ATI Radeon X1600 and HyperMemory

az_bont · Post by **az_bont** » Wed Jan 24, 2007 8:24 pm

I have a new PC with a 512MB ATI Radeon X1600 graphics card, which uses PCI Express. My PC also has 2GB of main RAM.

In the CATALYST Control Center for the card, it lists "HyperMemory" as the memory type. From what I've read, this means the card comes with a certain amount of its own RAM, and then sucks the rest of it from the main system RAM.

I know from previous experience that when you have an on-board graphics card, the BIOS allocates a certain amount of the main RAM to the graphics, and the amount of main RAM listed in Windows will reflect this (so a PC with 512MB of main RAM and 128MB of on-board graphics will show as having 384MB of main RAM in Windows).

However, Windows shows my computer as having 2GB of main RAM (the full amount) and 512MB of graphics memory. Is that normal with a "HyperMemory" card? I assumed that it was, until I ran that little Microsoft application to gauge the performance of your computer for gaming, and it stated that I had only 256MB of graphics RAM.

Anybody care to help out a chap who stopped paying attention to developments in graphics cards after he got his Voodoo 3500?

Ex-Cyber · Post by **Ex-Cyber** » Wed Jan 24, 2007 10:12 pm

The best way to find out how much "real" VRAM you have is to pull the card out and actually look at the chips. Manufacturer's part numbers are a lot less likely to give you BS than some piece of software.

perry · Post by **perry** » Thu Jan 25, 2007 7:32 am

Voodoo 3500, I'll always miss you

I would assume it needs to be set to take 256 from your system memory. Let me know how it performs once you get it set right, I've never followed GFX card dev either since those same days and this hypermemory sounds intersting. A lot like an on-board system as you say and they're just bad karma.

az_bont · Post by **az_bont** » Fri Jan 26, 2007 5:07 pm

Ex-Cyber wrote:The best way to find out how much "real" VRAM you have is to pull the card out and actually look at the chips. Manufacturer's part numbers are a lot less likely to give you BS than some piece of software.

I've only had it for about three weeks, so I'd rather not open it up if I can avoid it

.

perry wrote:I would assume it needs to be set to take 256 from your system memory. Let me know how it performs once you get it set right, I've never followed GFX card dev either since those same days and this hypermemory sounds intersting. A lot like an on-board system as you say and they're just bad karma.

I've manually altered the amoun of VRAM on a few different computers with on-board graphics, but couldn't find anything in the BIOS of this machine

.

Ex-Cyber · Post by **Ex-Cyber** » Fri Jan 26, 2007 5:50 pm

Look for something like "AGP Aperture Size".

neoak · Post by **neoak** » Sat Jan 27, 2007 5:02 pm

Hypermemory is PCI-E only.

It uses your system RAM like any software would. It uses it when it needs it, that is all.

Skynet · Post by **Skynet** » Sat Jan 27, 2007 6:44 pm

Is this of any help?

MKE · Post by **MKE** » Sat Jan 27, 2007 8:41 pm

(without reading the link skynet linked to)

Hypermemory is not the same as an integrated graphics card that directly uses your pc's onboard ram, and works like neoak says. It only take it when it's needed. So, you always have your 2 gb's of ram accessible to windows, however when you do start to run graphic intensive applications, it may allocate some of the ram to work with the video card.

My laptop has hypermemory for it's gfx card (ati x600 over the pci-e 16x bus) and it has 128 dedicated, and it will utilize up to 128mb of system ram when it needs to.

az_bont · Post by **az_bont** » Sat Jan 27, 2007 10:26 pm

Skynet wrote:Is this of any help?

My first port of call for anything I don't know - did you know, for instance, that itching is an early symptom of cancer?

Thank you for your explanations neoak and MKE, and to everyone else who repsonded!

Skynet · Post by **Skynet** » Sat Jan 27, 2007 10:36 pm

az_bont wrote:
Skynet wrote:Is this of any help?
My first port of call for anything I don't know - did you know, for instance, that itching is an early symptom of cancer?

You never know