Nvidia RTX vs AMD RX - VR recommendation

Hi all,

You know, new RTX 4000 series and RX 7000 series GPUs are here, unfortunately with higher prices, especially in the Nvidia case. :frowning:
I have a 3-year-old AMD RX 5700 XT 8GB VRAM. It’s not a bad GPU (high-end in NAVI 1.0), except for missing the Ray Tracing feature, based on lasted video/article comparison with RTX 3060 12GB VRAM (a little bit slower) and GTX 1080 Ti (same performance level) or RTX 2070 Super (a little bit faster) in QHD 2022 tested games.

I’m able to reach Cyberpunk 2077 DX12 in QHD, with FSR 2.x on Quality, all ultra setting (in-house benchmark) min. 39.4 fps, average 50.9 fps, and max. 67.7 fps.
Next-gen The Witcher 3 DX12 in QHD, with FSR 2.x on Quality, all other settings on max. - around 39 fps in Belosad village to 50 fps in nature.
Microsoft Flight Simulator in QHD, with FSR 2.0 on “Quality”? (85% - this means resolution 2176*1224) all other settings are on max. around 30-40 fps. Not bad on this heavy VRAM-demand game.

I realized that my Ryzen R7 3700X in combination with RX 5700 XT (NAVI 1.0) and X570 chipset support enables Resible-BAR (Smart Access Memory) with appropriate min. BIOS and GPU driver. Originally this feature was available only for Ryzen 5000 series in combination with RX 6000 series GPUs. Looking at System Requirements, it was surprising for me. :sweat_smile:
https://www.amd.com/en/technologies/smart-access-memory In some games, like RDR2 there is a big (positive) impact on min. and max. fps

Nowadays, there are new GPUs RX 7000 series and RTX 4000 series but at incredibly high prices. I can bough AMD RX 6800 XT 16GB VRAM Sapphire Nitro + Special Edition almost for MSRP price.
Is that good enough for VR in DCS World, MSFS 2020, and others or should I wait for the new 5nm generation with better prices or a little bit slower model like RTX 4070 or RX 7800 which should one day be on the market?

Is RTX 4070 Ti with 12GB VRAM and only 192-bit memory access good enough for VR? Despite of higher price. Watt/fps effectivity is much better in RTX 4000 and RX 7000 series GPU.

I don’t know if I should upgrade to RX 6800 XT or not. My colleague who is a race simmer has RTX 3080 10GB and looks like that whole VRAM is full by ACC or iRacing, etc. in combination with Meta Quest 2. Disappointed with only 8-10GB VRAM in RTX 3070/3080 GPUs.

So what is your opinion or experience with AMD or Nvidia and VR? Is VRAM really important or 12GB would be OK for the future?

2 Likes

Don’t just look at the size of the VRAM. It does not matter how much you can put there if you can’t read it all from there in time.

The RTX 4070 Ti does indeed seem to be a card that has relatively less strong VRAM, in terms of bandwidth and size, compared to its impressive compute. It is similar in that sense to the RX 6900 XT, which is also a very efficient compute card that suffered more from increased VRAM usage (due to bandwidth, size is not an issue here) than comparable cards. And to a lesser extent, the 6800 XT.

It seems that this generation, AMD and Nvidia have changed roles in that sense: the RX 7900 XT, the 4070Ti’s direct competitor has much stronger VRAM and as such, scales better with increased VRAM usage.

The RX 5700 XT is a fine card, if you are not in a hurry, I would definitely wait for the new generation of cards in that segment and decide then.
Even if you end up getting a card that is available now, it will probably get cheaper when the new mid-range is released.

Depending on what part of your performance you want to increase (average FPS with high graphics settings or minimum FPS (stutters) in busy missions), you might be better off getting a Ryzen 7 5800X3D. They cost only a tad over €300 now where I live.

2 Likes

Thank you for your opinion. I have a similar feeling about GPU nowadays market, not sure if MSRP RX 6800 XT (even if good model) is the best option nowadays (and for future simulations). It’s an older generation GPU but still better than mine. Hopefully GPU market decrease prices in general.

My completely new 3-year-old PC wasn’t cheap, to be honest.:slight_smile:
Respectively, I paid 8999 CZK (381 EUR) for Ryzen 3700X in July 2019. Ryzen 7 5800X3D price is 8790 CZK (372 EUR) where I live.

OK so big VRAM isn’t everything. I would like to get the best min. fps as well as enough power for a VR set as well as 60 fps in QHD resolution. Yeah, I prefer max. detail if possible despite lower fps.
And of course, be able to play one day CP77, TW3, and old-school FPS like Doom, Quake, and Half-Life with ray tracing (wish).

1 Like

I really would like AMD to compete well in VR but right now I think it’s lagging behind!
Mostly on driver quality

this is the take by babeltech that usually make great VR reviews on AMD vs NVIDIA
benchmark 7900 XTX vs RTX 4080

Although synthetic VR benches (except for OpenVR benchmark) predicted good VR performance, we were disappointed with our 7900 XTX VR experience, unlike with pancake games. In at least two games, we experienced distracting visual artifacting and texture shimmering. The 7900 series may benefit from some attention to VR from the Radeon driver team as in many cases it even falls behind the RX 6900 XT.

At AMD’s press event in Las Vegas, the presenters noted that AMD drivers continue to improve for the entire life of the architecture – generally with an up to 10% performance gain – often compared to “fine wine” aging well. However, for VR enthusiasts today, the RX 7900 XTX is disappointing and it performs well behind the RTX 4080 not logging a single performance win.

1 Like

Did you see following Hardware Unboxed video?!

Look like the owner of RTX 3000 series GPUs with only 8GB VRAM will very probably suffer in the future, especially if the game isn’t well optimized.
Hopefully, Nvidia know what they are doing if the new RTX 4060/4060 Ti should have only 8GB of VRAM and RTX 4050 6GB of VRAM. Hopefully, 12GB VRAM of RTX 4070 Ti/4070 will be enough in the next 3-5 years.

2 Likes

Didn’t expect that! It seems VRAM usage is bloating up way faster than I thought. Guess NVidia didn’t get the memo, either.