PS4 has 8 GB OF GDDR5 RAM

DieH@rd said:
PS3 will continue to sell, and sell well, for 3 more years easily.
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I'm not sure what constitutes "well" but no doubt it will continue to sell for years. But having said that, I don't foresee the PS4 lasting 10 years without a successor unless Sony goes bankrupt.
 
Iced_Eagle said:
I've been reading more about GDDR5 vs DDR3, and one thing that many other sites are talking about, and not discussing here is the latency. GDDR5 actually has higher latency than DDR3, at the cost of its increased bandwidth. In fact, GDDR5 is actually based on DDR3 memory!

Remember that the "G" in GDDR5 stands for graphics. The reason why this type of memory is found in GPU's is because a GPU is typically performing lots of calculations in parallel, making the latency almost a non-issue. However, when you use that same memory when dealing with a CPU, it actually starts performing worse than DDR3, since CPU's act in a linear fashion (execute instruction X, then Y, then Z, etc...). Of course, you can split up your compute jobs between multiple cores, but each core still executes in a linear fashion. This means that when the CPU needs additional instructions to execute, GDDR5 will actually be slower to respond than DDR3. Bandwidth doesn't matter as much as latency in this scenario, because you aren't shifting a lot of data, but rather you want the next instruction to come as soon as possible so you can move onto the next one.

This issue of latency is actually one of the reasons why they don't sell GDDR5 as system RAM. It's not that they can't, it's just that DDR3 is better. It's mostly useful for graphics cards when almost all of your work can be done in parallel, and DDR3 is more useful when dealing with CPU's when you're dealing with linear instructions and latency is more important.

Perhaps that's why Sony has extra compute units on the GPU, because they want to offload as much as they can from the CPU due to GDDR5's latency issues?

After looking at all of this, I'm actually not 100% sure that GDDR5 is always better than DDR3. It seems like it's an apples and orange comparison. You need to take the rest of the system into account, and not just focus on an individual piece (in this case, the type of RAM).

Thoughts?
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Yes and no. Yes because in standard model it is true. No because it is 1. SoC design which alone makes everything works faster 2. Unified pool. No memory jugling.

My opinion is this GDDR5 will have higher latency but because of above overall latency meaning architecture+ram latency could be in fact slower.

We don't know numbers we can only speculate my friend. We saw Killzone and most of us believe it looks just plain Next gen beating that old Killzone 2 CGI by miles. Something like K4demo clearly says that those 2Tf is much much much beefier than it should be.


ThoseDeafMutes said:
Irrelevant comparison, since the PS4 will be reserving a portion of memory for background tasks, and then splitting the remaining pool for resources that the CPU wants as well as GPU. It will not have 8GB of video memory for a given game. Soon, the GeForce Titan will be releasing with 6GB of GDDR5 memory, which will be more VRAM than a given game on PS4 will have to work with. The GPU itself on Titan is, needless to say, blowing the two upcoming consoles out of the water more than just the difference in memory would suggest. Of course, the 660 Ti already spanks it on the Tflop count anyway, a much more modest and inexpensive card than Titan.

I suspect that adding more memory (8GB is fantastic and more than we ever expected) was something they could do that would increase cost and board complexity, but would not break the TDP hard limits in the same way that including a beefier processor and GPU would have. The "ratio" of processing power to memory is simply different for the PS4 than it is for PC graphics cards - far more memory per unit of processing power. The memory quantity is extremely high end, while GPU performance is not.

Also as a note, the 690 does "really" have 6GB of memory, because it's a dual GPU setup and it's more like "2x 3", with each GPU having identical memory contents, and thus half of the memory being wasted.
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You are speculating my friend. Power wise it is clear that Titan will mop the flor with any console GPU as of Ram pool we don't know yet how it will be used. I think their OS was created with 512 mb in mind. It was said already they have custom hardware to offload different tasks which would impact system power.

Also 6GB on GFX card =/= 6GB of system ram. Most of game developers creating games on PC won't use even 4 GB (aside from textures) and won't use it in creative way because they still need to get their game working on other lower spec PC. 6-7GB as a standard can really change how games are made. Dumping whole game to RAM ? No problem. Something like this would reduce a lot LOD problems, if they dump everything to ram there may be games that have no loading at all (thanks to streaming engine).


My main concern is now Durango. If they won't buff up spec games will be scaled back a lot.
 
lol

Colour me surprised!

Even if all the background recording, video uploads, game downloads, OS etc etc take up a lot of ram, there will still be more than enough to go around.

Loving it!
 
As a PC gamer, this is very good to see, hopefully 720 steps up its game as well, so we have 64 bit systems with 8 gigs of ram running.
 
Perkel said:
You are speculating my friend.
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Yes, but not wildly. Assuming 512mb for OS, in order to match 6GB of memory for a Titan it would need to use merely 1.5 for CPU stuff. That's not impossible but it is severely imbalanced. Dumping a whole game to RAM would be madness since disc capacity is so high and games aren't going to be 7GB total size unless it's a PSN indie game or something.
 
JJD said:
It's such a shame that of all this advantages that the PS4 may end up having, the most important one IMO (AI) will never be fully realized outside first party games, since no third party dev. in the world will code more advanced AI mechanics for the PS4 version of it's multiplatform game.
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Deus Ex: HR has advanced AI in the pc version compared to the consoles.
 
As exciting it is to have 8GB of fast RAM, I would much rather have an SSD. Hard drives are slow, loud, and are going to be obsolete very soon.
 
Chittagong said:
I shouted 'holy shit 8GB GDDR5' with a San Miguel in my hand on our sofa, the look on my wife's face was priceless ("I've made a huge mistake")
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:) yeah 8GB GDDR5 was the holy shit moment of the night, to think talk was of 2GB only a few months ago. Just imagine what Naughty Dog will do with 8GB!
 
Vodh said:
Can someone explain it to me like to a technological ignorant that I am, just how different is the GDDR5 compared to DDR3? And what is it's relation to the graphics card/what do we know about PS4's graphics card?
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The 8GB of GDDR5 RAM is impressive. I would say it is tremendously impressive. It means....

-- High resolution textures.
-- Large levels without streaming or even larger levels with streaming.
-- Lots of RAM for both the GPU and CPU.
-- Lots of RAM for advanced rendering techniques and antialiasing.
-- Due to the speed of the GDDR5 RAM, there will be less latency and the GPU will perform better.
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Yes I copy and paste from Beyond3d so correct me if that's wrong!
 
Duji said:
As exciting it is to have 8GB of fast RAM, I would much rather have an SSD. Hard drives are slow, loud, and are going to be obsolete very soon.
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Well you can easilly put an SSD on it. Even the PS3.

But the controller on the PS4 might bottleneck it.
 
Not sure you guys realised this but 4 is an unlucky number (means death) and 8 is a very lucky number in many Asian countries, Japan included. So I think this might be the main reason why they decided to go with 8GB GDDR.
 
It's an absurd amount of RAM considering its speed, I guess its feasible that a lot of it is reserved for OS stuff, given the impressive features we saw on display... but even if they reserve 2GB, that still leaves a fucktonne for games.
 
ThoseDeafMutes said:
Yes, but not wildly. Assuming 512mb for OS, in order to match 6GB of memory for a Titan it would need to use merely 1.5 for CPU stuff. That's not impossible but it is severely imbalanced. Dumping a whole game to RAM would be madness since disc capacity is so high and games aren't going to be 7GB total size unless it's a PSN indie game or something.
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Most of the games today use a lot less data that you may think how this can change in future is question to be answered but right now you could dump all Final Fantasy XIII game data into that memory and still there would be a free space, same with Skyrim. Most of space in Sony games are used for different language support something that could be easly streamed from disc and in all those games thanks to dumping there would be no loading's at all !

Dumping whole game into memory is practically impossible with next game sizes (which will increase) but 6-7GB or ram is a lot of breathing room.

I seriously doubt that they will provide 2-3 GB for system. Mostly because 8GB of GDDR8 is something i think they even didn't know for sure that will end up in PS4. (Recently even 4GB of GDDR5 was unknown !). Looks like they already have working OS and basic features nailed down few months isn't that much to change how OS works imo.

Honestly i still can't believe they will provide 8GB of GDDR5. 8GB of GDDR5 ram requires stacking and stacking GDDR5 could generate a lot of heat which is mostly console killer.
 
Perkel said:
I seriously doubt that they will provide 2-3 GB for system. Mostly because 8GB of GDDR8 is something i think they even didn't know for sure that will end up in PS4. (Recently even 4GB of GDDR5 was unknown !). Looks like they already have working OS and basic features nailed down few months isn't that much to change how OS works imo.
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Are we talking about the same thing? The CPU needs to have stuff in working memory too, not just the GPU. Nothing to do with OS or tertiary features.
 
Just watched a bit of GT's invicible walls and cringed that they didn't understand how crazy 8 GDDR5 RAM. If the enthusiast press doesn't even understand how are they going communicate this to the average gamer. On the flip side it'll show in the games and it's more for developers I guess.

Duji said:
As exciting it is to have 8GB of fast RAM, I would much rather have an SSD. Hard drives are slow, loud, and are going to be obsolete very soon.
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SSD's are expensive though if you want a decent sized one.
 
2San said:
Just watched a bit of GT's invicible walls and cringed that they didn't understand how crazy 8 GDDR5 RAM. If the enthusiast press doesn't even understand how are they going communicate this to the average gamer. On the flip side it'll show in the games and it's more for developers I guess.
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I think this will come down to the simple 'don't tell them, show them' rule of marketing. It's clear that third party multiformat game will never exploit this much RAM over whatever the Durango may or may not have so it's down to Sony's first party to really bring it.

Live demonstrations of games (on stage at E3 or in store this holiday season) could be the most powerful way of showing the public the power of the PS4 and the reason they should buy one over a competitor's efforts.
 
One thing people are forgetting is how much this can ease the development. Devs don't need to worry much about fitting things into the RAM anymore. PS4 could be a dream to develop for.
 
schennmu said:
One thing people are forgetting is how much this can ease the development. Devs don't need to worry much about fitting things into the RAM anymore. PS4 could be a dream to develop for.
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That is what the devs said on stage. Dream platform.

Though Sony was probably holding their families hostage. :/

Really this platform is really facking exciting. PS Vita remote play (ALL TITLES I hope), instant ability to test a game out via Gaikai before you buy it, play as you download (I would really love to see that in action, not sure if possible tbh), a dedicated processor for uploading and downloading, no more CPU power being wasted on that shit. Sleepmode! YES!
Also, uploading videos and streaming, really really exciting stuff.

I hope we get to see the OS soon! :)

I am really liking the new platform visionary guy btw.. I think he did a fantastic job on stage.
 
Bravocado said:
It can't really be that much of an advantage... can it?

*desperately trying not to get too impressed*
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It's a marketing graph. Lying with statistics is their specialty. In this case, there's not even a scale. Disregard it until you see some actual numbers.
 
Busty said:
I think this will come down to the simple 'don't tell them, show them' rule of marketing. It's clear that third party multiformat game will never exploit this much RAM over whatever the Durango may or may not have so it's down to Sony's first party to really bring it.

Live demonstrations of games (on stage at E3 or in store this holiday season) could be the most powerful way of showing the public the power of the PS4 and the reason they should buy one over a competitor's efforts.
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RAM is one of those easier things to exploit imo, even if it just means higher res textures or more shit going on. I agree with that it'll show. I hope MS can step their game up one way or another.

Petrichor said:
This is the last time I trust GAF "insiders" or "experts" who proclaimed this to be false or impossible respectively.
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What do you mean? All the leaks pointed toward 4GB GDDR5 ram?
 
I still have to write it down so i can read it back, 8 gig of GDDR5. Sounds good yo, i thought it was a pipe dream when that thread broke the other week about them matching the 8 in the xbox i thought it was just bandwith that they meant meaning 4 gig of gddr would be the figure. Madness, and bravo sony for making a gaming ass gaming machine.
 
ThoseDeafMutes said:
Are we talking about the same thing? The CPU needs to have stuff in working memory too, not just the GPU. Nothing to do with OS or tertiary features.
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Didn't understand you well. Yes CPU also need ram but isn't most of system memory in PC used for precashing to faster GFX card ram ?
 
I was in shock when they first announced EIGHT. I was like... maybe 4gb GDDR5, and 4gb DDR3 for the video streamy stuff, but nope, all in, fucking 8GB GDDR5.

Surpassing current gen PC's wasn't really what I was expecting of next-gen at all, but here we are.

Price terrifies me.
 
ThoseDeafMutes said:
Yes, but not wildly. Assuming 512mb for OS, in order to match 6GB of memory for a Titan it would need to use merely 1.5 for CPU stuff. That's not impossible but it is severely imbalanced. Dumping a whole game to RAM would be madness since disc capacity is so high and games aren't going to be 7GB total size unless it's a PSN indie game or something.
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1.5 GB for game code is way too much anyway... most of that 7.5 GB will be graphics.

But what can be easily said right now is that PS4 made Titan worthwhile... now devs will actually use that 6 GB card properly :-).
 
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