What does memory space in GPU's actually do?

Yoo Song Won · November 30, 2015

What difference does more or less memory space actually make?

Misanthrope · November 30, 2015

Same thing it does for your system: the GPU is basically a co-processor and uses it's own memory to store the information it's about to process. The only difference is that the speed through output is more important than latency in the case of a GPU because of the way that it works which is a lot more structured to complete parallel tasks quickly instead of many different kind of instructions quickly like a CPU

Castdeath97 · November 30, 2015

double post: http://linustechtips.com/main/topic/496306-what-does-memory-space-in-gpus-actually-do/

It stores graphic data so that the GPU processor can access them without the need of using RAM. If a card has very little VRam it goes for the RAM which causes the game/graphic to stutter.

Nexxus · November 30, 2015

lets you pay higher resolutions/run higher res textures/have better AA generally speaking

crystal6tak · November 30, 2015

What difference does more or less memory space actually make?

You mean VRAM?

Well, a simplified explanation, cause that's all I know, is that it stores textures, frames, and all the things that the GPU has to process before a frame is spit out to your monitor.

An analogy, it acts as a table to put all the stuff the GPU is working on for quick access. Similar to how CPU has his own table (RAM) (Although CPU has lots of tables, the caches and stuff).

Now, the CPU and GPU don't actually sit next to each other, so if GPU's table is full, he'll have to put stuff on CPU's table. But this is bad, as now whenever GPU wants to work on that stuff, he has to go to CPU's table and retrieve it which takes extra time. So it's best if the GPU has a large enough table to store all the stuff he's working on.

Hope this helps