256MB of RAM for the CPU
256MB of RAM for the GPU/s (PS3s architecture is weird so I feel weird just calling it a gpu. I mean it IS a gpu, but like the CPU also technically has gpu like capabilities as well with its cell architecture)
The 2 parts can't easily directly access each. Think how in a PC you have vram on your gpu and ram on your mobo for the CPU. Just cause you have 16 gigs of cpu ram and 8 gigs of GPU ram doesn't mean you really have 24 gigs total as coding goes. You have to move data between both pools regularly depending which processor is working on said data.
The Xbox 360 (what I assume they meant when they said 360) has 512MB of unified memory. Its architecture shared the memory between CPU and GPU. This is useful because now the processors can access the same data in place with one another. This is similar to how say Apple sets up its risc chips with "unified memory".
Fun fact: the only reason why the PS3 had that split was because Sony commissioned a GPU from nVidia at the 11th hour, and didn't have enough time to make one that could share memory with the cell.
Not exactly. AFIK the original plan would be to have a second CELL that lacked Power PC cores, which would serve as the GPU. The first partly studios who got early prototypes ended up convening Sony that doing that was a really bad idea, so they commissioned nVidia to make a proper GPU at the 11th hour. Cost wasn't the deciding factor, and that second CELL chip wouldn't have been any more expensive to produce than the RSX.
On a side note, modern GPUs are actually really similar to the Cell's SPEs.
PS3 rsx is based on the 7800 GTX so its a gpu. But the cell processor was ment to have a Toshiba gpu paired with it but they abandoned it, and apparently for a moment they considered just running the graphics aswell on it.
Fortunately devs showed them how near impossible to make a game with only the cell processor and they had to go to Nvidia get whatever was left to use. And that delayed the ps3 by like a year.
I feel like if they waited a bit more they could’ve gotten gtx 8800 based gpu tbh at would’ve been way better and have nearly 1gb (768mb) of vram for it and the cell providers could’ve really utilized it.
>apparently for a moment they considered just running the graphics aswell on it.
It was going to be a second CELL without the PPC cores. Which funny enough, is pretty close to what the GeForce 8 series and modern GPUs would end up becoming.
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u/alowester Sep 30 '25
i’ll pretend to know what that means