| freedquaker said: ESRAM is actually the bottleneck itself BECAUSE, without Esram, and all that space it takes, they could have put GDDR5 there instead, and even put extra Compute Units. 4 GB DDR3 + 4 GB GDDR5 + additional CUs would definitely be a much better choice. But the very existence of a Esram creates a bottleneck. So yes, Esram is there to alleviate the bottleneck created by DDR3 but because it's in a tiny capacity, so huge, not fast enough, and cripples the GPU, IT IS THE BOTTLENECK. |
The eSRAM has nothing to do with the GDDR5 memory. At all.
You can have eSRAM and GDDR5 memory and it would work fine, they don't share the same die, they are independant of each other.
The Xbox One by it's very nature of having less compute resources also needs less bandwidth.
Basically, Microsoft played it safe, they wanted more Ram for other tasks so the system was more feature rich, without breaking the bank.
Sony was origionally going to go with 4Gb of GDDR5 memory, but decided to take a gamble as new higher density modules were released before the systems launch, so they were then able to double the memory amount for very little cost.
The gamble is that volume production could have been extremely limited as high density GDDR5 doesn't enjoy the same scales of economies that DDR3 currently enjoys and it needs to share whatever volume it has with GPU's on the PC.
It's a gamble that paid off for Sony and well deservedly so.
However... The eSRAM takes up allot of transister space on the APU die, which is not only at a premium, but it forced Microsoft's hand by making them cut back on the graphics processor in order to keep costs down and yields up, otherwise the Xbox one may have cost another $100 extra.
The APU's in the Xbox One and Playstation 4 are already pretty monolithic, so a concession had to be made.
With that in mind, the eSRAM isn't a bottleneck, it's a small "band-aid" solution, the eSRAM isn't going to increase the bandwidth for everything, but a few smaller vital things like render targets which will see massive boons.
Is it ideal as Sony's implementation? Hell no, but apparantly the Xbox One should be identical to the Playstation 4 and isn't allowed to be different in any way shape or form if some peoples comments are a basis to go by, it's good to have differences in a market such as this, otherwise the Wii would never have been made and showed us motion controls.
Basically, the eSRAM doesn't cripple the GPU, it lends its assistance for some tasks, developers also have the choice not to use it at all if it really was a bottleneck and anyone who states otherwise... Are the one's who shouldn't ever be taken seriously again, much like the bloke on the twitter feed.
eSRAM/eDRAM has been used for decades in various forms even on the PC and it has never held/hampered/slowdown/bottlenecked a systems performance.
--::{PC Gaming Master Race}::--
