Dedicated Graphic Card Video Memory Issue

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Dedicated Graphic Card Video Memory Issue

I find a phenomenon, I can not understand, on my MacBook Pro 16 inch base model, just for office use.

When using the integrated graphic card, only less than 15% (out of 1536 MB) video memory is used.
When using the dedicated graphic card, it always uses up more than 50% (out of 4GB) video memory.
When connecting to an external monitor, it always uses up the 100% (out of 4GB) video memory.

I am confused about the results between integrated graphics and dedicated graphics. The results are gotten during daily office use without any gaming or video editing. It even fills up when just browsing a few web pages on dedicated graphics.

The only time, I could see video memory usage drops on dedicated graphics, is when switching displays/monitors. It drops to 20% of 4GB and goes up to 100% gradually soon.

Who can explain this?

Why dedicated graphic card uses much more video memory?

Thanks!

MacBook Pro 16", macOS 10.15

Posted on Dec 23, 2019 6:59 PM

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Answer 1

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Siaoming Author

Level 1

11 points

Dec 27, 2019 11:37 PM in response to i_rina

Thanks for your reply!

However, neither link can answer solve my confusion.

Luckily, I do find somebody talking about this issue.

"There has often been problems with AMD based GPUs and their reporting of video memory usage in iStat Menu. This has in the past been for example always reporting 100% usage, always reporting a climbing usage, etc."

https://apple.stackexchange.com/questions/374506/can-i-flush-or-release-my-gpu-memory

Hopefully, this can also help others with similar confusion.

Cheers!

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Answer 2

i_rina

Community Specialist

Dec 26, 2019 8:18 AM in response to Siaoming

Hello Siaoming,

Thank you for using Apple Support Communities! I understand from the information you provided that you see a difference in memory usage between the integrated and the dedicated or discrete GPU; I'd like to help.

The discrete GPU will generally user more system resources. The following support article provides some insight into this behavior:

Find out which graphics processor is in use on your MacBook Pro - Apple Support

Also, this article can also help to understand a little more about how the 2 GPU's work together:

Set graphics performance on MacBook Pro - Apple Support

Best Regards.

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Dedicated Graphic Card Video Memory Issue

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