Seeking GPU advice/Speculation on upcoming AMD GPUs

[Illusion of Progress]

I'm posting this separate from the GPU rumor/speculation thread since it applies to my own situation, and because I asked there a few days ago but either nobody knew or answered/it was overlooked.

I've been more and more closing in on the eventual time I will upgrade from my GTX 1060 that has served me rather well for over six years, and still does for the most part. I'm looking for advice on what to do between going with an older GPU like the RX 6800 series, or wait for the upcoming RX 7800 or RX 7700 series. And yes, I'm listing AMD GPUs for two reasons. The first is nVidia's RTX 40series has no options that appeal to me. That would leave something like the older RTX 30 series, but price for performance is worse than the RX 6000 series, and most importantly, the second reason is a rather recent issue that sort of rules out nVidia. Interestingly enough, I'm having driver issues.

LONG DETAILS VERSION: (go ahead and skip this, this is for those curious about the "driver issues".)

I play a lot of Minecraft (yes, it is ALWAYS this game causing me issues, haha). Anyone familiar with the Java version knows you can set up multiple profiles/versions. For the longest time, I stayed on an older version for numerous reasons that aren't relevant here. The last couple of years I moved to current versions and started a new world, and dug into shaders. Lately, I've been wanting to play my old world, so I loaded up the other profile/older version. I also thought I'd try the shaders on that version (1.11.2 in case anyone is interested), and they worked fine after I unded my "fboEnabled=false" options file edit I made ages ago to get anti-aliasing working, which... no longer does thanks to nVidia's drivers after 373.06.

Or... I THOUGHT they worked. I started noticing the game would sometimes visually hang, and then crash. Usually it happened when minimizing/maximizing the game window, or switching from fullscreen to window, or then clicking back in the game window, etc. (haven't QUITE narrowed down which of these causes it, but it's basically not handling task swapping well, but if I only play it never crashes).

The latest error the game gave me was this...

https://imgur.com/a/bOvYlOC

So i started to search the internet for that specific code. Everything I've found, including a plethora of posts on the official Mojang bug tracker[bugs.mojang.com], cites nVidia's drivers are to fault. Only... these are referencing driver versions from the late 3xx.xx times and I'm on recent drivers. Also, these drivers don't have issues under 1.16, 1.18, or 1.19, but with 1.11.2 they do. Odd.

I looked into Event Viewer and see this...

https://imgur.com/a/Gn6UqnF

What... What!?

Has anyone ever seen such an error as "An application has requested more GPU memory than is available in the system. That application will now be closed."?

Interestingly, this might be a clue. I've noticed that in the aforementioned recent versions that DON'T crash, I sometimes get VRAM exhausted and then it goes into system RAM. Seems it's simply crashing instead there in 1.11.2?

nVidia has this page about that error.

https://nvidia.custhelp.com/app/answers/detail/a_id/3553

In short, I'm finding my PC is crashing SPECIFICALLY under that version of Minecraft. I have two Minecraft profiles because my older world is being kept from being updated on purpose. the reasons aren't really relevant, but I'm listing this before someone says "update the game". I have, but I simply play both versions.

In short, this issue is accelerating my desire to change my GPU, and interestingly enough, away from nVidia for the reason of drivers when people often state this is a reason to go TO nVidia. Hopefully a potential future with an AMD video card doesn't give me new issues, and just trade what I have for another one. :(

END LONG DETAILS VERSION

So, back to the primary point, does anyone have suggestions? I'm looking to upgrade as early as maybe next month or two. Does anyone know when AMD is possibly expected to announce the RX 7800 or 7900 series? If it's not soon, the 6800 is an option, but I'd hate to pick one up on the eve of a GPU that may use less power, make less heat (these ARE factors for me), and so on. But the game crashing is pushing me to upgrade sooner, but since it's not yet frequent/random enough (I'll just... try and avoid multi-tasking entirely I suppose *sigh), I CAN wait a couple/few months if it gets me a better option.

Also, I won't have a FIRM budget. meaning, I can be flexible if it gives a better option, but I'm not looking to spend near or above four figures. that's ridiculous amounts of money to me. Rough ballpark, $500 to $750 (?) USD but more means I'll have to save more. earliest I'm looking to buy is a month or two.

Sorry for the long, somewhat unorganized/randomly trailed, thread. Thank you so much to anyone who read it (or didn't) and will advise me. I just want to play Minecraft without worries again. Is that so hard. :(

[The Rt Hon. Sir_Sampie]

So Nvidia has just announced the release date and price of its RTX 4070 ti, launching for $799 on 5th January. We can assume that AMD will react quickly by launching an equivalent card (most likely the RX 7800), they'll probably undercut the price as well which will hopefully fall into your budget.

I would wait and see how good the AMD offering is, it could be exactly what you're looking for.

[emoticorpse]

Sir_Sampie님이 먼저 게시:

So Nvidia has just announced the release date and price of its RTX 4070 ti, launching for $799 on 5th January. We can assume that AMD will react quickly by launching an equivalent card (most likely the RX 7800), they'll probably undercut the price as well which will hopefully fall into your budget.

I would wait and see how good the AMD offering is, it could be exactly what you're looking for.

Seems like no matter what they'll be equally competitive only in different ways. Seems like for the budget, you have to choose either raytracing performance or VRAM. Whichever is more important, go for it.

The only good thing about it launching is that everything else will drop in price. But at this rate, you might as well be a competitive "waiter" than a competitive "gamer".

[Illusion of Progress]

Waiting is fine since I'm not ready to buy it right away. So I'm not "waiting just to see what comes in the future" because I know that's an endless game. But it is sort of the eve of some new potential launches and I need to wait a bit anyway, hence my inquiry on if speculation of new stuff should be expected "soon" within that time frame. If not then I'll just go with existing stuff, of course.

And ray tracing isn't super important for me right now. If two given options have comparable rasterized performance and one is cheaper, I'd lean towards the cheaper one. Same with VRAM. It might be a bit overkill nominally and for most other stuff, but my hope is to be able to get something with like 16 GB, no less than 12 GB as a compromise. I won't even look at anything with less.

8 GB on $500+ products is a joke to me when a $250 GTX 1060 had 75% of that six years ago. I know productions costs went up but that still seems stingy to me and like a small nod towards intended earlier-than-necessary planned obsolescence by nVidia. It rubs me wrong. I could ALMOST excuse it on the $400 RTX 3060 Ti, but actually no, I can't even there, not even if it was MSRP but the thing is it often costs more anyway, but especially the x70/x70 Ti only has that much too? The RTX 4070 Ti having 50% more VRAM than its same-tier predecessor speaks volumes, especially since I truly consider it an x60 Ti chip (meaning what I consider the more proper x70 this generation, which was called the RTX 4080, has even more at 16 GB). nVidia held way back on VRAM in the mid-range RTX 30 series GPUs IMO. And even their RTX 4070 Ti has the minimum VRAM I'd want, and it's a bit above what I really want to spend.

If the new Radeons end up more expensive after AIB versions, then maybe an RX 6800 will be what I go for. It does check just about every box (in good fashion as prices are even near the bottom end of my given budget range) so it's not like if the new stuff is disappointing, I have no options.

Here's to 2023 hardware launches going better than 2022!? I hope...

[emoticorpse]

Illusion of Progress님이 먼저 게시:

Waiting is fine since I'm not ready to buy it right away. So I'm not "waiting just to see what comes in the future" because I know that's an endless game. But it is sort of the eve of some new potential launches and I need to wait a bit anyway, hence my inquiry on if speculation of new stuff should be expected "soon" within that time frame. If not then I'll just go with existing stuff, of course.

And ray tracing isn't super important for me right now. If two given options have comparable rasterized performance and one is cheaper, I'd lean towards the cheaper one. Same with VRAM. It might be a bit overkill nominally and for most other stuff, but my hope is to be able to get something with like 16 GB, no less than 12 GB as a compromise. I won't even look at anything with less.

8 GB on $500+ products is a joke to me when a $250 GTX 1060 had 75% of that six years ago. I know productions costs went up but that still seems stingy to me and like a small nod towards intended earlier-than-necessary planned obsolescence by nVidia. It rubs me wrong. I could ALMOST excuse it on the $400 RTX 3060 Ti, but actually no, I can't even there, not even if it was MSRP but the thing is it often costs more anyway, but especially the x70 only has that much too? I know it's "called" the RTX 4070 Ti and not the base model, but the incoming one having 50% more VRAM speaks volumes, especially since I truly consider it an x60 Ti chip (meaning what I consider the more proper x70 this generation, which was called the RTX 4080, has 16 GB). nVidia held way back on VRAM in the mid-range RTX 30 series GPUs. And even their RTX 4080 Ti has the minimum I'd accept, and above what i really want to spend.

if the Radeons end up more expensive after AIB versions, maybe an RX 6800 will be what I go for. It does check just about every box so it's not like if the new stuff is disappointing, I have no options.

Here's to 2023 hardware launches going better than 2022!? I hope...

Yeah, in your case I know you are ok with waiting anyways but a lot of people I feel are kind of endlessly waiting without realizing it. I actually think AMD cards are somewhat reasonably priced (especially 6700 XT/6800) right now. The reason I don't jump on it is because I have a 2070 and it's not big enough an upgrade to make that purchase but if I was in your shoes with a 1060 or something I would feel like it's the perfect time to buy an AMD gpu.

But I'll admit my judgement gets skewed when I think of raytracing and just knowing it's out there and available and knowing Nvidia cards can do it better makes me NOT want AMD as much. It's crazy. Maybe it's the same way you thinking of older prices makes you not want to get something nowadays. I don't even really use raytracing or plan on it but it's a feature I'd like to have so it stops me from jumping on AMD. Maybe marketing has poisoned my mind (along with everybody on the internet talking about it). I think it builds hope of what I could be seeing some day in game and screws with my hope overriding my sensible judgement. I should just buy a 6800 and forget all about raytracing and even Nvenc and just accept gaming for what it used to be.

I do think regardless of all that, that Nvidias prices are a ripoff so I just like you and hardly considering AMD.

[Guydodge]

Illusion of Progress님이 먼저 게시:

Well I mean I'm due for upgrading soon anyway so it's definitely not just for this. This is sort of just accelerating it a tad (still need more time to save up and wait on AMD options maybe).

JVM allocation probably isn't related but I can't personally claim that for absolute sure. But I'm reallllly thinking it's not. I already allocate 4 GB and don't use all that so I doubt that is what's running out (seems to be GPU VRAM instead). And besides, allocating too much does nothing at best, and hurts performance at worst, because then the garbage collector might decide it has to run less frequently, but will be dealing with bigger amounts of data when it does, and the garbage collector running is a rather important source of stutters in Minecraft. Would also accelerate "real" RAM use because actual use is often near twice what the JVM itself uses (plus committed above that, as I found out the hard way when I disabled my page file years ago).

It's an old myth that allocating more RAM helps. It can, but it only does if your current allocation is too little to begin with (which sometimes is the case with Mojang set defaults, but I use above those already). Everything indicated this is VRAM/GPU driver related, not JVM allocation.

the game shouldnt be asking for more than your card has its software related not hardware related.i would research it more.try ddu your drivers a couple of times worked for me when i was having random game shut downs recently.these new devs entering the industry be it games,software..ect just arent up to snuff.the industry as a whole is lacking real talent.
all these copy paste schools are not teaching the skills needed to be successful and succeed.

[carl]

I can't give specific advice but the RX 7700/7800 series are card that also interest me. Unfortunately it has been quiet on rumours/speculation as attention is focused on the current RX 7900 XT/XTX release.

RX 6950 XT performance for the 7800 XT according this bit of speculation though this was before actual third party review testing for the 7900 XTX. At $400-550 though that seems far too optimistic to me. The 6700 XT offical MSRP was $479.

https://www.youtube.com/shorts/4QTU1qHCbPQ

Should Nvidia come out with a decent 40 series competitor on performance/price all good. The overheating furore on the 7900 series has taken a little of the shine off AMD for me.