128 vs 256 in D3

[John_Ryan07]

Hey, im getting a 9800pro but was wondering if its worth shelling out the extra $40 for 256mb of ram, i plan to play Doom 3 with this so i know more ram is an issue but didnt know whether if it was just for high end cards. Also does anybody know which company makes the best 9800pro card? I think i'm going to stick with the one made by ATI because i heard they use pretty fast ram (samsung / hynix) because i plan on OCing it. Thanks!

im sorry if this was posted previously, i looked and couldn't find anything related.

 

[priyajeet]

D3 has ocing issues, as Carmack has said. People have still done it and you can try too.

Brand: HIS Iceq...good for ocing too.

for D3 more memory is better (doesnt mean the card will be faster) bcos D3 has large detailed textures. With more mem u can have certain maps uncompressed (look below). Assuming ur system is not a bottleneck, I would say a 256 MB is better for Doom3.

You can tweak ur card in D3 to take advantage of 256MB Ram.

" The particular area from very early in the game that Timedemo1 uses isn't painting an accurate picture of overall game performance nor is it showing us the proper differences between the boards. The texture load for the particular area utilized in Timedemo1 is relatively low compared to other areas in the game and while we see the 128MB and 256MB parts performing very close overall for that bench, in game performance on other levels is going to show a significantly larger difference and will likely result in the 128MB parts being unplayable in certain areas, with the 256MB parts playing without a hiccup even though the parts may show identical results in the benches we are reporting here."

THG also said

High Quality: for 256MB video cards. Uses compression ( DXT1,3,5 ) for specular diffuse and no compression for normal maps. This looks very similar to Ultra quality but the compression does cause some loss.

Medium Quality: for 128MB video cards. Uses compression for specular, diffuse, and normal maps. This still looks really good but compressing the normal maps can produce a few artifacts, especially on hard-angled or round edges.

<i> <font color=blue>Futile is resistance,</font color=blue><font color=red> assimilate you we will.</font color=red> </i>
<b>Hard work has a future payoff. Laziness pays off now.</b><P ID="edit"><FONT SIZE=-1><EM>Edited by priyajeet on 08/24/04 09:50 PM.</EM></FONT></P>

 

[John_Ryan07]

i guess i'll go ahead and get the one with 256mb then, im sure it'll pay off seeing how the D3 engine will be used in other games, so im sure the extra ram will be justified later as well.

My question now is do i buy an ATI card and outfit it with an Arctic Cooling VGA Silencer(newegg), or would i be better off buying the HIS one, which is about the same price if you add costs for VGA cooler. I just want the best OCing ability and i feel the VGA silencer would be a better option for that, but i dont know anything about the HIS memory and whatnot. Thanks for your help!

 

[priyajeet]

are the HIS cards with 256 MB ram ?

<i> <font color=blue>Futile is resistance,</font color=blue><font color=red> assimilate you we will.</font color=red> </i>
<b>Hard work has a future payoff. Laziness pays off now.</b>

 

[John_Ryan07]

there are two, one with, and one without. the one with 256mb is aprox $330, but you do get a hl2 voucher with that.

 

[priyajeet]

get it !

<i> <font color=blue>Futile is resistance,</font color=blue><font color=red> assimilate you we will.</font color=red> </i>
<b>Hard work has a future payoff. Laziness pays off now.</b>

 

[John_Ryan07]

w00t! thanks for the help!

 

[priyajeet]

make sure u look at prices for the next best card...i mean u shouldnt spend 330 for a pro if an xt is for 340.

<i> <font color=blue>Futile is resistance,</font color=blue><font color=red> assimilate you we will.</font color=red> </i>
<b>Hard work has a future payoff. Laziness pays off now.</b>

 

[John_Ryan07]

yeah i made sure of that and looked around, but this seems to be where it's at

 

[gaussian]

I've got a question along the same lines as this post. I'm looking to upgrade my graphics card so that I can play HL2 and ROME:Total War. I don’t know if I should buy a newer card or an older card with more memory (i.e. 256MB). I made the mistake of buying a standard 5200 last time around and don’t want to repeat this error. Any ideas? I have around $270 to spend

Thanks

 

[gaussian]

OK Sorry was just looking through the boards and found a thread from Jim1013 answering my question.

http://forumz.tomshardware.com/hardware/modules.php?name=Forums&file=viewtopic&p=410812#410812

 

[pauldh]

I'd wait for HL2 to come out. How will a 256MB Radeon 9800 Pro compare to a plain GF6800 128MB? Also, your price range has the X800's and 6800GT out of the question, so it's looking like Radeon 9800 Pro 128MB and 256MB, and GF6800(non ultra) will be the best bets in your price range.

I picked up a new Retail BBA 9800 pro 128MB for $170 a few weeks ago. Hard to find at that price though. Is the GF6800 worth $100+ more, or a 256MB 9800 Pro worth $70 more? For Doom 3 maybe, but for HL2 not sure just yet. It does seem possible that 256MB will continue to show an advantage in playable detail settings as these new games come out.





ABIT IS7, P4 2.6C, 1GB Corsair XMS 4000 Pro Series, Radeon 9800 Pro, Santa Cruz, TruePower 430watt

 

[pauldh]

I think that thread more dealt with 128MB vs. 256MB on mid range cards. 256MB on a Radeon 9600 or FX5700 is definately not worth paying extra for. And in the past most people have felt the same about the huge price increase of the 256MB R9800 Pros over the 128MB ones. But as the prices get closer together, and games come out that show 256MB advantages for the R9800 Pro, maybe the 256MB one is worth a bit more. Personally, I still like a 128MB 9800 pro for under $200, or jump to a 6800GT for under $400. Otherwise not much great value in between IMO.

ABIT IS7, P4 2.6C, 1GB Corsair XMS 4000 Pro Series, Radeon 9800 Pro, Santa Cruz, TruePower 430watt

 

[priyajeet]

You should wait for Valve to give offcial HL2 requirements like id did.

The game starts preloading soon, was supposed to start this monday, so the system specs should be given out sometime early sept.

<i> <font color=blue>Futile is resistance,</font color=blue><font color=red> assimilate you we will.</font color=red> </i>
<b>Hard work has a future payoff. Laziness pays off now.</b>

 

[gaussian]

Thank alot, I'm loking forward to playing the next gen games, but what I'm really looking forward to is being able to play some of my 'older' game (Generals, CoD) with out turning any settings downand the computer throwing a wobbly! What I gather from the posts is that 128MB is enough as long as the card can use it fully. Thanks again for the info.

 

[sweatlaserxp]

Do you realize that $330 is almost twice the cost of the bare <A HREF="http://www.newegg.com/app/ViewProductDesc.asp?description=14-102-268&depa=1" target="_new">Sapphire</A> card? It's the 256-bit mem., too. I've only seen a few cases where the extra 128Mb makes a difference, and it's almost never much, certainly not worth $150. At that price you might as well step up to the X800 Pro. I don't know where you found that 256Mb HIS card, but on Newegg it says "no Half-Life 2 coupon".

 

[AMD_Man]

Actually, Call of Duty requires a 256MB to run max settings without swapping textures into main memory.

Intelligence is not merely the wealth of knowledge but the sum of perception, wisdom, and knowledge.