10gb of RAM? Do we need this?

[max.ine]

Like it or not, stuff like Windows 10 is the future—interchangeable desktop and mobile OS. Unfortunately Microsoft couldn’t pull it off and was smart enough to get out of the phone market. Here’s to hoping another company attempts it sometime soon... or hell, I guess it’ll be a reality soon enough on Android.

Basically: Yes. Eventually we’ll be running what are considered today full-fledged computers out of our pockets, much like how the iPhone would’ve been a full-fledged computer 20 years ago.

 

[ramram55]

The cell phone world is changing, definite the device makers wanted to make it better and powerful than PC.

 

[Tsepz]

Like it or not, stuff like Windows 10 is the future—interchangeable desktop and mobile OS. Unfortunately Microsoft couldn’t pull it off and was smart enough to get out of the phone market. Here’s to hoping another company attempts it sometime soon... or hell, I guess it’ll be a reality soon enough on Android.

Basically: Yes. Eventually we’ll be running what are considered today full-fledged computers out of our pockets, much like how the iPhone would’ve been a full-fledged computer 20 years ago.

Basically setups like Continuum, Samsung DeX and Huawei PC Mode are the future. I read a rumour somewhere (think it was on slashgear), that Samsung are looking to make the whole DeX setup wireless, and I am sure Huawei are probably working on something like that to, I would even put LG in there as they always try to be as competitive with Samsung as possible.

We are going to get to a point where you are NOT going to physically dock your Phone/Mobile device, but rather probably have it wirelessly transmit a Desktop UI to your screen(s) at your desk, while the phone itself also operates as normal.

You will probably have a separate user profile etc... running for the desktop mode. When you leave your desk everything will become mobile friendly working much like a Mobile Responsive website. We will probably buy displays that have the support built into them, much like how car infotainment systems have Apple CarPlay and Android Auto.

This again is why more RAM is needed and Graphics muscle to.

The next 10 years, dare I say it, may actually be more exciting than the last 10 years, as now these OSs are matured and now need to move to the next level, in terms of breaking the gap between desktop and mobile.

We may find that laptops become less of a common thing in most workplaces, other than those that need that heavy power e.g. architects, creative agencies, design studios etc...

 

[ramram55]

Basically setups like Continuum, Samsung DeX and Huawei PC Mode are the future. I read a rumour somewhere (think it was on slashgear), that Samsung are looking to make the whole DeX setup wireless, and I am sure Huawei are probably working on something like that to, I would even put LG in there as they always try to be as competitive with Samsung as possible.

We are going to get to a point where you are NOT going to physically dock your Phone/Mobile device, but rather probably have it wirelessly transmit a Desktop UI to your screen(s) at your desk, while the phone itself also operates as normal.

You will probably have a separate user profile etc... running for the desktop mode. When you leave your desk everything will become mobile friendly working much like a Mobile Responsive website. We will probably buy displays that have the support built into them, much like how car infotainment systems have Apple CarPlay and Android Auto.

This again is why more RAM is needed and Graphics muscle to.

The next 10 years, dare I say it, may actually be more exciting than the last 10 years, as now these OSs are matured and now need to move to the next level, in terms of breaking the gap between desktop and mobile.

We may find that laptops become less of a common thing in most workplaces, other than those that need that heavy power e.g. architects, creative agencies, design studios etc...

You are right, Huawei mate 20 might come out with 'whole DeX setup wireless'. Just rumor maybe. Never know.

 

[jerwin]

The original IBM PC (5150) came with between 16 and 64K of RAM.
The apple III came with 128K, but it maxed out at 512K.

The 640K limitation was imposed by IBM, not by Microsoft. The not quite compatible Apricot PC, released in 1983 could use up to 768K of RAM.

see The 640K memory limit of MSDOS for all the messy details.

The cortex A76 has a 40 bit physical address size-- twice that of the IBM PC 5050. So, we're good.

 

[willentrekin]

I think everyone agrees we need 512gb RAM and double that in an Xtreme Fuzion drive for regular storage.

 

[Michael Goff]

I think everyone agrees we need 512gb RAM and double that in an Xtreme Fuzion drive for regular storage.

Nobody has 512 gb of RAM anywhere. You're thinking storage. Nobody needs enough RAM to cache the entire OS ten times over.

 

[Hater]

Nobody has 512 gb of RAM anywhere. You're thinking storage. Nobody needs enough RAM to cache the entire OS ten times over.

Sarcasm isn't your strong point.

Anywho, 512GB RAM is so common that you can just jump on eBay for some second hand deals if you want.

https://www.ebay.com.au/itm/DELL-R8...240447?hash=item1ee8e3783f:g:GbwAAOSwbpVbf7MU

 

[throAU]

6 for Android, 4 for iOS is optimal. I'm not sure the point of anything more on such a small screen.

Depends what you're expecting the device to do.

Both android vendors and Apple are positioning their tablets (and eventually, their phones, via wireless peripheral connectivity and wireless display or AR goggles) as laptop replacements.

As they take on more complex applications with new software updates, they will need all the RAM they can throw at them.

Chicken and egg situation - you won't get the more complex applications without the hardware being available.


edit:
my first machine had 16K of RAM. RAM requirements always expand; standard RAM for a half-decent desktop these days is 16 GB, i would expect tablets and phones to follow suit within a couple of years in due course.

I fully expect a phone that can double as a desktop when paired with a screen, mouse and keyboard within 2-3 years. Leave work? Pick your phone up from its inductive charge pad and don't bother closing anything or logging off, etc. Your apps go with you.

 

[Michael Goff]

Sarcasm isn't your strong point.

Anywho, 512GB RAM is so common that you can just jump on eBay for some second hand deals if you want.

https://www.ebay.com.au/itm/DELL-R8...240447?hash=item1ee8e3783f:g:GbwAAOSwbpVbf7MU

Sarcasm isn't my strong point, no.

 

[slitherjef]

edit:
my first machine had 16K of RAM. RAM requirements always expand; standard RAM for a half-decent desktop these days is 16 GB, i would expect tablets and phones to follow suit within a couple of years in due course.

Reading this made me think of first 56k modem I bought to upgrade the slower 28k or whatever it was at the time. Damn I still remember the asa slots some motherboards had.

Tech has come a long way. Now computers are the size of credit cards

 

[zakarhino]

Let's just keep throwing RAM at the inefficient OS problem and hope it resolves itself!

 

[throAU]

Let's just keep throwing RAM at the inefficient OS problem and hope it resolves itself!

It's not just inefficiency. In the scheme of things, 1-2 GB for an OS is not that bad, if it means you have APIs that can do complex things like virtual reality, etc.

Programmer time/effort is expensive. Hardware is cheap. This has been true for decades.

 

[jerwin]

Slower algorithms mean that the CPU is consuming more power. A poorly programmed app will be noticed by users.

However, it may be possible to trade memory for speed. A cpu that uses a more memory intensive (but faster) algorithm can enter a low power state that much more quickly. This can offset the increased power requirements associated with larger amounts of RAM.

 

[willentrekin]

Depends what you're expecting the device to do.

Yeah, I intended my 512gb comment as satire of the crowd that puts everything on specs -- hence the "Xtreme Fuzion," which now that I think about it probably exists but in my head sounds like a Mountain Dew flavor from the 90s and is probably neon purple. It may even glow in the dark. The drink. Not the drive. The drive almost certainly would.

Anyway.

I think the quote here is the meat of it. The posed question is "Do we need 10 gb of RAM?" but I'm sure SOMEBODY does. I'm thinking some of the VFX folks who work in WETA might. While I was totally joking, I'm sure somebody uses the server that Hater linked to.

Earlier this year I finished Witcher 3, which became one of my favorite games of all time. It's gorgeous. But one of my other favorite games of all time is Moonmist, an old Infocom game from the 80s. My dad used to call games like Moonmist "typing games," because the entire game was text. You just typed into it.

Moonmist didn't require nearly the amount of RAM as Witcher 3 might. Does anyone NEED to play Witcher 3? On its most advanced settings? In 4k?

I mean, no, but it sure looks great.

 

[throAU]

Moonmist didn't require nearly the amount of RAM as Witcher 3 might. Does anyone NEED to play Witcher 3? On its most advanced settings? In 4k?

Not everything is about games.

People in the real world are dealing with data-sets that consume that much memory, or far more.

What is appropriate for the server today (say, 256 GB RAM for entry level serious server) will be appropriate for the typical desktop in 5-6 years and appropriate for phones 3-5 years after that.

 

[Tsepz]

Not everything is about games.

People in the real world are dealing with data-sets that consume that much memory, or far more.

What is appropriate for the server today (say, 256 GB RAM for entry level serious server) will be appropriate for the typical desktop in 5-6 years and appropriate for phones 3-5 years after that.

People have this tendency to believe that just because they don't need something, nobody else needs it.

There was once a time not long ago when phones came with 4GB of Internal Memory, not even RAM, and people asked who needs more than 4GB of memory in a phone .

Ask those same people if they would buy a phone with 128MB RAM and 4GB Internal with 2.5G connection and their answer will be very different now.

I don't understand why people resist progress so much, but will celebrate and embrace the omissions of good features. It's a state of idiocracy.

 

[Klyster]

People have this tendency to .....
...
.... state of idiocracy.

Precisely!
If people do not push boundaries, things gets stale real fast.
I want better and faster everything, and more of it, yesterday!
Where's my photo-realistic VR already?
You can keep your AR...
I want full digital immersion, in 16K.

My first computer had 1KB of ram.
It was not enough then (seriously, it just wasnt lol), 8GB isnt enough now and it never will be.

But people are all, "why would you need that much?"
Lol

 

[willentrekin]

Not everything is about games.

People in the real world are dealing with data-sets that consume that much memory, or far more.

What is appropriate for the server today (say, 256 GB RAM for entry level serious server) will be appropriate for the typical desktop in 5-6 years and appropriate for phones 3-5 years after that.

I was using games as a convenient lay example. My point was that somebody most likely needs it now, and more people will need it as technology advances. As you note, what is appropriate for a desktop now will be in our pockets in three years.

 

[kasakka]

Having tons of RAM on a phone at this point is nothing more than a nice bullet point in a specs list. Phone manufacturers are running out of things to drastically improve every year so they just throw more of everything regardless of if it can be utilized at all.

Maybe there will be a time when 10 GB RAM is a sensible amount but that time is not now nor in the next few years.

 

[throAU]

Maybe there will be a time when 10 GB RAM is a sensible amount but that time is not now nor in the next few years.

With the increasing use of mobile phones and tablets for video editing, i think 4k, or 4k stereoscopic 3d, or 8k, or AR will bring the RAM usage up to meet that a lot quicker than you might suspect.

There are PLENTY of things a developer can use more RAM for. Without it being common in the devices we use, they can't.

However much RAM you have in a machine, it is never enough for the future. The faster manufacturers increase RAM availability and processing capacity, the quicker we will get software progress.

 

[sunking101]

Having tons of RAM on a phone at this point is nothing more than a nice bullet point in a specs list. Phone manufacturers are running out of things to drastically improve every year so they just throw more of everything regardless of if it can be utilized at all.

Maybe there will be a time when 10 GB RAM is a sensible amount but that time is not now nor in the next few years.

I disagree. 6GB absolutely isn't enough for me circa right now.

 

[tbayrgs]

Having tons of RAM on a phone at this point is nothing more than a nice bullet point in a specs list. Phone manufacturers are running out of things to drastically improve every year so they just throw more of everything regardless of if it can be utilized at all.

Maybe there will be a time when 10 GB RAM is a sensible amount but that time is not now nor in the next few years.

I should have probably rephrased my comment way back in the beginning. I agree with this sentiment in the context that I feel like OEMs are throwing more RAM into phones to say they did it first and to mask inefficiencies in their software. Of course there is no reason to not want more RAM. My computer doesn't need it right now but I would never say no if the manufacturer decided to increase the amount (for a fair price increase). It just feels all too often like this is a crutch OEMs rely on instead of focusing on optimizing the performance of the software running on their devices--much easier to just dump a couple more GB inside.

 

[Caspavio]

possibly, when a phone is no longer just a phone. apple is working on unifying iOS and macOS, while google is working chromeOS, so we could potentially see phones (or watches) that work like samsung's DeX, where you can put it into a shell that transform it into a laptop/tablet/pc.

 

[throAU]

possibly, when a phone is no longer just a phone. apple is working on unifying iOS and macOS, while google is working chromeOS, so we could potentially see phones (or watches) that work like samsung's DeX, where you can put it into a shell that transform it into a laptop/tablet/pc.

Phones haven't been "only a phone" for at least 10-15 years at this point.

The future is a charging pad, wireless peripherals.

You plonk the phone down on the desk, wireless works for display, mouse, trackpad, keyboard, etc.

You leave work? You pick up your phone and leave. Everything goes with you.

The tech is there already. Some company just needs to put all the bits in the one piece of hardware.