Quote from: Superguy on March 10, 2020, 16:10:48
Always thought it would be cool to add more RAM to a console. 4GB just seems sparse to run the game. Why not at least 8 GB dedicated to the CPU/OS? 16 GB and 16 GB for GPU/CPU would be ideal for the long haul IMO. I'd never consider running a PC with only 4 GB these days. 8 GB minimum/16 GB preferred.
It's quite simple honestly, a game console isn't a PC. 4gb to run an OS dedicated to launching games and doing a few other simple tasks doesn't require 8 or 16 gigs of RAM. A Chromebook runs pretty damn well with 4gb of RAM and is meant to do nearly everything a standard PC does.
You're right, 8gb would provide a lot of headroom for OS expansion but the 16gb of GDDR6 RAM isn't necessarily dedicated to the GPU. It's shared otherwise they'd designate it as vRAM. Consoles use APUs for this exact reason, it allows them to put a single lump of RAM into the system that can be intelligently allocated to various things based on need. 20gb of GDDR6 would cost more than 16 with an additional 4gb of DDR4 and going with just 16gb of GDDR6 would result in a portion of that being constantly hogged by the OS (as systems for awhile have run the OS in the background to allow for quick game switching and things like chats/messaging/friends lists/etc). So this is obviously the best way to keep production costs low while getting the most performance possible out of their allotment of production money per console. Adding more DDR4 could be beneficial but honestly, what do you need your OS to do that the current consoles can't already? You want to edit videos on your PS5 or something? Build a PC then!