Intel Arc higher VRAM usage than competitors, texture compression.

[Mynameforum]

In game tests Arc A380 6 GB vs RTX 3050 6 GB, the Arc card uses more VRAM by 500-1000 megabytes. Most developers test their games on Nvidia cards (not guilting them). Nvidia using litle texture/color compression? also the devs limit their games to consume dedicated memory like 5500 megabytes and not to go over 6 GB. The problem that Arc has bigger VRAM usage (it goes over 6 GB in some tittles) and it triggers Windows heuristics? and WDDM? does memory swapping to the RAM wich causes lags.

Please do something, modern games very poorly optimised and very hungry. Also there is new Nvidia neural texture compression SDK, will Intel cards support that DirectX Raytracing 1.2 expantion and games? It should be released in April.

Im Arc A380 user.

[RobbieR_Intel]

Hello Mynameforum,

Thank you for sharing your observations and feedback regarding VRAM usage on your Arc A380. I understand your concern bout higher VRAM consumption and its possible impact on performance.

I'll further look into this internally and will get back to you once appropriate information is available.

Best Regards,

Robbie R.

Intel Customer Support Technician

[RobbieR_Intel]

Hello Mynameforum,

Thank you for patiently waiting. To investigate the case further, please provide the following information for investigation:

• What is the game that you are referring to?
• You have mentioned that there is recorded information based on game tests, if so please provide those.
• If you used CapFrameX to capture the data and comparison, it would be preferable and helpful for our investigation.

I look forward to your response!

Best Regards,

Robbie R.

Intel Customer Support Technician

[Mynameforum]

Hello RobbieR_Intel

In this video https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=_eHFOwmLb2w
There a lot of games tested.
AMD 8 gb card, Intel 6 gb card, Nvidia 6 gb card.
Arc A380 has biggest vram usage.
AMD card is the second (people on reddit said AMD most likely dont use texture compression or something), but usage is still lower despite bigger 8 gb buffer.
Nvidia has the lowest vram usage.
People in comments noticed it "the Intel Arc GPU is leaking into using your actual ram for vram"

And a newer 2 month old video https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=oLVIeMK26_s
Arc A380 card use way more vram again.

But i noticed that in comparasing ARC A580 8 gb vs RTX 4060 8 gb, Arc card use mostly same amount of vram.
Nvidia cards is from different generations in the tests and maybe their aproach to textures is changed, but i donno.
The video https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=NgyuYqJUiBM

Is the problem only with A380? Please research.

[RobbieR_Intel]

Hello Mynameforum,

Thank you for sharing the video comparisons and insights. I appreciate your interest in how VRAM usage differs across GPU architectures.

While third-party benchmarks like the ones you've linked can offer useful context, actual system behavior can vary significantly depending on configuration, driver versions, OS settings, and background processes.

To determine if this is a specific issue with your Arc A380, I would need to analyze direct data from your system.

Please provide the following details from your own setup:

• A list of games where you're personally observing unusually high VRAM usage or performance drops.
• CapFrameX logs if available, showing VRAM usage and performance behavior (ensure that this is atleast 2 minutes long)
• Your SSU log report.

To generate the SSU report, please refer to the article: How to get the Intel® System Support Utility Logs on Windows*.

I look forward to your response!

Best Regards,

Robbie R.

Intel Customer Support Technician

[Mynameforum]

I decided to make another post in Arc comunity after i started to play Final Fantasy 16 and having weird issues. I find out its mostly 6.1-6.5 gb usage and almost instantly its swapping 2 gb memory chunk to the ram after spawning in game area.
Then i found those videos and my suspicios confirmed. GTX 1660 Super 6Gb and old GTX 1060 6Gb also RX 5600 XT 6 GB has lower vram usage by average 500 megabytes in that game for example even on high settings.

Donno how my Arc can be problematic, rebar on it performs as should only vram usage is bigger. Driver 101.6449.
Please dont tell i need to update my driver. This problem persists for years like in those videos.
My vram consumption on the desktop is around 150-200 megabytes at 1080p. So its defenitely games eats more on Arc.
There is another interesting video shows Arc card but Linux gaming vs Windows, on linux vram usage up to 2gb! lower, how is that?

SSU report is faking and gathering wrong data, im having bigger ram voltage for 3600 frequency but mostly its correct.

[RobbieR_Intel]

Hello Mynameforum,

Thank you for your response and for providing the necessary information.

Upon further review, it seems that you are not currently using the latest Arc Driver. Please try to download and install the latest update, which would be 32.0.101 6739. So that your GPU may benefit from the latest available update that may help address the issue you're having with the VRAM usage.

However, to further investigate, please answer the following questions:

• What is your Power Supply Unit?
• What is your Monitor?
• Have you observed any differences on the voltages when playing different games?

I look forward to your response!

Best Regards,

Robbie R.

Intel Customer Support Technician

[Mynameforum]

So i updated driver to the latest one 32.0.101 6739. Nothing changed, vram consumption same high, but you improved saturation slider in the driver that good.

But other problem i wrote about still persists in latest driver:

https://community.intel.com/t5/Intel-ARC-Graphics/Intel-Graphics-Software-taskbar-context-menu-problem/m-p/1677045

PSU unit is from FSP 500 W model, its working fine, i cleaned and checked the volatges by Multimeter few months ago. No problems.
Monitor is 100hz LG 24MS500-B connected through HDMI cable.
Voltages are dropping a bit, but thats normal they dont drop lower 11.7 v on 12 v line.

[JeanetteC_Intel]

Hello Mynameforum,

I'll keep this in mind and look into it internally. If I require more information or have any updates, I'll be sure to contact you.

Best regards,

JeanetteC.

Intel Customer Support Technician

[RobbieR_Intel]

Hello Mynameforum,

Thank you for patiently waiting. This behavior with the Intel® Arc™ A380 Graphics is expected and rooted in architectural and driver-level differences rather than performance inefficiencies.

Below are the following reasons:

• The Intel Arc GPUs follow a conservative memory management model. The driver tends to preload more assets - including textures, computer buffers, and shading data into data-into VRAM upfront. This ensures smoother frame pacing, reduces real-time resource streaming overhead, and minimizes stuttering in complex scenes.

• The Intel Arc's architecture handles compute and graphics workloads differently from NVIDIA's Ampere architecture.

Best Regards,

Robbie R.

Intel Customer Support Technician

[RobbieR_Intel]

Hello Mynameforum,

I just wanted to follow up and see if you’ve had a chance to look over the information I shared earlier. If there’s anything unclear or if you need help going through the next steps, just let me know—I’m here to help however I can. Looking forward to your response so we can get this sorted out for you.

Best Regards,

Robbie R.

Intel Customer Support Technician

[Mynameforum]

Yes i understand the answer. So you cant do anything on driver level to make vram usage efficient and simmilar to other GPUs?

Here is my post about Doom the Dark Ages black artifacts on Arc A380, this can be related to high vram usage problem.

Black artifacts appears on mobile rtx 3050 4 gb, ARC A380 6 gb! but not rtx 3050 6 gb.

DOOM The Dark Ages, Arc A380, visual artifacts. - Intel Community

[RobbieR_Intel]

Hello Mynameforum,

Thank you for your response. I will further check internally if an action can be done regarding the VRAM Usage Efficiency. However, please do note that the Architecture of NVIDIA and the Intel Arc GPU is completely different from each other.

Best Regards,

Robbie R.

Intel Customer Support Technician

[RobbieR_Intel]

Hello Mynameforum,

Thank you for patiently waiting. Please note that these are inherent features of the architecture and its interaction with video memory, not defects. However, we are continuously working to improve the graphics architecture, and enhancements can be expected in future generations. 

Additionally, regarding the thread that you have provided, we are currently investigating the issue and will provide an update once it is available.

With that being said, I will now be closing this thread. Please post a new thread if you have further questions.

Best Regards,

Robbie R.

Intel Customer Support Technician