What is the future of GPU VRAM in view of next gen consoles with unified system memory?

[3t3P]

I've read the eurogamer article suggesting that you will want as much VRAM as possible when developers start feeding us true next-gen titles.


What I haven't seen is much discussion on the current status quo and what will happen next year when Maxwell (not sure what Red team are doing, I imagine the same...) lands with its ability to share system ram.

Will they still ship cards with 2-4-6-8gb?! on-board or offload to system RAM so everyone starts buying big, fast kits?

How can DDR3/4 compete with GDDR5/6 bandwidth on GPUs?

In view of perhaps needing more VRAM for next gen titles, will cards, in relative terms, become cheaper/stay same price though shipping with more VRAM?

or will they just make us pay for our cards

 

[3t3P]

Lots of debate here.

PC has always looked better than console. That I will never worry about.

My question was really, will the PC platform for gaming stay recognisable as we see it today, or will or components talk to each other differently in a years time.

Also it is always unfair to compare the GPU of a console to ours.

Consoles have far fewer OS overheads so proportionally are far more efficient at churning out decent looking graphics.

Wipeout HD on PS3 was an early launch game that is true 1080p at 60fps, it looks amazing and its such a shame Sony shut the Liverpool team down and there will be no iconic wipeout launching with PS4.

I realise racing games are easier to render however as the camera flies effectively down a tunnel which you wrap textures around.

What's HSA?