Ben-DutkaWe know the PlayStation 4 offers 8GB of GDDR5 RAM. But how much of that is actually accessible to developers?
After all, you need a certain amount to make the system run, right? The good news, however, is that according to a new Eurogamer Digital Foundry report , game makers will have access to as much as 5.5GB, with 4.5GB guaranteed.
The PS4 will only reserve 3.5GB of the total RAM for the operating system, but sources say an additional GB of RAM can be used as flexible memory, which would bring the available total to the aforementioned 5.5GB. Furthermore, other sources have said the 3.5GB requirement could be reduced once work on the PS4 OS is complete and potentially streamlined. As for the RAM used for the OS, that will go towards new system features, such as application switching and the ability to pause and resume games in mid-session.
So, does this sound like a developer's dream machine, as many have already stated? Or would you rather they had even more RAM to play around with? Seems like plenty, but…
From a political standpoint the water molecules give it 10,000 hexagons at a rate of 24 dolphins per inch cubed.
I was wondering why they had…..Flipper controls lol ;~)
It needs 128GB of RAM or it's garbage. 😉
If you ever need proof of a troll, they mark down every comment they see in a forum they hate.
I'm not bothered by this, I though they'd reserve some RAM and a couple cores. Its not a big deal at all really, most PC games don't use more than a quad-core CPU and 4 GBs of RAM right now, nevermind what consoles have been stuck with.
What this means though is that the PS4 will be much closer perfomance-wise than people think.
Yeah, and as the gen moves forward Sony probably could be able to free up some more RAM for Devs.
Has anyone heard if the PS4 is going to play 3D movies???
I hope this rumor isn't true. Sony never said it but I assumed the PS4 might use 1 or 2 gigs of RAM for the OS, I really think 3.5 GB of RAM is a bit excessive. Even if it is true, I will still most likely get a PS4, mainly for the exclusives.
When I took my C++ class my instructor was talking about how programers are not as creative about system resource management now because of the abundance of resources these days. If this rumor is true I will certainly agree with that statement.
BTW, Have you seen IGN's article on this, it already has 15,000 comments on it.
Last edited by BigT_1980 on 7/26/2013 11:12:11 PM
I got banned from IGN comments for asking a Microsoft fanboy if he liked his MS branded lube.
What a joke. There is SO much trolling on there.
EDIT: Yes, programmers are not very efficient any more, this is why the current day hardware is way ahead of the current day software.
Last edited by Akuma_ on 7/26/2013 11:13:06 PM
That's why some devs (e.g. Naughty Dog) don't whine about things vs. others that are too lazy to write efficient code and blame their problems on other limitations. Most computer software has become bloatware since the mid-late 90's because they just rely on better hardware to compensate for their messy code. There was a time when Windows PCs generally had more RAM than Macs and often the Mac versions of the software only needed 60-70% the amount of RAM as Windows versions w/ all the same features (though that was also partially due to 68K and PPC CPUs), but now it's about the same between both.
Akuma please. Everyone know all Microsoft fanboys use thermal paste as lubricant.
shouldnt be a problem then, since if theres 1gig of memory for floating, then the os is really only using 2.5 gigs. which is fine.
I'd just like to say that this really is just a rumour, until it is confirmed.
Eurogamer said they had 'seen' documents, then claimed of all these other sources. But never really provided any evidence.
Also, around E3 there was reports from several developers that they had access to 7GB of RAM.
Killzone SF was originally developed on the PS4 dev kits, which had 4GB of RAM, with 3GB allocated for games. Which means at the time, only 1GB was allocated for the OS.
There is a LOT more evidence to say that the OS uses a lot less than 3.5gb.
Even IF this is just future proofing, it doesn't make sense, because in the future they can reduce the OS footprint.
Last edited by Akuma_ on 7/26/2013 11:16:17 PM
Didn't Johnathan Blow also say that The Witness uses up to 5 gigs of RAM. That's within the 5.5 but over the guaranteed 4.5. I mean would a developer already start pushing the limit this early in the next gen?
It's very likely that the 3.5 gig OS is false. Digital Foundry, the ones that started this rumor, is not credible in my eyes. I'd rather see what VGLeaks comes up with or what Sony has to say about this. At least when VGLeaks reported about the X1's 3 gigs of RAM usage, they were correct.
I'd like the PS4 to have a comfortable memory lead over XboxOne, but even if it doesn't it's not quite the 360 and PS3 scenario all over again.
The unified memory design will make it easy for developers to shift things around the way they want. PS3 forced a hard divide that didn't sit well at all with multiplat development. That was the big reason why multiplats started 'leading' on PS3. It was easy to map the 360's memory to how the PS3 handled it's memory, but not the other way around, as we all witnessed from early PS3 multiplats.
I see numbers. What do they mean? I couldn't tell ya.
*lays down*
Simply put, more RAM equals bigger and better potential in games. You can never have too much RAM. Having 3.5GB for the OS versus 1GB cuts about 2.5GB of more breathing room for devs to work with. In a way, it's a big deal, but 4.5 – 5.5 is still plenty. Like I said though, you can never have too much.
You CAN have too much…at some point, there's no real benefit and therefore useless and adding cost, heat, and address/bus inefficiencies.
That doesn't sound right. The OS can't be using 3.5GB of RAM, unless they were confident that they were going to be able to put 8GB of RAM on the PS4. But most people said devs were working with 4GB kits before they announced the 8GB, so that means the OS must have been able to run with in those specs.
My thoughts exactly regarding their initial plans of 4GB RAM. Had they stuck with 4GB, that would leave them about 0.5GB for gaming… that's like about the same as current gen. :/
They also said that they made it possible for them to easily up from four to 8gb. If this rumor is true, then no wonder the devs really pushed Sony for 8GB.
Seriously though, 3.5gb is just too much for the OS. That's more than Windows! Nothing is suppose to be more sourceful than windows!!
+1, 3.5GB is a _lot_ for OS. I think it was 40MB or so for the PS3, so we'd be looking at an OS with almost 100 times as much resources. Yes, they'll be recording the last 15 minutes of gameplay, but even taking that into account (1GB will get you about half an hour of HD, more or less, and they're looking at 15 minutes reportedly) that's still a huge allocation. I call dodgy rumour at this stage, and if not then there's something the PS4 is doing we don't know about yet.
Keep in mind there's a difference between "using"/"taking up" and "reserving" RAM. The OS itself will likely only occupy .5GB or so. The rest that is reserved for the system would be for caching all sorts of information and background processes, including the share functionality and who knows what all else. If they stuck w/ 4GB, things like the share functionality would just have only been 2-5 mins. instead of 15 mins. and probably still had up to 2-2.5GB available for devs, which itself should still be plenty if the devs weren't lazy.
I heard that the PS4 will only require 1GB RAM for the os and the Xbox 1 will require 3GB RAM.
wow, so i guess the xbox ones 3GB of RAM reserve is not so bad after all.
shocked the ps4 uses more especially when M$ has the TV DVR functionality too.
oh well, just goes to prove the old adage.
never ask software companies to do hardware, and never ask hardware companies to do software.
Why would they need RAM for the DVR stuff? But who cares, obviously everybody thought it'd be a waste of time to deal with you.
Also are you the "downvote troll"? I know you always upvote your own stuff. Whenever you post something neutral, you always have 1 upvote and no downvotes even if everyone else has one downvote…
Fanboys are going batshit over at IGN over this rumor, its insane. Am glad it didn't overflow onto here like some other sites.
As for this rumor, it really does make no difference to me, am still going to get one. Am not like some idiots out there who are cancelling their PS4 pre-order because of it.
People waste so much energy into fanboy politics, it's exhausting just reading it.
3.5 ram is indeed alot in a OS, I see this as more of a precaution on Sony's part, the company has plenty of time to trim and/or put in features that make full use of the 3.5 ram OS before developers might wish for more Ram for whatever, I don't think it should matter all that much. Especially since the first generation games rarely tax their systems.
Sony most likely wants to avoid a missed console feature like the cross game chat in ps3. and we all know 80 percent of games will be multiple platform anyways and that the 360 had more ram than the ps3 this gen and that Ram is only a part of the full picture of a console.
Last edited by Conn on 7/27/2013 12:54:49 PM
yeah they will make more efficient use of the ram. the amount of ram avalible to devs will increase cos they will want to be as competitive as possible.
happy gaming =)
sounds weak from the initial number guesses
the Eurogamer article has already 2 updates, one with a Sony information explaining RAM for games is divided in 2 sorts and they won't comment on how much memory is set for the OS – this is the only valid information so the Eurogamer article (and consequently this one) is just rumor / speculation.
A dev named Proviciano from VBlank has said the rumors are "absolutely false" and "absolutely ridiculous".