How much RAM for integrated graphics systems?

[jekbrown]

hey gang, I am probably going to start with an APU from AMD or some integrated (on the mobo) graphics for my 1st MAME build.  For those with similar builds, where RAM is shared by the CPU and GPU, how much RAM are you using?  How much is enough?  I want to get as much as I need (it's cheap these days!) but I don't want to over-do it either, that's wasteful!  I'm going to be playing vertical games on the cab, mostly old (pre-1993) stuff.....if that matters.

[ark_ader]

64mb

[equlizer]

im using the AMD apu (Asus board) and I only have a few hiccups.  Maybe 5% of the games have slowdowns and GBA seems to be really slow no matter what i do   The weird thing is i can play MK4 all day with no problems.  I have 6gig of ram in mine (only cause it was dirt cheap) and overclocked it to 1.7ghz (its a dual core)

Throwing in a video card wont help any either, just in case you thought of that 

Im running xp 32bit   I need to upgrade to win7 64bit

[bramk]

My setup also had performance problems with games running on AMD and onboard VGA

http://forum.arcadecontrols.com/index.php?topic=113917.0

it was solved by adding a 64mb agp card (the difference was huge!)

[jekbrown]

I'll be running W7, 64-bit.  The APU should be significantly faster than older AMD processors + traditional onboard-the-motherboard GPUs, but we'll see I guess.  I'm mainly concerned about RAM right now, having enough of it and making sure I get the right speed stuff to work with the APU/mobo in optimal fashion.  For what I want to do, I think these processors are a good match...but the proof is in the pudding, and I need to buy the right parts so things work well together. 

Anyone else using integrated graphics or an APU wanna comment on how much RAM they have and how it's worked for them?

[JODY]

4GB leaving 3.5GB for use by Windows 7 64-bit and 512MB going to the integrated graphics.  I have this configuration on two different machines using AMD CPUs.  One is a triple core and one a quad.  Both run very well.  The quad is able to run games like Cruisin' USA and NFL Blitz at more than full speed using the 64 bit version of MAME.  I think the quad is a 3.4Ghz CPU.  The RAM is high speed, I think it is 1800 speed but not sure.  The triple core is a 2.9Ghz and it doesn't run the high end games at full speed.

[jekbrown]

thanks for that very specific info, one question though: what type of onboard GPU do you have in these systems?

[JODY]

The triple core has ATI Radeon HD 4200.  The quad core is an ATI Radeon HD 4250.