GTA V Memory usage?

[DragonTamer1]

When I start GTA, my GTX 760 shoots up to 3.8GB of VRAM used and no amount of tinkering seems to bring that number down, at least not for long. When I first built the computer and got the game I was able to run on very high settings. My GTX 750 can run it on higher settings for crying out loud.

 

My friends have 900 series graphics cards and they are using less than 2GB on max settings, does GTA favor newer video cards and why do I need to keep lowering my settings over time?

[GreezyJeezy]

well lower your graphical settings in gta 5, it tells you how much VRAM youll use. the advanced settings will kill your VRAM too

[Bajantechnician]

6 minutes ago, DragonTamer1 said:

When I start GTA, my GTX 760 shoots up to 3.8GB of VRAM used and no amount of tinkering seems to bring that number down, at least not for long. When I first built the computer and got the game I was able to run on very high settings. My GTX 750 can run it on higher settings for crying out loud.

 

My friends have 900 series graphics cards and they are using less than 2GB on max settings, does GTA favor newer video cards and why do I need to keep lowering my settings over time?

probably optimizations for new cards arnt doing old cards a favor

[HPWebcamAble]

The amount of VRAM shouldn't change.

 

Did you upgrade your computer from 7 or 8 to Windows 10? Are any programs running along side GTA V?

Try scanning your computer with Avast and Malewarebytes, it is possible (though unlikely) that a virus is stealing some of your GPU power

[Praesi]

With max settings it uses almost 6GB Vram with my Card. No chance your Friend has max settings with only 2GB Vram usage.

[Apathetik]

14 hours ago, GreezyJeezy said:

well lower your graphical settings in gta 5, it tells you how much VRAM youll use. the advanced settings will kill your VRAM too

The in-game VRAM usage meter in GTA V doesn't always work right. Mine shows my VRAM usage at about 2270MB. But while playing, My actual VRAM usage is around 1800-1900MB. This is on a 2GB EVGA GTX 950.

17 minutes ago, Praesi said:

With max settings it uses almost 6GB Vram with my Card. No chance your Friend has max settings with only 2GB Vram usage.

Dunno about absolutely maxed settings. But at 1080p I run on (with the exception of the advanced gfx settings) mostly very high and some high settings with a 2GB Card no problem (usage listed in reply to previous quote).

 

Settings listed below, in case you're curious.

Spoiler

Ambient Occlusion - High

Anisotropic Filtering - x16

Distance Scaling - 100%

Extended Distance Scaling 10%

Extended Shadows Distance 0%

FXAA - off

Grass Quality - High

High Detail Streaming While Flying - on

High Resolution Shadows - off

In-Game DoF Effects - off

Long Shadows - on

MSAA - off

Nvidia TXAA - off

Particles Quality - Very High

Population Density 100%

Population Variety 100%

Post FX - High

Reflection MSAA - off

Reflection Quality - High

Shader Quality - Very High

Shadow Quality - Very High

Soft Shadows - Softest

Tessellation - Very High

Texture Quality - Very High

Water Quality - Very High.

 

14 hours ago, DragonTamer1 said:

When I start GTA, my GTX 760 shoots up to 3.8GB of VRAM used and no amount of tinkering seems to bring that number down, at least not for long. When I first built the computer and got the game I was able to run on very high settings. My GTX 750 can run it on higher settings for crying out loud.

 

My friends have 900 series graphics cards and they are using less than 2GB on max settings, does GTA favor newer video cards and why do I need to keep lowering my settings over time?

Don't know about GTA V favoring newer graphics cards or not. As far as having to constantly tweak your settings goes. Do you know what your usage averages used to be before you noticed the game eating up all your VRAM? Did you make or notice any major changes prior to this happening (driver changes, GTA V updates, etc.)?

[DragonTamer1]

9 hours ago, Apathetik said:

The in-game VRAM usage meter in GTA V doesn't always work right. Mine shows my VRAM usage at about 2270MB. But while playing, My actual VRAM usage is around 1800-1900MB. This is on a 2GB EVGA GTX 950.

Dunno about absolutely maxed settings. But at 1080p I run on (with the exception of the advanced gfx settings) mostly very high and some high settings with a 2GB Card no problem (usage listed in reply to previous quote).

 

Settings listed below, in case you're curious.

  Reveal hidden contents

Ambient Occlusion - High

Anisotropic Filtering - x16

Distance Scaling - 100%

Extended Distance Scaling 10%

Extended Shadows Distance 0%

FXAA - off

Grass Quality - High

High Detail Streaming While Flying - on

High Resolution Shadows - off

In-Game DoF Effects - off

Long Shadows - on

MSAA - off

Nvidia TXAA - off

Particles Quality - Very High

Population Density 100%

Population Variety 100%

Post FX - High

Reflection MSAA - off

Reflection Quality - High

Shader Quality - Very High

Shadow Quality - Very High

Soft Shadows - Softest

Tessellation - Very High

Texture Quality - Very High

Water Quality - Very High.

 

Don't know about GTA V favoring newer graphics cards or not. As far as having to constantly tweak your settings goes. Do you know what your usage averages used to be before you noticed the game eating up all your VRAM? Did you make or notice any major changes prior to this happening (driver changes, GTA V updates, etc.)?

The changes weren't something that I took note of, but I was noticing that the frame rate continued to get lower and lower over time even with lower settings. I think the issue may have been an out of date driver as updating it seemed to fix it. It's still using the same amount of VRAM but the GPU is now actually doing something instead of sitting at an idle clock and 50% load like it was before. The frame rate still varies quite a lot but it's a smoother transition now than it was before and is bottoming out at 45FPS rather than the 25 it was before.

[Apathetik]

9 minutes ago, DragonTamer1 said:

The changes weren't something that I took note of, but I was noticing that the frame rate continued to get lower and lower over time even with lower settings. I think the issue may have been an out of date driver as updating it seemed to fix it. It's still using the same amount of VRAM but the GPU is now actually doing something instead of sitting at an idle clock and 50% load like it was before. The frame rate still varies quite a lot but it's a smoother transition now than it was before and is bottoming out at 45FPS rather than the 25 it was before.

Well, glad that fixed some of your issue (don't think you mentioned the idle clock / load in your initial post  lol). As far as the VRAM goes. There's only two things that really come to mind. Firstly, people modding in online lobby's and spawning all kinds of crazy shit into the map definitely causes issues (one of the main reasons they piss me off lol). I've personally experienced massive spikes, and even crashes due to that. So avoid it when you can if that's been present. Also, from experiencing the online issues with modding. I'd have to assume that modding single player could potentially lead to similar issues. So if you're running single player mods. Try disabling them to see if that helps with the issue.

 

The only other thing I can think of. Is that perhaps GTA V will cache as much as it possibly can to VRAM if it's given more to work with. Which could also explain why I can run on pretty high settings (and also your friends) on 2GB cards. But Praesi as well as yourself have much more of your available VRAM used by the game.

 

As far as dealing with the FPS spikes. There is one GTA V specific thing that I know from experience can absolutely wreck FPS. And that's using the Self.fm radio station (I made the mistake of symlinking my entire music collection to the folder it checks... it hurt lol). This is a known issue that Rockstar still hasn't dealt with. So if you're using that, best to disable it and just play music through a music player in the background. 

 

Also, if you're using EVGA's PrecisionX 16 software. I've found that the in-game overlay doesn't play nicely with GTA V and causes frame spikes, usually in the range of 10-20fps dips in my testing. So there's that, just in case.

 

Lastly, if all else fails. Go to the usual suspects in settings. Disable all the AA options (especially MSAA) see if that helps smooth things out. Then start with the other higher usage settings. Overall shader quality will usually net really good performance boosts. But personally I like to start with things like Shadows, as I find their absence / lack of quality less detrimental than really blocky and blurry images from lower shader quality / texture quality.