How much vram does an external screen use?

I saw over at bare feats that a 30" ACD may have the machine split up it's vram in 128MB for each screen. Does OS X always do that? It's not as simple as xres*yes*3 bytes/screen?

I wonder because I want to use a 20" 1680x1050 screen together with a MBP and Apple are retarded and ship it with 128MB vram.

 

Well, the thing is that the 30" ACD has a resolution of 2,560 x 1,600 (or 2*1280x800 screens). So that's why it uses so much VRAM. You should be fine with a 1680x1050 screen considering that's only a small step up from the MBP's native screen display. Although if you're planning on going dual screen then it would depend what you're doing on each screen as you could easily max out the VRAM in that case.

 

you can run a really high resolution screen (way beyond 1680x1050) with the macbook pro with 128 megs of ram. its a non issue really. the extra 128 megs of ram won't let you run additional screens compared to the entry level machine.

 

Well, I would prefer to use both screens, not that I know how usable the 15.4" TN-panel will be at an angle thought.

But if memory are split in half between screens I only have 64MB for the 1680x1050 or equivalent to about 1 screen and 5 full screen Windows if nothing else uses it. Rather limited but I guess I can close the lid...

I don't wanna pay the Apple premium for this but also I'd rather not have a 128MB vram computer, this sucks so hard

Also I guess 128MB will be worse for gaming but that is so ****ty in OS X compared to XP anyway and I don't know if I want to infect it with XP.

So for the price difference I could get a gaming PC later (and eventually turn it into a hack) and game on that one instead.

Decisions decisions, if only Apple could make a computer which didn't sucked instead.

 

dont know all the info on mac but I have never had a performance ht in normal usage, ever! when useing 2 screen ( for normal work or even video editing n stuff, jut not games ), all that video ram is for video and games, most programs dont care at all. hell back in the day rember watching videos and having maby a browser open with only a 4mb ram video card, and even then it was mostly cpu that gave any performance hit vs the card.

 

I'm a power user and have the 2.16GHz X1600 128MB and it's fine.

I don't play games on it, so, that's a gamer's specific consideration.

I can do whatever 3d design I've thrown at it using Cinema 4d.

 

Yeah, I guess 128MB is fine but I'd still want 256MB, but probably not at the cost of 4000 SEK

Noone of you uses dual screen thought?

 

I always drive an external 17" LCD at 1280x1024 will no ill effects.

 

Actually the same setup as Count Schemula above, 17" LCD with 1280x1024 - works like a charm, never noticed any ill effects. Don't worry about it unless maybe if you're going to be running a 30" ACD.

Oh, and since you seem to be Swedish: Välkommen till NBR