Of course there are many things that could be done, but these usually result in other trade-offs being made. With more exotic memory architectures this usually results in the system being more difficult to develop for. In some cases it may not be that taxing (for example on-chip memory which tends to have a very specific and isolated use) but in other cases it can be problematic. Hypothetically speaking, a system could be built with memory on the GPU for screen buffers and texture caching, have dedicated GDDR5 memory for the GPU, some DDR4 memory for the CPU, and a lot of low performance DDR3 to hold lower priority data could give you the performance and cost you want but it would also be a pain in the ass to manage memory in a system like that.

They can get away with 8 gigs of ddr3 ram its fast enough and cheap..

And once again, Cervat Yerli thinks that Crytek should be and indeed is the mark to aim for. He's wrong and is being completely unrealistic. Perhaps he wants them to have 8GB RAM but that doesn't mean they'll need it.

If Crytek was less into making tech demo's and more into optimization and making playable games, his words would hold meaning.

I think it means the other consoles are in danger. Look at the Vita, state of the art and selling terribly.

GDDR5 is going to go end of life within two years and it is very expensive and uses a lot of power. It will go EOL because the alternatives are simply that much better than what you can get with the new technologies coming on board with hybrid memory cube (HMC) and high bandwidth memory (HBM). DDR3 is simply inadequate for high performance applications so that leaves either DDR4 or an exotic application of DDR4 (HMC/HBM) as the two good options for console memory. This kind of technology has already been deployed in a console environment because the PS Vita uses Wide IO which was done before the the standard was finalised and has a 1024 bit bus which says to me it is doable and I already understand why it is desirable.

Is it worth the money? Being able to put 8GB on a 512 bit bus is quite enticing isn't it? You can get the speed of GDDR5 with the capacity of DDR3 for lifetime cost of GDDR5 AND simplify the one or two lifetime process shrinks on the APU/CPU+GPU because the memory bus and I/O is off die. I would be shocked if we don't see HBM or HMC deployed on a next gen console.

You're not going to see 8GB of RAM in Sony and Microsoft's next consoles. At current densities that would be 16 x chips of DDR3 or a ridiculous 32 x chips of GDDR5. The motherboards would be bloomin huge and overly complex and the consoles will cost a small fortune. Not going to happen.

People's expectations of the PS4 and 720 are way too high, there are probably going to be a great deal of disappointed people once the specs are known.

Actually it is very possible. Two stacks of 8 DDR4 chips = 16 chips @ 4Gb per chip = 8GB. It is well within the spec to do something like that.

when he says 8GB,is he saying that all 8 is for the game itself,or is some for the overhead/os

i think i agree to that.

Or the Vita does poorly because it is trying to be a portable home console in a world that increasingly wants handheld gaming to be more casual 10 minute time wasters than 60 hour RPG or intense action games. It could be that the Vita is the best handheld that nobody was asking for and it's technology has nothing to do with.

But that doesn't translate to the home. At home people want to buy the best machine with the best graphics and the best games. At home they want what they hook up to their giant HDTV to be as visualy spectacular as possible.

If the Nextbox and PS4 do end up to be far more powerfull the Wii U will be in trouble. The same trouble that the Wii faced, but this time the soccor mom's aren't excited for a balance board and the retirement homes already have Wii Sports and don't need anything else. This time missed ports will matter much earlier.

With that said, I'm still going to buy a Wii U when the real Mario, Zelda and Metroid games hit. But just like the Wii I doubt I'll buy many 3rd party games for it. It will be my Nintendo box just like my previous Nintendo machines.