Is GDDR2 better?

Coolness,

This isn't a theoretical discussion about GDDR5 and what vendors "might" be able to do with it one day in the future; it's a practical discussion about graphics cards. I asked for the link to a card which would back up your statements; instead, you give me Wiki...

If you can't provide the links that demonstrate this "always better and 3x as fast" nonsense... (and we knew that in advance) then perhaps questioning whether it's the other guy who knows what he's talking about isn't one of your better ideas?

Hynix 2Gb GDDR5 boasts with 7GHz clock speed.

What you forgot to include was the last part...

The memory maker claims that the new chip will be in demand in the second half of 2010.

I'm stunned that it doesn't bother you that no graphics cards exist with the specs you cite...

Fumz said:

Coolness,

This isn't a theoretical discussion about GDDR5 and what vendors "might" be able to do with it one day in the future; it's a practical discussion about graphics cards. I asked for the link to a card which would back up your statements; instead, you give me Wiki...

If you can't provide the links that demonstrate this "always better and 3x as fast" nonsense... (and we knew that in advance) then perhaps questioning whether it's the other guy who knows what he's talking about isn't one of your better ideas?

Hynix 2Gb GDDR5 boasts with 7GHz clock speed.

What you forgot to include was the last part...

The memory maker claims that the new chip will be in demand in the second half of 2010.

I'm stunned that it doesn't bother you that no graphics cards exist with the specs you cite...

Didnt read that far
Alright, alright, youre right in everything you say and im wrong in everything i say. You win, i lose. Now lets never talk about this again

computersplus said:

you need to look at the memory bit rate as well I would rather have 1 gig of 256 bit ram then 2 gigs of 128 bit ram

From what i understand, the memory bus measures how many bits the gpu can send to the GRAM at a time. Its true that this is useful, but i wouldnt trade 2 gigs for it. 128 is really fast enough.
@Fumz i figured out where i got the theory from, i really mixed thing up! GPU-Z tells me, that the bandwidth is mulitplied by two in gddr3 vs. ddr, and again multiplied by two in gddr5 vs gddr3. Sorry, my bad.

No problem Coolness... no blood no foul ... all is good.

You multiply the clock frequency of the RAM by 2 for all DDR because data is sent on the leading and trailing edge of the wave... whether it's DDR, DDR2, 3, 4 or 5. Sometimes web sites mess up and post the clock frequency, sometimes they post the effective rate... so it can be confusing if you don't already have a good idea of what you're looking for with each particular card.

The differences in performance between 128-bit and 448-bit is huge. The bit rate of a card is it's bottleneck... most of the time... but again, you've got to take the overall picture into account when selecting a card.

ATI and nvidia have historically approached this differently, with ATI choosing a lower bit-rate and higher clock speeds; nvidia choosing lower clock speeds and higher bit rates. I think ATI learned its lesson well when they tried to compete with the 8800's... and since then, it's rare to see 128-bits on anything but their low end cards.

As far as the onboard RAM goes, whether to get 2GB or 1GB or less really depends on your monitor as that isn't going to determine overall performance, but rather what AA settings you'll be able to use at what resolutions. If you're running 2500 on two displays, then yeah, you'll be wanting the card with a lot of onboard RAM; however, if you're running 1680x1050, then 2GB isn't going to help you as 1GB of onboard is more than enough RAM to render the game with full AA and AF, thus, that extra gig is just sitting there idle... so again, it really boils down to what you've got and what you expect to do.

Fumz said:

No problem Coolness... no blood no foul ... all is good.

You multiply the clock frequency of the RAM by 2 for all DDR because data is sent on the leading and trailing edge of the wave... whether it's DDR, DDR2, 3, 4 or 5. Sometimes web sites mess up and post the clock frequency, sometimes they post the effective rate... so it can be confusing if you don't already have a good idea of what you're looking for with each particular card.

The differences in performance between 128-bit and 448-bit is huge. The bit rate of a card is it's bottleneck... most of the time... but again, you've got to take the overall picture into account when selecting a card.

ATI and nvidia have historically approached this differently, with ATI choosing a lower bit-rate and higher clock speeds; nvidia choosing lower clock speeds and higher bit rates. I think ATI learned its lesson well when they tried to compete with the 8800's... and since then, it's rare to see 128-bits on anything but their low end cards.

As far as the onboard RAM goes, whether to get 2GB or 1GB or less really depends on your monitor as that isn't going to determine overall performance, but rather what AA settings you'll be able to use at what resolutions. If you're running 2500 on two displays, then yeah, you'll be wanting the card with a lot of onboard RAM; however, if you're running 1680x1050, then 2GB isn't going to help you as 1GB of onboard is more than enough RAM to render the game with full AA and AF, thus, that extra gig is just sitting there idle... so again, it really boils down to what you've got and what you expect to do.

Dude! Earlier today we went and bought a card for my friend. Its was a ATI Radeon HD 5770 with 850 mhz processor and 1gb gddr5 @4.9 Ghz. It was 128-bit. Did we screw up? I think we can still change it. Should we?

Coolness said:

Dude! Earlier today we went and bought a card for my friend. Its was a ATI Radeon HD 5770 with 850 mhz processor and 1gb gddr5 @4.9 Ghz. It was 128-bit. Did we screw up? I think we can still change it. Should we?

4.9GHz or 4.9Gbps? I think you mean the latter... which is the data rate.

Did you screw up? No. It's a decent card; although for current gen stuff you'd like to see it outperform a GTX 260 or a 4870. I guess it all boils down to whether you paid more or less than you would have for a 260 or a 4870?