VRAM Usage question

[Zesca]

So I just recently got the gtx 970 even with the 3.5 gb vram issue... and I was wondering if you put two or more 970's in sli would it decrease the overall vram usage when in games such as shadow of mordor, if you had that extra power would the graphics cards not even need to use more than that 3.5 gb? Do you think that with two or potentially three gtx 970's (FTW edition) that I could play most modern games at 4k with high-ultra textures without running into stuttering issues even when using more than the 3.5 gb or not reaching that amount at all?

[-CLASSIFIED-]

sli/crossfire vram is not combined , you still only have a max 4gb vram 

[Fate]

Putting more 970's would in theory increase your ram usage because you'd be able to turn the settings up higher. Vram does not stack, yet. You should be able to play most games with high/ultra textures at 4k with two 970's as long as all of your other eye candy settings aren't maxed, but in games like SoM with ultra textures you will probably run into the vram limitations of the 970's at 4k, I'm not sure though.

[Thebman712]

vram does not stack, and usage should stay the same for each card in a dual config

[-CLASSIFIED-]

vram does not stack, and usage should stay the same for each card in a dual config

the only time it will (in theory as we have yet to see it happen yet) will be in windows 10 

[Thebman712]

the only time it will (in theory as we have yet to see it happen yet) will be in windows 10 

im saying that theoretically if the settings are at the same with 1 gpu and 2 gpus each gpu should have about the same vram usage THEORETICALLY 

[-CLASSIFIED-]

im saying that theoretically if the settings are at the same with 1 gpu and 2 gpus each gpu should have about the same vram usage THEORETICALLY 

ah yes sorry , i misread that apologies man that is correct lol 

[Aniallation]

Do you think that with two or potentially three gtx 970's (FTW edition) that I could play most modern games at 4k with high-ultra textures without running into stuttering issues even when using more than the 3.5 gb or not reaching that amount at all?

In your theoretical terms, yes. However it's very unlikely, because you'll hit the 3.5GB speed reduction at 4K with high-ultra textures way before you'll use three 970 GPUs to their full potential. This is why for 4K and higher resolutions currently the best GPU solution is two or three 8GB R9 290X.