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Forums - Nintendo - Rumor: Cafe has 8 GB internal storage, maybe no 1080p

Squilliam on 05 May 2011
greenmedic88 said:
Squilliam said:

Actually the reason why the Xbox 360 has no HDD in the Arcade is because they doubled the RAM in the console to 256 MB, so it was a good tradeoff because the alternative was even worse.

Anyway if Nintendo go for a reasonable system such as 1GB of RAM with 6-8* Blu Ray they'll have a better stream speed/memory size ratio than the PS3, including the HDD streaming from the install (if applicable)

The only thing MS got out of making HHDs optional was an initial $299 SKU to shave $100 off the entry price. They did it to offer a low cost alternative. It had nothing to do with the Xbox having "so much RAM" that it didn't need external storage of any kind.

In 2012, 8GB of flash memory will be the equivalent of the 512MB of flash Nintendo put in the Wii. Which everyone who actually used their Wii and bought VC/WiiWare games complained about. Unless they're not planning on selling DD games or content without some pretty serious capacity limitations (no 1GB demos or XBL/PSN games), it's pretty short-sighted.

From what insiders said at Beyond3D Microsoft asked developers whether they wanted a HDD in every box or 512MB or RAM, developers chose the latter and the rest is history. Remember that $299 Xbox 360 needed a memory card and came with a wired controller, it wasn't just the HDD.

As for 8GB of flash, well since developers don't need to know how much capacity the NES 6 has that could simply be a development kit quantity. I think it'd be enough for most but it's still up in the air as to how much they'll actually include. It depends on what shape their network strategy has and will evolve into.



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Silver-Tiger on 05 May 2011
greenmedic88 said:
jarrod said:
greenmedic88 said:

 

SD cards are not a substitute for HDD. Currently. Data transfer rates for standard Class 10 SD cards are about 10MB/s compared to the current average 2.5" HDD of 100-200 MB/s. Faster SD formats (UHS-1/UHS-2 compliant) are of limited availability (UHS-2 under development) and quite expensive. Current UHS-1 cards top out at about 45 MB/s at a cost of about $150 (low) for a 32GB card. This is not to say that Project Cafe will even support UHS-1/2 compliant SD format cards.


What are you talking about?  You can get a 64GB SDXC card with a transfer speed of 15MB/s for $113 or a 64MB SDXC card @ 25MB/s for $144 right now?  UHS-1 will run you more yeah (about $220-ish) but that's for 64GB @ 60MB/s. A year from now or whenever Cafe hits, they'll have larger size capacities and faster transfer speeds for less money... SD a year from will make more sense for a 360-plus level system.

Compared to a 2.5" 500GB 5600 rpm HDD that costs $50 with a data transfer rate of between 100-200 MB/s?

It isn't a comparison by any measure.

You're trying to compare a 15MB/s 64GB card with 100MB/s 500 GB HDD at less than half the price ($113 vs about $50). One third the price of the 25MB/s card, which still has only 1/4 th the transfer speed.

If you think 64 GB UHS-2 cards will exist in 2012 with data transfer rates of over 100MB/s for under $50, by all means, feel free to chime in now, but even if they matched the bandwidth of current common 2.5" 5600 rpm HDDs, which in the same time frame will be 1TB for the same price or much less for a 500 GB HDD, you're still comparing a 64GB storage device with a 500-1000 GB storage device.

Even a comparable capacity 64 GB SATA-3 SSD is currently cheaper with far faster transfer speeds.

While it's entirely possible I'M being the irrational one here, I'd rather have a 128-256GB SATA-3 SSD for "$50" if anyone actually believes NAND flash memory is going to be that cheap in another year than a 64GB UHS-2 SD card with a transfer rate that barely matches current HDDs with a fraction of the storage capacity.

Listen to this man, he knows what he's talking about. I completely agree with this.



updated: 14.01.2012

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kitler53 on 05 May 2011
greenmedic88 said:
jarrod said:
greenmedic88 said:

 

SD cards are not a substitute for HDD. Currently. Data transfer rates for standard Class 10 SD cards are about 10MB/s compared to the current average 2.5" HDD of 100-200 MB/s. Faster SD formats (UHS-1/UHS-2 compliant) are of limited availability (UHS-2 under development) and quite expensive. Current UHS-1 cards top out at about 45 MB/s at a cost of about $150 (low) for a 32GB card. This is not to say that Project Cafe will even support UHS-1/2 compliant SD format cards.


What are you talking about?  You can get a 64GB SDXC card with a transfer speed of 15MB/s for $113 or a 64MB SDXC card @ 25MB/s for $144 right now?  UHS-1 will run you more yeah (about $220-ish) but that's for 64GB @ 60MB/s. A year from now or whenever Cafe hits, they'll have larger size capacities and faster transfer speeds for less money... SD a year from will make more sense for a 360-plus level system.

Compared to a 2.5" 500GB 5600 rpm HDD that costs $50 with a data transfer rate of between 100-200 MB/s?

It isn't a comparison by any measure.

You're trying to compare a 15MB/s 64GB card with 100MB/s 500 GB HDD at less than half the price ($113 vs about $50). One third the price of the 25MB/s card, which still has only 1/4 th the transfer speed.

If you think 64 GB UHS-2 cards will exist in 2012 with data transfer rates of over 100MB/s for under $50, by all means, feel free to chime in now, but even if they matched the bandwidth of current common 2.5" 5600 rpm HDDs, which in the same time frame will be 1TB for the same price or much less for a 500 GB HDD, you're still comparing a 64GB storage device with a 500-1000 GB storage device.

Even a comparable capacity 64 GB SATA-3 SSD is currently cheaper with far faster transfer speeds.

While it's entirely possible I'M being the irrational one here, I'd rather have a 128-256GB SATA-3 SSD for "$50" if anyone actually believes NAND flash memory is going to be that cheap in another year than a 64GB UHS-2 SD card with a transfer rate that barely matches current HDDs with a fraction of the storage capacity.

i'd also like to chime in...

flash memory makes sense for mobile devices that are going to get moved around a lot since it is physically more roubust and i believe it is also more energy efficient.  for something that is going to sit on a shelf all of the time plugged into the wall it just isn't worth paying the really high premium when there is literally no advantages but plenty of disadvantages.



jarrod on 05 May 2011
greenmedic88 said:

Compared to a 2.5" 500GB 5600 rpm HDD that costs $50 with a data transfer rate of between 100-200 MB/s?

It isn't a comparison by any measure.

You're trying to compare a 15MB/s 64GB card with 100MB/s 500 GB HDD at less than half the price ($113 vs about $50). One third the price of the 25MB/s card, which still has only 1/4 th the transfer speed.

If you think 64 GB UHS-2 cards will exist in 2012 with data transfer rates of over 100MB/s for under $50, by all means, feel free to chime in now, but even if they matched the bandwidth of current common 2.5" 5600 rpm HDDs, which in the same time frame will be 1TB for the same price or much less for a 500 GB HDD, you're still comparing a 64GB storage device with a 500-1000 GB storage device.

Even a comparable capacity 64 GB SATA-3 SSD is currently cheaper with far faster transfer speeds.

While it's entirely possible I'M being the irrational one here, I'd rather have a 128-256GB SATA-3 SSD for "$50" if anyone actually believes NAND flash memory is going to be that cheap in another year than a 64GB UHS-2 SD card with a transfer rate that barely matches current HDDs with a fraction of the storage capacity.

Uh, I wasn't arguing the merits of SD over HDD, I was just letting you know your benchmarks for SD were already outdated.  SD technology moves fast, which was sort of my point.

Personally yes, I'd rather take a USB HDD standard, or have Nintendo just stick in a notebook HDD bay. The storage is cheaper, bigger, faster, and will remain that way.  Of course that doesn't mean SD doesn't have it's own advantages (it's portable, it's durable, it's reliable, it's ubiquitous) or that it won't work fine for what Nintendo wants with Cafe (probably max 2-4GB files for DLC, patches, DD games, etc, no DD service for retail games). And beyond that, we don't know if they'll support USB or not even, you can't really even rule out HDD support yet.

Of course above all I'd rather have any set industry standard than an overpriced proprietary solution, or a closed internal drive.  If you want to get a 250GB 360 drive, it costs about "$50" twice over depending on what sales you hit.  When I bought my 360's 120GB HDD (upgrading from the measly 20GB it came with) it cost me almost $200.  Compared to that, I think I can swing a 64GB SDXC in a year or two without much pain.  Hell, I'll probably already have a spare one that came with a camera or DVR or something. ;)



wiifan75 on 05 May 2011
Rainbird said:
kitler53 said:

8 Gb is too small, i had to upgrade to 500 Gb just to manage.  not that everyone need 500 Gb but 8 is really too small for most people.  remember, if the wii 2 gets third party support that mean required game installs as that is pretty common now-a-days.

Only on the PS3, and that's because the blu-ray drive isn't fast enough to compete with the DVD drive in the 360. If Nintendo can match the 360 in disc drive speed, they won't need installs.

I've always wondered why a game would need an install for a console.  If this is true then I've got my answer.



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Rainbird on 06 May 2011
wiifan75 said:
Rainbird said:
kitler53 said:

8 Gb is too small, i had to upgrade to 500 Gb just to manage.  not that everyone need 500 Gb but 8 is really too small for most people.  remember, if the wii 2 gets third party support that mean required game installs as that is pretty common now-a-days.

Only on the PS3, and that's because the blu-ray drive isn't fast enough to compete with the DVD drive in the 360. If Nintendo can match the 360 in disc drive speed, they won't need installs.

I've always wondered why a game would need an install for a console.  If this is true then I've got my answer.

That's the answer pretty much. The blu-ray drive in the PS3 isn't terribly fast, so developers resort to installing their games on the harddrive to get good enough loading speeds.



binary solo on 06 May 2011

There's not a lot that would compel me to buy any given Nintendo console over what Sony offers, but if Nintendo delivers great games without 1080p and only 8Gb of internal storage then why should those particular elements be a problem for people?



“The fundamental cause of the trouble is that in the modern world the stupid are cocksure while the intelligent are full of doubt.” - Bertrand Russell

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oniyide on 06 May 2011

^^^ because 8Gbs is crap your limited to what you can download on the system, some DL games range from 50MBs to 3GBs