agree. and that's why there will be no third party support.
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Wii U has 2GB of DDR3 RAM, [Up: RAM 43% slower than 360/PS3 RAM]
- Thread starter Horse Armour
- Start date
agree. and that's why there will be no third party support.
Gah. This is worrying me to a point of cancelling my pre-order. Only wanted to pick it up early for my tech fetish. But I think this can wait until the library proves itself some more (1st Party titles). Besides I still have yet to finish SMG 1 & 2 on the wii. Assume I can get away finishing those before I make the jump.
They were complementing the amount of RAM based on the target specs, I don't think they realized how slow it would be.
I'm really surprised by this news. Nintendo usually has been really good on the RAM front in many of their consoles. I figured the Wii U would be the same.
What? No. The Wii U from Wii is a better jump up than the Wii from GameCube.
I remember plenty of RAM amount compliments, not any on its speed.
Opus Angelorum
Member
I think this is simply a case of 'the game-pad is the centre piece, at all costs'.
Nah, that's really not true. The Wii was 5 years out-of-date performance levels coupled with a 5 years out-of-date feature set. Wii U seems to be 6 years out-of-date performance levels with a 2 years out-of-date feature set.
His point was that the Wii was better than the original Xbox and the WU might be worse than the 360.
Yeah, Wii U seems to actually be better in some regards (more ram total, stronger GPU, more eDRAM) whereas the Wii seemed content to match the Xbox in numbers and nothing more. Still, it does feel like a frustrating case where just a few relatively small steps could've really pushed the system forward, even if it would still be trounced by whatever Sony/MS put out. At the least we'd probably be seeing parity in multiplatform titles more than downgrades.
I suppose we'll just have to see what happens if we get some decent 3rd party games built from the ground up.
I'm talking about the Wii U from the HD twins. Its possible its less of a jump than wii from ps2/xbox/gc. Perhaps not a good argument from me, I'm tired, pethaps I might not be thinking soundly
God dammit Nintendo... slower ram than your biggest competitor which launched in November of 2005. Two-thousand fucking five. It's a disgrace.
All the innovation that's taken place in seven years with smartphones and tablets. Compare the first iphone to the iphone 5. It's remarkable. Compare the 360 to the Wii U... it's an embarrassment.
Proud Wii U owner here... I just want Nintendo to succeed. But I don't see them keeping third party support strong once the other new consoles launch. It's nothing but shit versions of multiplatform games just like last gen. Your Wii U sits on the bottom shelf, pushed far to the back, gathering dust in-between Nintendo first party games. Guess that's how they want it.
All the innovation that's taken place in seven years with smartphones and tablets. Compare the first iphone to the iphone 5. It's remarkable. Compare the 360 to the Wii U... it's an embarrassment.
Proud Wii U owner here... I just want Nintendo to succeed. But I don't see them keeping third party support strong once the other new consoles launch. It's nothing but shit versions of multiplatform games just like last gen. Your Wii U sits on the bottom shelf, pushed far to the back, gathering dust in-between Nintendo first party games. Guess that's how they want it.
Shin'en explicitly complimented the performance, actually:
http://www.notenoughshaders.com/2012/11/03/shinen-mega-interview-harnessing-the-wii-u-power/
Notice how he doesn't compliment bandwidth itself, but how cache and low latency alleviate common throughput issues.
Another $30-50 might have done enough to fix most of those problems. I would have paid it.
Could very well be.
It's up to Retro to show us the money.
blu
Wants the largest console games publisher to avoid Nintendo's platforms.
So I asked the same question in the specs speculation thread but I'll ask it here to hedge my chances:
How does Anand know the clock of the DDR3? Because nothing in those chip markings that I've seen indicates that. For reference, here's the manufacturer's page: https://www.skhynix.com/products/computing/view.jsp?info.ramKind=19&info.serialNo=H5TQ4G63MFR
How does Anand know the clock of the DDR3? Because nothing in those chip markings that I've seen indicates that. For reference, here's the manufacturer's page: https://www.skhynix.com/products/computing/view.jsp?info.ramKind=19&info.serialNo=H5TQ4G63MFR
SpookyBlackFish
Member
I can not point towards a source right now but as far as I recall the Wii U was mentioned to be a "quite well balanced system". These RAM numbers might sound bad in comparison to other relevant ones (I am no techie). Nevertheless, this is only one component of the console. If the "well balanced" statement turns out to be true, I guess there should be some other components working in that machine which, if used properly, work around this RAM issue.
I do not think the Wii U is a somewhat strong hardware. But I also can't believe that it is overall behind "6 year old tech and features". At least I hope so.
I do not think the Wii U is a somewhat strong hardware. But I also can't believe that it is overall behind "6 year old tech and features". At least I hope so.
what makes you think any of this is true?
Now it makes sense that they only have a relatively weak GPU. No point having a good one if it sits twiddling its thumbs most of the time waiting for data.
DDR3 and GPUs are a bad combination, even basic mobile GPUs are limited by shit ram.
Durante's comment about how accessible the edram is, is critical. But even if its completely accessible by developers, it's so small that you can't store all your textures per frame in it, you'll still need to go out to main memory
I guess this makes PS4/720 ports a little less likely too.
DDR3 and GPUs are a bad combination, even basic mobile GPUs are limited by shit ram.
Durante's comment about how accessible the edram is, is critical. But even if its completely accessible by developers, it's so small that you can't store all your textures per frame in it, you'll still need to go out to main memory
I guess this makes PS4/720 ports a little less likely too.
Pie and Beans
Look for me on the local news, I'll be the guy arrested for trying to burn down a Nintendo exec's house.
Wow. 12.8. Wow. This deal just keeps getting worse all the time.
At least the devs suggesting this box was going to be just behind say the PS3 were fairly bang on and now vindicated. Perhaps the GPU will be amazing and the eDRAM mitigate some of this shit, but weaker CPU and this atrocious 43% behind RAM bandwidth are quite the fetching pair of concrete shoes.
At least the devs suggesting this box was going to be just behind say the PS3 were fairly bang on and now vindicated. Perhaps the GPU will be amazing and the eDRAM mitigate some of this shit, but weaker CPU and this atrocious 43% behind RAM bandwidth are quite the fetching pair of concrete shoes.
have you ever had a friend who plans to buy a pc, you give them the old "i'll help you get the right parts and put it together" first-shave talk, only for them to end up taking the safe option of going to a guy they know who runs a repair shop?
that's like saying the solution to overcrowded trains is to increase the size of the stations.
Annoying thing is that if the exchange rate stayed about the same as it did when the Wii came out, they could've really ramped things up by keeping the current price point (in NA anyway), but as is they're at a huge disadvantage for exporting. I'm not sure "insane" is the right word but it definitely is true that the exchange rate is making some of the Japanese corporations make calls they wouldn't have in the prior decade.
Though I'm not sure how much the analog triggers matter, racing aside. I did forget the point of using analog to toggle sniper zoom, but even that seems like it's better toggled with a button press.
I wouldn't go THAT far, but then I'm in it for exclusives or games that take good advantage of the Wii U's setup versus bleeding edge hardware (which PC is always best for anyway). Still, it's going to nag me whenever I play games that going JUST a bit further could've made a huge difference, kinda like with 480p being a stretched 4:3 image rather than a native 16:9 on Wii (though I wonder if most TVs even take a 848x480 image?)
So no matter what the quality of the games, the memory speed is a deal breaker? lol
GraveRobberX
Platinum Trophy: Learned to Shit While Upright Again.
That Giant Bomb Wii 7 hour live stream escapade
None of the 3rd party games were optimized, looked good
Go see Epic Mickey 2...
I mean Epic Mickey was OK as an exclusive, the hell happened with 2?
I actually think that the system is too expensive atm around these 30-50.
Opus Angelorum
Member
If you are happy buying a Wii U to play Nintendo franchises and current generation third party offerings then great. Just don't expect it to hold any relevance in a few years from now.
Obviously first party stuff is going to be better, because it will have been designed for the limitations of the hardware already. But there is nothing at all impressive about the first party line up on a technical level so far.
Maybe The Wonderful 101 is going to be the thing.
Maybe The Wonderful 101 is going to be the thing.
Not bad. Under idealized assumptions, if you want to stream last-gen assets with last-gen image quality (e.g. anisotropic filtering really messes with your calculation).
PS360 market is not the same market as Wii. There is little overlap. There are still more people wanting a true next-gen system the a weak console centred on a gimmick input method.
Port from Wii to PS3/360, then port "back" to Wii U. Not that it's unprecedented for HD upports to run worse even if you think they shouldn't, but I doubt Epic Mickey 2 has the "well the hardware didn't scale up in a way that matched the predecessor" excuse that Zone of the Enders 2 had... and going by most accounts it sounds like Epic Mickey 2 makes ZoE2 look like a shining example of how to turn a game HD. Hell, possibly Silent Hill HD collection too if the frame rate literally dives into single digits rather than being 15 FPS or whatever.
exactly. NONE of them. If your common point between all these games is the Wii U you need to ask yourself. is it maybe the console?
No, I'm taking a wait and see approach. On balance I'm leaning toward getting one late next year. However I'm not going to dismiss it until I see a second generation of Wii U games. Launch games are a terrible metric of a system. And memory speeds aside, it's all about the games and features for me.
It's using all the bus width available from the chips.
UberTag
Member
Those were never in the cards.
On the bright side, the X360/PS3 will continue to be supported for the next 3-4 years so the WiiU will have plenty of Western port-love to enjoy... perhaps even some simultaneous releases (not GTAV, though)... to go along with its Japanese-developed third party titles and first-party Nintendo IPs.
I wonder how big of an issue this really is. As anyone that does a lot of overclocking and benchmarking on their PC knows, latencies are often more important than raw bandwidth. I'm going to wait until we get more developer impressions before I join in on all the hyperbole.
Edit: Oh nvm, I forgot the Wii U's main RAM is also used as VRAM.
Well, a bit of both isn't out of the question, Black Ops 2 sounds like it came out mostly fine and at least has some legitimate advantages that the rest can't claim: if you want Wii Remote controls with Epic Mickey 2 go with Wii, or for similar in HD go to PS3, while the others don't even really seem to have actual improvement by having the GamePad there. I think we'll see how things go with games like Aliens that aren't being rushed out for launch, though I do kind of expect them to be the same at best.
Fatalmephisto
Member
I honestly don't understand all this tech spec talk, but that doesn't concern me at all. As long as i have fun on the Wii U, then its a good system.
Why do you think that?
blu
Wants the largest console games publisher to avoid Nintendo's platforms.
You're largely off (below) on the texture side (1:1 texure mapping is a really ideal case - introduce an angle on that and it gets much worse), and similarly largely off (but this time above) on the geometry side (such vertex/pixel ratios are not something you'd aim for without tessellation). Other than that, what really helps with texture filtering are the caches - modern GPUs normally do their texutre lookups in tiles of multiple texels (for instance, 32x32). Last but not least, some of those render targets originating from edram will need to get spilled to main RAM.
In other words, give it another try ; )
This is disappointing. With what was said about the Wii U being a slight upgrade over the consoles we have now, this wasn't what I expected.
Going to wait a year or two I think, see what games come out for it and then decide whether to buy one. It'll be interesting to see how the 3rd party support is.
Going to wait a year or two I think, see what games come out for it and then decide whether to buy one. It'll be interesting to see how the 3rd party support is.
DeFiBkIlLeR
Banned
With the WiiU it's pretty simple...if you're happy to only get 1 or 2 triple AAA Nintendo franchise titles every 18/24mths or so, then buy it, Nintendo will code down to the metal, and get more out of this system than the laughably weak hardware would suggest it's capable of.
But if you're buying this console in the hope its going to keep up with, in terms of release quantity or quality, the 3rd party releases on the PS4 and Xbox Next, then for gods sake save your money, wait 12mths and buy a REAL next generation console.
I've been saying it since this thing was unveiled, it's Nintendo's Dreamcast, it will keep the faithful happy, deliver some unique games, but will quickly fade into obscurity once the masses see the shiny new stuff from Sony and Microsoft.
If Nintendo hadn't been so dumb as to blow half the budget on this gimmick laden controller, it could have been so different, it only worked for the Wii because of its paradigm shift in user controller input, Nintendo only had one shot to do that, and they've used it up, it wont work a second time for them.
But if you're buying this console in the hope its going to keep up with, in terms of release quantity or quality, the 3rd party releases on the PS4 and Xbox Next, then for gods sake save your money, wait 12mths and buy a REAL next generation console.
I've been saying it since this thing was unveiled, it's Nintendo's Dreamcast, it will keep the faithful happy, deliver some unique games, but will quickly fade into obscurity once the masses see the shiny new stuff from Sony and Microsoft.
If Nintendo hadn't been so dumb as to blow half the budget on this gimmick laden controller, it could have been so different, it only worked for the Wii because of its paradigm shift in user controller input, Nintendo only had one shot to do that, and they've used it up, it wont work a second time for them.
TheFLYINGManga_Ka
Member
That's what I was asking.
I think some people, (kind of including myself), would be satisfied with 1st party Nintendo games in current-gen offerings.
Although I don't understand everything discussed in this thread on the technical side of things, I'm getting the impression that even current-gen offerings will be downgraded. So if Battlefield 3, Skyrim, or Red Dead was on the Wii U, it would be worse? That's what's bumming me out.
I would've been fine if the Wii U can churn out the definitive versions of current-gen games, but it looks like that's not the case based on this thread. I want the Nintendo games to be at least better than what current-gen consoles offer. It sucks if they won't be.
I did read some positive posts like patches to increase the speed of the ram. So there's hope that Nintendo can patch the system and optimize it over time. I don't understand how that can be done, but I hope all this is just a console launch's paranoia doom and gloom and the reality will actually be better than it seems right now.