AMD’s new Variable Graphics Reminiscence lets laptop computer customers reassign their RAM to gaming

Many laptops and gaming handhelds share a single pool of reminiscence between the CPU and GPU — and typically, you may want that RAM boosting your graphics as a substitute. Now, AMD gained’t make you dive right into a BIOS to reroute that energy. The corporate’s new Variable Graphics Reminiscence permits you to flip as much as 75 p.c of your system reminiscence into devoted video RAM, simply by tapping a button in AMD’s desktop Adrenalin app.

It’s solely at the moment accessible for AMD AI 300 “Strix Level” laptops, and the way a lot RAM you’ll have the ability to divert relies on your system’s whole — AMD explains that the “medium” setting will flip a 32GB laptop computer which got here with 512MB of video reminiscence right into a 24GB one with 8GB of devoted VRAM.

You is perhaps questioning: does that additional video reminiscence really make a distinction? Nicely, it relies on the sport. Some video games, like Alan Wake II, require as many as 6GB of VRAM and can throw errors at launch should you’re quick — Steam Deck, Asus ROG Ally and Lenovo Legion Go consumers have been tweaking their VRAM settings for a while to take video games to the brink of playability.

However in early testing with the Asus Zenbook S 16, a Strix Level laptop computer that’s already shipped with this function, my colleague Joanna Nelius noticed that turning it on isn’t a silver bullet for each sport. With 8GB of VRAM, the laptop computer performed Management notably sooner (65fps vs. 54fps), however some titles had smaller boosts, no increase, and even slight framerate decreases.

Your mileage will differ — however I’m keen to seek out out if it’s an enormous increase specifically video games!

There, AMD says you may get substantial boosts mixed with VGM, assuming you’ve bought no less than 50 fps to work with earlier than you apply the body producing approach — although AMD doesn’t say whether or not you’re getting any extra frames with AFMF 2 than you probably did with the unique model of the tech.

The corporate does declare, although, that in case your laptop computer can already handle 39 fps in, say, Horizon Zero Daybreak, now you can play it at a (theoretically) easy 66 fps on a 2880 x 1800 laptop computer display should you mix AFMF2, VGM, and AMD’s FSR upscaling tech.

In different AMD laptop computer gaming information, the corporate’s simply introduced the RX 7800M, a brand new up-to-180W chip that comes with 12GB of devoted video reminiscence. Tom’s {Hardware} calls it “primarily a stripped-down RX 7800 XT,” evaluating it to the desktop GPU, however it’s additionally filling an enormous gap in AMD’s lineup between the flagship RX 7900M and the RX 7600M XT, as you may see beneath.