Geomerics: Devs looking forward to not dealing with PS3/360 512MB RAM constraints

GB: We asked specific questions to Dr. Chris Doran, Founder & COO of the company, on the difference between PC and console tech in a yet to be published interview, and he had a lot of interesting things to say.

[LX-General-Kaos]

In this day and age 512mb of RAM is quite limited. But luckily there are people taking care of that problem.

[3-4-5]

Wii U has 2 GB. So that is 4 times the fun for them.

Xbox 720 & PS4 are said to be 6-8 times are powerful as they are now.

My Macbook Pro from 2007, that can't play games has 2 GB of Ram.

Xbox 720& PS4 should have AT LEAST 4GB, but I'd like to see 6-8GB of Ram.

Imagine the worlds they could build.

[Kamikaze135]

Yeah, but even if the PS4/720 only had 2GB, they can handle much more than a mac can with 2GB since console operating systems aren't nearly as demanding.

[zebramocha]

@345 from what rumors are saying,the ps4 was to have 2gb of ram but dev are press for twice that.

[DarkZane]

They should just put 8 or 16GB in the ps4 or xbox720. It's not like RAM is expensive these days, I just bought 16GB for less than 100$.

So instead of worrying about the cost too much, make a machine that will last longer. They won't use all that ram in the first years anyway.

[Nutsack]

Half of that 2GB WiiU RAM is reserved for the OS. So basically they have 1GB to play around with really.

For the 360 for example the OS takes only 30MB of that 512MB. So basically it has 2 times the RAM available.

Thing is, soon enough they'll run into the 1GB limit too. This is always how it goes. With last gen they ran into the 64MB RAM limit.

Xbox 8 and PSOrbis are likely to get 4GB RAM, even more fun than WiiU's 2GB where just 1GB is available for gamestuff... So, that.

[asyouburn]

@darkzane

Yeah, less than 100 bucks is good for a customer, but as a corporation building millions of 720's and ps4's, you can imagine the cost of that. It'd be 100 * a million

[Vortex3D]

Remember, just because Wii U has 2GB of memory doesn't mean developers will treat it like having 2GB of memory. Lazy on optimization is one because everyone is so rush to release games.

In the end without good optimization, having 2GB isn't that much more than 512MB for games that are well optimized.

And, PC is the worst on using memory because the developers simply expect users to buy more memory. Why waste the time to heavily optimized how little memory is needed to run.

That's something a lot of people don't seem to get.

[andyboy13]

I mean pc ram is down to like $35 for 8 gigabytes. That is at retail to,let alone what a manufacturer would pay for it.

[jib]

"In the end without good optimization, having 2GB isn't that much more than 512MB for games that are well optimized."

highly disagree. 2GB is still 1.5GB more to work with & you can only compress so much data. sure there are lazy devs but even if they weren't, programmers do work with a deadline

[YoungPlex]

"Half of that 2GB WiiU RAM is reserved for the OS. So basically they have 1GB to play around with really."

@Nutsack You are correct however the Wii U has 4 separate 512MB RAM chips that are split in half at the moment. PS3 and 360 were both able to shave off RAM from the OS and I believe that the Wii U will be capable of utilizing a full 1.5gigs after some time. Initially, Nintendo will probably be the only developer to do so but will probably allow close third-party devs to do the same as next-gen starts to strut their stuff. Either-way these current consoles mainly utilized 256MB of RAM and were able to pull off some ridiculously beautiful graphics, now imagine what the Wii U will do with a full gig dedicated to gaming... Not to mention if Nintendo decides to shave off 512 MB or more off the OS during game-play... The possibilities are quite exciting if you ask me...

[GameSpawn]

Why can't people educate themselves. The reason computers (PCs and Macs) have 8GB+ of RAM is because they have the overhead of the operating system and EVERY background process running. Because computers have to be more flexible in what they can run, the OS kernels end up being HUGE to be able to have the flexibility.

Embedded devices such as gaming consoles, cell phones, and tablets have much more streamlined OSes that have very limited kernels meant only for specific lightweight or specialized tasks. Embedded devices have small amounts of RAM for one of two reasons: (1) Power consumption and cost must be minimized as much as possible and RAM isn't exactly cheap per gigabyte and watt. (2) Also in the case of gaming consoles the RAM needed needs to be fast, not large as gaming consoles are built to stream their data, not store it and high speed GDDR5+ and XDR memory are also ridiculously expensive in comparison to the DDR3 probably in your computer (this is the same reason PC graphics cards with 2GB+ of memory aren't cheap).

So for those of you thinking the next generation of gaming consoles will have 16GB+ of memory it ain't gonna happen. 4GB MAX and it will be some evolution of GDDR (Graphic DDR - special high speed variation of DDR memory made with graphics processing in mind) or XDR -- both types of memory being specially formulated, again, for streaming systems that don't need to hold on to data for very long.

[crxss]

devs shouldn't be the only ones looking forward to this, GAMERS should also be pumped about this. nextgen needs lots of RAM if they want, not only their games to run amazingly, but also their BIOS. for ps3, it takes forever for the xmb to load and we cant do cross game chat mainly because of the RAM limitations.

[darthv72]

when you first start out with something new you tend to think of the possibilities. Over time perceptions change because you become adjusted and the 'new-ness' wears off.

Is 512mb limiting? from todays POV, yes. From 6-7 years ago, not really. We have basically caught up and now have even greater expectations. We see what is happening around us in other platforms that exceed this limit.

So a new limit will be revealed and it will start over with the oohs and ahhs until our perception catches up again.

That is norm. Has been and will always be.

[LX-General-Kaos]

completely agree

[kayoss]

Can't say it any better. After getting the spec for the PS4 and 720 we all can determine it validity. But say if they do have 4-6gb of rams then the Wii U will be considered limiting with it's 2gb. This always been the trend and it is more apparent when it comes to technology. Even when the PS4 and 720 are released it will be considered outdated in terms of technology. With consoles having a longer lifespan this issue will never be solved. But seeing how the PS3 exclusives becoming better it still continues impress me with the 514mb of rams its daunting to see what they can do with 2gb.

[DivineAssault]

Yup wii u will have more than enough for them to do wonderful things.. Nx gen PS/xbox will too.. Ram is a very important component for gaming systems & idk what the hell Sony was thinking when they designed PS3 with such a small amount.. Luckily vita wasnt shorted in that department..Cant wait to see what they do with it in the future.. Bayonetta 2 should be one of the 1st nx gen games to show off wii us power

[mewhy32]

" In this day and age 512mb of RAM is quite limited. But luckily there are people taking care of that problem."
Especially if that is split into 256 for system and 256 for video. In this case the Xbox 360 is vastly more flexible that the ps3. The Xbox with its 512 unified ram that can be used however the developer sees fit. We see this deficientcy in large open world games where the xbox usually outshines the ps3. A prefect example is Skyrim.

[MysticStrummer]

Next gen will have it's own limitations. Most devs will deal with them. Some will whine. A few will make amazing games despite them. Most will make the same games we've been playing for decades, except with better visuals.

[NastyLeftHook0]

im letting this 512 ride until i get my ps4.

[Oldman100]

It would be nice if next gen consoles provided over 9000 megabytes.

[attilayavuzer]

9000 megabytes? Who says that?

[CalvinKlein]

fajita says taht, tahts who.

[WiiUalpha]

9 gigs? I have 16000mb of Ram in my PC now.

1024mb = 1 gigabyte

[LiquifiedArt]

Its a DragonBall Z reference. lol.

[jetpacksheep]

RAM is generally used for multitasking so the 512mb in consoles is ok for now, of course they will upgrade this next gen though.

[BlackPrince 42]

I can't speak to the 360, but the PS3 used edRAM, which is more efficient than normal DDR3 RAM, from what I understand. So just saying that next gen consoles will have more ram and that's better isn't quite taking into account all the factors involved.

Though, I will say in hindsight that splitting the RAM on PS3 wasn't a good decision.

[neoMAXMLC]

Actually it's the 360 that uses eDRAM. Only 10MB though.

The PS3 uses XDR RAM.

[BlackPrince 42]

Ah well, I didn't look it up again before I posted. But my point, I believe, still holds true.

Comparing the RAM in consoles to the RAM we think of as being in PC's is still not a 1:1 ratio.

[Gondee]

The PS3 used XDR ram, but only half of the ram was XDR while the other half was shared over graphics card. The 256 XDR was a great choice, as its very fast. However the architecture of the PS3 bottlenecked the memory if i remember correctly. In the end it came down to the PS3 having a very unbalanced design. A CPU that was designed for mass floating point operations, a GPU that was underpowered and required the use of some of your RAM, and RAM that while fast, couldn't be fully utilized because of the traditional RAM.

I used to be a "Xbot" back in the infancy of N4G but have since forgot most of my fighting facts ahahahaha.

On a side note, i can see the Next gen only have 2Gigs of ram, while giving the GPU a dedicated 1Gig of faster DDR5 or something like that. It would be more cost

[BlackPrince 42]

Yeah, I get that, I used to be a little bit of a PS3 fanboy back in the day.

Trouble was, the more I learned, the more I found that there wasn't so much a difference in power between the consoles as a difference in specialization.

[Cam977]

Could this imply that next consoles infact have over 512mb of ram? Yes.

[aquamala]

Too little ram for video is exactly why consoles this gen can't do 1080p. RAM is expensive back in 2006 though, now you can get 4gb ddr3 ram for $20

[George Sears]

Never did I thought that I will have a phone with 4 times the amount of RAM than current consoles. Damn, technology, you scary.

[MasterD919]

Time for an upgrade.

[AtomicGerbil]

Obviously!

[Ck1x]

Well I think Ubisoft came out recently and proved that the WiiU in fact has zero bottle necks at this stage. Being able to run high resolution textures uncompressed is an amazing feat and is just added proof of what a well designed console can achieve...

[Skate-AK]

"Though we have learnt." learnt....

[boxer1985]

hardware resources will always be finite. consumer demand is infinite. and developers all play in the same ball park, regardless.

gamers wont be anymore satisfied playing on a ps4 in 2015 then they were plaing on a ps1 in 1995.

so spare us the $$ for the upgrade and continue making games for the current gen sony, microsoft.

but thats never gonna happen. because people dont know any better.

[taquito]

as important as ram is, and it is, you could have a machine with 16gb ram and a crappy cpu and gpu and it would be total crap, the gpu is by far the heavy lifter for rendering 3d graphics, and while ram is an integral component of the machine, gpu is by far the most utilized in games, followed by cpu then ram

nintendo surely would have benifited by using 4gb ram, but, the true test will be the gpu, here's hoping its a great one, i certainly am sick of poping in a ps3/360 game i am excited for only to find jaggies everywhere, pop-in, screen tearing, bad framerates and long load times, and this is every ps3/360 game nowadays!

[SAE]

Let's just hope they show the ps4 befor e3 , then it would make sense if they released it in the same year , the early , the better for everyone ^^ ...

[d3nworth1]

Weird I click the link and a random porn site came up.

[bubblebeam]

No, actually that's just Gamingbolts advertising....

[Platinum_k]

... this calls for the next gen!

BRING ON THE NEXT GEN! >=) WE ARE READY FOR IT! MUHAHAHA!

[Bordel_1900]

I stopped using my PS3 6 months ago, I even stopped my Plus membership. Next generation cannot come soon enough.

Only thing I use my PS3 for today is NetFlix. I use my PC for gaming, occasionally play GT5 on my PS3.

I mean, my AlienWare is lightyears ahead of the PS3, load times, graphics, etc., everything on the PC is so much quicker and better.

I'll be the first to buy the PS4 though, just as I pre-ordered my first expensive PS3 way ahead of launch.

[Braid]

RAM and processor power is not the real issue when it comes to grapchis, they contribute to the graphics, sure, but it's mainly the GPU unit that determines the graphical power of a device.

To give an example, if you upgrade your processor from an i5 to i7, you don't see much of a difference in games. When you upgrade your RAM from 8 gigs to 16 gigs, you'll hardly see any difference at all. But upgrade your graphics card from something like GTX 480 to GTX 680 and that's when you get your easily observable extra frames per second. RAM's more likely to be used for multi-tasking, and it'll be a welcome increase for open world games like Skyrim. Other than that, don't bother yourself too much with available RAM, it's rather the VRAM and how much tflops the GPU can handle that you should worry about.

As far as I know, Unreal Engine 4 requires 1-2 tflops of graphics processing power for an acceptable FPS rate at FULL HD resolution, and that's kind of worrying. That's a GTX 690/HD 7990 performance and I really doubt any company would put such a beast in a gaming console that's supposed to retail at a reasonable price. I don't really care about how much RAM they have in the console, but Nintendo's yet to announce the GPU spesifications and why it's still a secret is kind of alarming for me, especially given the unit's relatively cheap price ticket.

[Bordel_1900]

Yes, but when I buy a gfx card for my PC it has 2GB of dedicated gfx RAM or more, in addition to the 8GB. The PS3 has 256MB of dedicated gfx RAM and 256MB for the CPU, this is a bottleneck for HD textures. Games look better with better textures, -> better gfx. A PS3 with 1GB of VRAM would give you much better gfx.