Greetings folks, today, I'll be sharing my thoughts on the 3GB models of the GTX580 3GB edition. My cards are the Palit 3GB versions as EVGA doesn't currently offer a 3GB card.
 
Out of stock at the moment:
http://www.newegg.com/Pro...x?Item=N82E16814261098
 
Pic of them in action:
 

 
Sorry but I still need to do some cable management as I just literally did a quick swap with them.
 
 
Some people scoff at a 3GB card and call it totally useless. Now that is true for your average gamer as the 1.5GB card will be fine for users with a single screen in most games. But when you step up to Surround in a 3 monitor configuration, you'll see how constraining 1.5GB can be if you like high IQ settings. I'll be testing a few games today but 1st let me discuss a few things. 1st is that many of you are wondering if these cards can do Surround on a single card since they also sport a Displayport out. Well the answer is sadly no, I've tried but the most any card will support is 2 displays per card. So SLI is still a requirement for multi monitor with Nvidia. This is something that Nvidia needs to address in their next product line. Next issue, is that these cards don't seem to be supported by MSI Afterburner or Precision to adjust voltage manually. So hopefully this will be addressed soon by a future release. I'm hoping that Palit didn't cheap out and use VRM's that don't allow software voltage tuning. However overclocking works fine and I was able to easily set all cards to 850/1700/4200 on stock voltage straight out of the box with MSI Afterburner.
 
Now on to the test results. I apologize but it seems there isn't a free image hosting site that will allow me to upload images at 7920x1600 without automatically resizing them. So, I'll post the full image and then a zoomed in image so you can see the memory usage, temps and frame rate.
 
First up we have a popular favorite with Battlefield Bad Company 2. And this was surprising. Just take a look at how much VRAM this game is chewing up....yikes....
 
Battlefield BC2 @ 7920x1600 32xCSAA








 
It plays smooth as churned butter with extreme settings. Absolutely impressive. Next lets move on to one of my personal favorite games to just romp around in and cause chaos. Just Cause 2:
 
Just Cause 2 @ 7920x1600 16xCSAA


 


 
This surprised the hell out of me with it's appetite for VRAM. It was using nearly 2GB most of the time I was goofing around. Still ran very smooth though. Next up is Mafia II.
 
Mafia II @ 7920x1600 max settings


 


 
This is one game that didn't really benefit at all from the added VRAM. As you can see it's only using about 1GB. Now I'm sure I can push that way higher by forcing higher AA modes through the Nvidia control panel but this test was done all using in game settings to give a better baseline for you guys to look at. Next up is the VRAM monster Metro 2033...stand back this one is huge......
 
Metro 2033 @ 7920x1600 Max settings 4xMSAA


 


 
Look at that, 2.3GB eaten up by a single game and this game put a huge strain on the cards. You can see it drops below 30fps and it's really still not playable with 4xMSAA. To get it to be playable I have to drop down to AAA and the frame rate improves to mid 40's and VRAM usage drops to about 1.9GB. Still a huge improvement as I wasn't even able to use max settings with my GTX480's at this resolution due to them only having 1.5GB.
 
I'll touch briefly on temps, but since I'm not able to push the voltage I'm not sure how they will do with increased voltages. But judging from the max observed temp of roughly 80C at load, I'd say they have some head room to tinker with it when or if it becomes possible.
 
I'm going to include more game tests as time permits, but alas today I'm out of that precious commodity, the baby is screaming and now the wife is mad, so please enjoy what I have for now and I'll update as time permits.
 
 

whats your vid craps on the 3 580`s?

tommyk2005

whats your vid craps on the 3 580`s?

  Dunno, it's just blank in MSI AB, no voltage monitoring or adjusting is supported yet it appears.

I almost forgot to ask, when you did these tests did you do it with the OC on the cards that you stated in the post or go back to stock?
 
BTW you also have to figure in the fact that the GPU, temp, memory, and FPS hit your cards for a 4-5% drop in Performace, but you still got very good results.
 
Now you have me thinking I really want 3 23" Alienware monitos for surround, if I got them and had 2 3GB 580's would my Performance be okay? I think your displays are bigger than 23" so im wondering. If I have to I'll do a 3 way SLI, Money isn't a big issue at the moment.

Can you SLI one 3GB with a 1.5GB card? wondering if the memory on the second card is even being used in SLI mode.

rafale

Can you SLI one 3GB with a 1.5GB card? wondering if the memory on the second card is even being used in SLI mode.

I don't have a standard GTX580 to test. But I would imagine the answer would be yes, but not sure why you would want to do this as you'd be wasting half the memory on your 3GB card as it will not use it and only use 1.5GB to match the other card.
 
And yes memory is used on all cards in SLI. The way SLI works is that all cards memory banks must contain the same data. This is required for them to be able to render the same scene at the same point in time. So what's in card 1's memory bank is mirrored in all other cards in the SLI array. This is why you do not get double or triple the memory from SLI. You have an effective amount equal to one card or if cards are used with differing memory amounts equal to the card with the smallest memory amount.

hey crap. I was considering 3 gtx 580 FTW HC2 for tri sli and now after seeing most of those games take more than 1.5 gb of memory i have  a question :P.
 
I will be using 3x 25.5 samsung monitors 1920x1200 each so if i decide to game at 5760x1200 do you think i will need the 3gb models as well to get the performance bump or will 1.5 gb for that resolution be enough? I dont wanna get the FTW now and regret it later if it wont be smooth at my resolution. 
 
IF you could share your thoughts it would help :P. I dont play on keeping the cards long anyway depending on kepler performance but i still want to enjoy them while i have them :P.
 
Thanks!

Great info! Not waht i wanted to hear though as i have 4 GTX580s and using them in Surround Vision. :(
 
I bet this is why i have the stuttering probs..
 
Didnt know it was so important to see the used memory of the cards and cant wait to do some tests on my rig.
 
 

Just a note, people addressing the insane amounts of VRAM being used, also please note the the extreme settings used. Battlefield BC2 played just fine on my 3 GTX480's at 7920x1600 but I was not able to use such high AA mounts. I was limited to 2x or 4x at the most. Other games I was not able to use AA at all. That is the case with almost all the games except Metro 2033. That game is just a VRAM juggernaut if you turn all the in game settings on. Everything maxed, DOF, tessellation, 4xMSAA....ect the works. That was one game that I was forced to drop to "high" settings with my GTX480's because of the VRAM it chewed up.
 
As for if someone would be OK at 5760x1200, I'm sure you will. If anything you'll have to sacrifice some AA with the 1.5GB cards.
 
Regarding testing with a single card, if I have time I may include it. But that's not were this thread was intended to go. This is to showcase the need for large frame buffer amounts while in Surround and show people that 3GB VRAM is not so "useless" fot those of us that use Surround. Everyone has a single monitor, not many use 3 yet......

_Nite_

having 3 monitors would be great, its just I don't want to deal with the problems that SLI has is why I have no reason to get such a setup.

Single Monitor + Single card = Better Reliability

I can somewhat agree with you, but I'll tell you this. I honestly haven't had a single problem yet regarding games working in SLI. In today's market, it's almost unheard of for a game to not support SLI or CF for that matter.
 
And judging at the rate the 3GB cards flew off the shelves at newegg, I'm assuming there is a demand for them by users that have been enjoying SLI and Surround

I didnt notice any probs runing the few games i did in Surround Vision with 3x 23" monitors at 1920x1080 each using my 580s.
 
The most memory i've seen so far was like 1345 and that was with bad company 2. Batman was just over a gig and Mafia 2 was a solid 900 durring the benchmark for me and that was max settings and 8x AA.
 
Still gota check some other games but so far i think i'm safe with these. Good to know about this as it was never a thought prior.. At least i can lower some settings in certain games if need be.  But sucks even thinking about that after spending so much on this rig.
 
I just cant see selling 4 of these regular 580s with blocks and starting over again and waiting for new blocks to come out for 4 of those 3GB cards.  Done that once 2 months ago with the 4 480s!
 
If one was going to buy today and is going to run tripple screens as large as 30" each then yeah, grab those GTX580 3GB cards!
 

I guess i could pick up 3x 580 3gb models and put water blocks on them instead of getting the 3x 580 gtx ftw hc2 cards. I just dont wanna get the 1.5gb models and be screwed down the road with like crysis 2 or something. I think  with my 3x 1920x 1200 monitors it would be cutting it pretty close to the 1.5 gb vram with all settings on high for quality game play.
 
Sigh.  Would the 3gb model suffer from overclocking compared to the 1.5 gb model?  Seeing as how you already got FTW speeds i would assume it is safe to say they are not gimped :P

Why don't we see bezel dividers with your three monitors?  Even if you took the bezels off, we should see the LCD enclosure.  I even drag the pics to my desktop to find the dividing lines somewhere and they are non-existent.
 
BTW, Thanks for this awesome thread you've started.

basicallyevolve

I guess i could pick up 3x 580 3gb models and put water blocks on them instead of getting the 3x 580 gtx ftw hc2 cards. I just dont wanna get the 1.5gb models and be screwed down the road with like crysis 2 or something. I think  with my 3x 1920x 1200 monitors it would be cutting it pretty close to the 1.5 gb vram with all settings on high for quality game play.

Sigh.  Would the 3gb model suffer from overclocking compared to the 1.5 gb model?  Seeing as how you already got FTW speeds i would assume it is safe to say they are not gimped :P

 
Well, regarding overclocking, it's hard to say at this point. I don't have any control over voltages at the moment and what you see is what they are able to do on stock voltage. I doubt the cards are gimped in any way, but as I said at present I cannot adjust voltages to see how these will do with a little more juice.
 
If you want to get more longevity out of them, then the 3GB cards are a good idea. Hopefully EVGA will release their own 3GB model, but they haven't made any mention of it. Also to consider there is no guarantee that there will be water blocks available for these 3GB cards.
 

sk2play

Why don't we see bezel dividers with your three monitors?  Even if you took the bezels off, we should see the LCD enclosure.  I even drag the pics to my desktop to find the dividing lines somewhere and they are non-existent.

BTW, Thanks for this awesome thread you've started.

 
It's because I'm just that damn good......
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
j/k...lol.....they are screen shots. With screen shots there is no bezel to worry about

i can volunteer to do some comparisons at that res with vanilla 580's