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Is 2gb VRAM enough these days? (1080p gaming)

How the fuck are we supposed to have a smooth VR experience that takes full advantage of the Rift, Vive, etc, when the current crop of cards on the market are only 4-6gb?

When are we getting 12gb or even 24gb cards?
 
2GB is already cutting it close for modern games. Not to mention Nvidia will be releasing their Pascal cards this year (and AMD will be releasing their new cards too). With the increasing demands in VRAM, I wouldn't recommend a 2GB VRAM card.
 
I don't think so. I have a 4GB card (R9 290) and sometimes that isn't enough. I could use 4GB easily in GTA V and The Division beta was using 3.5GB for me. I'd say 4GB is the minimum.

If I were to buy a card today it would be the R9 390 because it has 8GB VRAM which should last a good while. Any new cards will probably have 8GB as standard.

isamu said:
How the fuck are we supposed to have a smooth VR experience that takes full advantage of the Rift, Vive, etc, when the current crop of cards on the market are only 4-6gb?

When are we getting 12gb or even 24gb cards?
Click to expand...
I'd imagine very soon. As I said above right now the R9 390 has 8GB and I think this is due to HBM which will be featured in the upcoming cards by both Nvidia/AMD. Apparently Nvidia will have pascal cards with up to 16GB VRAM.
 
blly155 said:
I don't think so. I have a 4GB card (R9 290) and sometimes that isn't enough. I could use 4GB easily in GTA V and The Division beta was using 3.5GB for me. I'd say 4GB is the minimum.

If I were to buy a card today it would be the R9 390 because it has 8GB VRAM which should last a good while. Any new cards will probably have 8GB as standard.
Click to expand...

I think 8gb is quite overkill honestly.
Not to mention i bet its expensive as shit , and i dont like Radeon cards personally.(Mostly SW/ Drivers wise)

I'm not jumping into VR anytime soon either so its really unnecessary. ( i wanted the Vive but 799 US is like 1000$ CDN.. no thanks , ill wait)
 
therapist said:
I think 8gb is quite overkill honestly.
Not to mention i bet its expensive as shit , and i dont like Radeon cards personally.(Mostly SW/ Drivers wise)

I'm not jumping into VR anytime soon either so its really unnecessary. ( i wanted the Vive but 799 US is like 1000$ CDN.. no thanks , ill wait)
Click to expand...

I agree, I wouldn't be able to use 8GB right now while playing at 1080p but the only 6GB VRAM card I can think of is the 980 ti which here in the uk cost about £520-600. The R9 390 is in the £250-300 price range.
 
blly155 said:
I agree, I wouldn't be able to use 8GB right now while playing at 1080p but the only 6GB VRAM card I can think of is the 980 ti which here in the uk cost about £520-600. The R9 390 is in the £250-300 price range.
Click to expand...

Even the 390X Is at an affordable price point now that it might be worth looking into. I just wish we would get an inkling of the new cards already.
 
I can play most of the games that come out fine with 2GB at 1080p (R9 270). Obviously not ultra or with ultra textures. I am probably going to get a 4GB anyway for some wiggle room but, most of those AAA games are unoptimized or have been grossly overstated sometimes.

Then again people in this thread think you have to max everything so idk.
 
Have a 1 GB card (GTX460), I still set high textures in 1080p in every game I play (e.g. Dying Light at 30-50fps with medium/high settings)

People have left older cards so far behind in the past they have no reference for them in modern games
 
I've come to regret my 970 purchase last year because of vram limitations. Its a great card but the 3.5 GB is starting to become an issue. I will most likely upgrade sooner than my usual cycle due to games using more and more vram.

4GB is the minimum right now. 6GB is a much safer bet.
 
Lockjaw333 said:
I've come to regret my 970 purchase last year because of vram limitations. Its a great card but the 3.5 GB is starting to become an issue. I will most likely upgrade sooner than my usual cycle due to games using more and more vram.

4GB is the minimum right now. 6GB is a much safer bet.
Click to expand...

that is such a weird issue. seems to affect all 970's. God damnit Nvidia.
960 uses the full 4 , but its still way slower anyways.
 
therapist said:
that is such a weird issue. seems to affect all 970's. God damnit Nvidia.
960 uses the full 4 , but its still way slower anyways.
Click to expand...

Nobody has seen any effect of that 3.5GB buzz on any game beside some benchmark.

Currently playing Arkham Knight 60fps at 1080p all settings maxed (and gsync), 4GB fully loaded. I have yet to see any problem from that "3.5GB limit".
 
wazoo said:
Nobody has seen any effect of that 3.5GB buzz on any game beside some benchmark.

Currently playing Arkham Knight 60fps at 1080p all settings maxed (and gsync), 4GB fully loaded. I have yet to see any problem from that "3.5GB limit".
Click to expand...

ah really ok.
since there is a 970 on sale , and i want the division , i think im gonna splurge a bit and go for that one (Same asus one just the 970 variant)
 
2GB is really pushing it. More and more games have higher VRAM requirements now. Even Shadow of Mordor in 2014 stuttered like crazy on my old 770 unless I set textures to medium (lower than the console version I believe).
 
Maybe not, unless you want to absolutely max everything for minimal difference in most cases.
If you have a competent video card with 2 GB of RAM I would wait for a significant increase in performance.
 
It depends on the games you run and at what detail you want to run them, to just play light games like Counter Strike at 1080p and low settings i guess you'll be able to achieve high frame rate even on 1080p and 2GB VRAM won't be an issue
 
I have a 2gb 960 card and games run fine for me. The Witcher 3, Rise of The Tomb Raider, GTA V, and Ryse all run smoothly. I'm not maxing the games though.
 
I don't think you are going to get much upgrading from a 660 to a 960, at least price to performance wise.

It's just not a worthwhile upgrade. If you want something cheap to hold you over go to Ebay or something and get an older model but upgrade, like a 670. It will hold you over until new cards come out if you are just playing stuff like CS Go (you may not want AMD because of the recent update being botched with AMD cards).
 
Well, that depends on the game, resolution and settings you will use.

I´ve been running a GTX760 2GB since its launch and never had any issues so far. Been playing @1080p games like Dying light, GTAV, Witcher 3, The Division, etc. Not maxed out of course, but some games with High settings, another ones with Medium settings. I even play Assetto Corsa in triple screen @5760x1080 and don´t have a single stutter.

Since you asked about The Division Beta in particular OP, I´ve played with a mix of Medium/High settings and got anywhere between 35-50 fps. No stuttering.

BUT, buying a new card now or upgrading a GPU, you would want to go with a minimum of 4GB, no question. Possibly looking at 6GB.
 
You need 4GB now really.

I went from 3 to 6 and I'm already seeing games hit 4.5-5 pretty regularly. It won't be long before 6 is the standard.
 
TatorTots said:
I have a 2gb 960 card and games run fine for me. The Witcher 3, Rise of The Tomb Raider, GTA V, and Ryse all run smoothly. I'm not maxing the games though.
Click to expand...

Yeah people have lost a sense of reality when it comes to cards, they upgrade so fast that they have no idea how well older cards still do

Here is a the old GTX460 1GB running Dying light med textures, 1080p at about 40 fps (GTX460 is below min recommendation for that game)

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=UTVM9xrPjjA

So people saying 4GB is min to run games well is a little weird, if you can why not, but if you have an older card, you're still having fun at a fraction of the cost
 
I wouldn't buy a 2GB card at this point and I would advise against it.
 
2gb is enough to get the job done at medium settings. 4gb is good for nearly maxing stuff out but I suspect as new cards and games release the standard will get pushed further.

If you absolutely need a new card right now, do not buy a 2gb and instead spend a little more and grab a used 970 somewhere.
 
4GB or 3GB isn't enough if we are talking most PC titles with some grunt and maxing out effects not even considering resolution will fill the vram of most titles I play. I say this using a 970 or 7950 mainly but I like pushing my games.
 
I'm still rocking a 1.25GB GTX 570 lol. Only this past year has it really started to show its age, because I can no longer run most new games smoothly at 1080p. I have to either set textures to low or cut the resolution to around 900p to consistently stay above 30fps.

nephilimdj said:
Same thing, MSGV is best optimized game of late, nearly maxes out at 1080p on my 960 2GB.
Click to expand...
Yeah MGSV is definitely a standout title for optimization. I can run it 1080p@60fps on high settings with FXAA.
 
Neo_Geo said:
We are reaching a point where 4GB really isn't enough for comfortable 1080p gaming. Hopefully Nvidia steps up their VRAM game and goes for a minimum 8GB on any cards that come out this year.
Click to expand...

oh god, when i read that 4 GIGABYTES of Vram is not enough for 1080p games its kinda perturbing, like its not the Vram completely separated from the main memory? why would you need too much of that?
 
I don't think I would recommend buying any card at this point with less than 4gb vram. Not because you can't play the games you mentioned or even currently released AAA games a lower settings but it's just not something that seems like it will last you for very long. I have sli 970s and cannot wait for better cards.
 
It's alright, when "next gen" began alot of games started coming out for PC that really need 4GB for an optimal high-end experience. Alot of it is just poor optimization IMO, but it is what it is. I wouldn't buy a 2GB card right now.
 
alexbull_uk said:
I went from 3 to 6 and I'm already seeing games hit 4.5-5 pretty regularly. It won't be long before 6 is the standard.
Click to expand...

Jump to HBM2 should make something like 8GB or even 16GB minimum we start to see on GPU's.

Edit:
Sub Boss said:
oh god, when i read that 4 GIGABYTES of Vram is not enough for 1080p games its kinda perturbing, like its not the Vram completely separated from the main memory? why would you need too much of that?
Click to expand...

High quality assets, textures etc. eat up VRAM quite fast.
 
I played over 90 hours of Fallout 4 on a 1GB 550ti and only really encountered issues with one area of the game. Not being able to max it out didn't detract from having fun at all.
 
3GB on my GTX 780 Ti hasn't held me back in any of my games thus far and I don't see anything that interests me in 2016 changing that... with the possible exception of Gears of War UE, but I'm hopeful that I'll still be able to max it at 1080p without having to disable AA.
 
As multiple people have said, Tomb Raider requires more than 4GB on 1080p and I can attest to that, I have a 970 and I'm tuning down options because it's breaking the 3.5 barrier. And it's probably only going to get worse, as the gen goes on developers will get more used to using DX12, and will be able to optimise more for the new graphics cards. Tomb Raider is pushing Maxwell cards to the limit, and games will eventually push the 16nm/14nm cards to the limit as well.

You're probably best holding on until 16nm arrives in 3rd quarter realistically. There will be a big push from the GPU vendors when VR gets released, AMD have a dedicated VR card lined up and presumably they will have their inventory raring to go at that point.
 
My GTX 580 died on me over a year ago and now I'm forced to play on my laptop with a GTX 660M with 2 GBs of VRAM. I'd be lucky if I can get around 40 FPS on low setting on most games...at 720p.
 
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