I built my first computer at the beggining of this week. But, I left out a GPU so I could do some extra research and because I didn't have the money for one at the time. I'm interested in the AMD Radeon series GPUs and have narrowed it down to the 7770 (I pretty much have the money to buy that now) or wait a little longer to get the 7850. The 7850 has a 256-bit memory interface, so would 1GB GDDR5 be sufficent to play games at 1920x1080 (I only have 1 monitor)?
Cheers
^Seconded
How much performance difference would there be with only 1GB?
I'd urge for the 7850 as well, becaues there is a pretty big performance gap between the 7850 and 7770. There is not performance gain with more memory, but it's usually good to invest in more memory because if you run out your framerate will tank. 1GB should be fine at 1920x1080 for now, but there's no garauntee for the future and you definitely be stuck with single monior gaming. I occasionally monitor GPU mem usage with GPU-z (1GB Radeon 5830) and I'm usually about 850MB give or take 50MB. I usually play BF3 on medium-high settings, and Fallout NV (ultra).
So if I play on 1366x768 then 1 Gb of V-RAM will do just fine for me? Nope I don´t have a larger monitor. It´s just 19 inches "large".
1GB will be plenty for 1366x768 with full AA but not if you go any higher than that, its like 15-20 extra bucks for 2GB, might as well get it
http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16814131473
cheapest 2GB 7850 on newegg with shipping included
Newegg won´t work for me but thank you for your recommendation. I am from Germany and prices here are higher. That´s why I could only afford an HD 7770 with 1 Gb V-Ram.
For example the cheapest HD 7770 with 2 Gb would cost me € 140 / $ 180. The cheapest HD 7850 starts at € 150 / $ 193, which is the 1 Gb version. The cheapest 7850 with 2 Gb goes for € 170 / $ 219.
My HD 7770 cost me € 113 / $ 145 including shipping costs. I bought it shortly after it was released though. Prices haven´t gone down since then. Those HD 7770s are selling very well here. They´ve actually increased slightly. On the day of release an XFX HD 7770 used to cost only € 98 and two weeks later they´ve raised the price to 114 € on most websites.
The Brits have even higher prices then we do.
well if you already have one and if your MOBO supports crossfirex then get another one and crossfirex them both, that would actually be faster than a single 7850
The thing with VRAM right now is that more current games are starting to use more and more of it. Battlefield 3 at ultra settings at a resolution of 1920x1080 uses close to 2GB. Obviously, you don't need to worry about that too much because you're running a lower resolution, but games are going to use more and more memory in the future. 2GB is pretty much the standard right now, and more is always better for multiple screens. Newer and more demanding games are always going to use more though.