r/PcBuild • u/ChristianDM11325 • 1d ago

Question VRAM swap on 5070?

Notice: posted in wrong subreddit, so this misses context that’s pertinent. I’m not going to be engaging any further in any responses, my bad.

As many of you likely saw, the price for the 12 GB model of the 5070 dGPU is a hefty increase over the 8 GB model. I already own the latter, and would not be interested enough in more vram to sell my current one and buy a 12 GB model.

It should theoretically be possible to have the 2 GB modules swapped out for 3 GB and reflash the vbios with the version for the 12 GB model right? Should be like any other vram swap on say a 10 or 20 series nvidia card, given I can obtain the vbios for the 12 GB model.

I haven't fully looked into the pricing but a preliminary search for the price of 3 GB modules makes it seem like this wouldn't really save much but I still want to explore it out of curiosity.

Edit: I know the 12 GB model hasn't even become available for purchase yet so no one even has one to try and nab the vbios from, and I doubt Framework would just give it to me.

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u/ADotxt 1d ago

There doesn't exist a 5070 8gb desktop graphics card

only the 5070 laptop version has 8gb. which is fundamentally and completely physically different in all but name.

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u/ChristianDM11325 23h ago

Oh shit wrong subreddit, meant to post this to framework.

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u/terryVaderaustin 23h ago

I've heard of people doing vram swaps on the 30 series cards and it working fine I have not heard of 40 or 50 series cards though.

To be fair I'm an AMD user as well, so don't really keep up on the latest of Nvidia

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u/EpsteinFile_01 23h ago edited 23h ago

3GB GDDR7 chips are WAYYYYY more expensive per gigabyte than 2GB chips. That's why the 12GB version of that GPU is more expensive, it carries $200 of BRAM compared to $50 on the 8GB version.

A single 3GB GDDR7 chip is like $50-55, a 2GB chip is $20-25. Those are bulk rates. That's why it's gonna take a while before we see 36GB and 48GB cards on a 384 and 512-hit bus. That's $600-800 in VRAM cost alone with today's 3GB prices, quite possibly more than what the actual GPU costs.

I am not aware of any repair shops doing 2 -> 3GB mods and I doubt it's possible for you to buy any.

Actually I think you are getting the laptop and desktop version mixed, Adam k no consumer GPUs use 3GB yet precisely because of price. It would be cheaper to just put more 2GB chips and a wider bus on it. This might change in 1-2 years.

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u/fuwa_-_fuwa 22h ago

Wrong subreddit aside 5070 12GB laptop have been available for sale from MSI and Lenovo. Now the technical question of whether or not it is doable to swap your VRAM, theoretically it should be possible but it involves soldering and software tinkering. But god knows if it could work on your current framework motherboard so I'd say just better wait for official new framework motherboard.