3060ti 8gb vs 3060 12gb

[Bomby569]

This is not as simple as an allocation problem because that will vary wildly based on the game engine and how the game uses vram. It's true that what you see is allocation not actual use, but that always comes up when talking about ram or vram, it's not always the answer to the question people are asking, it depends on how close you are to the limit.

I also don't think it's a question of better, of course the faster one is better, but ratter if the 8GB is really enough for a normal gamers that doesn't change cards every year especially in this market, there is a real question of long term use of this cards.
I bought and own the 3060ti, but i really wish they had put a little extra vram especially considering the prices, just talking about MSRP, not even going for the shortage problem.

8 GB is more than enough for 3060 Ti, and therefore it's nonsensical that 3060 would benefit from more than that. Even you can't deny that.

Just play RE village and try to max the settings on a 3060ti to see what happens. And don't give me a theoretical answer, download the demo and do it. See for yourselve what i saw. You don't own the card or don't want to try the game, too bad because i have and i did

 

[AusWolf]

While true, you take a big quality and performance hit. Max everything out and even 1080p, 8GB is just not enough.

That's not true. I finished the game with my 8 GB 2070 at 1080p, all settings maxed out, RT Psycho, DLSS Quality, and suffered no technical issues (no texture/asset popping or slowdowns) whatsoever.

Additionally, VRAM usage barely hit 7 GB. Like I said, the game uses as much VRAM as it can. Anno 2021, VRAM usage is not a constant value across different hardware.

That's a bold claim and just as equally incorrect.

This is the same argument that happens with every generation of GPU's that end up offering more VRAM for games pushing and exceeding the limits. People argued that same way when the 2GB cards came out when everyone thought 1GB was enough. It happened again with the 2GB VS 4GB jump and again with the 4GB vs 8GB jump. And the same result happens EVERY time. The cards with the greater amount of VRAM end up being more useful longer.

Progress ALWAYS marches forward and as it does the resources needed to accommodate that progress need to expand.

I agree with that when you're comparing two cards using an identical GPU with different amounts of VRAM. When you're comparing a slower card with more VRAM to a faster one with less, I'm not entirely sure.

 

[Selaya]

also the 3060ti has a wider bus than the 3060 and bandwidth matters, too so yeah

 

[AusWolf]

Just play RE village and try to max the settings on a 3060ti to see what happens. And don't give me a theoretical answer, download the demo and do it. See for yourselve what i saw. You don't own the card or don't want to try the game, too bad because i have and i did

It has a demo? I didn't know! Downloading it now...

 

[efikkan]

This is not as simple as an allocation problem because that will vary wildly based on the game engine and how the game uses vram.

While the game is in control of what it allocates and how much, the game is not in control of how much bandwidth and computational performance is required to utilize that texture. We developers can't speed up how the TMUs work, this is hardware, it's fixed. We can only change the utilization of these resources.

… but ratter if the 8GB is really enough for a normal gamers that doesn't change cards every year especially in this market, there is a real question of long term use of this cards.

Well, if you understood my earlier post, you wouldn't be wondering about this.
If you want to utilize more VRAM in future games on the same hardware, you have to sacrifice frame rate, since you are limited by the bottlenecks of bandwidth and computational performance.

Just play RE village and try to max the settings on a 3060ti to see what happens. And don't give me a theoretical answer, download the demo and do it. See for yourselve what i saw. You don't own the card or don't want to try the game, too bad because i have and i did

Really? Because there are people who are able to run 3060 Ti in 4K at max settings.
But trying to do this with a 3060 12 GB would give you much lower FPS, lower than 60 FPS, so what's the point? Running a ~40 FPS slideshow? RTX 3060 Ti still remains the better card, regardless of your feelings.

 

[Bomby569]

Really? Because there are people who are able to run 3060 Ti in 4K at max settings.

No they don't, that's impossible, it's not even a question of maxing it, you won't even get nowhere near close to be able to do it. Maybe for a couple of minutes then it's a slide show. As soon as those vram numbers get to red you're done.
I'm not talking about "people", i did it myself.

 

[AusWolf]

If you want to utilize more VRAM in future games on the same hardware, you have to sacrifice frame rate, since you are limited by the bottlenecks of bandwidth and computational performance.

This!

Let's not forget the fact that GPU performance improves through the years just as much as VRAM capacity does (if not more). Your "superior" 12 GB 3060 might run out of computational power long before more powerful, but lesser VRAM-equipped cards run out of VRAM. Futureproofing is a myth.

Edit: https://www.techpowerup.com/review/halo-infinite-benchmark-test-performance/4.html

Guys, let's look at two graphs: VRAM usage: 1080p: 6600 MB, 1440p: 7 GB. Yet, the 6 GB 1660 Ti runs it better than the 8 GB 1080 even at 1440p. It only shows its weakness at 4K. Why?

 

[Frick]

While true, you take a big quality and performance hit. Max everything out and even 1080p, 8GB is just not enough.

The problem is that it's really hard to test this statement, but it's clear the 12GB 3060 doesn't handle Cyperbunk 2077 better than the 3060ti. I don't get a smooth 60fps with everything maxed out @ 1080p, and that is not because of a lack of memory. But what about the next generation games? Well, the lack of power would require a dropping of settings anyway.

This is the same argument that happens with every generation of GPU's that end up offering more VRAM for games pushing and exceeding the limits. People argued that same way when the 2GB cards came out when everyone thought 1GB was enough. It happened again with the 2GB VS 4GB jump and again with the 4GB vs 8GB jump. And the same result happens EVERY time. The cards with the greater amount of VRAM end up being more useful longer.

The only proper test on this I know of is this, and while it's a bit old now, it's still pretty telling. The graphs below is the worst case scenario (where the amount of RAM actually did make a difference). You'd probably want to tweak the graphics anyway to get a smoother framerate, meaning dropping settings. The big problem for the cards below isn't the amount of memory, it's the performance of the GPU and the memory. But you do have a point, sure. More memory is good, most of the time (remember the Geforce 4 MX440 variants with stupid amounts of memory?). But when a game comes along that brings the GPU to its knees the reason for that is always - to my recollection - GPU performance, not the amount of VRAM. If you have a specific example saying otherwise (even just from memory) tell us. I mean I've seen the same things as you, but my conclusion is basically the opposite: GPU performance is more important than the amount of VRAM, up to a point. A 6GB version of the RTX 3090 would be terrible, but that doesn't exist. The 8GB RTX 3070 exists however, and that is faster than the RTX 3060ti, and I guess only time will tell if the 12GB 3060 with at any point be a better at games than both of them, but I seriously doubt it (or rather, I know in my bones it won't).

A 12GB 3060ti would of course have been lovely, but that is not a thing that exists. And in any case the market is bonkers now, so all this is theoretical if you want to buy a GPU for "sane" prices.

EDIT: Hah, here's a fun quote:

Standout products included the GeForce GTX 980 Ti and Radeon R9 390X, though at $400+ we realize these stellar graphics cards aren’t for everyone.

Yeah.

EDIT: Thinking about it, maybe the R9 Fury was held back by the 4GB of HBM?

 

[AusWolf]

The 8GB RTX 3070 exists however, and that is faster than the RTX 3060ti, and I guess only time will tell if the 12GB 3060 with at any point be a better at games than both of them, but I seriously doubt it (or rather, I know in my bones it won't).

My gut feeling is that by the time we can say for certain that 8 GB VRAM isn't enough anymore, the pure computational power of the 3060 won't be enough, either, regardless of its 12 GB VRAM.

Alright, guys. I've been playing RE: Village demo with 1080p maxed out settings for nearly half an hour now. While my VRAM usage is constantly pegged at 8 GB, the game runs at a rock solid 40 FPS. As far as I've seen, this is normal behaviour from new RE games. Unless you want to be looking at your VRAM usage instead of playing the game, I'd say everything's fine.

 

[lexluthermiester]

I don't know if you're attempting a straw man argument here, or if you are just completely missing the point.

No one is claiming that x GB will be enough for future hardware forever, what I am pointing out is the fact that there are limits to how much a particular GPU can effectively utilize in games, and the fact that this is related to memory bandwidth and computational performance. 8 GB is more than enough for 3060 Ti, and therefore it's nonsensical that 3060 would benefit from more than that.

No, I'm very certain it is you missing some context. Your opinion about what a 3060 can do is rather off kilter. Please review;

EVGA GeForce RTX 3060 XC Review

EVGA engineered a compact dual-slot design with the RTX 3060 XC that will fit all cases. Unlike all other RTX 3060 cards we've tested today, a metal backplate is included. EVGA's card ticks at a rated boost of 1852 MHz, and the cooler features the idle-fan-stop capability.

www.techpowerup.com

Those results are nearly universal so the argument over which brand of card performs better can be ignored.

And as you can see from those results, the 3060 performs on par with or beats out cards that were top tier just a few years ago and are still considered powerful enough for current highend gaming. If those older cards were good enough for gaming at 4k back then, they are still good now. The question of whether or not it can perform well is academic. That leaves us the question of the topic, will a player using a 3060 benefit more from 12GB or the extra performance of the ti model. The simple answer is clear: Long term, the 12GB will age better. History has ALWAYS shown this. Cards with more VRAM stay relevant longer. It is fact, not opinion. Full stop, end of discussion.

Now if a prospective buyer knows they will upgrade again in a year or two, the problem is once again academic and the VRAM is not going to be a factor. But if that prospective user needs the card to last them more than 2 years, then the math flips itself and the VRAM becomes very much more important and needs to be a compelling factor in the buying choice. Anyone who fails to grasp that simple logic and understand proven history is fool unto themselves.

The problem is that it's really hard to test this statement

I will concede that it can be objectively difficult to make an exact determination. However, the math doesn't fail to show games are pushing the limits of VRAM more than the limits of raw performance. And history teaches us that lesson further. It is a pattern that has been repeating itself since the dawn of the computer age.

but it's clear the 12GB 3060 doesn't handle Cyperbunk 2077 better than the 3060ti.

That's just one game and example. As was stated above, short term, the 3060ti would be the better choice. But if a buyer needs their GPU purchase to last them 2 or more years, the 3060-12GB will be the objectively better choice by far. Games will always be optimized to meet the needs of the mid-tier GPU's, but few devs use high level texture compression anymore and thus the need of expansive VRAM is very important, again long term.

 

[Tetras]

No, I'm very certain it is you missing some context. Your opinion about what a 3060 can do is rather off kilter. Please review;

EVGA GeForce RTX 3060 XC Review

EVGA engineered a compact dual-slot design with the RTX 3060 XC that will fit all cases. Unlike all other RTX 3060 cards we've tested today, a metal backplate is included. EVGA's card ticks at a rated boost of 1852 MHz, and the cooler features the idle-fan-stop capability.

www.techpowerup.com

Those results are nearly universal so the argument over which brand of card performs better can be ignored.

And as you can see from those results, the 3060 performs on par with or beats out cards that were top tier just a few years ago and are still considered powerful enough for current highend gaming. If those older cards were good enough for gaming at 4k back then, they are still good now. The question of whether or not it can perform well is academic. That leaves us the question of the topic, will a player using a 3060 benefit more from 12GB or the extra performance of the ti model. The simple answer is clear: Long term, the 12GB will age better. History has ALWAYS shown this. Cards with more VRAM stay relevant longer. It is fact, not opinion. Full stop, end of discussion.

Now if a prospective buyer knows they will upgrade again in a year or two, the problem is once again academic and the VRAM is not going to be a factor. But if that prospective user needs the card to last them more than 2 years, then the math flips itself and the VRAM becomes very much more important and needs to be a compelling factor in the buying choice. Anyone who fails to grasp that simple logic and understand proven history is fool unto themselves.


I will concede that it can be objectively difficult to make an exact determination. However, the math doesn't fail to show games are pushing the limits of VRAM more than the limits of raw performance. And history teaches us that lesson further. It is a pattern that has been repeating itself since the dawn of the computer age.

That's just one game and example. As was stated above, short term, the 3060ti would be the better choice. But if a buyer needs their GPU purchase to last them 2 or more years, the 3060-12GB will be the objectively better choice by far. Games will always be optimized to meet the needs of the mid-tier GPU's, but few devs use high level texture compression anymore and thus the need of expansive VRAM is very important, again long term.

It's not academic how the card performs (or the memory bandwidth). As the card ages it gets less effective at pushing pixels in newer games and higher resolutions have more pixels, so to preserve playability the resolution gets dropped. VRAM is a factor, but it's not the only factor.

History does care for performance, if you take the RX 570/580 for example, 8GB of memory doesn't put the 570/580 in another performance category. It could never compete with a 3060 Ti at 1080p or 1440p, it's simply too slow. If you'd got the 8GB model anticipating it would last into the 8GB generation (as 8GB is on mainstream cards now), it hasn't helped. The RX 6600 8GB outperforms the 580 8GB by a wide margin. If you'd went for a RX 570 8GB instead of an RX 580 4GB, it wouldn't have helped either, the RX 6600 simply monsters it, at any resolution. The 3GB model of the 1060 was criticised even at the time as being too marginal, so that's maybe a different story.

 

[lexluthermiester]

8GB of memory doesn't put the 570/580 in another performance category

If you'd got the 8GB model anticipating it would last into the 8GB generation (as 8GB is on mainstream cards now), it hasn't helped.

Total rubbish. The differences in gaming capability between the RX570/580 4GB and 8GB are very distinct. A user can, in fact, still game on an 8GB RX570 or RX580 with a good level of quality and experience where as the 4GB models are struggling more to keep up due to the lack of VRAM. Those cards are a perfect examples of the differences to gaming experience a user can expect. The 8GB versions are still usable, the 4GB versions less so.

There are no hard lines to be drawn in this debate, but to say a 12GB card is currently less useful than an 8GB card and will remain so going forward is simply short-sighted to say the least.

 

[Tetras]

Total rubbish. The differences in gaming capability between the RX570/580 4GB and 8GB are very distinct. A user can, in fact, still game on an 8GB RX570 or RX580 with a good level of quality and experience where as the 4GB models are struggling more to keep up due to the lack of VRAM. Those cards are a perfect examples of the differences to gaming experience a user can expect. The 8GB version are still usable, the 4GB versions less so.

There are no hard lines to be drawn in this debate, but to say a 12GB card is currently less useful than an 8GB card and will remain so going forward is simply short-sighted to say the least.

It's funny you say there are no hard lines when you 'rubbish' everybody else's opinion.

The RX 570/580 4/8 are largely unplayable in the same scenarios nowadays. The RX 6600 is 1080 class level of performance and capable of things the RX 570/580 are not. I expect there are some edge cases that the 8GB can just about manage it at higher detail settings, but modern triple a 1440p/4K gaming are just not possible on these cards anymore and having double the VRAM doesn't change that.

 

[lexluthermiester]

It's funny you say there are no hard lines when you 'rubbish' everybody else's opinion.

Think through that one a moment.

but modern triple a 1440p/4K gaming are just not possible on these cards anymore

I never mentioned a specific resolution for those cards. You seem to be missing the point or deliberately glossing it over. Either way, it's on you.

 

[oxrufiioxo]

I agree with that when you're comparing two cards using an identical GPU with different amounts of VRAM. When you're comparing a slower card with more VRAM to a faster one with less, I'm not entirely sure.

That's the whole point though, Nvidia cheaped out on the 3060 Ti giving it less Vram than their much weaker 3060 while making the 3070 and 3080 look even worse as under the 3080 ti the weakest 30 series card has the most vram on Desktop. They partly didn't have a choice because 6GB is no longer enough and really shouldn't be on any 300+ usd card anyways but that still doesn't excuse Nvidia from cheaping out on higher tiered variants.

When looking at msrp there has been no progress in Vram amounts since Pascal other than the 3060 which only has 12GB because 6GB would have looked terrible. Half Decade with zero progress from the green team is just sad.

Everyone has got to decide with their own wallet though and at least for me I would expect more vram at a given price bracket generation to generation.....

 

[lexluthermiester]

That's the whole point though, Nvidia cheaped out on the 3060 Ti giving it less Vram than their much weaker 3060

No one can argue this. NVidia has misread the market needs. If the 3060ti had the same 12GB, the choice would need no debate. But NVidia is also constrained by the pandemic-effect on the market.

 

[AusWolf]

That's the whole point though, Nvidia cheaped out on the 3060 Ti giving it less Vram than their much weaker 3060 while making the 3070 and 3080 look even worse as under the 3080 ti the weakest 30 series card has the most vram on Desktop. They partly didn't have a choice because 6GB is no longer enough and really shouldn't be on any 300+ usd card anyways but that still doesn't excuse Nvidia from cheaping out on higher tiered variants.

When looking at msrp there has been no progress in Vram amounts since Pascal other than the 3060 which only has 12GB because 6GB would have looked terrible. Half Decade with zero progress from the green team is just sad.

Everyone has got to decide with their own wallet though and at least for me I would expect more vram at a given price bracket generation to generation.....

I don't think they "cheaped out".

To put 12 GB VRAM on the 3060 Ti, they would have had to cut down the memory controller to 192 bits, resulting in a 336 GB/s transfer speed which is lower than what the 3060 non-Ti has. They could have used higher speed memory, but it would have increased costs without helping much in performance. According to the TPU database, there's roughly 25% difference in performance between the 3060 and the 3060 Ti, which wouldn't be the case if the Ti was bottlenecked by VRAM bandwidth. Then nothing would have justified its higher price, even though it uses the larger GA104 chip, which doesn't matter much to the end user.

Another route could have been putting 16 GB VRAM on it which would not only have been unnecessary, but probably uneconomical as well.

The only reason the 3060 has 12 GB VRAM in my opinion, is that 6 GB on a mid-range card doesn't look too appealing anno 2021, and its memory controller doesn't make 8 GB possible.

 

[Vario]

3060 Super would probably be the card to watch for, if 12GB with Ti performance. Regardless, if the pandemic/crypto VGA market holds, my present plan is buy a 3060 Ti when available, sell the 3060, enter queue for 4060, sell the 3060ti. Presently planning on selling my 1060 6GB as they are worth about $300 right now.

NVIDIA GeForce RTX 3080 SUPER, 3070 SUPER and 3060 SUPER get rumored specifications - VideoCardz.com

NVIDIA RTX 30 SUPER Specifications might be confusing to customers The full list of all four RTX 30 SUPER SKUs has been shared by kopite7kimi, a leaker who revealed the specs of NVIDIA Ampere GPUs more than a year before release. Kopite revealed the specs of the missing three SKUs of the...

videocardz.com

 

[oxrufiioxo]

No one can argue this. NVidia has misread the market needs. If the 3060ti had the same 12GB, the choice would need no debate. But NVidia is also constrained by the pandemic-effect on the market.

Yeah, I'm guessing with the 4000 series Nvidia will be more generous with Vram amounts but only because AMD is competitve in Rasterization performance and seem to have the edge in newer games minus 4k.

I don't think they "cheaped out".

To put 12 GB VRAM on the 3060 Ti, they would have had to cut down the memory controller to 192 bits, resulting in a 336 GB/s transfer speed which is lower than what the 3060 non-Ti has. They could have used higher speed memory, but it wouldn't have helped much. According to the TPU database, there's roughly 25% difference in performance between the 3060 and the 3060 Ti, which wouldn't be the case if the Ti was bottlenecked by VRAM bandwidth. Then nothing would have justified its higher price, even though it uses the larger GA104 chip, which doesn't matter much to the end user.

Another route could have been putting 16 GB VRAM on it which wouldn't only have been unnecessary, but probably uneconomical as well.

We should never feel them giving us too much vram is uneconomical from a billion dollar company yes they have proved they do not give a shit about gamers but even if MSRP were 100 higher the extra vram would be welcomed even if as just an option.

There are already examples of games with shit performance due to the 8GB vram look at the 3070 vs the 2080 ti at 4k, look at that 3060 go embarrassing.

 

[AusWolf]

3060 Super would probably be the card to watch for, if 12GB with Ti performance. Regardless, if the pandemic/crypto VGA market holds, my present plan is buy a 3060 Ti when available, sell the 3060, enter queue for 4060, sell the 3060ti. Presently planning on selling my 1060 6GB as they are worth about $300 right now.

NVIDIA GeForce RTX 3080 SUPER, 3070 SUPER and 3060 SUPER get rumored specifications - VideoCardz.com

NVIDIA RTX 30 SUPER Specifications might be confusing to customers The full list of all four RTX 30 SUPER SKUs has been shared by kopite7kimi, a leaker who revealed the specs of NVIDIA Ampere GPUs more than a year before release. Kopite revealed the specs of the missing three SKUs of the...

videocardz.com

Why plan on selling a card that you don't even have yet? I'd say, just buy it, and sell it when it doesn't make you happy anymore.

 

[chrcoluk]

Tho still ran fine on 980 Ti, allocating isn't the same as usage.

Just to be clear it 'used' the memory.

I also keep reading that allocated memory is not used memory, it is used.

If memory is allocated to an app, it means another app cannot use the same memory, windows doesn't support overcommit.

However in the case of FF15 the memory isn't just allocated it is actually used by the game in fact if your VRAM runs out, it will then fall back to normal system RAM causing stutters and then eventually if you don't stop the game, give you a out of memory error crashing windows.

How do I know? It happened to me many times until I disabled Nvidia grass. It also happened to many others, someone on reddit, got a OOM playing FF15 with 48 gigs of RAM. The dev of the SpecialK mod driver tried to fix it as well and was partially successful. I don't know if SE ever managed to eventually fix it themselves.

 

[AusWolf]

We should never feel them giving us too much vram is uneconomical from a billion dollar company yes they have proved they do not give a shit about gamers but even if MSRP were 100 higher the extra vram would be welcomed even if as just an option.

They didn't become a billion dollar company by giving VRAM away for free.

There are already examples of games with shit performance due to the 8GB vram look at the 3070 vs the 2080 ti at 4k, look at that 3060 go embarrassing.

View attachment 229950

Of course you need more VRAM for 4K! Who would have thought?

 

[oxrufiioxo]

They didn't become a billion dollar company by giving VRAM away for free.


Of course you need more VRAM for 4K! Who would have thought?

This game would be playable on the 3060 ti and 3070 if they had more vram at 4k they are plenty fast enough but instead they lose to a weaker gpu with more Vram.

These are all 400+ cards even at MSRP you shouldn't need to worry about if you are going to run into vram limitations in a couple years with them....... Again if people want to spend that much on 8gb cards more power to them and if they can get them at or near MSRP I would say go for it but that doesn't make any less shitty.

 

[lexluthermiester]

Yeah, I'm guessing with the 4000 series Nvidia will be more generous with Vram amounts

Agreed.

3060 Super would probably be the card to watch for, if 12GB with Ti performance.

This would be great bang for buck.

 

[AusWolf]

This game would be playable on the 3060 ti and 3070 if they had more vram at 4k they are plenty fast enough but instead they lose to a weaker gpu with more Vram.

I haven't seen anybody talk about 4K before you mentioned it. It is still a niche market segment that doesn't concern most gamers. Not to mention, OP has a 1440p screen according to their profile.

It is clearly not the topic here, I believe.