1GB VRAM cap should be increased

[Bel]

It seems like the Steam Deck caps out at 1GB VRAM for most games, but most modern games would likely want more than that. I've heard someone say that they have increased the VRAM allowance to 4GB in the BIOs and it smoothed out frametimes in Death Stranding after it could use the ~3GB the game was trying to use instead of just 1GB.

It would be nice if the Deck could put aside ~4GB VRAM so that games had a more comfortable amount to work with.

Although if it is simply a case of the overlay incorrectly reporting VRAM usage, fixing that would be nice.

[chris_destroyer]

What's the problem to enter BIOS and change it?

There's UMA Framebuffer size. Note sure if it's only needed for extremly high resolutions and bit depths, because it's only framebuffer I think, not dynamically allocated video memory for textures, shaders, etc.

[Prime Rib]

Correct me if I'm wrong as I've never used intergrated graphics before the Steam Deck but I think a computers actual RAM is also used for VRAM so for example if you have a Ryzen 2200g and a game requires 4GB VRAM as long as you have a lot of Dual channel ram the APU will use the PCs RAM for its VRAM. I'm not sure how the Steam Deck would be any different. It may say it's capped at 1GB VRAM but it should have all the extra 14GB to use if it needs to.

[chris_destroyer]

There are different kinds of RAM memory that's claimed. Not sure if framebuffer is threated same and must be preallocated or not. You can ask Mesa/libdrm/amdgpu devs. They are not there probably.

[Sasuchi-sama]

Originally posted by Bel:

It seems like the Steam Deck caps out at 1GB VRAM for most games, but most modern games would likely want more than that. I've heard someone say that they have increased the VRAM allowance to 4GB in the BIOs and it smoothed out frametimes in Death Stranding after it could use the ~3GB the game was trying to use instead of just 1GB.

It would be nice if the Deck could put aside ~4GB VRAM so that games had a more comfortable amount to work with.

Although if it is simply a case of the overlay incorrectly reporting VRAM usage, fixing that would be nice.

Its Minimum 1gb vram. This prevent that the SD use all RAM for "ram-things"...

[Prezidentas]

Originally posted by Bel:

It seems like the Steam Deck caps out at 1GB VRAM for most games, but most modern games would likely want more than that. I've heard someone say that they have increased the VRAM allowance to 4GB in the BIOs and it smoothed out frametimes in Death Stranding after it could use the ~3GB the game was trying to use instead of just 1GB.

It would be nice if the Deck could put aside ~4GB VRAM so that games had a more comfortable amount to work with.

Although if it is simply a case of the overlay incorrectly reporting VRAM usage, fixing that would be nice.

doesn't any vram that doesn't fit go into the regular ram? which is why it's set at 1 GB, since vram and ram is the same gddr.

[RealCelticGamer]

I doubled the UMA Frame Buffer (VRAM) size to 2GB, making games run a lot smoother.

[Boblin the Goblin]

Originally posted by RealCelticGamer:

I doubled the UMA Frame Buffer (VRAM) size to 2GB, making games run a lot smoother.

Can you show me a tutorial on how to do this. I wanna give it a shot.

[Boblin the Goblin]

Originally posted by Bel:

It seems like the Steam Deck caps out at 1GB VRAM for most games, but most modern games would likely want more than that. I've heard someone say that they have increased the VRAM allowance to 4GB in the BIOs and it smoothed out frametimes in Death Stranding after it could use the ~3GB the game was trying to use instead of just 1GB.

It would be nice if the Deck could put aside ~4GB VRAM so that games had a more comfortable amount to work with.

Although if it is simply a case of the overlay incorrectly reporting VRAM usage, fixing that would be nice.

So the "cap" isn't actually a cap. Steam OS will dedicated as much RAM as it needs as the game runs. The 1GB is the MINIMUM that is set aside for SteamOS.

As the game needs more RAM, the OS will automatically start dedicating that to running the game.

[Prezidentas]

Originally posted by KittenGrindr:

Originally posted by Bel:

It seems like the Steam Deck caps out at 1GB VRAM for most games, but most modern games would likely want more than that. I've heard someone say that they have increased the VRAM allowance to 4GB in the BIOs and it smoothed out frametimes in Death Stranding after it could use the ~3GB the game was trying to use instead of just 1GB.

It would be nice if the Deck could put aside ~4GB VRAM so that games had a more comfortable amount to work with.

Although if it is simply a case of the overlay incorrectly reporting VRAM usage, fixing that would be nice.

So the "cap" isn't actually a cap. Steam OS will dedicated as much RAM as it needs as the game runs. The 1GB is the MINIMUM that is set aside for SteamOS.

As the game needs more RAM, the OS will automatically start dedicating that to running the game.

is that true? doesn't it just start using regular RAM space for video?

[Boblin the Goblin]

Originally posted by Red Star Gopnik:

Originally posted by KittenGrindr:

So the "cap" isn't actually a cap. Steam OS will dedicated as much RAM as it needs as the game runs. The 1GB is the MINIMUM that is set aside for SteamOS.

As the game needs more RAM, the OS will automatically start dedicating that to running the game.

is that true? doesn't it just start using regular RAM space for video?

Yes, it will start allocating the needed RAM when the game needs it. The 1GB is just the minimum reserved. Not the max.

[Prezidentas]

but auto allocation has an auto setting for the UMA, if it's set manually then it wont change

[Boblin the Goblin]

Originally posted by Red Star Gopnik:

but auto allocation has an auto setting for the UMA, if it's set manually then it wont change

People have shown it increasing the performance on the Deck when changed. It allows it to have more dedicated memory before needing to pull.

[ThyConius]

Originally posted by KittenGrindr:

Originally posted by Red Star Gopnik:

is that true? doesn't it just start using regular RAM space for video?

Yes, it will start allocating the needed RAM when the game needs it. The 1GB is just the minimum reserved. Not the max.

I remember valve talked about this on their steam deck dev live stream. I'm not gonna bother changing a bios setting for no reason

[Boblin the Goblin]

Originally posted by ThyConius:

Originally posted by KittenGrindr:

Yes, it will start allocating the needed RAM when the game needs it. The 1GB is just the minimum reserved. Not the max.

I remember valve talked about this on their steam deck dev live stream. I'm not gonna bother changing a bios setting for no reason

People have reported it helps improve performance and also battery life since the system isn't needing to constantly allocate more RAM on the fly.

[Prezidentas]

Originally posted by KittenGrindr:

Originally posted by ThyConius:

I remember valve talked about this on their steam deck dev live stream. I'm not gonna bother changing a bios setting for no reason

People have reported it helps improve performance and also battery life since the system isn't needing to constantly allocate more RAM on the fly.

how could the battery be even affected by this??