| NATO said: indeed but there is a fairly good chance the existing memory controller would handle it just fine since it's based of an APU that has the support for it, but even if it didn't, designing an already customized system around additional ram wouldn't really cause a significant increase to unit cost, just more cost for the R&D of the hardware to begin with, and a little extra on more circuitry and power distribution for the additional modules. |
GPU's and the Console APU's are a little different than what you would see on a Desktop PC that uses ranks on a DIMM/SIMM.
Each memory chip usually has it's own memory bus that connects directly to the memory controller or chipset. So if you double the amount of memory chips, you generally need to double the memory controllers bus width. Console APU's typically aren't built with such forward/backward thinking in the memory controller as it would be transistors going to waste (and thus money) for no benefit.
| NATO said: Point is, even if you gave it a really broad and generous estimation of final additional cost per unit, you'd only really be looking at $30-$35, and that would be *very* generous too. |
Agreed.
| NATO said: Simply because of balance, they wont put more ram into a system that would very much benefit from it (due to 4k targets), because they know the rest of the system wouldn't really be able to fully utilize it, and including it would also mean that somewhere down the line their next console would need to be significantly better to entice buyers. |
I think cost is a more important factor than balance. If balance was a concern... Scorpio wouldn't be using Jaguar.
Ram is also one of those things that someone is always screaming out wanting more... If you do not include enough... It can have catastrophic consequences. Put to much in... And you are wasting money. Ram itself also possess no hardware for processing so it doesn't actually hardware accellerate or process anything to make them go faster.
Balance is certainly important though, consoles of old were certainly far more balanced machines than today... Such as the Gamecube and the original Xbox.
In Scorpio's case, the vast majority of games on release will be using at most... 5GB of that 9GB pool. That is 4GB sitting around twiddling it's thumbs and doing nothing. Normally.
Microsoft instead will use whatever memory is free for caching, which is something consoles never typically did before this generation and I am keen to see how that translates into the UI, Apps, Game loading etc'.
| NATO said: No console manufacturer is ever going to release a system that's as cutting edge as they can possibly make it, because there would be no profit in it for them, which is why i'm a PC gamer, you choose what to spend, you choose how good or bad you want things to be. |
Exactly. It all comes down to profit. Costs. And balancing those aspects.
| NATO said: Scorpio is, in my opinion, Microsofts bridge console between their Xbox brand and their windows brand, as it moves ever closer to pc, and evidence to me that they're slowly tapering off out of the console market while trying to take as many console gamers with them as they can - ultimately, it's a Microsoft branded, MS-Store locked steambox. |
They have been saying that before the Original Xbox dropped onto the market, that console gaming and PC gaming will get closer together and lines will be blurred. :P
Here we are 15+ years later. Haha.
I still see a reason to own both a console and a PC for gaming even with most of their game library being identical.
I am keen to pick up a Scorpio though... It's hardware is what I would have preferred the generation to release with. But I digress. :P
--::{PC Gaming Master Race}::--
