CrunchinJelly
formerly cjelly
Update:
http://retrocityrampage.com/blog/2013/07/522/
I can't find the old thread, but Digital Foundry just updated their PS4 RAM article with confirmation from another source that devs are guaranteed 4.5GB RAM with a further 512MB of the flex memory, however, this may have performance problems due to paging issues.
http://www.eurogamer.net/articles/digitalfoundry-ps3-system-software-memory
UPDATE: Sony statement:
Digital Foundry Update on this:
Lock if old.
We can’t go into specifics about stuff like that, but I’ll say that if you go by Eurogamer’s article “update”, it would show that PS4 provides at least as much RAM to the developer as the XB1. While Eurogamer updated theirs, Game Informer still has their sensationalist headline “PlayStation 4 Reserves Nearly Half Of RAM For OS” up, a headline which was poor even at the time of the initial rumor. While the article itself does say “slightly more than its competitor”, the headline is what the majority of people will ever see. This is a problem. This caused problems.
Now let’s look at it closely. The rumor stated that the PS4 reserved 3.5GB, while the Xbox reserved 3.0GB. Think about how this headline then spins the story. Even had it been true, this was a difference of 0.5GB, yet the headline would make it sound like the PS4 has a massive weakness.
http://retrocityrampage.com/blog/2013/07/522/
I can't find the old thread, but Digital Foundry just updated their PS4 RAM article with confirmation from another source that devs are guaranteed 4.5GB RAM with a further 512MB of the flex memory, however, this may have performance problems due to paging issues.
http://www.eurogamer.net/articles/digitalfoundry-ps3-system-software-memory
UPDATE: A new source familiar with the matter has provided additional information to Digital Foundry that confirms only 4.5GB of the PS4's 8GB GDDR5 memory pool is guaranteed to game developers right now, while also clarifying how the PS4's "flexible memory" works in practice.
In real terms, an additional 512MB of physical RAM may be available in addition to the 4.5GB mentioned in the SDK. Flexible memory consists of physical and virtual spaces, and the latter introduces paging issues which impact performance. In our original story we combined them together.
For practical game applications, the correct figures for this story, as we understand it now, are a guaranteed 4.5GB for development and a further 512MB from the flexible pool. We have updated the headline accordingly.
UPDATE: Sony statement:
We would like to clear up a misunderstanding regarding our "direct" and "flexible" memory systems. The article states that "flexible" memory is borrowed from the OS, and must be returned when requested - that's not actually the case.
The actual true distinction is that:
- "Direct Memory" is memory allocated under the traditional video game model, so the game controls all aspects of its allocation
- "Flexible Memory" is memory managed by the PS4 OS on the game's behalf, and allows games to use some very nice FreeBSD virtual memory functionality. However this memory is 100 per cent the game's memory, and is never used by the OS, and as it is the game's memory it should be easy for every developer to use it.
We have no comment to make on the amount of memory reserved by the system or what it is used for.
Digital Foundry Update on this:
Based on this information, plus the new source coming forward to explain the properties of flexible memory, our take on this right now is that there is 4.5GB of conventional RAM available to developers, along with the OS-controlled flexible memory Sony describes, in addition to that.
We understand that this is a 1GB virtual address space, split into two areas - 512MB of on-chip RAM is used (the physical area) and another 512MB is "paged", perhaps like a Windows swap file. But to be clear, of the 8GB of GDDR5 on PS4, our contention is that 5GB of it is available to developers.
The good news is that the amount is static and not dictated by OS functions as we stated in our original post, making it a lot easier for developers to work with.
Lock if old.