ENABLE GTA to use system ram for VRAM

[thales100 0]

Nice this allows for me to play on high textures with my 8800GT 512 without texture popping. It is however not all good because it does eat away some FPS. I'm happy with high textures and a few less FPS though. Thx!

Sounds good.

[gameguy1589 0]

why are a few people denying that this works at all when many other people have confirmed it including myself?

 

And for the last time, you CAN use your RAM as VRAM (basically) and yes it is slower but for me I barely notice the performance hit as long as you have enough RAM in your system and it doesn't start using your paging file. That will make your hard drive constantly load and will slow the game down to be unplayable. That is the whole purpose behind Vista's shared VRAM.

[Mr Heckler 0]

you're forcing high texture..

 

look at your benchmarks.. the first one you're using 100% vram.. the 2nd you're using 50% which means the game only uses 512mb

 

you can not use system ram as vram.. if the op is talking about storing video texture in ram.. well the game already does that!! that's what ram is for! it stores things before going to vram

 

if you're talking about your video card using ram as vram.. well that is not possible without driver implementation.. not something game controlled.

 

this trick is the same as using -norestritions .. it allows you to have higher settings but does not give you more vram.. because guess what? you dont have it!

 

running high texture on 512mb will give you pop ups every where.. that is not normal.. i'm sure lots of ppl have come to accept the fact that textures pop up in this game.. NO! if you keep your vram in the green and use the -nomemrestrict launch option.. you should have ZERO texture popups.. everything you can immediately see in any direction should fit and stream perfectly into your vram...

 

please stop posting these bs "fixes" that actually make the game experience worse for people

 

So the fact that I can leave it on medium textures and increase view distance to 100... which makes a hell of a difference in how the game looks... can't be done without pop ups? Except that's exactly what is happening for me, I get nothing at all... not one single thing has changed for the wrose... never got pop ups before and never get them now.

 

As for it running at 50%, what I had done is change the texture settings to high, but ignored the game telling me it needs to be restarted to take effect... so in real terms it was using medium textures and a 50 view distance... which accounts for the lower memory usage as I ran it before on medium with a view distance of 62 and 512mb.

 

I can run the benchmarks again for you if you like?

[thales100 0]

K two benchmarks, without and with the VRAM tweak.

 

Without Tweak

 

Statistics

Average FPS: 44.00

Duration: 37.20 sec

CPU Usage: 63%

System memory usage: 72%

Video memory usage: 94%

 

Graphics Settings

Video Mode: 1680 x 1050 (60 Hz)

Texture Quality: High

Render Quality: Highest

View Distance: 47

Detail Distance: 100

 

Hardware

Microsoft® Windows Vista" Ultimate

Service Pack 1

Video Adapter: NVIDIA GeForce GTX 280

Video Driver version: 180.84

Audio Adapter: Alto-falantes (2- Razer Barracuda AC-1 Gaming Audio Card)

Intel® Core2 Extreme CPU X9650 @ 3.00GHz

 

File ID: benchmark.cli

 

 

With Tweak

 

Statistics

Average FPS: 55.58

Duration: 37.15 sec

CPU Usage: 68%

System memory usage: 76%

Video memory usage: 58%

 

Graphics Settings

Video Mode: 1680 x 1050 (60 Hz)

Texture Quality: High

Render Quality: Highest

View Distance: 100

Detail Distance: 100

 

Hardware

Microsoft® Windows Vista" Ultimate

Service Pack 1

Video Adapter: NVIDIA GeForce GTX 280

Video Driver version: 180.84

Audio Adapter: Alto-falantes (2- Razer Barracuda AC-1 Gaming Audio Card)

Intel® Core2 Extreme CPU X9650 @ 3.00GHz

 

File ID: Benchmark.cli

Edited December 22, 2008 by thales100

[thales100 0]

As you can see, i got 11 extra FPS in the benchmark, even setting view distance from 47 to 100 ! CPU usage was 5% higher, system memory usage 4 % higher and video memory usage 7 % lower (58 x 1.5 = 87%).

 

Edit: I run the benchmark again using the tweak and got very similar results, so thats it.

 

 

Statistics

Average FPS: 54.83

Duration: 37.13 sec

CPU Usage: 67%

System memory usage: 71%

Video memory usage: 60%

 

Graphics Settings

Video Mode: 1680 x 1050 (60 Hz)

Texture Quality: High

Render Quality: Highest

View Distance: 100

Detail Distance: 100

 

Hardware

Microsoft® Windows Vista" Ultimate

Service Pack 1

Video Adapter: NVIDIA GeForce GTX 280

Video Driver version: 180.84

Audio Adapter: Alto-falantes (2- Razer Barracuda AC-1 Gaming Audio Card)

Intel® Core2 Extreme CPU X9650 @ 3.00GHz

 

File ID: Benchmark.cli

Edited December 22, 2008 by thales100

[pLaTaNo 0]

Question: I Have 2GB of RAM and a 512MB HD 3850, and i wanna use an extra 500MB of RAM for my Video Card, how can i do it, and whats the command?.

[noid449 0]

if its working like that ill set aside 4 gig .. whats the magic commands ?

 

wait i tried it didnt do anything for me :| i guess im just unlucky with this game

 

[norbi1988 0]

Hi,

The tweak is working for me. But i've got error like Marcin6 gta stop running and game some times slow to load textures.

My RIG:

 

Q6600 @ 2,4Ghz

4GB RAM DDR2 800Mhz Kingston

Gainward GF 8800 GT 512MB GS

newest drivers of course

 

I think my problem is with ram 800Mhz. Am I wrong?

Edited December 22, 2008 by norbi1988

[Mr Heckler 0]

 

 

Seems to be working for those on vista (64bit), I can't imagine it would work on a 32 bit system or with XP as the way the system handles ram is a little different... not to mention the quantities of ram it can handle.

 

I runs great on 4gb ram, even better with 8gb ram and I see no reason to run it higher than 1.5 or 2.0 on my system... Adding an extra 50-100% does the trick perfectly for me.

[thales100 0]

Seems to be working for those on vista (64bit), I can't imagine it would work on a 32 bit system or with XP as the way the system handles ram is a little different... not to mention the quantities of ram it can handle.

 

I runs great on 4gb ram, even better with 8gb ram and I see no reason to run it higher than 1.5 or 2.0 on my system... Adding an extra 50-100% does the trick perfectly for me.

It works on 32 bits too, im running Vista Ultimate 32 bits.

[stroszek 0]

My computer didn't seem to fancy this tweak.

 

The FPS went up when standing still, but as soon as I travel in high speed around the city it stutters constantly.

 

E8400 @ 4.5GHz

GTX 260 @ 756/1512

Vista Ultimate 32-bit

[Mr Heckler 0]

 

So it's a vista thing rather than an XP thing... I knew that vista could make use of system ram for other things.. but assumed it was 64bit versions... For once MS got something right.

 

 

[thales100 0]

Hi,

The tweak is working for me. But i've got error like Marcin6 gta stop running and game some times slow to load textures.

My RIG:

 

Q6600 @ 2,4Ghz

4GB RAM DDR2 800Mhz Kingston

Gainward GF 8800 GT 512MB GS

newest drivers of course

 

I think my problem is with ram 800Mhz. Am I wrong?

Dunno dude, maybe you need fast VRAM and RAM to make it happen 100 %.

[bukkit 0]

 

Hi,

The tweak is working for me. But i've got error like Marcin6 gta stop running and game some times slow to load textures.

My RIG:

 

Q6600 @ 2,4Ghz

4GB RAM DDR2 800Mhz Kingston

Gainward GF 8800 GT 512MB GS

newest drivers of course

 

I think my problem is with ram 800Mhz. Am I wrong?

so u need to boost ur fps right ? so i think ist a sin to have q6600 on 2.4Ghz overclock it to 3.2Ghz with no problem. maybe to 3.4 by increasing the voltage. and since gta performace depends pretty much on the cpu performance, than the overclocking is a good choice, especialy with q6600 ... a great overclocking cpu. give it a try

[-TheStig- 0]

where do i add the command in vista?please

[thales100 0]

where do i add the command in vista?please

Download this txt file - http://www.ghostaholic.com/datas/users/1948-commandline.txt

- (rename it to commandline, keeping it as a .txt), edit the multiplier you want (1.5, 2.0 or whatever you want to try) using notepad, and place it inside the folder

 

C:\Program Files\Rockstar Games\Grand Theft Auto IV .

Then start game, go to GFX options and check if your available VRAM has increased, then tweak graphics the way you want and play !

 

[-TheStig- 0]

where do i add the command in vista?please

Download this txt file - http://www.ghostaholic.com/datas/users/1948-commandline.txt

- (rename it to commandline, keeping it as a .txt), edit the multiplier you want (1.5, 2.0 or whatever you want to try) using notepad, and place it inside the folder

 

C:\Program Files\Rockstar Games\Grand Theft Auto IV .

Then start game, go to GFX options and check if your available VRAM has increased, then tweak graphics the way you want and play !

thanx m8

[thales100 0]

Question: I Have 2GB of RAM and a 512MB HD 3850, and i wanna use an extra 500MB of RAM for my Video Card, how can i do it, and whats the command?.

Check post above.

[-TheStig- 0]

vrams the same?

[Marcin6 17]

But when you do this you have virtual memmory on ?

 

BTW . This don`r working , textures are ok but my hard disc always working then and game is unplayable

[thales100 0]

But when you do this you have virtual memmory on ?

 

BTW . This don`r working , textures are ok but my hard disc always working then and game is unplayable

Reduce the multiplier, if you use the virtual ram im afraid youll blow up your hd.

[Kurgen 0]

*sigh*

 

 

[norbi1988 0]

Hi,

The tweak is working for me. But i've got error like Marcin6 gta stop running and game some times slow to load textures.

My RIG:

 

Q6600 @ 2,4Ghz

4GB RAM DDR2 800Mhz Kingston

Gainward GF 8800 GT 512MB GS

newest drivers of course

 

I think my problem is with ram 800Mhz. Am I wrong?

so u need to boost ur fps right ? so i think ist a sin to have q6600 on 2.4Ghz overclock it to 3.2Ghz with no problem. maybe to 3.4 by increasing the voltage. and since gta performace depends pretty much on the cpu performance, than the overclocking is a good choice, especialy with q6600 ... a great overclocking cpu. give it a try

No, not to boost fps. I've got average 47-49 fps on bench. Nah i'm not playin' witch OC, never do that. Maybe one day I'll give a try OC on stock cooling. This slow down (imo) depends on ram fast ddr2 800 is too slow for that game on high textures with 512MB vram

[Marcin6 17]

Yes !!! When i turned off Virtual memmory game run fine

[norbi1988 0]

 

Yes !!! When i turned off Virtual memmory game run fine

I should try this.

 

Dziêki/Thanks

 

I'm testing it right now.

Edited December 22, 2008 by norbi1988

[link626 1]

turn off the pagefile to make this work.

[jas927 0]

how do you turn off the virtual memory and pagefile

[reeven 0]

After some time the game crash always:(. I must put the textures on medium, if i put it on high after 10 minutes i get always bad slow downs, like 1 fps, witout this hack i can get 33 fps minim on rain and in rest 40-66 fps on [email protected] and a powerhorse 8800GTS 640 mb , 700/1650/2400Mhz, this is the best overclocking i ever see on this series, it's almost like an 9800GTX+ but with more ram:P

Edited December 22, 2008 by reeven

[thales100 0]

how do you turn off the virtual memory and pagefile

Control Panel / System and Maintenance / System / Advanced System Settings / Performance Settings / Advanced

[jas927 0]

thanks