radeon xpress 200m ram allocation

I've looked for threads about this but not found any, if there are and I missed them I apologise.

Half an hour on the phone to Toshiba support brought me to the conclusion that the xpress 200m in my Satellite Pro L100 (marketed as up to 256mb) does not have a manual control for graphics ram used. It would seem something inside this thing does that itself. Right now i'm running 512mb ram, of which 64mb is dedicated to video.

Can other users of the 200m tell me:

IS there a manual control for v-ram?

Is v-ram allocated decided by total system ram in the laptop?

Does it allocate a base 64mb ram and then take more when it needs it?


Thanks very much

Jessica

 

The 200m will take 64MB of memory for basic Windows use, then when the system needs it it will allocate more memory to the 200m. The amount will be decided by the total system memory you have. I think with 512MB of memory it will be up to 256mb.

If there is a manual control I would imagine it would be in the Bios menu somewhere, although I have no experience with Toshiba laptops. On my Acer laptop there is no manual control, though I know some laptops do have it.

 

Check in BIOS for the settings. I have the 200M graphics on my Compaqs, and the adjustments need to be done in there. HP claims that the 200M will automatically allocate more system ram to video when installing 512MB or more, but such is not the case. My V5000z remained at 32MB video until I bumped it to 128MB myself.

Check and see if you have any "Sideport" or "UMA" options for video. You may need to select "Sideport+UMA" and/or simply bump up the "UMA" (depending on your manufacturer's specs for the 200M, as Toshiba may have configured it slightly different than HP).

 

I just installed another 512mb ram to take me up to 1GB and now it's taking 128mb leaving 896 for system.

I guess it does do it automatically but i'll recheck my bios anyway.

 

nope, nothing in the BIOS, guess it's all auto. Gonna try a game on it tomorrow

 

Interesting. I wonder if 1GB is the determining factor and not 512MB in my case. I'll have to try that, as I have some PQI 1GB sticks coming soon.

 

Well, I tried some games and the results were mixed.

Battlefield 1942 is ok on 1024x768 on high settings but there are few lag-free servers in the uk these days and it can get a bit tardy.

Need for speed underground 2 runs ok on 1024x768 on low settings with a cpl bits pushed towards medium.

City of Heroes has presented me with a problem. It's very slow at 1024x786 at uberlow settings and slightly better at 800x600 but 800x600 is a pretty micky mouse resolution.

I have all my 3d settings set to performance not auality, anyone got any other ideas? I really dont want to have to spend £70 upgrading to 2GB ram...

 

1) you graphics card has it's own 32mb ram and that does not use any of your system ram

2) the system ram is dynamically shared with the gpu, which means it only takes what it needs, but ati's hypermemory is pretty crappy so it only gives minimal-nominal performance boast

3) even if you bought more ram, that will not help much with your gaming experience. the x200m realistically will never need more then 256mb as it can't process information fast enough to require 256mb, so don't bother upgrading to 2gb if your primary reason for buying it is to improve gaming experience