Integrated Video Card and Gaming

[bstedne18]

K...I know that the integrated video cards drain power from the system RAM...about how much? And...If you just pumped your system full of RAM, would it almost negate the integrated card? Say I put in 2 gbs of RAM for a WoW system....would it just drain the RAM to run like a computer with a designated video card and around 1gb of ram?

Just a ballpark estimate would be great....Thanks.

 

[Blind Dragon]

Right click on my computer and look at properties, it will tell you how much ram is being used for graphics.

and no adding ram is not a replacement for adding a video card

A video card preforms calculations based on polygon shapes and physics. And
actually now you have video cards that perform the polygon calcs and graphics acceleraters that do the physics calcs.

 

[wolfram]

Also the overall memory bandwidth is shared between your integrated card and the CPU.

Let's suppose you have DDR 400 RAM. It's theoretical bandwidth is 3.2 Gb/s. So the CPU and video "card" are sharing those 3.2 GB/s (thus reducing overall system performance)
Obviously when you have DDR2 RAM running in dual-channel mode, onboard video performance increases quite a bit, because there can be up to 12.8 GB/s (or even more) overall memory bandwidth.

Even if you load up your system with 4GB of RAM, the bandwidth will still be the same, so performance is not going to increase much.

So even a cheap, good video card is going to destroy any integrated graphics solution.

 

[pdyckman@comcas]

I didn't read everything above but to answer your question simply...adding ram helps everything but it won't increase your integrated video's properties. Just follow along with your upgrades. What is it with this 'WOW' stuff? I just don't get it...any game...any game...will benefit from component upgrades. Figure 2 gigs of ram...A dual core (at least) speedy CPU...add a decent GPU and watch your games come to life! It will make you want to get more...ram.....CPU speed (or cores)...faster card(s)...more power and it keeps on going. To 'Blind Dragon" I have right clicked on 'my computer' many times... but have never been enlightened as to how much ram is being used for graphics. Please explain further to one who doesn't know.

 

[Blind Dragon]

@pdy - talking if you don't have a graphics card and your computer is assigning ram to be used

Click on “My Computer” and select “Properties” using right-click in the Explorer window. This will open “Systems Properties.”

Click on the “General” tab. Here you can view the physical memory installed on your computer.

so lets say you have 512 of memory and it shows you having 448 then your computer is assigning 64MB to use for graphics

 

[M®Ð®£ÄM£®§]

vid card issue

i found a p3 hp 98win computer and i have a p4 xp dim 2350 dell i been upgrading by parts i find, my question is can i take the intergrated vid card (nvida rive tnt2 64) and put it with my dell(intergrated too!) to get better preformance on games or anything?

 

[Tmagic650]

Integrated video are not cards, they are integrated circuits on motherboards. If you change motherboards you change integrated video, understand? In your case M®Ð®£ÄM£®§, you would be much better off getting a PCI or AGP video card to replace the integrated video entirely

 

[M®Ð®£ÄM£®§]

well i have extra open slots cant i put it in to see if it will better the preformance at all?

 

[Tmagic650]

If you can take out a video card, it is not integrated. So these "video cards" are removeable? If so, you can swap them

 

[M®Ð®£ÄM£®§]

the question is can i put the Integrated vid card from the old pc i found into my dell pc that has integrated vid card too with no non-integrated vid card involved! and if so will it better my pc in anyway??
Thanx

 

[Tmagic650]

M®Ð®£ÄM£®§,
English is not your first language is it? Do what you want to do. I cannot be any clearer. Good luck

 

[Eddy Rassy]

the question is can i put the Integrated vid card from the old pc i found into my dell pc that has integrated vid card too with no non-integrated vid card involved! and if so will it better my pc in anyway??
Thanx

Tmagic explained it to you clearly. An integrated video is not a card, but is part of the motherboard. If your old thing that you are talking about is a small card that fits in one of the motherboard slots then this is not integrated and yes you can use it in your dell board.