Nvidia GeForce GTX 1000 Series (Pascal) MegaThread: FAQ and Resources

[17seconds]

VRAM usage graphs are difficult to apply to absolute requirements. Many games will cache textures and use as much as the card has available. This does not mean that the game needs to use that much memory, just that it will if it's available. Many of the commonly cited VRAM hogging games actually run quite well on cards with less memory.

The big question is whether gameplay is affected as you move into more memory intensive situations. Does FPS crash and is there noticeable stuttering?

 

[U6b36ef]

Ah, I see you are correct. And, I actually went back and watched some benchmarks of the games you listed ag 1440p using a 980 ti or higher and indeed, it does show more than 4gb of vram being used. However, I also found a few of the same benchmarks (same game, resolution, and settings) using the 980 (or 970) SLI setup and it seemed to hover around the 3.9gb of vram and rarely got over 4. Now, the higher rated cards obviously had better performance, but it seemed like that was more a result of it just being a faster/better card rather than more ram as the performance delta was in line with other improvements from 980 to ti to 1080, etc.

It could just be a result of my ignorance on the subject - and this might be a better topic for another thread as I don't want to get too far off of Pascal - but it did strike me that on cards tested that had 4gb, the games you listed seemed to hover right below that limit, while on the cards that had more available went over. How long, I wonder, until 8GB isn't enough?

Yeah I mean wasn't this sort of debated over 2Gb and 4GB, using Crysis as an example. Possibly other games too. No difference in frame rates between the cards.

 

[nuclearaddict]

I just purchased this GTX 1070 off Newegg. I'm curious to know if this card requires DX12? I'm still on Windows 7 and I'm not ready to upgrade yet.

 

[mr91]

So what should i do, chop in my 980 and get a 1070 or sli my 980? playing at 1440p

cheers

As an owner of a 980 SLI setup playing at 1440p, I can safely say that I'll be waiting for a ti model or just whatever comes next, because any single card in the new generation so far hasn't been shown to beat the FPS that I'm getting at 1440. I'd lose money selling the 980's, and end up with less performance.

In your situation - it's a tough call honestly. If all you need is 60 fps, wait for the 1070's when they become more widely available in a couple of months. If you need 60+ at 1440p, like I do, then you might want to consider another 980 since it will be far cheaper and in most situations outperform a single 1080, albeit with all the caveats that come with using a multi GPU setup.

As a newcomer to SLI when I finalized my rig early this year I wasn't sure how I would like it, but it's been a great experience so far. I truly dont understand why so many people demonize it; it works in almost all the games I play regularly, and in the ones that don't it only takes 1 card to run it anyway. You will get a lot of opinions on using a multi GPU setup however (scroll back several pages in this thread to see a lengthy discussion about it).

One of The main advantages of the 1080 vs the 980 SLi is the extra VRAM...

Many recent games use more than 4 gb of VRAM at 1440p...

I've heard this put forth before, and I'm not saying it's not accurate, but I haven't experienced running out of VRAM at 1440p...are there any well known examples of this? I'm finishing up expansions on FA4 and TW3 and have no problems with max details at 1440p.

Fallout 4 and The Witcher 3 are great games, i beat the witcher 3 and I'm almost finished the first expansion. I'm almost with with fallout 4.. These games look great however they don't use much vram...

GTA 5, Shadow of Modor, black op3, rise of tomb raider and many more use more than 4 GB of RAM @ 1440p...

Earlier in this thread this topic was discussed...

Ah, I see you are correct. And, I actually went back and watched some benchmarks of the games you listed ag 1440p using a 980 ti or higher and indeed, it does show more than 4gb of vram being used. However, I also found a few of the same benchmarks (same game, resolution, and settings) using the 980 (or 970) SLI setup and it seemed to hover around the 3.9gb of vram and rarely got over 4. Now, the higher rated cards obviously had better performance, but it seemed like that was more a result of it just being a faster/better card rather than more ram as the performance delta was in line with other improvements from 980 to ti to 1080, etc.

It could just be a result of my ignorance on the subject - and this might be a better topic for another thread as I don't want to get too far off of Pascal - but it did strike me that on cards tested that had 4gb, the games you listed seemed to hover right below that limit, while on the cards that had more available went over. How long, I wonder, until 8GB isn't enough?

I've played shadow of mordor on a 980, Titan x and 1080 and with ultra textures there was some hitching with the 980...
The game was not as smooth with the 980 with ultra textures however with the Titan x and 1080 it was butter smooth.

There is a difference when there isn't enough vram...

 

[mr91]

VRAM usage graphs are difficult to apply to absolute requirements. Many games will cache textures and use as much as the card has available. This does not mean that the game needs to use that much memory, just that it will if it's available. Many of the commonly cited VRAM hogging games actually run quite well on cards with less memory.

The big question is whether gameplay is affected as you move into more memory intensive situations. Does FPS crash and is there noticeable stuttering?

some games will have stuttering and fps dips do to lack of vram... Another good example is AC unity which uses more than 4 gb at 1440p...

This can be resolved by lowering textures and settings...

 

[TehPenguin]

VRAM usage graphs are difficult to apply to absolute requirements. Many games will cache textures and use as much as the card has available. This does not mean that the game needs to use that much memory, just that it will if it's available. Many of the commonly cited VRAM hogging games actually run quite well on cards with less memory.

The big question is whether gameplay is affected as you move into more memory intensive situations. Does FPS crash and is there noticeable stuttering?

I played Shadow of Mordor with 2gB of VRAM on high settings with no stutters. And there I feared the required 6gB meant the end of my game life back then. It was an old HD5870

 

[turkey3_scratch]

Some people do overexaggerate it, but then there are others who seem to think VRAM is unimportant altogether. Certain cards have a higher amount of VRAM for a reason - not no reason. Would you like a 1Gb GTX 1080? I don't think so.

 

[mr91]

Download the ultra textures and switch to ultra and let us know

 

[GuerillaTaktics]

Shot in the dark but does anyone have an approximate estimate of when these cards will be obtainable..? I've been trying to get a 1070 but they're pretty much sold out everywhere aside from the scalpers who want 200-300 more than the market value. I thought about back ordering from newegg but I'm not sure how long that will take.

 

[turkey3_scratch]

The MSI Aftermarket card is in stock for the GTX 1070 http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16814127955 though the price is $440.

 

[GuerillaTaktics]

The MSI Aftermarket card is in stock for the GTX 1070 http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16814127955 though the price is $440.

Thank you sir you have made my day

 

[Math Geek]

I just purchased this GTX 1070 off Newegg. I'm curious to know if this card requires DX12? I'm still on Windows 7 and I'm not ready to upgrade yet.

does not require it, rather it is dx 12 capable. but to use dx 12 you will need win 10 eventually. may as well grab it now while the upgrade is free. one more month to get it done and then it's gonna cost ya

 

[Math Geek]

Shot in the dark but does anyone have an approximate estimate of when these cards will be obtainable..? I've been trying to get a 1070 but they're pretty much sold out everywhere aside from the scalpers who want 200-300 more than the market value. I thought about back ordering from newegg but I'm not sure how long that will take.

yup as has been noted multiple times. mid july is when manufacturers claim stock will rise and cards will be better available.

 

[Math Geek]

The MSI Aftermarket card is in stock for the GTX 1070 http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16814127955 though the price is $440.

this card is basically the same as the gaming x but with lower clock speeds. save $10 and oc it yourself. just no dual bios on it.

 

[U6b36ef]

The MSI Aftermarket card is in stock for the GTX 1070 http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16814127955 though the price is $440.

**Drools at an online store page**.

 

[Math Geek]

this is one of those cards that is not even listed at MSI's site. drives me nuts cause it's for sale yet they don't even have a product page for it 🙁

 

[melenie]

this is one of those cards that is not even listed at MSI's site. drives me nuts cause it's for sale yet they don't even have a product page for it 🙁

Yeah I went searching for it a couple of days ago when I found that model being sold on new egg but the "gaming x" was out of stock. I scratched my head multiple times thinking perhaps new egg just accidentally listed the same card twice but forgot to include the "x". But then i noticed the different clock speeds being advertised haha.

 

[Math Geek]

it was rumored early and i actually had it listed but took it off when it did not show on their site. so i added it back with the specs from newegg and no link to a product page. best i can do under the circumstance

 

[U6b36ef]

You know melenie, games like Dead Space up to DS3 will probably run on your CPU graphics if you have Intel. (Stuff to keep you going while waiting for a GPU. Steam Sale starts tomorrow too.)

 

[melenie]

You know melenie, games like Dead Space up to DS3 will probably run on your CPU graphics if you have Intel. (Stuff to keep you going while waiting for a GPU. Steam Sale starts tomorrow too.)

haha thanks. I'm currently running an asrock extreme 6 Z77 mobo.
I have my ROG maximus VIII boxed up along with other components waiting to get my hands on some cards so I can begin my new build. I've just been passing time strolling around these forums, looking up cool watercooling loops and also familiarizing myself with available parts in the water cooling world and deciding what path I will take with my build lol.

Off topic for a moment. Is there a forum section here to discuss watercooling etc? or can anyone recommend me a site for this purpose (inbox if need be).

Back on topic;
I was disappointed by nvidia's new sli bridge results. I was planning on stepping up into 4k from 1440p this year and was hoping the bridge would provide some amazing results. It seems as though either the technology can not currently be fully taken advantage of or it was just a way for nvidia to get their hands deeper into our pockets lol.

So we have 6days to go to see where polaris leaves us. If the rumors are true and crossfire RX 480 out performs a GTX 1080, we can finally see some fight back in AMD for the first time in a while. Early synthetic benchmarks are claiming the RX 480 crossfire to out perform the GTX 1080 by 1-2% and cost about $300 less (depending on what prices you are referencing).

However, this won't sway me from the path I have decided I will take. I'm going all the way to the 1080. i can add further performance later with a second 1080. Performance will be more consistent. Also, the fact that I'm watercooling...I'd have to purchase two blocks for crossfire aswell as further materials. This starts to eat into the bang for buck aspect.

 

[sean8102]

I can provide some info on the MSI Aero OC for the original post with all the dif info on the dif 1080's.

Its exactly the same as the FE, it's a reference PCB with 5+1 power phase. The PCB and all the parts look identical.

 

[Mandolista]

It looks like some custom 1070 cards are available to buy in the UK now (albeit at quite high prices). I'm looking to get one but struggling to figure out which of the models is 'best'. i see differences in certain features e.g. number of power connectors, power phases etc, but i'm not really clear what this means from a user's perspective. What do you guys think?

i'm looking for 60+fps at 1440p, and would probably stick to the stock clock to begin with until overclocking becomes a necessity to keep frame rates up.

 

[Mousemonkey]

@Melenie, Watercooling is a subsection of the Overclocking forum.

 

[U6b36ef]

@melenie, yeah, we gotta hope that AMD have something to reduce the Nvidia pricing. In the UK the 1080 is out of a lot of folks's price range. Even the 1070 for some.

I was thinking I needed to move to a 1080 so that I could move to 1440p. However I have been re-thinking that. My monitor is 22" (or 21.5" in real terms), and 1080p. When I played Doom I ended up finally settled in 1080p and it was fine. Using DSR 1440p didn't gain me anything, but it slowed down frame rate. Crysis 3 pushes my 980 a bit too hard but it's OK.

Basically what I mean is that I think after lots of wishing for 1440p, that I am OK at 1080p. I do not know how the 980 will cope with new releases though. I like to max settings and equally important be able to use anti-aliasing, and maintain close to 60fps. Getting rid of jaggies is equally important. Max settings and full AA then, starts to get demanding.

 

[Math Geek]

I can provide some info on the MSI Aero OC for the original post with all the dif info on the dif 1080's.

Its exactly the same as the FE, it's a reference PCB with 5+1 power phase. The PCB and all the parts look identical.

i am assuming this as well but not seen anything official to verify. do you have a link that verifies this. i almost put the info in like that since it is almost certain to be true but held off until i could verify it with a tear down somewhere or official review.

please link some info if you can and i'll be happy to make the change we all know should be there

It looks like some custom 1070 cards are available to buy in the UK now (albeit at quite high prices). I'm looking to get one but struggling to figure out which of the models is 'best'. i see differences in certain features e.g. number of power connectors, power phases etc, but i'm not really clear what this means from a user's perspective. What do you guys think?

i'm looking for 60+fps at 1440p, and would probably stick to the stock clock to begin with until overclocking becomes a necessity to keep frame rates up.

still not enough reviews out to know for sure about the 1070's. they start clocked lower than the 1080's but still oc to the same 2ghz level. this leaves more room for custom cards to be different. there will still likely be little difference between the cards but until we have more reviews to go with, we can't know for sure. i'm linking all i can find but there are just none out there yet.