256 or 512mb ????

[mandalay]

Hello,

I am wondering if anyone can give me a good answer on how important the amount of ram is on a video card...

I have seen some midrange cards that offer 512mb and am considering buying one since I am on a tight budget..

Does the ram help with the textures in the game and allow you to set to higher settings?

Or is the ram only good for letting you play at a higher resolution?

Right now i have a plain old nvidia 6800 128mb..

I figured jumping from 128mb to 512mb would be an improvement.

I was considering this card as a replacement for my old one..
http://www.ewiz.com/detail.php?name=AT-X1600P5

How important is the amount of ram?

Or do i buy a higher end card with only 128 or 256mb on it...

I play everquest 2

I do have a budget system so i am sure the cpu is a bottleneck.

amd sempron 2800
ram ddr 400 1.5 megabytes.
nvidia 6800 128mb

 

[cleeve]

256mb is still very satisfactory.

More memory does almost nothing for performance in most cases; in one or two games there will be an increase.

Mostly, it allows you to use higher resolution texture sets, but most developers only make 256-meg texture sets for their games because there are so few 512mb cards out there.

 

[Vokofpolisiekar]

I agree fully. But with games getting more complex this year with many developers using HDr, Paralax Mapping etc. I think the whole 512 vs 256 might become an issue revisited. But for now, I can not see any difference nor reason to go the 512mb route. And if it does make a difference, then only on cards that run at the top segment of the whole circus.

Seeing that it can't have a detremental effect (that I know of), getting a 512mb card for a price equal to or better than a 256mb counter part, I'd say go for it.

 

[mandalay]

Yeah basically i just wanna turn up my graphics detail higher... I run at 1280x1024 anyways thats the max my 19 lcd can do...

I just want the game to look nicer with less strain on my vid card... Thats why I thought having 512mb would really help..

I am still agp anyways and goin to x1900 or 7800gtx wouldnt matter cause my cpu bottleneck etc.. plus cant afford it heh..

Will my hard drive page less with more video memory?

If there isnt enough video memory then does the game start using my system ram?

 

[ak47is1337]

Yeah basically i just wanna turn up my graphics detail higher... I run at 1280x1024 anyways thats the max my 19 lcd can do...

I just want the game to look nicer with less strain on my vid card... Thats why I thought having 512mb would really help..

I am still agp anyways and goin to x1900 or 7800gtx wouldnt matter cause my cpu bottleneck etc.. plus cant afford it heh..

Will my hard drive page less with more video memory?

If there isnt enough video memory then does the game start using my system ram?

More video ram does mean better video quality, but not better gaming. Also, higher clocked ram and higher clocked core speeds mean a lot more, and since the higher amounts of ram you have usually have fatter timings, you can actually lose performance moving from a 256 to a 512 video card. Compare the 6800 Ultra 256 to the 512; it lost performance and costed about 1.5x as much.