Hey Y'all,
I am on a strict Budget and want to upgrade my APU build (currently sporting a borrowed 3850 from a friend). I have read places on the internets, that more Ram on a GPU doesn't always add up too better card. I can get a 1 Gb GDDR5 R7 260X for about $20 less than the 2Gb version. Would it be a big enough overall performance difference to try and stretch my budget to get one more Gb, when it comes to the R7 260X? Is there something other than Ram I should pay attention too?
P.S. I chose the R7 260X because it is cheap, has TrueAudio (which I think will be fun), and sounds to be powerful enough for me.
More GB doesn't equate to more performance. While a 260x might utilise 2GB of VRAM, the GPU itself is a limiting factor. It's not going to process that memory any faster, and so, 1GB should be more than enough. Quite balanced with the performance of the card.
Depending on the games that you enjoy, I would save additional funds for the R7 265. It doesn't have True Audio, but it is a great performer. Will work fine with your APU as a CPU.
Thank you for the info, Berserker. That's what I thought might be the case. I was looking into the R7 265, but it seems to be too good to be true, and so far is. I will wait a month or so, no rush. See if the R7 265 reappears at it's suggested price, it's just looking like the R7 260X is just the safer bet at this time, unfortunately.
The R7 265 is only £10-20 more than the 260x. I'm sure it's a comparative price difference wherever you are. It's already released, but very hard to find on the market.
Would a 2Gb R7 265 make more sense? Would they even make a 1Gb version? I just can't find any to even look at.
The R7 265 is a 2GB card. The 265 is a rebranded 7850 with some additions. While there were 1GB and 2GB variants of the 7850, there are only 2GB variants of the 265.
Honestly, the amount of VRAM is of no concern. VRAM is always sufficient for the card.
Good to know. Thank you for the help.
The extra VRAM will come in handy if you are playing games with high end textures, playing a heavily modded skyrim or playing at high resolutions
So you think if I can't manage to snag a R7 265 2Gb, I should maybe go with the R7 260X 2Gb? I like texture.