Memory in consoles

[Guffe]

Okey, so the WiiU has got a release date (US18nov, EU30nov and Japan6dec) but the main thing that is discussed about on these forums when we talk about the new console is its hard drive memory size which is either 8GB or 32GB.

The Xbox360 and PS3 had a lot bigger memory drives at release and after that new versions with even bigger memory capacity have been brought into the market.

Since my knowledge in the apartment of computer drives or parts, or machines in general is pretty much nonexistent I am asking: Does it matter that the memory size is so small? Because in my gaming life (from 4 to today aged 21) and playing with a N64, GC and Wii, while this does not concern the N64 since those had memory cards but the two other consoles. And my friends owning xboxes, PS2s, Xbox360s and PS3s no one has ever "run out of memory" on any of these consoles. I mean how many games would you have to play to fill that basic 8GB for instance or what factors play a role? Does it fill upp a lot faster if you play a lot online or is the way memory is stored the biggest factor?

I bet there are hundreds of different answers to these question but if someone could try and clarify some of this to me I'd be really happy.

 

[capper42]

Surely this should be in the Gaming forum?

Anyway, I don't think game saves are the problem of such a small HDD, it's DLC and patches and things that take up lots of space. As an example, the last Battlefield 3 patch was about 1.5GB. If the Wii U is to compete with even the current consoles, let alone the next Xbox and PS, an 8GB hard drive is just not big enough.

 

[mad825]

Since my knowledge in the apartment of computer drives or parts, or machines in general is pretty much nonexistent

You gave that away in the thread title ^.^

Nintendo wants maintain the SSD/cartridge types of storage however because of the costs means they have to keep it small and the ever growing storage requirements for games means that it will cause a lot of inconvenience. Not even to mention the constant writing from SSDs aren't consider healthy doesn't help.

 

[tippy2k2]

Sony and Microsoft are also focusing much more on multi-media versus Nintendo's philosophy of focusing solely on gaming. This focus on just gaming let's them get away with a smaller hard drive because you don't need a large hard drive.

For Microsoft, I have the ESPN app, Netflix app, full digital game downloads, installing games to the hard drive, movie purchase options (1.5 GB for a standard definition movie), TV show purchase options, and so on.