Predict: The Next Generation Console Tech

[Shifty Geezer]

there's amemory standard (any type) that is speedy enought to not be a bottleneck for the hdd, but still be cheap?

You could chuck in a big pool of slower DDR, like how Wii has a two-tiered memory model. It'd be volatile though and you'd need to refresh it every time you played a game. Actually a lump of flash on the HDD itself would augment the fast cache and slow-access disc with lower-latency small-file accessing, basiclaly doing ReadyBoost on the HDD independent of the OS.

 

[fehu]

I've found this on a recent real world tech article

At present, the cost of a 32Gbit (or 4GB) NAND chip using multi-level cells (MLC) is approximately $7, and the controller is the same price as for hard disks.

The controller must be integrated in the southbridge, so wouldn't add too much to the cost, and supposing a doubling in density for 2012, 16GB will cost about 14$ for two chips, and half for one chip wen density doubles again
Ok a little optimistic, expecially on the 14$ particular

Now
I don't remember who succeded to j allard, but if you are reading, please contact me so i can sell you this idea

 

[Squilliam]

Okay, that sounds workable. 20 MB/s read listed there too. Man, that's gonna be slow to load off!

Flash speeds are increasing. With two chips it increases to 40MB/S, 4 is 80MB/S and if flash scales to say 150% of the original speed in the intervening time of 2-3 years it becomes 30, 60 and 120MB/S respectively.

You think another $25 on top of the $25 for the HDD itself? Sounds high to me. I'm in agreement with corduroygt, that you'll have the interface anyway because these companies want owners to upgrade to HDD and buy DLC. So as I see it, it really is a choice of ~$25 on an HDD, or ~$25 on flash.

I was thinking about $30-$35 for the drive itself because the first model defines the system as far as expected read speed so they would want a higher density platter with as high a read speed as possible for the first model which rotates at 7200RPM. If they rely on this component for loading then it makes sense that it deliver at least 130MB/S average read throughput. Then you can add a few dollars here and there for ancilliary sata controllers, power, packaging, shipping and retail margins.

Only because Wii is sans HDD! Next gen if they get the chance to sell DLC, they'll take it. And if they go with reasonable specs and 16+GB titles on a 2GBs of RAM system, they're going to need one to overcome huge loading delays. Technically and economically I can't see any way to pair 2+GB of RAM to a non-HDD system. Will holographic drives offer a plausible solution?

I don't actually see Nintendo moving past 1GB of ram for their next system, they would likely target at maximum 4 32/16bit 2Gbit DRAM modules and a HDD is out because they have obvious packaging requirements, so flash is still in as far as I can see for Nintendo.

Nintendo would still want their console to be small and ubotrusive because they'd believe it served them well this time around. So again they will probably not be able to package a 2.5" HDD nor bulky cooling within their desired form factor.

Overall theres no harm in using flash to keep the overall entry level cost of a system down. So long as the people who abhor loading like yourself are satisfied then it doesn't matter if a lower end system which you'd never buy comes with say 16GB of flash (8 user, 8 cache) if that satisfies a part of the market that doesn't care too much.

 

[MfA]

A 2.5 inch drive takes up 5% of the volume of the existing Wii.

 

[Shifty Geezer]

1.8" drives are an option too. It's not like adding an HDD is going to be the difference between a Wii sized console or an XB360. It'll be the difference between a Wii and slightly bigger Wii.

 

[tongue_of_colicab]

But wouldnt drives like that be overkill for what nintendo is likely to do with wii2? I suppose 1.8 and 2.5'' drives come atleast at several 10's of gb's? I think nintendo probably doesn't think there should be more than a maximum of 4gb in the system. It would be smaller and cheaper to use flash memory I think. If they are smart the make sure that this time around you can also just run content of your own flash card right away and than there wouldn't be a need for more than 2 or 4gb anyway because they can just have the consumer buy a memorycard if they want lots of stuff stored at the same time will they can keep the price down and still offer all functionality right from the start.

But maybe a hdd will be better as wii2 will be HD and given the size of some xbla and psn games 2 or 4gb of memory would probably be insufficient for storing a decent amount of games.

 

[Shifty Geezer]

But wouldnt drives like that be overkill for what nintendo is likely to do with wii2?

Sell download content. They're already opening up their 'games consoles' to lots of non-gaming functions, despite protesting that it was always about the games. I'm sure they'll pursure other revenue streams next-gen when they see what easy money it is. Pokemon only as a downloadable TV series on NintyNet? Subscription models for Wii-Total-Life-Check with evolving video content? Seems possible to me. To not include an HDD is to lose $30-40 on every box and potentially $100s on DLC over the course of 5 years of ownership. I don't think they'll try to compete with the living room space against MS, Sony, and everyone else, but I do see them extending DLC just as they have done with WiiWare, DSiware, and services.

BC with Wii titles will warrant multiple gigabytes to resell everyone the same content again!

 

[corduroygt]

However, if you want to play a different game and only have room for one install (16GBs isn't much), that'll be another 5-10 minute install minigame as the cache is replaced. Dunno about you but that'd seriously discourage me from changing the game in the drive! Although I'd be sure to get an HDD console as I like download titles.

That's why you'd buy the hard drive accessory so you can keep multiple games installed without having to play the minigame, and the minigame could be something like PS Home, but better, maybe something RPG oriented where you gain levels and such.

 

[corduroygt]

1.8" drives are an option too. It's not like adding an HDD is going to be the difference between a Wii sized console or an XB360. It'll be the difference between a Wii and slightly bigger Wii.

1.8" mechanical hdd's are incredibly slow and only run at 3600 rpm or so, I've experimented with macbook air with ssd vs hdd and there was an enormous difference. They're also very expensive at retail because of economies of scale, I'd wager 100 2.5" Hdd's are being made for each 1.8" hdd.

 

[MfA]

A 2.5" drive should fit easily anyway.

 

[fehu]

You could chuck in a big pool of slower DDR, like how Wii has a two-tiered memory model. It'd be volatile though and you'd need to refresh it every time you played a game. Actually a lump of flash on the HDD itself would augment the fast cache and slow-access disc with lower-latency small-file accessing, basiclaly doing ReadyBoost on the HDD independent of the OS.

DDR has the problem of the density, if don't we'll have console with 4GB+ of main ram almost eliminating the cache problem.
And everything you put directly on the hdd is proprietary and too small for what i'm tinking.

Imagine GTA5.
You are in Miami, and can choose to murderdeathkill everyone on your path to take an offshore and go in Cuba, murderdeathkill everyone on your path, take a cigar and go smoke with fidel castro's brother. Or you can go north, murderdeathkill everyone on your path, and rape a prostitute in Palm Bay. (hell i hate the mindless violence in this game...)
If you do this on silly 2GB of uma ram, everytime that you turn 180°, everything must be recollected from hdd if you are lucky, and from bluray if you was cursed from a gipsy.
In any way you will see the city building before your eyes like a cyberpunk movie, and i don't like to spend a ton of money to have something worst than my previous console.
My idea is to use this memory to store both what you will see going south, and what is behind your shoulder, and to be effective the cache must be a multiple of your ram.
The alternative is a 7twentwii

 

[grandmaster]

I think there's a strong argument that there won't be internal hard disks in the next gen console. The price of a hard drive doesn't go down as such, instead the capacity increases. That's what I was told by a high-ranking exec of one of the platform holders...

Make no mistake, the next gen platforms will be built to a cost.

 

[Shifty Geezer]

How on earth is that going to work with load times and flash? Are we looking at 3 minute load times every time you want to play a game? Or do you think they'll bite the bullet at launch for substantial fast flash knowing the price will drop below HDD costs, thus enabling very cheap SKUs down the line while preserving target performance across the entire system?

 

[fehu]

How on earth is that going to work with load times and flash? Are we looking at 3 minute load times every time you want to play a game? Or do you think they'll bite the bullet at launch for substantial fast flash knowing the price will drop below HDD costs, thus enabling very cheap SKUs down the line while preserving target performance across the entire system?

The cache is cahce not main ram, so you start the game as usual.
First time you sekk and load data traditionally, but depending on programmer implementation keep a copy of the data on the cache. You start walking, and the new data streams from the bluray, and a copy is placed in the cache in addition to that present.
The world is streamed directly ftom the disk and all load slowly with texture and poles that appear from nothing and maybe some slowdown as in oblivion.
You turn and return to the starting point, the game make a request to the southbridge, and before going to the bluray make a search on the cache, if it's yet there start the streams, if not go seek to the disk traditionally.
A game can programmatically update the cache too. For example if you are facing the last boss of the level, the game can empty the cache and start loading the next level.
I recall that nvidia on the first nforce done something similar.

 

[Shifty Geezer]

The cache is cahce not main ram, so you start the game as usual.

I was replying to grandmaster! I understand your idea of cache and I agree in the design. It's a suggestion I've already agreed with some months I think when we were all talking about SSD/flash replacing optical disks.

 

[brain_stew]

I think there's a strong argument that there won't be internal hard disks in the next gen console. The price of a hard drive doesn't go down as such, instead the capacity increases. That's what I was told by a high-ranking exec of one of the platform holders...

Make no mistake, the next gen platforms will be built to a cost.

That's precisely why Microsoft ditched it on their low end model this generation and I'd expect the same next generation. There's bound to be the option of a HDD for users that want to buy lots of DLC, but I'd expect all three to release models that don't have a HDD as standard.

 

[PalmiNio]

Currently writing an academic article on product innovation and the shift from the traditional hard drives to SSD, this is my opinion:

2007 the price for a 250 dollar SSD drive was around 16 dollars per GB and with a capacity of 16gb. This drive was also inferior in sequent write/read speed.

2009 Intel gives us 80gb at 250 dollar with a price per gb around 3-3,5. This drive has superior speed.

This is the progress within 2 year. Today we have far more competitors and more focus on SSD. Is it then to silly to think that in 2012-2013 when the next generation launch that SSD will be standard instead of the old drives?

Within 4-5 years some in the business believes that the price per gb of a SSD will be lower than the old drive.

Since we know that SSD and NAND chip has a much better cost advantage over time then the classic drives (which only increase in capacity) it would be, in my opinion, foolish not to build a new console based on SSD in 2013 if you expect the machine to live for 5-10 after that.

 

[assen]

Since we know that SSD and NAND chip has a much better cost advantage over time then the classic drives (which only increase in capacity) it would be, in my opinion, foolish not to build a new console based on SSD in 2013 if you expect the machine to live for 5-10 after that.

You're talking of progress at the $250 SSD level; what is interesting in the design of a $300-at-launch console is what can you get for $25, not how big the $250 SSD becomes.

 

[DuckThor Evil]

Currently writing an academic article on product innovation and the shift from the traditional hard drives to SSD, this is my opinion:

2007 the price for a 250 dollar SSD drive was around 16 dollars per GB and with a capacity of 16gb. This drive was also inferior in sequent write/read speed.

2009 Intel gives us 80gb at 250 dollar with a price per gb around 3-3,5. This drive has superior speed.

GB = Gigabyte

Gb = Gigabit

gb = Wrong (/Arnold)


Make sure you get that right in the article.

Within 4-5 years some in the business believes that the price per gb of a SSD will be lower than the old drive. .

You can get over 10GB today per $ with regular HDD and much more in 4-5 years. There is absolutely no way for SSD's to become cheaper per GB in that timeframe, no way in hell.

 

[PalmiNio]

You're talking of progress at the $250 SSD level; what is interesting in the design of a $300-at-launch console is what can you get for $25, not how big the $250 SSD becomes.

Well the 250 dollar modell was about the cheapest thing you could find 2007. Today the field is different.

Kingston has hit sub-100 dollar with 40gb, and that is 2009. We are talking from no sub-200 dollar modells in 2007 and the entery models at around 16gb in 2007. Today you can get a SSD at sub-100 dollar at 40gb. That progress in only 2 years.

If the price of the entry model can be sliced to half the price in less then 2 years, i believe that 80gb of harddrive can be produced and sold for under 50 dollars in 2012.