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[monkeymagic]

http://www.maxconsole.net/?mode=news&newsid=4433

PSM September Magazine reveals interesting PS3 Information

#3 The Specs Aren't Set

Sony revealed some impressive PS3 tech specs at E3, but they apparently weren't set in stone. Developers have begun to tell us about actual improvements being made to the system's specifications, including more system memory and other low-level upgrades that we won't physically notice, but are making the people producing the games simply giddy.

Obviously the original source of this information is the PSM magazine September edition, so when it's available be sure to grab yourself a copy!

The rest of the article is at the link provided

There are scans too not sure if we're allowed to link to them so I won't

 

[human5892]

More memory?!

14 GB RAM
TREE SIDDY CRY

 

[Mashing]

Bah, fuck that... it's going to cost too much as it is... don't need more upgrades.

Of course I'm probably the only one who feels that way about this news.

 

[Myoclonic Jerk]

BEEEEEF IT UP..

I want this console to be AAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAA when it comes to raw power...

I'm willing to pay $500-600 for it

 

[Gek54]

Bah, fuck that... it's going to cost too much as it is... don't need more upgrades.

Of course I'm probably the only one who feels that way about this news.

It will pay off in the long run.

 

[NotMSRP]

So what if it costs too much now with or without the upgrades. Just wait for the price drop to your magic price point. If the system gets upgraded, the better, right?

Hope MS counters. Go arms race! This will make picking these two up at <$200 the better in a few years.

 

[gofreak]

I'm highly sceptical of this.

 

[digitalKiva]

#8 Speed OR Quality: It's Your Call

this is crap.. i shouldn't have to make a choice about which one I want. Console and game developers should be able to deliver both. I shouldn't have to play my game at 480 in order to get an acceptable frame-rate.

 

[robo_robo]

I want to smile but my wallet is forcing me to cry.

 

[Bluemercury]

So not only i have to deserve it by working harder like little ken said but now i may have i may have to kill for it??..............hummm dont think so.............

 

[Dr_Cogent]

I'll believe it when I see it.

 

[Juice]

Well, as of right now the PS3 is only going to have 256MB of ram, half of Xbox's (recently beefed) 512.

Can't have that after showing up a year later on the market. I've been waiting for this announcement.

I'm still pretty sure they're going to drop a lot of the media ports before it's all said and done, and then retail at $400 at Japan launch, and $350 in America.

 

[Dr_Cogent]

Well, as of right now the PS3 is only going to have 256MB of ram, half of Xbox's (recently beefed) 512.

Yeah, but the Xbox's is unified remember? Isn't the PS3 non-unified?

 

[sonycowboy]

Well, as of right now the PS3 is only going to have 256MB of ram, half of Xbox's (recently beefed) 512.

:lol :lol :lol :lol :lol :lol

how long have you been out of the loop?

(PS3 has 512MB as well)

 

[monkeymagic]

#8 Speed OR Quality: It's Your Call

this is crap.. i shouldn't have to make a choice about which one I want. Console and game developers should be able to deliver both. I shouldn't have to play my game at 480 in order to get an acceptable frame-rate.

I think everything will run acceptably at 720p and below with only the better developers hitting 1080p or I could be totally underestimating PS3's raw power and everything runs great at 1080p.

 

[Ruzbeh]

#8 Speed OR Quality: It's Your Call

this is crap.. i shouldn't have to make a choice about which one I want. Console and game developers should be able to deliver both. I shouldn't have to play my game at 480 in order to get an acceptable frame-rate.

Yeah. That's horrible. Stuff like that should be left to the developers. This is one of the reason why PC gaming sucks.

 

[digitalKiva]

So what if it costs too much now with or without the upgrades. Just wait for the price drop to your magic price point. If the system gets upgraded, the better, right?

Hope MS counters. Go arms race! This will make picking these two up at <$200 the better in a few years.

Too bad there might not ever be a price drop: http://ps3.ign.com/articles/618/618540p1.html

"PC Watch also reveals that a fixed price for the system is a possibility. Sony has stated that the PSP will stray from standard videogame pricing models and stay at its launch price, without going through periodic price drops. If PC Watch's sources are right, the PS3 may have a similar model."

 

[gofreak]

Well, as of right now the PS3 is only going to have 256MB of ram, half of Xbox's (recently beefed) 512.

Can't have that after showing up a year later on the market. I've been waiting for this announcement.

The announcement you're waiting for happened at E3. There's 512MB of RAM in PS3 (256MB XDR + 256MB GDDR3).

 

[Pimpwerx]

If there are really upgrades...IF...then they would be made within the bounds of the target price. It's not like someone's sitting around saying, "hey, let's throw this shit in, we'll just readjust the final price." The price is set, whatever it is. It's probably been set for months, if not from the drawing board. Whatever adjustments are made will not change that price at all. I say throw in as much shit as possible. I have a bad feeling it's gonna be around $350 anyway, so why the fuck not get more for my money? PEACE.

 

[Doom_Bringer]

:lol :lol :lol :lol :lol :lol

Clueless much?

(just kidding - PS3 has 512MB as well)

I thought it was 256 VRam and 256 System Ram!?

 

[human5892]

Too bad there might not ever be a price drop: http://ps3.ign.com/articles/618/618540p1.html

That's complete and utter nonsense.

 

[sonycowboy]

I thought it was 256 VRam and 256 System Ram!?

They can both be used by both chips.

CPU can access the DDR3 memory and GPU can access the XDR memory.

What could make this really worthwhile is that GPU can essentially access main memory at ~47.5Gb/s by accessing the two memories independantly. Over double the bandwidth.

 

[gofreak]

I thought it was 256 VRam and 256 System Ram!?

It is, but that's 512MB of RAM total The Ram is non-unified, but both RSX and Cell can read from and write to both pools.

 

[FiRez]

NEO-GEO 2

 

[Andy787]

It will pay off in the long run.

I agree. I think it's going to be a really bad situation for MS and Nintendo if their consoles aren't future proofed enough, because once we're a few years into the next gen, I think things will be so significantly better than what we're seeing now, and the improvement provided by a new generation of consoles would be a much harder sell. I think this gen is going to be much more like 8-10 years, or more.

Anyway, I hope this is true. Beef that motherfucker up all you can, Sony, and give me all of the extra features you can think of. I'll gladly take an all in one ass beating machine.

 

[robertsan21]

#8 Speed OR Quality: It's Your Call

It's something PC gamers have been able to do for years: Run their games at a lower resolution in order to speed them up. As it stands, Sony is leaving the door open for developers to offer players the ability to make their games run faster and smoother by using lower resolutions like 480p(progressive) or 480i(the standard egular TVs use). Sony obviously wouldn't want to abandon the majority of gamers who have non-HDTVs do by forcing all games to run at 720p. It's nice to hear that HD-less folks will get a little speed (can't read) from the lower resolutions, but if you're like us, it's all about resolution, baby.




WTF
i am not getting a HD TV.

so your telling me that if a game is in 720p that i cant run it on my normal TV?

i always tought that it was up to the hardwear in the video game console/PC to make a game run smooth and fast due to ram,graphics cards and other stuff, and not up to the TV/monitor.

the tv/monitor just displays the game for you or?

 

[Dr_Cogent]

It is, but that's 512MB of RAM total The Ram is non-unified, but both RSX and Cell can read from and write to both pools.

That's kind of odd. It seems like it is unified in a way then.

 

[Vince]

That's kind of odd. It seems like it is unified in a way then.

Sort-of as it's more of a non-uniform memory architecture. From the a system level perspective there is no logical distinction between the storage volumes. It's unified from a storage perspective, but in actuality is more NUMA-like due to the preformance differential (each pool of RAM has a relative difference in speed as seen from each processor) reflective from it's locality.

Where as on the X360, they architected the memory controller only on the GPU, on the PlayStation3 both Cell and the RSX come with one (for one reason or another *cough*), so it only makes sense to utilize both and maximize bandwith while minimizing the utilization impact on the internal, Cell <-> RSX, bus.

 

[NotMSRP]

I often wait for price drops on almost everything, so I have built up a good patience level. Still waiting for the $99 Xbox for a good 4 years and I can continue to wait.

Do you honestly believe the PR statement that the PSP will be at $250 FOREVER?

The PS3 and X360 will engage in a war with pricing as one of their tactics so they will come down in price.

 

[digitalKiva]

I often wait for price drops on almost everything, so I have built up a good patience level. Still waiting for the $99 Xbox for a good 4 years and I can continue to wait.

Do you honestly believe the PR statement that the PSP will be at $250 FOREVER?

The PS3 and X360 will engage in a war with pricing as one of their tactics so they will come down in price.

It may have to stay at that price point for a 4 or 5 years in order for Sony to start making a profit on the system.

 

[Pimpwerx]

ALL SYSTEMS WILL SCALE THE PICTURE DOWN TO FIT 480i...STOP COMPLAINING ABOUT IT.

The issue that article addresses is that there's no minimum spec set, so some games may ONLY come in at 480i/p instead of supporting a minimum of 720p like the 360 is. But I seriously doubt that's gonna be an issue at all. Those games will get bad reviews for picture quality, and should be few and far between. That or gamers with HDTVs will just ignore them completely. But all systems can support 480lines of resolution. It's the upper range that's the mystery. I hope Heavenly Sword and others weigh in at 1080p. That would be cool just for bullet-point bragging rights. PEACE.

 

[sonycowboy]

It may have to stay at that price point for a 4 or 5 years in order for Sony to start making a profit on the system.

My goodness. This week is starting off so well. It must be opening day for troll season. I must have missed it on my calendar, because my rifle isn't ready yet.

 

[NotMSRP]

Fine with me. I have plenty of other things to do for the next 4 or 5 years.

 

[brocke]

Wow you must have a lot of patience to wait 4 years to buy a system just for a $50 price drop

I don't think it will work that way with choosing between quality and speed in the end. Here is why. Where as with a computer you can upgrade the system components to get the fastest and prettiest game possible, with a console that is impossible.

I believe in the end they will all run the same and take into account the highest common denominater. So all games will be made to run perfectly at 1080p thus they will all run just as well at the lower resolutions.

 

[gofreak]

WTF
i am not getting a HD TV.

so your telling me that if a game is in 720p that i cant run it on my normal TV?

That's not what it's saying. What it's saying is that the option would be left open to the dev to increase the framerate for non-HD resolutions. So you would indeed be able to play games fine, and possibly at a faster framerate than those on HD, if a dev did that.

I find that kind of unlikely, though..I'd be pretty wary of these rumours.

 

[Nerevar]

Hey, as long as they can still launch it at $300, I'll be happy if they're making it more powerful.

My line in the sand has already been drawn, however. No more than $300. Both MS and Sony can go fuck themselves if they think I'm paying more than that.

 

[Zeo]

BEEEEEF IT UP..

I want this console to be AAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAA when it comes to raw power...

I'm willing to pay $500-600 for it

Anyone willing to pay $600 for a new console needs to get their head checked, my friend.

 

[Pimpwerx]

It may have to stay at that price point for a 4 or 5 years in order for Sony to start making a profit on the system.

No, it won't. In 4-5 years, you're moving close to 100M units. If economies of scale can't drop the cost below $300-350 or whatever, on a system that Sony is making themselves...then maybe they made it out of solid gold. There's misinformation, and there's rubbish.

The PS2 stayed $300 a long time. Even now, it should be either at $130 or $100, but it's not. KK's talked about extending the life and price of systems for years. That's what we're seeing now. My guess is you could maybe...MAYBE expect the PS3 to keep its launch price for a couple of years, assuming it's still selling in volume. When sales drop, they'll do incremental price drops. My guess is $350/300->250->200->180->150/130->100 in steps like that. The $180 price was obnoxious IMO. It's an insult to ask that much that late into a system's life. That's why, after my PS2 broke, I didn't re-up, I got a GC. MS has been pricing in line with Sony this gen, so I think they have kinda agreed on this silly pricing pattern. I would expect much the same from them, unless they get really aggressive. Hopefully they do, and force Sony to play along...hopefully. :? PEACE.

 

[Razoric]

Hey, as long as they can still launch it at $300, I'll be happy if they're making it more powerful.

My line in the sand has already been drawn, however. No more than $300. Both MS and Sony can go fuck themselves if they think I'm paying more than that.

What if it was sold in bundles only? $400-450 for PS3, memory stick and GTA4 (or whatever game you want)?

 

[Flo_Evans]

more memory if true = yay!

but jeez... 512 seems like a lot for a console already. What does the PS2 have 32mb?

 

[Chiggs]

It would be cool if the PS3 launched with 1 gig of ram.

 

[Nerevar]

What if it was sold in bundles only? $400-450 for PS3, memory stick and GTA4 (or whatever game you want)?

I'd wait until either

a) There was a bundle I just HAD TO HAVE (i.e. all included games were ones I wanted) and the retail price wasn't inflated (i.e. total cost of the bundle was equal to the exact MSRP of all the individual components combined) and none of the games included were $60 MSRP.

b) They stop the bullshit bundling.


I've got plenty of stuff still to come in this gen plus my backlog to keep me busy until they come around.

 

[gofreak]

I'm thinking that short of making these rumours up, the mag may have heard about 512MB of XDR being in the next version of the dev kits, and confusing that with the final retail box. Dev kits often have more memory than the consumer unit. A very silly mixup if that's what happened.

I think it seems somewhat unlikely that news of the proportion would leak out of a mag..it seems incredible to me that it wouldn't have gotten on to the net first.

 

[ziran]

maybe kutaragi will fix what he previously said to:

"I'm not going to reveal its price today. I'm going to only say that it'll be really expensive,""

so how much more ram? i can see running games in 1080p is going to need as much ram as poss, and this will probably be a future proof move as some people have already said.

640MB, 768MB, 1GB?

if 360 launches at $299, will sony have to match it? or could they get away with $349, or even $399, because of the playstation brand?

 

[AB 101]

Anyone willing to pay $600 for a new console needs to get their head checked, my friend.

Same goes for PC owners buying graphics cards.

In fact, its even a worse condition.


$599 for a top end graphics card or the same amount for a HD ready console.

SO difficult a decision.

 

[Piepz]

only a rumor

 

[gofreak]

if 360 launches at $299, will sony have to match it? or could they get away with $349, or even $399, because of the playstation brand?

I'm sure you'll get a million and one answers to that, but you can maintain a premium over your competitors and still outsell them handsomely. Nintendo has often played the price card against Sony with home consoles, but it wasn't very effective in the mid to long term.

I guess, to be more specific, price alone is not a deal-breaker or deal-maker. There's a lot of psychology involved in what the right price to target is.

 

[NotMSRP]

Wow you must have a lot of patience to wait 4 years to buy a system just for a $50 price drop

No it's from 2001 @ $300.

You learn to find other things to fill in the time void.

 

[gigapower]

NEO-GEO 2

Don't get my hopes up like that.

 

[monkeymagic]

I'm thinking that short of making these rumours up, the mag may have heard about 512MB of XDR being in the next version of the dev kits, and confusing that with the final retail box. Dev kits often have more memory than the consumer unit. A very silly mixup if that's what happened.

I think it seems somewhat unlikely that news of the proportion would leak out of a mag..it seems incredible to me that it wouldn't have gotten on to the net first.

If PS3 were to have 768MB or even 1GB of memory what kind of performance improvement could we expect?