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512mb vs 256mb effecting resolution?

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xtreme404

Member
Joined
Aug 1, 2002
Hey guys, I have been out of the game for a while and just about to finish my new system. Just check my sig below. All I need now is a graphics card and I have been looking at the 3850 since it seems to be the best cost/performance option right now for the $150 price range. My question is I see people saying you want the 512 version for higher resolution saying and th 256 version if you don't need to play high resolution. Is this correct and could someone explain why?

Thanks!!
 
The amount of VRAM required increases with resolution and detail levels. On a 256mb card, once you exceed 256mb total usage your performance starts to take a fairly big hit. If you can afford a 512mb card definitely get one as it will allow you to run at higher detail/resolutions before the frame loss kicks in.
 
Ok, just sounds so weird. I would have assumed more ram would make it better. Thanks for the info
 
Also for the $150-$175 do you think the 3850 would be the best card out of anything including Nvidia ones?

Thanks
 
newegg has a saphire 512mb for 200. I recommend the 512 because it's basically the same card as the 3870...no cut pipelines or lack of shaders that mid range cards usualy end up with.

If your gonna hold onto this card for more than a year then definitly go 512 as newer games will use up more and more RAM at lower resolutions. Higher resolutions meen more data that needs to be stored in RAM for the GPU to process. once this is exceeded it has to find the data via much much slower means, this is the performance hit.

checkout some reviews of the 512 vs 256 and see the resolution that certain games begin to take the large hit and then compare where those res' and games compare to your needs, and future expectations.
 
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