Shared memory Video card - yes or no?  | | 
February 17th, 2003, 07:56 PM
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#1 (permalink)
| | Junior Member
Join Date: Feb 2003
Posts: 2
| Shared memory Video card - yes or no?
I am looking at two different laptops in my pricerange - one has a Geforce 4 420 with 16 Mb of RAM onboard. The other has a mobility radeon with shared memory, but can share up to 64 megs. All other factors being equal, which of the two is superior? Would I be better of with the faster, dedicated 16 Mb of RAM, or the slower, shared 64 Mb of RAM? | 
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February 17th, 2003, 08:01 PM
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#2 (permalink)
| | Senior Member
Join Date: Feb 2003 Location: Florida
Posts: 672
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hmm..depends on what you plan to use it for | |
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February 17th, 2003, 08:04 PM
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#3 (permalink)
| | Junior Member
Join Date: Feb 2003
Posts: 2
| What I plan to use it for -
Probably some occasional gaming, but not much. I have a ti4400 in my desktop system for that. Both systems have 512 Mb of RAM, so I doubt that I would miss the 64 megs allocated to a video card, but I hesitate due to the fact that I can't find any reviews online that compare 3d performance of shared versus dedicated memory video cards in laptops. | |
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February 17th, 2003, 08:05 PM
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#4 (permalink)
| | Mean Moderator
Join Date: Oct 2001 Location: N of Music City, USA
Posts: 7,791
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If I was given the choice, I would choose the one w/ 16MB dedicated to video as opposed to the shared video memory from system RAM. | |
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February 17th, 2003, 08:07 PM
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#5 (permalink)
| | Si vis pacem, para bellum
Join Date: Sep 1999 Location: KBAD-Bossier City LA
Posts: 7,606
| Quote: Originally posted by EvilRick
If I was given the choice, I would choose the one w/ 16MB dedicated to video as opposed to the shared video memory from system RAM. | Me too. | |
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February 17th, 2003, 08:16 PM
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#6 (permalink)
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Yup, I agree with Dave. The 64 shared RAM can fluctuate and go below 16MB if the other applications use up too much. | |
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February 17th, 2003, 08:28 PM
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#7 (permalink)
| | Mean Moderator
Join Date: Oct 2001 Location: N of Music City, USA
Posts: 7,791
| defl8ed, you might find this interesting. It makes reference to both video systems you're asking about. | |
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February 17th, 2003, 09:38 PM
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#8 (permalink)
| | Ultimate Member
Join Date: Oct 2001 Location: Montreal, QC
Posts: 1,950
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I think part of it is that the 16MB of dedicated memory is probably FAR faster than the up-to-64MB of main system memory. | |
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