Graphic Card for PS-CS2 256MB or 512MB ?

RK
Posted By
Ruben_Karel
Oct 4, 2006
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788
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22
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Closed
I have the option to upgrade my card from 256 to 512MB for as litte as 30-40 bucks + a litte effort.

Is it worth it ? Does PS use graphic card memory for anything?

I currently use geforce 7900 GT (256) and I can upgrade to 7900 GTO (512). Is it worth it? Could anyone give me some suggestions ?
thank you!
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BL
Bob Levine
Oct 4, 2006
If you’re doing some serious gaming, it might be worth it. For Photoshop only…I’d sooner spend the money on beer.

Bob
M
MisterOwl
Oct 4, 2006
wrote:
I have the option to upgrade my card from 256 to 512MB for as litte as 30-40 bucks + a litte effort.

Is it worth it ? Does PS use graphic card memory for anything?
I currently use geforce 7900 GT (256) and I can upgrade to 7900 GTO (512). Is it worth it? Could anyone give me some suggestions ?
thank you!

I’m not sure an upgraded gfx card will help with photoshop’s *processing* speeds, but it seems to help rendering speeds.

I recently upgraded (at work) from a 128M card to a 512M Quadro. While I haven’t noticed a huge increase in processing things like effects & filters, once those filters are done running, the re-render of the image I’m working on is much faster. This helps, because I work at a large-format printer and the PSDs I usually see are along the lines of 500M or larger. On the old card, I’d have to wait a good 15-20 seconds for the image to re-draw itself, and with the new card it’s almost instantaneous. 15-20 seconds may not sound like a long time, but every little bit helps.

This is all just my own experience though, I don’t have any real numbers to back it up. Maybe somebody more tech-savvy can weigh in on the subject.

J
M
MisterOwl
Oct 4, 2006
BTW, If I’m using ‘processing’ and ‘rendering’ in the wrong context, forgive me.. hopefully what I said made sense in some way. heh

J
RK
Ruben_Karel
Oct 4, 2006
no gaming. I don’t mind to run something once a year, but thats about it. I work on Dreamweaver, Photoshop and some video editing every day. I was wondering what was the primary use for ram mem on graphic cards ? Only for loading textures in games ? Is it really totally useless when it comes to 2D and video edit applications ?
KV
Klaas Visser
Oct 5, 2006
It’s not totally useless, but the memory is used for 3D textures. If you’re not doing any 3D work at all, you won’t benefit from the extra memory.
P
Pipkin
Oct 5, 2006
Some time ago, Mr. Chris Cox (Adobe engineer) said here that 128 Mb of video memory is quite enough for PS.
JJ
John Joslin
Oct 5, 2006
Certainly works for me!
MD
Michael_D_Sullivan
Oct 6, 2006
Chris also said that the OS may make its own demands on video RAM. I suspect he was thinking about Vista, which will require a considerable amount of video RAM for the Aero interface.
CC
Chris_Cox
Oct 6, 2006
Vista and MacOS X use the GPU memory pretty heavily.
I’d invest in a good graphics card, but you don’t have to go top of the line unless you’re REALLY into 3D games. And the cards will be replaced by something faster in 6 months anyway….
Y
YrbkMgr
Oct 6, 2006
I’d invest in a good graphics card

So Chris, is that RAM or what? And if so, is 128 MB adequate?
CC
Chris_Cox
Oct 6, 2006
128 Meg should be adequate, 256 is pretty standard now.
512 and more is into hardcore gaming territory.
Y
YrbkMgr
Oct 6, 2006
Well, I don’t game anymore (no time), so I have opted for the routine and customary "it doesn’t matter much". So next time I purchase a system, I’ll keep it in mind.

Thanks man.
SK
Stefan_Klein
Oct 7, 2006
If you want to use Vista with 2 monitors 128MB will not be enough! You will need 256MB according to Microsoft.
Stefan
BL
Bob Levine
Oct 7, 2006
I’m running Vista with two monitors with a Matrox G400 Max that only has 32 megs of RAM.

Bob
H
Ho
Oct 7, 2006
I’m running Vista with two monitors with a Matrox G400 Max that only has 32 megs of RAM.

Sans Aero Glass, yes?

How do you like it? Seems like a waste of resources from what I’ve read…
BL
Bob Levine
Oct 7, 2006
Sans Aero Glass, yes?

Yes.

How do you like it? Seems like a waste of resources from what I’ve read…

Haven’t seen the Aero experience yet, but I really like the O/S. A bit too hard on the security if you ask me. I turned off most of it and it’s still a PITA.

Bob
CE
Carl_English
Oct 24, 2006
Hello, I just took delivery of a new AMD Antheon 64 based system with 2 GB RAM and am running CS2. The onboard NVIDIA 6100 graphics adapter utilizes the motherboard memory (256MB). Is this OK or should I invest in a stand-alone graphics board with integrated memory? I’m hearing from some that the graphics board is not important in a 2D environment and from others that a fast card makes a huge difference. ARG! What to believe!!!

Carl
J
J._Makela
Oct 24, 2006
I wouldn’t worry too much about dropping a ton of money on an expensive video card. Get a good 256M card and you’ll be fine. From what I’ve read, the most important things are RAM, HD speed, and processing power.

I recently went from a machine with an old nVidia 128M card to a new machine with a Quadro 512M card, and to be honest, I haven’t seen a whole lot of speed-up when it comes to Photoshop number-crunching. Renders are faster, but that’s maybe 2% of the battle.

HTH
J
CE
Carl_English
Oct 24, 2006
Thanks for such a quick reply.

WHile reviewing several graphics cards, I noticed one specification that concerns me about the lower-end. For instance, the ASUS RADEON® X1600PRO, (256 MB) PCI Express Graphic Card is priced at appx.$112. But, the Memory Data Width is pegged at 128 bits. (Please see the definition of Memory Data Width below in brackets)

[The data width (similar to bit depth) determines the range of colors that can be displayed through the graphics card. The higher the data width, the more colorful the picture results will be.]

If the color space of Adobe RGB displays pixels as a 256 bit grey scale and a video card can resolve only 128 bits, shouldn’t this alarm me?

Perhaps I’m looking at the whole color space thing incorrectly?

Carl
CE
Carl_English
Oct 24, 2006
Oop’s, I believe I’ve answered my own question. The comparison should be CS2’s 8 bit color (or 2 to the 8th power = 256 shades) vs the 128 bit video card capability which is more than enough to cover the CS2 requirement. Sorry for all the bother…

Carl
CC
Chris_Cox
Oct 24, 2006
No, the 128 bit on the card has ABSOLUTELY NOTHING to do with the depth of your documents in Photoshop.

You’ve confused yourself somehow.
C
Clyde
Oct 30, 2006
Photoshop doesn’t use the 3D capabilities of most graphic cards. It is a 2D program that doesn’t need much in video power to display. So, don’t spend a lot of money on a graphics card for Photoshop.

There are a few reasons to spend some money on a graphics card though. Windows Vista will require a 3D graphics card to use it’s Aero interface. You’ll want at least a 256 MB video card for that. It doesn’t have to be very high end though. My ATI X-550 is plenty for Vista.

If you use the motherboard’s graphics, it does use the system memory for for video display. It also uses the system memory bus to move data in and out of memory. In theory that will slow down the rest of the system when it has to change the video. However, I’ve never been able to see any significant difference in overall system speed because of it.

Many people do like to use Photoshop on two monitors. They put all those pallets on one monitor and use the full space of the other for the picture. You do need a graphics card that will handle two monitors to do this. They are a bit specialized and most of your gaming cards won’t do this.

If you play games, you do want a 3D video card. Many games won’t play without one. Depending on the game, you would want to buy the most you can afford for good gaming. The vast majority of video cards are engineered for gaming.

There is another type of video card that you may need. This is the OpenGL card that is needed by 3D artists, CAD users, and anyone else actually creating 3D art. These tend to be very expensive because they are highly tested and certified for the expensive software that uses them. If you do a lot of 3D rendering with 3D software that uses OpenGL, these cards will save you a bunch of time.

Thanks,
Clyde

wrote:
Hello, I just took delivery of a new AMD Antheon 64 based system with 2 GB RAM and am running CS2. The onboard NVIDIA 6100 graphics adapter utilizes the motherboard memory (256MB). Is this OK or should I invest in a stand-alone graphics board with integrated memory? I’m hearing from some that the graphics board is not important in a 2D environment and from others that a fast card makes a huge difference. ARG! What to believe!!!

Carl

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