High Ram and VRAM usage on AMD

[MikeSTaco]

I used a ryzen 7 16 gigs of ram and an 8 gig video card... I have played on ultra in some of the most crowded sims events and clubs at 60 frames for the past 3 years straight on my pc. But after this last update on firestorm and sl viewer both this is just obscene. I have never seen memory usage like this before 

Task Manager (gyazo.com)

 

If anyone knows how to tune this down or fix it let me know because i have never had crashes and problems like this before once it hits my cap in memory or video my whole pc is crashing now not just sl. 

[Cinos Field]

Did you possibly update to the newest "Optional" AMD drivers? They do not agree with SL in the slightest and will cause both colossal memory use and crashes. The "Recommended" version works fine.

If not that, then I have no advice.

[Charalyne Blackwood]

Just out of curiosity, what are your specs?

me:

Ryzen 7 2700 16 CPUs @ ~3.2Ghz

16GbRAM

Radeon 580 8GbRAM

I keep mine at high unless crowds get thick. I use ultra for pics

[MikeSTaco]

23 minutes ago, Charalyne Blackwood said:

Just out of curiosity, what are your specs?

me:

Ryzen 7 2700 16 CPUs @ ~3.2Ghz

16GbRAM

Radeon 580 8GbRAM

I keep mine at high unless crowds get thick. I use ultra for pics

Basically the same hardware. I recently had to install amd drivers I had done it a few days before I updated sl viewer and again i had no problem. But since the latest viewer update I am going all the way up to 15,500 (15.5 out of 16 gigs) on the memory usage before i get a crash. I use msi afterburner to monitor my hardware settings including temp. Nothing is out of the ordinary or going crazy but The memory in now just climbs and climbs and climbs with no cap same with the vram. Only difference is some sims are using the memory first and others are using the gpu first so i either get colorful sporadic images and my huds and chats all go blank before a crash or i get a full pc overload and crash 

 

To put this in comparison... I can run fortnite and sl while streaming with no issues or stutters in a sim with 95 people. (last month)

 

I can run 2 instances of red dead redemption 2 on ultra at 75 frames, or I would run sl and one instance of red dead with no issues. 

 

I streamed Star citizen (a game that does need a minimum of 12 gigs of ram and an ssd to run smoothly) for friends in sl over discord on ultra while still logged into sl (again last month) 

 

I have never seen this kind of memory usage its driving me crazy 

[Lindal Kidd]

6 hours ago, MikeSTaco said:

I recently had to install amd drivers I had done it a few days before I updated sl viewer and again i had no problem. But since the latest viewer update I am going all the way up to 15,500 (15.5 out of 16 gigs) on the memory usage before i get a crash.

This sounds like an incompatibility between the drivers and the viewer. Install an earlier version of one or the other.

[MikeSTaco]

On 8/14/2022 at 12:04 PM, Lindal Kidd said:

This sounds like an incompatibility between the drivers and the viewer. Install an earlier version of one or the other.

I tried that and it didn't help so i reinstalled the latest drivers this has been going on for days but today I got a new record on my ram count  

Firestorm-Releasex64 6.5.6.66221 - LazyCajun (gyazo.com) (remember this on a 16 gig ram pc)

 

and a better picture

 

Firestorm-Releasex64 6.5.6.66221 - LazyCajun (gyazo.com) 

 

I managed to stay online for this and got the task manager figures from an empty sim

 

Task Manager (gyazo.com)

 

I have tried older versions, turning my graphics down that I have had and been using for years, my draw distance is 64, my allowable complexity is basically only me now lol Firestorm is just using up all the memory and i can't stop it or figure it out

Edited August 16, 2022 by MikeSTaco

[blissfulbreeze]

I'm having this same issue. I am not techie at all but here is a gyazo of my amd driver. Is this one not compatible with SL?

https://gyazo.com/8a0cdde5c18e2408b205ab02c0a959df

[blissfulbreeze]

On 8/16/2022 at 7:23 PM, MikeSTaco said:

I tried that and it didn't help so i reinstalled the latest drivers this has been going on for days but today I got a new record on my ram count  

Firestorm-Releasex64 6.5.6.66221 - LazyCajun (gyazo.com) (remember this on a 16 gig ram pc)

 

and a better picture

 

Firestorm-Releasex64 6.5.6.66221 - LazyCajun (gyazo.com) 

 

I managed to stay online for this and got the task manager figures from an empty sim

 

Task Manager (gyazo.com)

 

I have tried older versions, turning my graphics down that I have had and been using for years, my draw distance is 64, my allowable complexity is basically only me now lol Firestorm is just using up all the memory and i can't stop it or figure it out

Were you able to solve the issue?

[blissfulbreeze]

@MikeSTaco were you able to solve the issue?

[blissfulbreeze]

In another thread, someone mentioned about turning the water to opaque in graphics tab in preferences. I did that and got higher fps and less lag. I'm going to test it on another account. 

I also need to find out if my AMD drivers are causing issues too. See my gyazo couple posts above. If anyone can help. Thanks so much.

[SarahKB7 Koskinen]

.

Edited August 20, 2022 by SarahKB7 Koskinen

[MikeSTaco]

10 hours ago, blissfulbreeze said:

@MikeSTaco were you able to solve the issue?

I have not I am in the process of doing a clean complete install. I even tried to run it on sl viewer and had the same issue, I have turned down my graphics settings in sl which did spike me back up to 30 frames however certain sims, regardless of the people in them just crash me in under a minute with massive memory spikes. its like my vram just is not taking the load off and every thing is being put on the ram which anyone who knows pcs will know thats literally a temporary fix. My multi thread cpu runs all cores with no problem i am only using 3 gigs of my 8 gig video card But the ram itself is capping out at the max and the pc flickers and sl crashes. 

 

I have played and tried other games this week

 

Star wars the Old republic mmo (not very intensive but still) no issues after a long play session

 Fortnite on Ultra 100 frames had one crash after a 5 hour play session following a duo win. 

A closed beta test of a soon to be released game i cant talk about yet (NDA)but I was at 75 frames on high settings 

And my most intensive game I took a flight in Star Citizen from Orison to Lorville on Ultra 30 frames the whole way 1 hour 

I had no issues. 

I just logged into sl and visited a friend I have at a club and i crashed in less than 2 minutes memory was at 14500 with 5 fps on medium (not ultra) when the screen started to flickr. Shut it off and everything is normal. 

[Henri Beauchamp]

If you see the same issue happening with different viewers, then it is indeed likely a graphics driver issue: did you try reverting to an older driver version ?

[arabellajones]

The mentions of "Task Manager" say Linux to me, but there isn't an SL Viewer for Linux, so I am guessing you are on Windows.

It's better to be explicit about that, Linux or Windows or Apple Mac, and graphics drivers for those three options are often distinct. Just saying "Latest driver" feels slipshod to me.. I do not use the GPU hardware you do, but I know that the latest driver version can cause problems. I know the driver numbers for nVidia are different for Linux and Windows, and I have seen some of the know-everything types apparently not know that.

After that experience, I try to be precise. Firestorm does give this basic info in Help > About Firestorm before it even logs in to SL. And it's the one thing you don't give us as a screen-cap. (I am not having problems, but if I were I think this would answer most of the questions you have been asked.)

[MikeSTaco]

Maybe this is the issue... the moment i log into sl I get 20 instances of the dullahan file and i cant seem to figure out how to limit it. Over time they slowly die down to under 10 but at launch its just a file bomb. Task Manager (gyazo.com) 

 

Is this the same for everyone. Again its never been this bad before and i been watching my afterburner and task manager alot more lately when logging on and staying in sl 

Edited August 26, 2022 by MikeSTaco

[Henri Beauchamp]

5 hours ago, MikeSTaco said:

Maybe this is the issue... the moment i log into sl I get 20 instances of the dullahan file and i cant seem to figure out how to limit it. Over time they slowly die down to under 10 but at launch its just a file bomb.

LL is pretty adamant about Dullahan/CEF ”pre-loading” to ”speed up” browsing with the web media plugin (*)... See this commit, for example, with my comment in it (un-replied and ignored by LL). Once more, LL, I told you so !  You may try the Cool VL Viewer (it won't load extra CEF instances), and see if it solves your memory consumption issue.

Note however that, if the place where you log in got a lot of web media on surrounding objects (”media on a prim”) and you configured the viewer to auto-load all media, you will get a lot of Dullahan instances fired up... Try turning off media in the viewer to see whether it makes a difference, and if it does, turn it back on but limit the playing media to the agent parcel, for example.

If none of the above solves your issue, then this is most likely a driver issue, and you need to find an old graphics driver version that won't be affected by it.

(*) in your task manager, you will see several (up to 6 or so, IIRC) dullahan_host.exe instances per playing web SLPlugin.exe+CEF instance; this is because CEF uses several threads to render a single web page. The processes themselves do not consume that much RAM, but each CEF instance will also load the GPU and use the graphics driver, which may worsen your memory issue if the driver is the culprit.

Edited August 26, 2022 by Henri Beauchamp

[KjartanEno]

This might not be the problem being experienced by the OP, but I'll put it out there anyway. Ever since Firestorm added the 'flexible' VRAM code, I experienced occasionally a situation where my system would run out of memory. This is on Linux with 16 GB system RAM and an 8 GB AMD RX 580. Disabling that option and setting Firestorm to 2 GB for texture RAM fixed it for me. It may not be OP's issue, but maybe try changing that option in the graphics preferences and see how it works out. Frankly, you'll never notice any degraded textures with 'just' 2 GB texture RAM setting.

I'm going to go out on a limb and suggest that AMD is perhaps borrowing code from the open source Linux drivers now, granting Windows users that OpenGL speed boost which we've enjoyed on Linux for years, and just maybe there's something in the FS flexible VRAM code that's making it blow up? Pure speculation on my part. It sort of fits, but nobody will know anything unless enough users start comparing notes.

[Blaiminio]

I noticed this Problem too. 

My RX 6700 XT's VRAM runs slowly full over time with SL only ( 12GB!)

I always had the 2GB max VRAM setting enabled instea dof the dynamic one. Worked on my old NVIDIA Card but AMD seems to ignore it.

If I reduce it down to 64 MB it takes a slight effect, lowering the VRAM usage (with constantly loading textures) but the majority of the VRAM keeps beeing filled.

[JaxRyker]

Hello everyone, I have the same problem high ram usage up to 13.8 gb out of 16 ddr4 3200 mhz,

But AMD decided to downclock it to 2133 mhz I read online I'm supposed to turn on something in bios and overclock the ram myself, it's upsetting I regret buying AMD i never had problems with my old pc intel i5 4460 - nvidia gtx 970

This is my set up - Ryzen 5 5600g 3.90 GHZ   -  AMD Radeon RX 5500 4 gb Driver 31.0.12016.6003 - windows 11 64 bit - 

Bios updated - windows updated - gpu drivers updated - could it be something in the AMD Software Adrenalin Edition settings? 

I don't think it's an SL issue or Firestorm issue because Microsoft Edge is using almost 2 gb ram with only 6 web tabs open.

If anyone finds a fix please post it and in my opinion for anyone reading this that does their research first before buying a PC, I do not recommend anyone buying AMD. I will never again buy anything AMD.

 

KjartanEno could you please explain How do I disable "Flexible Vram"? Where do I find that option, is it in firestorm viewer?

On 8/28/2022 at 5:27 AM, KjartanEno said:

This might not be the problem being experienced by the OP, but I'll put it out there anyway. Ever since Firestorm added the 'flexible' VRAM code, I experienced occasionally a situation where my system would run out of memory. This is on Linux with 16 GB system RAM and an 8 GB AMD RX 580. Disabling that option and setting Firestorm to 2 GB for texture RAM fixed it for me. It may not be OP's issue, but maybe try changing that option in the graphics preferences and see how it works out. Frankly, you'll never notice any degraded textures with 'just' 2 GB texture RAM setting.

I'm going to go out on a limb and suggest that AMD is perhaps borrowing code from the open source Linux drivers now, granting Windows users that OpenGL speed boost which we've enjoyed on Linux for years, and just maybe there's something in the FS flexible VRAM code that's making it blow up? Pure speculation on my part. It sort of fits, but nobody will know anything unless enough users start comparing notes.

AMD Software: Adrenalin Edition (gyazo.com)

AMD Software: Adrenalin Edition (gyazo.com)

AMD Software: Adrenalin Edition (gyazo.com)

AMD Software: Adrenalin Edition (gyazo.com)

 

Edited January 17, 2023 by JaxRyker

[Kathrine Jansma]

GL_ATI_meminfo() is reporting bogus numbers for the combination of 5600G + discrete AMD GPU (on Windows, on Linux it looked fine). I saw 22 GB VRAM reported for my 5700G + Vega 56.

So if Firestorm depends on that extension to determine available VRAM, it might drastically overcommit the VRAM.

 

[KjartanEno]

3 hours ago, JaxRyker said:

KjartanEno could you please explain How do I disable "Flexible Vram"? Where do I find that option, is it in firestorm viewer?

I could have phrased that better. It is "dynamic texture memory."

 

 

I have a Ryzen R9 3900X, 32 GB System RAM, and an RX 580 (8GB) running dual monitors on Linux, 1920x1080 and 1920x1200. I have lots of games on Steam that I play aside from using the computer for Second Life. I see no problem with AMD on Linux. Maybe AMD sucks on Windows, but Windows doesn't need help to suck on its very own.

As an aside, I also have an Intel i3 6100, 8 GB System RAM, and GTX 960 (2GB) also running on Linux. Works great too. Kind of wish that 960 at least had 4GB VRAM since NVidia still does OpenGL better than AMD. If the PBR viewer or one in the future uses Vulkan, however, the NVidia advantage in SL will evaporate.

[JaxRyker]

Update : I was blaming AMD, it is not AMD it's firestorm Viewer eating up all the ram, I asked them about it, they said it didnt matter if u had 32 gb firestorm will use 20, 

and windows 11 does use much more ram than windows 10.

[JaxRyker]

Update , high ram usage issue seems to have been fixed in firestorm viewer , it now levels off around 6 to 8gb ram.

[Bobby Rydell]

I had same problem with high memory usage and ram usage and I dj which uses even more. I tried everything. I have the AMD Radeon RX 460 not the most powerful I know but...... I finally went to AMD sight and downloaded a new chipset. I then went to the most crowded and highest scripted sims I could find. Memory leveled off around 7200 mb. I have 16 gig of Ram and It didn't go much higher. No flickering and no crash........ so far lol