Memory width for 3D apps?

[clonesauce]

Hey there THW!

I am planning to upgrade my very old hardware for 3D modelling use. I am not very tech savvy and needed advice/information on some tech. specs. How does mem. width affect 3D modelling? As far as I understand, a bigger vRAM allows more textures to be loaded onto it, thus avoiding stress on the PC's RAM. But how does the mem width affect this equation?

Currently I am facing 2 options: a gfx card with 4gb of vRAM + 128bit of mem. width(GTX650 iirc) and a gfx card of 2gb of vRAM(HD7850, again iirc). What is the better option?

Thank you very much in advance!

 

[eatmypie]

What engine are you using?

 

[getochkn]

the vram and texture thing is a gaming thing. not sure how well it translates to 3d modelling and tht would mostly depend on what software your using and if it uses 3d acceleration in it, and if it takes advantage of the vram at all. check with your software you plan to use and the forums for it to see.

 

[clonesauce]

Thank you for the replies!

@eatmypie
I use the v-ray engine for working. Mostly sketchup for modelling, with the ocassional 3ds max.

@getochkn
Thanks, that is sound advice and I haven't thought to do that.

 

[getochkn]

for the v-ray, it says this

"V-Ray RT GPU on CUDA - the CUDA engine requires a Fermi or Kepler card and the newest nVidia drivers"

I would assume that a faster memory bandwidth would be better in this case, and I would go with an Nvidia card over AMD in this case. Just make sure it is as they said, Fermi or Kepler card.