Sony Silently Squeezed Out 70MB More PS3 RAM

[guitarpeggio]

Has there ever been a gaming related article on TH that didn't spawn comments from pompous ass console or PC fanboys? STFU!

 

[matt87_50]

[citation][nom]pharge[/nom]Nice job SONY! Though 70MB is not that much more... but it is better than before for sure. While squizing your OS size, SONY... have you thought about increasing the system memory size? At least in terms of the building cost of PS3... adding extra 1GB memory should not effect the building cost too much... ..[/citation]

it does when you are building a console, and after years of people like us bashing it for being too expensive I doubt they are going to add more expense to it. consoles use more proprietary and higher quality ram, that makes it more expensive than the ddr3 we buy.

 

[d_kuhn]

[citation][nom]matt87_50[/nom]it does when you are building a console, and after years of people like us bashing it for being too expensive I doubt they are going to add more expense to it. consoles use more proprietary and higher quality ram, that makes it more expensive than the ddr3 we buy.[/citation]

No not really...

The PS3 uses 256meg of GDDR3 (same tech as PC Cards) at a lethargic 700mhz.
the other 256meg is XDR... which is Rambus, a failed PC memory tech (too expensive). Performance is comparable to DDR3 at similar clock rates.

So while performance would have been excellent in it's day... it's an old Platform and is fairly mediocre by today's standards.

 

[tacoslave]

[citation][nom]babybeluga[/nom]...you mean $60[/citation]
remember when you could get 4gb of ram for 30 bucks after rebate? those were epic days.

 

[Guest]

[citation][nom]pharge[/nom]Nice job SONY! Though 70MB is not that much more... but it is better than before for sure. While squizing your OS size, SONY... have you thought about increasing the system memory size? At least in terms of the building cost of PS3... adding extra 1GB memory should not effect the building cost too much... ..[/citation]

you would think that adding that extra gig of memory wouldnt cost that much money but you forget the type of memory the ps3 utilizes. The system uses XDR DRAM which is quite expensive for memory. adding as much memory as you suggest would raise the price by a good amount.
But it doesnt really need that much more RAM because it does use XDR DRAM.

 

[tygrus]

They should make a PS3.5 that uses compatible CPU & GPU API's but CPU at least 1.5x performance (would like 2x) and GPU at least 3x (prefer 4x, DX11). Same game runs on PS3 as well as PS3.5 but the newer can enable higher detail, full 1080p at 60-120Hz, higher AA filter, more effects.

 

[hakesterman]

Why would they waist their time tweaking what they got, it works just fine, the games are sweet and there
comming around with some good stuff. I think it will be a good 5 years before you see a new machine
from Sony, they just started makeing money so they will soak in the profits for awhile i am sure.

 

[welshmousepk]

RAM in a console is tied together to the system in a much more efficient way than a PC. a console needs nowhere near as much RAM.

i like tygrus' idea i must say. if there were a more expensive version of the PS3, identical in every way to the standard except for being able to output games in 1080p...

well i'd buy it for sure. i dont think its time for a console new generation of consoles yet, the ps3 in particular seems to only now be finding its legs. and another 2 years of them would help the market. but a refresh would be nice, and 1080p gaming would be a big draw to a lot of people.

 

[alextheblue]

[citation][nom]sigma3d[/nom]ps3 dont uses directx system. it uses its own property gpu sdk platform.the only limit for ps3 is its cpu and gpu power. you can get much more realistic visuals than dx10 or even dx11 in ps3. but you get real crappy fps.because of this developers are tied within the optimal visual/fps range when developing thier titles...[/citation]That's a self-defeating statement. Of course performance is what limits visual quality! If performance isn't an issue, you can crank out equally realistic visuals using DirectX 9+ and OpenGL as you can with their proprietary PS3 SDK. In any given case, performance of the targeted hardware is the limiting factor.

 

[palladin9479]

All this about consoles being more efficient about memory or using "specialized super expensive" memory is horse hockey.

Consoles use the same tech as PC's, usually a generation or two behind depending on costs. Consoles and console games require less memory because they do not need the shear amount of shared library's, system drivers, windowing system, or caching that modern PC's use. Console games are compiled for a specific set of system specs, because the dev's know exactly what HW they will run it on they can tweak and refine the code down to a extremely small / efficient foot print. This also means the code doesn't port well (MS was the first to really adopt a port "friendly" SDK, and even then its got issues).

The #1 driving factor behind a console is price, a gaming PC can afford to be 2 grand or more, a console must be low priced to appeal to mass users. Just think about it this way, a ~single~ modern high end GFX card costs over $400 USD, which is the price of the entire damn console.

 

[listerd]

Umm... given the system os likely resides on the split 256mb XDR tied to the cell... a 70mb reduction in the memory footprint constitutes a roughly 30% gain in addressable memory space.

I don't know who wouldn't be excited over a 1/3 gain in useable memory when considering how memory starved the current gen consoles are. At least the devs will be happy. Hopefully, this will translate to better cross platform title performance instead of the PS3 always being shafted with shitty ports.

 

[anamaniac]

My OS uses 1GB.
I still have plenty to spare, thank you.

 

[climber]

[citation][nom]welshmousepk[/nom]RAM in a console is tied together to the system in a much more efficient way than a PC. a console needs nowhere near as much RAM.i like tygrus' idea i must say. if there were a more expensive version of the PS3, identical in every way to the standard except for being able to output games in 1080p... well i'd buy it for sure. i dont think its time for a console new generation of consoles yet, the ps3 in particular seems to only now be finding its legs. and another 2 years of them would help the market. but a refresh would be nice, and 1080p gaming would be a big draw to a lot of people.[/citation]
You forget that most PS3 exclusive titles that are out there are already 1080P, the cross platform titles are the ones dumping out to a measly 720P/1080i(XBox360). Until the next generation of consoles come out I wouldn't count on all titles being at least 1080P. Development costs for games is so high that adding details through tessellation and higher res textures won't be deployed in cross platform console gaming.

 

[rhino13]

50MB is a lighy OS. They've done a good job with this.

 

[eccentric909]

It doesn't make good business sense to offer a PS3 version 1.5 with "better" specs or at least there isn't much reason to. The software developers would still have to program for the "lesser" model and you just wouldn't notice a difference on another machine. Developers wouldn't be able to take advantage of the upgraded machine, so it really doesn't make sense to put out an upgraded version of any console. It is better to start from scratch and build from the ground up.

Like with the 360, developers have to program their game so it doesn't "have" to install to a HD, since there are HD-less 360's out there (which I might add that while I like the 360, not requiring the HD was a bad move on MS's part IMO). Now you can install the game to the HD and notice a performance increase due to faster access times with a HD. That however, is a lot different than system or video memory, which wouldn't require you to program any extras in for those who have an "upgraded" machine.

So, in my opinion, upgrading either console's specs, just wouldn't help matters at all... better to come out with a new system, IMO!

 

[Clintonio]

[citation][nom]palladin9479[/nom]All this about consoles being more efficient about memory or using "specialized super expensive" memory is horse hockey.Consoles use the same tech as PC's, usually a generation or two behind depending on costs. Consoles and console games require less memory because they do not need the shear amount of shared library's, system drivers, windowing system, or caching that modern PC's use. Console games are compiled for a specific set of system specs, because the dev's know exactly what HW they will run it on they can tweak and refine the code down to a extremely small / efficient foot print. This also means the code doesn't port well (MS was the first to really adopt a port "friendly" SDK, and even then its got issues).The #1 driving factor behind a console is price, a gaming PC can afford to be 2 grand or more, a console must be low priced to appeal to mass users. Just think about it this way, a ~single~ modern high end GFX card costs over $400 USD, which is the price of the entire damn console.[/citation]

And the irony is now that consoles are beggining to add more of the stuff that they never used to have, converging slowly to game oriented, but pretty regular OSes. Hell, I have Opera on my Wii, Symbian phone, PC and Laptop (Win7x64 and Win7 respectively). The Wii doesn't multitask, but it still does a lot of things that the previous generation didn't do at all (they similarity is that it plays games). I can't speak for the other two consoles, I've only owned a Wii.