RTX 3090 RAM requirements?

[Snakemare]

Hello!

 

A little back story, back in 2015 when Titan X Maxwell launched my system RAM of 16 gb was not enough to make the Titan's Vram of 12 gb usable in Windows. Meaning that windows "locked" the usable amount of Vram to 4 gb from the original 12 gb. SO when I upgraded my PC to 32 gb system RAM, windows then "unlocked" the Vram to native 12 gb that's on the GPU.

I read somewhere back then (perhaps Nvidia forum, not sure) that you would need double the amount of system RAM as your Vram to make it work oprtimal, at least back then.

 

Anyone know if this holds true still today? If the RTX 3090 has 24 gb Vram buffer does it require an upgrade to 48 or 64 gb system RAM to work properly? Only thing I know is that it seemed to be the case back in 2015.

 

Any input would be helpful.

[Moonzy]

6 minutes ago, Snakemare said:

you would need double the amount of system RAM as your Vram to make it work oprtimal

first time i've heard of this

[SHADFAN]

14 minutes ago, Snakemare said:

Hello!

 

A little back story, back in 2015 when Titan X Maxwell launched my system RAM of 16 gb was not enough to make the Titan's Vram of 12 gb usable in Windows. Meaning that windows "locked" the usable amount of Vram to 4 gb from the original 12 gb. SO when I upgraded my PC to 32 gb system RAM, windows then "unlocked" the Vram to native 12 gb that's on the GPU.

I read somewhere back then (perhaps Nvidia forum, not sure) that you would need double the amount of system RAM as your Vram to make it work oprtimal, at least back then.

 

Anyone know if this holds true still today? If the RTX 3090 has 24 gb Vram buffer does it require an upgrade to 48 or 64 gb system RAM to work properly? Only thing I know is that it seemed to be the case back in 2015.

 

Any input would be helpful.

Seems like a myth. VRAM and RAM have no relationship whatsoever.

[Nayr438]

I have never heard of such a thing. Your vram is completely separate from your system ram. They don't influence each other.

 

A google search tells me that at launch the Titan X listed 24GB of system memory as a requirement and it was later changed to 8GB shortly after, however I imagine you could use less. There were several people who ran them with 8GB - 16Gb just fine. If you had any sort of limitation, it was probably caused by something else.

[Moonzy]

30 minutes ago, Nayr438 said:

Your vram is completely separate from your system ram.

i mean, it sorta makes sense since the GPU would use system RAM as spare when it overflows

 

but i dont think limiting VRAM just because of low system RAM is a good way to go about it

[HardStroke]

1 hour ago, Snakemare said:

Hello!

 

A little back story, back in 2015 when Titan X Maxwell launched my system RAM of 16 gb was not enough to make the Titan's Vram of 12 gb usable in Windows. Meaning that windows "locked" the usable amount of Vram to 4 gb from the original 12 gb. SO when I upgraded my PC to 32 gb system RAM, windows then "unlocked" the Vram to native 12 gb that's on the GPU.

I read somewhere back then (perhaps Nvidia forum, not sure) that you would need double the amount of system RAM as your Vram to make it work oprtimal, at least back then.

 

Anyone know if this holds true still today? If the RTX 3090 has 24 gb Vram buffer does it require an upgrade to 48 or 64 gb system RAM to work properly? Only thing I know is that it seemed to be the case back in 2015.

 

Any input would be helpful.

mmmmm the gpu has nothing to do with system memory

the gpu vram and system ram both work in different ways and like i said, they have nothing to do with each other

you system doesn't start taking the gpu's vram when it runs out of ram and its the same about the gpu, it cant just stat eating on you system ram

[Briggsy]

Windows 10 will allocate a certain amount of memory to be used by your GPU, but that memory isn't locked. Previous versions of windows ymmv though. In the task manager screenshot below for example, windows 10 has shared half my 32GB of memory to be used by my RTX 2080 if I run out of video memory, and only has about 182MB locked as hardware reserve.

 

I've previously tested what happens when I use up all my memory (by creating a dedicated ram cache) and the shared memory was taken away from the GPU successfully. Of course, if you reach the point where you've used up you graphic card memory and are tapping into system memory, you're going to have some serious FPS drop and stutter in game. This happens periodically to me in ARK when I get near a massive base made of stone. 

 

TL:DR I wouldn't worry about it.

 

*edit - that being said, if you're playing a game that could eat up 24GB of video ram (cough ms flight sim), you're probably going to need a fair amount of system memory to avoid swaps with storage.

 

[Biomecanoid]

17 hours ago, Snakemare said:

Hello!

 

A little back story, back in 2015 when Titan X Maxwell launched my system RAM of 16 gb was not enough to make the Titan's Vram of 12 gb usable in Windows. Meaning that windows "locked" the usable amount of Vram to 4 gb from the original 12 gb. SO when I upgraded my PC to 32 gb system RAM, windows then "unlocked" the Vram to native 12 gb that's on the GPU.

I read somewhere back then (perhaps Nvidia forum, not sure) that you would need double the amount of system RAM as your Vram to make it work oprtimal, at least back then.

 

Anyone know if this holds true still today? If the RTX 3090 has 24 gb Vram buffer does it require an upgrade to 48 or 64 gb system RAM to work properly? Only thing I know is that it seemed to be the case back in 2015.

 

Any input would be helpful.

 

Years ago i had a system and i upgraded the GPU with one that had more vRam than actual Ram.

 

The PC started doing weird things like didn't load the wall paper all the way. had missing textures etc. when i install more Ram on the computer the issue went away.

 

I would not have a system with less Ram than Vram

[Blue4130]

On 8/31/2020 at 6:06 AM, HardStroke said:

Its the same about the gpu, it cant just stat eating on you system ram

It certainly does. 

[RubberAnimations]

On 8/30/2020 at 10:39 PM, Snakemare said:

I read somewhere back then (perhaps Nvidia forum, not sure) that you would need double the amount of system RAM as your Vram to make it work oprtimal, at least back

This is correct. You need 48gb system memory to utilize all 24gb VRAM.

 

I have a 3090 and had to upgrade from 32gb to 48 in order to utilize all VRAM. With 32gb I could only utilize 16gb VRAM before my system became unstable.