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[CLEEK]

So why did Microsoft and Sony opt for relatively weak cpus by AMD instead of chips by Intel? A lot of products nowadays have Intel's chip as their cpus. In Microsoft's case, the Surface runs with i3, i5, and i7. Perhaps they will use profits from this gen to create powerful hardware next generation? Phones, tablets, and other stuff can be crazy expensive but gaming consoles can't?

Both the XB1 and PS4 use APUs. CPU and GPU on s single die. If they went with Intel, they couldn't do this (unless they wanted very poor GPU performance).

An APU keeps manufacturing costs down, uses less power compared to discrete chips, allows for more control over cost reduction in the future, and ties them into a single vendor.

Consoles are all about bang for buck, and the AMD APU gives the best performance/cost. It's no coincidence that both MS and Sony went to market to design their next gen consoles, and independently both came out with effectively the same architecture from the same vendor.

 

[Muppet of a Man]

Sure you have underutilizerd compontents. But if you feed those underutilized components with info to get em moving... you are taking away from bandwidth. Even in the best scenario you are not just getting "free performance" due to clever programming. It is give and take... like all things on a closed platform.

Also, please be aware that there str a lot of "words" thrown about by hardware makers about their products. Even Cernys words should be looked on with scrutiny. "Super charged" "power of the cell" "HuMA" etc... all acronyms power point presentations etc.. direct from manufactures have to be looked upon with said scrutiny. In the end they are propogandizing a product.

HuMa will indeed help. Efficient use of resources is the name of the game here, especially since the CPU in both consoles is an underpowered netbook class processor. This is an unfortunate reality of fiscal constraints when engineering a $400 dollar games console. Fortunately, Cerny had mindfully allocated resources where they count. In terms of bang for buck, he designed a fantastic $400.00 box.

In fact, Cerny took a cue from J Allard's own playbook by prioritizing GPU features/power + an emphasis on overall system bandwidth and univeral memory addressing, even at the expense of the CPU. In the last generation, this is what made the X360 the more dev accessible and functionally powerful machine (even though in discrete terms, the X360 CPU was a third as powerful in certain tasks as the PS3 CPU).

It's almost like Sony and MS flipped places in terms of hardware design, except MS doesn't have an incredibly powerful exotic CPU. MS's CPU is marginally more powerful in isolation due to a clock boost at the last minute but functionally is actually gimped relative to the PS4's setup due to the X1's relatively poor memory architecture and multiple OS virtualization model (and even more so prior to MS lifting the 10% resource allocation to Kinect). This is the reason why PS4's version of 3rd party multiplat games always have better graphics (higher res, effects, IQ, etc.) AND perform better (higher framerate). A system is more than the sum of it's parts, and before the systems released, devs had been on the record as saying that PS4 as an overall system is approximately 40% to 50% more powerful than X1.

 

[delta25]

Looking at games like shadowfall, infamous, The Order and uncharted 4 its clear that regardless of the CPU lacking it still isn't going to change the fact that the PS4 is more than capable of producing amazing looking games now and in the future.

 

[lonedigitalwolf]

Looking at games like shadowfall, infamous, The Order and uncharted 4 its clear that regardless of the CPU lacking it still isn't going to change the fact that the PS4 is more than capable of producing amazing looking games now and in the future.

Excellent point.

 

[ThoseDeafMutes]

Looking at games like shadowfall, infamous, The Order and uncharted 4 its clear that regardless of the CPU lacking it still isn't going to change the fact that the PS4 is more than capable of producing amazing looking games now and in the future.

We're not seeing much last gen couldn't do except in the graphical sense, of course. AC: Unity is one of the few games pushing things on the scale front and it's seemingly bursting at the seams because of CPU limitations.

 

[delta25]

We're not seeing much last gen couldn't do except in the graphical sense, of course. AC: Unity is one of the few games pushing things on the scale front and it's seemingly bursting at the seams because of CPU limitations.

AC unity is only one game, I think its a bit early to be throwing in the towel in regards to the kind of scale we can expect out of both the PS4 and Xbox one.

 

[perineumlick]

We're not seeing much last gen couldn't do except in the graphical sense, of course. AC: Unity is one of the few games pushing things on the scale front and it's seemingly bursting at the seams because of CPU limitations.

I still can't help but feel that this is more of a reflection of the efficiency level of their engine than what these consoles are capable of. We are still early in the generation, and I'm sure that there are growing pains, and some devs will wrap their heads around things faster than others. I mean, this is Ubisoft...

 

[ThoseDeafMutes]

AC unity is only one game, I think its a bit early to be throwing in the towel in regards to the kind of scale we can expect out of both the PS4 and Xbox one.

Well I don't mean geographic largeness but really ambitious simulations pushing loads of complex NPCs. The choice of GPU prioritisation at any cost is something I feel is regrettable in retrospect - of course I also wish it was just a more powerful box generally.

It's gonna be a year or two before PC GAF has to start complaining about being held back by wimpy consoles again

 

[Koobion]

Krazy Ken was onto something I tell yee. If only a modern CELL could be used with ease.

 

[scitek]

I have to imagine AMD must've made a hell of an offer to Sony/MS, coupled with the fact that NVIDIA already pissed away any goodwill with either manufacturer, so AMD everything probably seemed logical at that point.

Nvidia doesn't make CPUs, though.

EDIT: I've been drinking, but a console wouldn't have been based on a Tegra regardless.

 

[Kayant]

Damn, I think I blew a few brain fuses trying to understand this tech stuff. That went right over my head.


But that is not how DX11 model works. The DX11 model does an implicit copy of the buffer before use, yet the first slide doesn't show the copy. That slide is how the DX11 model works on the PS4.


The GNMX is a compatibility wrapper around the GNM to make it easier to port DX11 code, but it is not DX11. Here is another explanation of it.



It is entirely possible that I'm wrong, but according to their own slides Assassin's Creed is using the DX11 wrapper to access the PS4's GPU which has a significance CPU overhead. That would explain why they say that the CPU was the limiting factor and that resolution parity was the best they could achieve when their own graphs show a huge PS4 GPU advantage.

Slide 73? It really looks more like a comparison between the two because 74 talks about the pro/cons using the PS4's method over DX11.

 

[GHG]

Krazy Ken was onto something I tell yee. If only a modern CELL could be used with ease.

Yep this is the biggest takeaway for me.

The Cell processor was well ahead of its time.

 

[Mario007]

We're not seeing much last gen couldn't do except in the graphical sense, of course. AC: Unity is one of the few games pushing things on the scale front and it's seemingly bursting at the seams because of CPU limitations.

I disagree. Having played Infamous SS, that game really brings in the next-gen feeling. And I'm not talking about the graphics only but about the powers you have in the game, what they allow you to do, how you can switch them on the fly and the travelsal that they provide. I mean I doubt even the Neon Rush thing could be done on the ps3.

 

[Maninthemirror]

Yep this is the biggest takeaway for me.

The Cell processor was well ahead of its time.

actually No, the cell processor would be equavalent to an Intel ATOM processor. The difference is last gen had the CPU and GPU working on their own separate tasks, this time both consoles have a GPGPU whereby the GPU handles the tasks which were previously handled exclusively by the CPU because the GPU is a lot more powerful than the CPU

If these consoles had a Core i5 GPGPU, the CPU side would have had trounced the ps3 cpu AND the console price would be $200 more

 

[Conduit]

June SDK update.

Well. this is Matt's post AFTER Xbone's June SDK update :

http://www.neogaf.com/forum/showpost.php?p=121958788&postcount=203

 

[ThoseDeafMutes]

I disagree. Having played Infamous SS, that game really brings in the next-gen feeling. And I'm not talking about the graphics only but about the powers you have in the game, what they allow you to do, how you can switch them on the fly and the travelsal that they provide. I mean I doubt even the Neon Rush thing could be done on the ps3.

Don't you fly around in jets and helicopters and stuff in GTA? Seattle was pretty sparse in a lot of places and particularly light on car traffic from memory.

 

[neogaffer1]

So why did Microsoft and Sony opt for relatively weak cpus by AMD instead of chips by Intel? A lot of products nowadays have Intel's chip as their cpus. In Microsoft's case, the Surface runs with i3, i5, and i7. Perhaps they will use profits from this gen to create powerful hardware next generation? Phones, tablets, and other stuff can be crazy expensive but gaming consoles can't?

So if price a major factor, do you think Intel will offer the console manufactures a good price on cpus next gen? Intel is currently developing heat efficient (Broadwell?) cpus so surely Sony and Microsoft would be interested in that. It just saddens me that other consumer electronics sell for high prices but gaming consoles can't offer slightly more expensive consoles without fear of losing sales.

The OG Xbox used an Intel CPU paired with an Nvidia GPU. Made it uber powerful and insanely easy to develop on, but incredibly expensive to Microsoft in the long run. Even in the 360 era Nvidia was a bitch and demanded MS pay a licensing fee for every HDD they sold, because preinstalled to every HDD was the OG Xbox emulator that MS made. Because it emulated an Nvidia card, it probably used Nvidia code. So don't expect Intel or Nvidia to have a role in future consoles, at least not Nvidia.

actually No, the cell processor would be equavalent to an Intel ATOM processor. The difference is last gen had the CPU and GPU working on their own separate tasks, this time both consoles have a GPGPU whereby the GPU handles the tasks which were previously handled exclusively by the CPU because the GPU is a lot more powerful than the CPU

If these consoles had a Core i5 GPGPU, the CPU side would have had trounced the ps3 cpu AND the console price would be $200 more

The hell's a i5 GPGPU?

 

[Renekton]

AMDs ARM SoC Seattle is the successor of the old Jaguar based X-"****" Products:
http://community.amd.com/servlet/JiveServlet/showImage/38-2545-2550/AMD+Server+Roadmap.jpg

Slight nitpicketypick. This one is not an indication of Jaguar vs A57 performance.

ARM used here is an additional product line that ties in with AMD/Nvidia's direction of pairing modest CPUs with very powerful GPUs.

 

[alexandros]

FYI, that lowest common denominator is still higher than the vast majority of Windows PCs. Want to blame the lack of technical progress on something? Blame the consumers who won't spend more on hardware, be it console or PC.

Windows PCs in general are an irrelevant metric when we're talking about PC gaming. Even the Steam hardware survey that some people like to bring up from time to time is massively skewed by the fact that a lot of people who participate in it are from very poor countries. Given the now well proven fact that even Core i3s and 750Tis can give consoles a run for their money I'd say that even low end gaming PCs are at least on par with current gen consoles.

You should get your facts straight. Even AMD's crap PC CPUs are enough to compete with those netbook-grade Jaguar cores.

 

[neogaffer1]

Windows PCs in general are an irrelevant metric when we're talking about PC gaming. Even the Steam hardware survey that some people like to bring up from time to time is massively skewed by the fact that a lot of people who participate in it are from very poor countries. Given the now well proven fact that even Core i3s and 750Tis can give consoles a run for their money I'd say that even low end gaming PCs are at least on par with current gen consoles.

'Tis true, my mobile i7 + 765m often outperforms XB1 and sometimes even the PS4.

 

[Coffee Dog]

Don't you fly around in jets and helicopters and stuff in GTA? Seattle was pretty sparse in a lot of places and particularly light on car traffic from memory.

Yeah, second son definitely isn't pushing anything crazy.

 

[Brad Grenz]

Where Im going is: in december 2013, PS4 CPU ran at 1.6ghz and XBO CPU ran at 1.75ghz. So they were the same speed as today. The substance benchmark results gave a clear advantage for the PS4 CPU which could process 14 MB/s textures per core while XBO CPU could only process 12 MB/s texture data per core. Ok, this results made people here think that you could obtain more performance from PS4 CPU, and a user here which I understood is in the know (Matt) confirmed that was true. Ok.

Now, we have these guys at Ubi that are using the CPU to process a cloth simulation, and the results are opposite to what we got in the substance benchmark, as in now the XBOs CPU can process 15% more dancers than PS4s CPU. My question is, and maybe it is just impossible to answer for somebody that doesn't work at Ubi, why the performance results for their simulation are opposite to what we got last year wiith substance benchmark? I understand different engines have different requirements, etc, but I thought the jaguar cores in Both current gen machines were essentially equal. So why the difference, an specially, why te difference is now oposite to what it was in 2013 (PS4 performance delta changed from +15% to -15%)?

When I saw the substance benchmark last year, i assumed that it was a good representation to assume what we could expect from each CPU, but now the results are opposite, and I don't know what to make out of it. What is the real performance delta in CPU? Has PS4 15% more CPU performance as I thought last year? Is XBOs CPU 15% more powerful according to todays info? Or is the real performance delta 9.x% in XBOs favour, as the core speed indicates, and we are just seeing different engines giving different results because of factors we don't know about?

It's hard to know exactly, but it's likely each test stressed the systems in different ways. The Substance Engine uses code that fits entirely in cache to generate a constant rate of texture data to be written out to memory. The rate was low enough that the differing memory architectures would not have any effect on the performance of either system.

It is likely the Ubisoft cloth simulation uses a much larger data set and stresses the external systems in a way that confers a certain advantage to the Xbox One architecture when using the CPU. Maybe they get better latency from main memory, or using the ESRAM lowers contention for the DDR3 bandwidth for displaying the output compared to the unified GDDR5 in the PS4.

We should try to remember this is not game code. and maxing out the CPU in a single task like this will not be representative of a live gameplay scenario.

 

[rokkerkory]

Man imagine if both had better cpu??

 

[alexandros]

Man imagine if both had better cpu??

While I am very critical of their choice, there were very few options if they desperately wanted to make very cheap consoles. Nvidia and Intel would command a much higher price for their hardware compared to AMD. I do believe Nvidia when it said that console contracts weren't worth the effort.

What both Sony and Microsoft should have done is take a hit upfront and include better hardware.

 

[belmonkey]

I had another question about that GPGPU stuff from earlier. Would it basically just lessen the load on the CPU so that the GPU can perform more to its potential? For instance, BF4 singleplayer doesn't seem to strain a CPU too much, and it happens to run similarly on the PS4 compared to a 750 ti, but another game like Watch Dogs (more CPU-demanding) can manage to run better with the 750 ti and a good CPU; would offloading certain CPU work to the PS4's GPU basically just lead to a case where the console is held back less and keeps up with the 750 ti + good CPU even in CPU-demanding games?

 

[Chezzymann]

Phones, tablets, and other stuff can be crazy expensive but gaming consoles can't?

Because phones and tablets are focused on doing a large variety of crucial things and are many peoples primary devices. Gaming consoles focus on one specific thing and are usually a secondary device.

 

[Crossing Eden]

I disagree. Having played Infamous SS, that game really brings in the next-gen feeling. And I'm not talking about the graphics only but about the powers you have in the game, what they allow you to do, how you can switch them on the fly and the travelsal that they provide. I mean I doubt even the Neon Rush thing could be done on the ps3.

Saints row 4 has a very similar move to the neon traversal move in Infamous. You can also move quite fast in past infamous games. Besides the visuals/effects infamous SS isn't really doing anything "next gen." that wouldn't be possible on last gen. I'd even go so far as to say that there's less going on in the world compared to Infamous 2.

 

[Mario007]

Don't you fly around in jets and helicopters and stuff in GTA? Seattle was pretty sparse in a lot of places and particularly light on car traffic from memory.

Flying in GTA and the traversal methods and powers don't realy compare, if only for the very different physics and much faster speed. Now I'm not saying Seatle wasn't sparse (as all infamous games are) but all I'm saying is that I struggle to see how all of that could have been done on the ps3.

 

[Ryoku]

actually No, the cell processor would be equavalent to an Intel ATOM processor. The difference is last gen had the CPU and GPU working on their own separate tasks, this time both consoles have a GPGPU whereby the GPU handles the tasks which were previously handled exclusively by the CPU because the GPU is a lot more powerful than the CPU

If these consoles had a Core i5 GPGPU, the CPU side would have had trounced the ps3 cpu AND the console price would be $200 more

This is a very generalized (and incorrect) way to look at it all...

As for the bolded... What?

Funnily enough, I remember back in the Project Cafe threads how many were bringing down those who were shouting "GPGPU". It's pretty hilarious now that I think about it. Many people here seem to ignore that even the Wii U has a GPU capable of handling general purpose code, as well (obviously to a lesser degree than XB1/PS4). It doesn't make a world of a difference. The type of code suitable for GPU compute is limited in contrast to what many here are making it seem. Now, I'm not saying it's worthless. Hell, look at PhysX on the PC side. It can be very beneficial. However, take into account the power of the GPUs themselves. I will say, however, that the PS4 is very well-equipped for handling these tasks compared to its competitors.

 

[CLEEK]

actually No, the cell processor would be equavalent to an Intel ATOM processor. The difference is last gen had the CPU and GPU working on their own separate tasks, this time both consoles have a GPGPU whereby the GPU handles the tasks which were previously handled exclusively by the CPU because the GPU is a lot more powerful than the CPU

If these consoles had a Core i5 GPGPU, the CPU side would have had trounced the ps3 cpu AND the console price would be $200 more

Bolded are wrong. And I'd love to see your source for the claim the Cell is equivalent to an Atom.

PS3 offloaded GPU tasks to the CPU, as the SPUs were designed to handle such tasks. As for Core i5 GPGPU, only you know what you're talking about.

 

[Renekton]

Even the Steam hardware survey that some people like to bring up from time to time is massively skewed by the fact that a lot of people who participate in it are from very poor countries.

Huh that's interesting, where did this info come from

 

[EventHorizon]

Slide 73? It really looks more like a comparison between the two because 74 talks about the pro/cons using the PS4's method over DX11.

They are all talking about the PS4. The title on slide 74 is The PS4 version. In fact the title on all of those slides are The PS4 version and they are located in a section titled The PS4 version. I'm not really going out on a limb here by saying that they are showing how compute shaders work on the PS4. If the XB1 or PC were being described, wouldn't they be labeled?...at least once?...somewhere?

Yes slide 74 talks about the pros and cons of the PS4's implementation of the computer shader, and slide 75 talks about how UbiSoft handles it on the PS4. Slide 75 describes the 2 cases they have to deal with. One when the buffer is in use, and one when it is not in use. Low and behold those two situations correspond to the only two diagrams given in the section.

Sorry to keep hammering the point, but it really is the key point, the entire section labeled The PS4 version is about the PS4. No other interpretation makes sense because not enough information is given to be discussing both the PS4 and XB1/PC.

 

[MrNyarlathotep]

I disagree. Having played Infamous SS, that game really brings in the next-gen feeling. And I'm not talking about the graphics only but about the powers you have in the game, what they allow you to do, how you can switch them on the fly and the travelsal that they provide. I mean I doubt even the Neon Rush thing could be done on the ps3.

You're kidding right?

 

[Renekton]

They are all talking about the PS4. The title on slide 74 is The PS4 version. In fact the title on all of those slides are The PS4 version and they are located in a section titled The PS4 version. I'm not really going out on a limb here by saying that they are showing how compute shaders work on the PS4. If the XB1 or PC were being described, wouldn't they be labeled?...at least once?...somewhere?

Yes slide 74 talks about the pros and cons of the PS4's implementation of the computer shader, and slide 75 talks about how UbiSoft handles it on the PS4. Slide 75 describes the 2 cases they have to deal with. One when the buffer is in use, and one when it is not in use. Low and behold those two situations correspond to the only two diagrams given in the section.

I thought 72-73 is "here's how it works on DX11" as an introductory before biting into PS4, it does not necessarily describe DX11 on PS4.

Then again if you use CopyResource you have to do your own synchronization right? Nvm I'm confused again...

 

[USC-fan]

Somehow this data proves misterxmedia was right all along.

 

[Putty]

Somehow this data proves misterxmedia was right all along.

He's a nut job who has many "users" wrapped around his finger. #cult

 

[Aizu_Itsuko]

Windows PCs in general are an irrelevant metric when we're talking about PC gaming. Even the Steam hardware survey that some people like to bring up from time to time is massively skewed by the fact that a lot of people who participate in it are from very poor countries. Given the now well proven fact that even Core i3s and 750Tis can give consoles a run for their money I'd say that even low end gaming PCs are at least on par with current gen consoles.

You should get your facts straight. Even AMD's crap PC CPUs are enough to compete with those netbook-grade Jaguar cores.

Poor people and those without a brand new high-end gaming PC aren't real PC gamers now?

 

[Cole Slaw]

What both Sony and Microsoft should have done is take a hit upfront and include better hardware.

Microsoft owes you this because why?

 

[boredandlazy]

Poor people and those without a brand new high-end gaming PC aren't real PC gamers now?

You'll have to excuse Commander Riker, he is from the 24th century you know.

 

[Panajev2001a]

Microsoft owes you this because why?

As a forum reader I want more posts written in a user story format so that discussion threads are more readable and enjoyable .

Jokes aside, not that I think these consoles are underpowered, but more performance does make software developers' lives easier, especially smaller studios who might not have the time, man power, and/or skill set to optimize the console ports well.

 

[SmartWaffles]

Looks like an inverted last generation, in which one console has significantly better GPU while the CPU's raw power is slightly weaker.

 

[Lord Error]

We're not seeing much last gen couldn't do except in the graphical sense, of course. AC: Unity is one of the few games pushing things on the scale front and it's seemingly bursting at the seams because of CPU limitations.

Resogun was unflinching 60FPS with like billion things moving all the time on the screen. I haven't seen anything like it up to or since then, even on PC, outside of maybe some scene demos, which again didn't have quite the same visual effect. Then there's Driveclub in which literally everything that's on screen is simulated and dynamically lit. I can't think of anything like that in older games, not on that scale anyway, and especially not in the racing genre. Tomorrow's Children needs no comment, I guess - it would be unimaginable on older hardware. Games like this are not going to be churned out by the dozen regardless of hardware power, because they are simply difficult to envision and make.

 

[AuRoN89]

Looks like an inverted last generation, in which one console has significantly better GPU while the CPU's raw power is slightly weaker.

with the difference that the GPU have 100% more power, and CPU difference is absolutely irrelevant.

 

[CyberPunked]

Looking at games like shadowfall, infamous, The Order and uncharted 4 its clear that regardless of the CPU lacking it still isn't going to change the fact that the PS4 is more than capable of producing amazing looking games now and in the future.

It's all a matter of perspective. You won't be saying that U4 and the Order have amazing graphics in 2-3 years time. Think about how dated Uncharted 1 and Killzone 2 look now, and they we're considered graphical masterpieces.

 

[Goo]

I see so many posts wishing an Intel CPU was used; I understand that Intel has the most effecient x86 CPU compared to AMD in both power consumption and instuctions per cycle, but doesn't Intel cripple their low end CPUs by removing instructions and cores to reduce cost?

Considering the cost restrictions of the current consoles, would we have seen anything more than dual core ATOM with hyperthreading or a dual core Celeron with missing instructions like AVX?

The current generation of ATOM has respectable performance, I think close to Core 2 territory in terms of IPC, but considering when the consoles were being planned, I think we would have ended up with last gen ATOM which would be slower and have less cores compared to the AMD CPU the PS4 and Xbox One have today.

 

[TheLegendOfMart]

Not only that but having an Intel CPU goes against the design philosophy for this generation, they didn't want another one with honking great big consoles that sound like jet engines and pump enough heat out to warm up the room.

They wanted low power, small and cheap. If they went with Intel it would have cost them a lot more than it did with AMD and because Intel doesn't make APUs they would have had to waste more PCB space by having a separate power hungry GPU.

This gen they went smart with the design, things are increasingly going GPGPU, hell even Apple and Microsoft are saying their future OS will offload more processing to the GPU and not just for pretty graphics.

Last gen they were starved for CPU performance with the lack of multi processing, this generation they have 8 core CPUs. Clockspeed is also irrelevant, it's not how fast it runs it is what it does per clock at the speed it runs.

Could they have put a Haswell-E 8 core/16 threaded beast in the system, sure, but it would have doubled or tripled the price of the console and probably the dimensions as well.

 

[alexandros]

Huh that's interesting, where did this info come from

Common sense and Steam revenue graphs. Something like 90% of Steam's revenue comes from North America and Weatern Europe combined. Steam is a global service and PC gaming is very popular in countries with massive populations and low average income.

Poor people and those without a brand new high-end gaming PC aren't real PC gamers now?

I never said that. But it is a simple fact that moms playing Sims and people buying the odd indie game to play on their laptops are an audience that is neither particularly relevant nor directly comparable to the core gaming market.

 

[GrantDaNasty]

Nvidia doesn't make CPUs, though.

EDIT: I've been drinking, but a console wouldn't have been based on a Tegra regardless.

I wasn't clear when making the original statement, I meant more as in "Nvidia wouldn't have been an option for GPU regardless, due to their past history, leading to both manufacturers favouring AMD's deal for GPU, and CPU while they were at it".

 

[gofreak]

Well I don't mean geographic largeness but really ambitious simulations pushing loads of complex NPCs. The choice of GPU prioritisation at any cost is something I feel is regrettable in retrospect - of course I also wish it was just a more powerful box generally.

I'm glad they went GPU heavy and I think it was the obvious choice.

GPUs can be pretty general processors, and tight coupling to a CPU is the ideal for exploring what they can do more generally. But we've only barely begun to explore what can be done. I think you'll see substantial and sophisticated improvements to simulation on different scales over the course of the gen (though they may not always be trivial to spot...a game could be pretty wasteful of heavy simulation processing in terms of perceptual bang-for-buck if not judiciously applied). AC Unity is far from a benchmark for the generation.

 

[cheesekao]

Windows PCs in general are an irrelevant metric when we're talking about PC gaming. Even the Steam hardware survey that some people like to bring up from time to time is massively skewed by the fact that a lot of people who participate in it are from very poor countries. Given the now well proven fact that even Core i3s and 750Tis can give consoles a run for their money I'd say that even low end gaming PCs are at least on par with current gen consoles.

You should get your facts straight. Even AMD's crap PC CPUs are enough to compete with those netbook-grade Jaguar cores.

What is considered low end though? My PC still uses core 2 duo and only has 2 gigs of RAM. I can't even run L4D2 at 60fps at 900p and I play most PC games at low or medium presets at low resolutions at 30fps or so.