SEGAvangelist
Member
Already discussed earlier in the thread. Main thing we discovered from this article is the possibility of developers using the app partition of the RAM to enhance game features.
OXM: Why splitting Xbox One's OS RAM allocation is good for developers
- Thread starter mocoworm
- Start date
Already discussed earlier in the thread. Main thing we discovered from this article is the possibility of developers using the app partition of the RAM to enhance game features.
Vestal
Junior Member
You need resources(Ram, CPU) cycles to be able to have Multitasking and run the underlying OS.
In the instance of a console they will give devs a set amount of CPU Cores and RAM for the games which the OS will not touch.(Currently it is unknown if the PS4 will reserve GPU power for the OS)
Multitasking will be big on next gen consoles. just wait until someone invents a good little time waster app that keeps people occupied in between the little down times you get in games. A few people are gonna make serious bank off of a fun little time waster because the got to be engaged in something add generation will buy into it.
Iced_Eagle
Member
No. It does fast switching, but only one app can be displayed at a time.
For example, if they have Skype, if someone calls you, you have to suspend the game to open the Skype app, and when you're done you switch back to the game. On X1 Skype snaps into the side so you can keep playing while Skyping.
How huge? Obviously not PS4 Pre-Order huge. lol
Why would battlelog app be running on the xb1? i would be running on your phone/tablet. you would download it as a client, communicate with the server, and the server would send the data to the game. this type of thing already happens with the 360. If you have the xbox app you can send messages to your friends and it shows you who is on in realtime. both the game and app access the server. that is how they would communicate with each other.
graywolf323
Member
if Skype can run in the background on Vita I don't see why that wouldn't happen on PS4 as well
Garrett 2U
Member
Yeah, at launch. Doesn't mean there aren't games he is looking forward to in the future.
Vestal
Junior Member
Wow are you serious?! Damn didn't know that. that's actually pretty huge IMO. Surprised given the resources they are blocking for the OS, that they do not have this type of functionality.
This isn't the PS3 split RAM.
They shouldn't even use the term. Devs have 5GB of RAM to use, period. On PS3 they have 2 different types of RAM, one regular, one video both 256MB. It was a shitty setup.
sono
Gold Member
A game you play between games then?
I personally prefer immersion over multitasking.
I multi-task in every other aspect of my life, but when I start a game I want everything else to leave me alone.
Where is that confirmed?
Bony Manifesto
Member
Nah, hypervisors are generally used to isolate individual apps and provide them with virtualised resources. The example you bring up sounds like much more like a job for... The Cloud.
Based off some leaked info about the xb1's OS that is not the case, when something like skype pops up the game kind of suspend's itself.
Cornbread78
Member
so they can be open at the same time, but XBone can operate both at once.
just like vita
SEGAvangelist
Member
Well we don't really know for sure what amount of RAM is blocked for OS. They could show something new (OS related) at Gamescom for all we know.
is this legit info? not being a dick, i actually am curious. it would make no sense for them to reserve so much RAM for the OS and not be able to multitask. I assumed that all the reserved ram for specifically for multitasking.
No skyping while gaming on the xbox1, the game suspends when skype is snapped.
It is possible to watch something without it pausing and having skype snapped at the same time though.
It runs tasks in the background - look at cross party chat for instance. But only one seems to be visible at a time. In theory you could get a Skype notification,answer it and continue the call in the background (audio only) while you play. I don't think you'd seriously be talking on video Skype while playing?
iamshadowlark
Banned
Where is this detailed at and what makes you think it's a global rule?
soul creator
Member
finally, "next gen galaga during loading screen" functionality
JonathanPower
Member
I never said that. What I said is that there are a limited number of gaming applications that run during a game on PS4, such as video recording and audio chat, and that there is dedicated hw for them so that these specific applications do not use additional CPU power. Regarding memory, if the video is recored to the HDD, no RAM would be used as well.
You'd reserve ram for fast task switching - eg if you suspend a game you can't use any of that ram for OS/apps. For multitasking you need ram *and* CPU
Iced_Eagle
Member
It totally could. It depends on the type of API's Sony provides. If they provide the APIs on Vita, it will likely come to PS4.
But my point still stands, that was just one example. If you wanted to make a call to someone using Skype on PS4 you have to open Skype which suspends the game, but once the call starts you could switch back (I'd assume audio only, no video at that point On X1 you can say "Xbox Call Matt" while youre in game and it would snap Skype to the side without leaving the game.
SEGAvangelist
Member
That's a game changer for some. My wife loves her some Galaga.
Chobel
Member
Source?
Vestal
Junior Member
Yeah curious of this as well. Its the first I see of this, and if so its pretty massive.
SEGAvangelist
Member
Shit. Inviting people to party chat while playing a game without even pulling up a menu that pauses your gameplay experience? Didn't think about this. That's such a nice convenience if it works like that.
Garrett 2U
Member
Are you talking about the constrained state?
That is when you go back to your dashboard while playing a game. That isn't snapping.
If it saves more gpu and cpu resources for games, I'd rather not do both at the sane time, but if it makes no difference, why not.
Iced_Eagle
Member
That's why Sony reserves this amount of RAM. From everything I've seen PS4 can't have two apps on screen at once. However because they're reserving the RAM now it gives them the option to implement a similar feature later.
iamshadowlark
Banned
I haven't even seen Skype on ps4. YouTube/Google provides nothing. I dont wanna call BS but....
Cornbread78
Member
MLG would cry because it would ruin S&D tournies, lol
buy yeah, would be great to see on PS4.
LukasTaves
Member
Fair enough. But the system reservation at least in terms of processing doesn't seem much bigger than it was on 360, or even Ps3. How much it was back then? I think I remember 5% of cpu/gpu on 360 and 32mb of ram, but i could find anything now that would confirm that...
Last gen consoles had the system available anywhere and anytime. Moving that to having the system and apps available at any time seem to have taken a very tiny toll on processing resources, it was the memory that was more impacted, and both have gone with huges amounts of ram to compensate for that.
The Ps3 also had reserved processing resources to the OS. 1 entire spu and part of the ppu, if I'm not mistaken (and I don't know if it used the gpu or not, as the one spu most certainly had enough performance to handle system graphics tasks while running the game)
What i meant is that if you don't reserve resources in advance a system event could occur in a specific time of the game where they are using all of the available resources and thus it would compromise the game experience.
What you describe is the suspended state, what I am talking about is the constrained state (I forgot the names) that from the leak :
"The game is loaded in memory and is still running, but it has limited access to the system resources. The game is not rendering full screen in this state; it either is rendering to a reduced area of the screen or is not visible at all. The user cannot interact with the game in this state.."
I re-watched the reveal demo again. A movie was snapped side to side with video Skype but nothing about games snapping with Skype video.
http://www.ign.com/videos/2013/05/21/xbox-one-skype-demo-xbox-one-reveal
Microsoft is going for what they believe optimal user experience. It doesn't matter that your smartphones and tablets can check twitter and such. There are several times when I'm playing games like FIFA for example online, where I want to check my twitter feed, but I can't without wasting a pause. The Xbox brings this to your screen while maintaining the game functionality. To those who say they don't want it, no one is forcing you to buy the Xbox One and even if you do buy it, you are no forced to use snap mode and such, it is an option. Microsoft is trying to improve the user experience of their device and having an integrated appstore goes a long way with this. The 360 has sold over 70 million units, and now anyone with the skill and resources will be able to develop apps for the Xbox One, that's a huge incentive for app developers and improves the overall experience of the Xbox One. It can be used strictly for gaming or it can be used for it's multimedia capabilities, that's why it's being marketed as an all in one device. Reserving the RAM is Microsoft's way of future proofing the console against the likes of Sony, Google and Apple. As the generation goes on, we'll see who has made the right decisions. Sony reserving a significant portion of it's RAM shows that the battle for next gen will not be determined by games alone.
Sure, I'm not disagreeing with you.
I was just surprised to see 90% GPU mentioned here when I haven't heard anything in that regard yet.
Tripolygon
Banned
You don't know how multitasking on PS4 works and the amount of reserved RAM has nothing to do with how it works. From very little we have seen, PS4 has not been shown to run 2 applications side by side but that could just be how the OS was designed.
Xbox one in constrained state
Of course there are apps like Skype that could be given the ability to run in the background when game is running, like in PS Vita you can have skype running in the background while playing a game. The ability to interact with a background app using voice does not mean you can have the app running side by side with the game is running.
Update: This is just going by kotaku post which could have changed btw but reserved RAM has little to do with being able to have multiple apps running side by side. Consider PS4 and Xbox One have about the same amount of RAM reserved for OS so its pretty much by design.
Garrett 2U
Member
I don't believe you're correct.
I am on my phone so I can't show you, but you can go look at the demonstration.
During the demo, he is playing a movie.
At one point he minimizes the movie and brings up the dashboard.
The movie is still playing in one of the tiles on the dashboard, but it is in a constrained state, he doesn't have control of it until he maximizes it. If it was suspended while on the dashboard, the video wouldn't have still been playing in one of the tiles.
He then maximizes it again, which unconstrains it and he is able to control it again.
He then receives a Skype notification that his friend is calling him, and he snaps Skype, which doesn't minimize and constrain the video application.
Garrett 2U
Member
Correct, it is moreso that the X1 runs two operating systems in parallel that allows it to snap apps.
Oops, sorry for the double post!!
The keyword you missed is "game" and even so, I said I meant the Constrained state and that it keeps the game running, but it has less system resources to play with and can not take user input.
LukasTaves
Member
And what about entertainment apps?
For example, 360 has last.fm, but it will only play when the app is running. Now that they use the same framework that w8 does, not only you are going to see more music streaming apps, but they will be able to play music even when the game is running.
Depending on how well apps, system and OS are integrated, you could have some very interesting case uses too, for example, you are playing GTA VI, picks a car and it's playing a music that you never heard before but now you love it. You snap the shazam app, it recognizes the music, and from the shazam app itself they add the music to your music service of choice, so you can play this music while playing other games too...
If Ms has some stuff like that coming down the road I can see it making a lot of buzz.
Garrett 2U
Member
Sometime during the demo he shows the same constrained state with Forza on the dashboard.
The Forza game continues to run even though it constrains to one of the tiles when he brings up the dashboard.
I didn't even think about this. Oh man.
Can we get a picture-in-picture style of app overlay so people can watch The Daily Show while building stuff in Minecraft?
Mihael Mello Keehl
Banned
Oh god