB 1600MHz, (just a Dell workstation with a 6450 in it).
 
Sort by date Sort by votes
Novuake

Novuake

Champion
Aug 27, 2011
14,308
0
56,960
"I know the 780 ti chip will crush the 290x."

Dont be so sure about that. Wait for aftermarket coolers. Personally think the GTX780ti will win, but crush is an overstatement.

Personally I would suggest you wait for the aftermarket cooling on both cards and see how that pans out.

Right now I actually would say go for 2 R9 290s instead, since the 150$ premium for 290X is not really worth it.
 
Upvote 0 Downvote
G

g4bandit

Honorable
Nov 6, 2012
16
0
10,520
at 1440p 3gb is more than adequate. Its even fine for 1080p triple monitor set ups (which has about 25% more pixels). As long as you plan to not move to 4k or triple monitor 1440p, you should be fine (triple monitor 1440p would be the absolute edge of 3gigs.)
 
Upvote 0 Downvote
burdenbound

burdenbound

Splendid
Aug 9, 2011
3,225
0
22,960
I currently have a 7970 and I haven't come close to hitting the 3GB of VRAM on the card when playing games @1440p. I think you would want more than 4GB if you ever planned on going with three 1440 screens but for a single one you should be ok.

The 780ti doesn't crush the 290x though, it's only a little faster at 1440p and up, and for the price I would get the 290x after some better cooling solutions come out. If you want to stick with nvidia and you have the money the 780ti will not disappoint.
 
Upvote 0 Downvote
ingtar33

ingtar33

Glorious
Dec 17, 2012
9,017
198
45,840


not so sure about "crush"... considering any benches with the r9-290x in uber mode show the two cards 0%-5% apart...

The xfire numbers for the 290x are eyepopping... good enough and with low enough latency as to make nvidia cards in SLi to look quite poor options in comparison; xfire is clearly fixed on the 290/290x atleast.

That said, 1440p, the only title i know of that uses more then 2gb of vram at that resolution is BF4... and it barely uses more. 3gb of vram should be fine in a single card settup at pretty much any resolution... in SLi, down the road with more demanding games you'll probably feel ram bottlenecked.

So here is my suggestion.

If you don't mind playing around with fan settings or getting an Arctic Accelero Extreme III onto your r9-290x i would get the r9-290x now.

If that isn't attractive to you, then wait till some black or extreme edition of the 780ti comes out with more then 3gb of vram.

If both of those options aren't attractive to you get yourself the r9-290... two of them will destroy one of either of those cards, and cost just a little more then one 780ti.
 
Upvote 0 Downvote
C

Christopher Gonzalez

Honorable
Jul 27, 2013
330
0
10,810


I'll be doing both 3x 1080p and 1x 1440p (not at same time) switching off.
 
Upvote 0 Downvote
S

sancco

Distinguished
Sep 16, 2009
216
0
18,710
i play BF4 on 1440p and at the moment i'm regularly reaching 2.4GB on a 3GB card. this isn't even with full settings (AA, etc). 1 year ago i was debating 680 vs 7970 and am glad i went with the 7970 and it's 3gb vram, otherwise i'd be bottlenecked right now.

go AMD's 584-bit 4GB card.
 
Upvote 0 Downvote
You must log in or register to reply here.

TRENDING THREADS

Latest posts

Moderators online

Share this page

COMPANY
RESOURCES
FOLLOW
Top Bottom