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VGleaks: Orbis Unveiled! [Updated]

gofreak

GAF's Bob Woodward
So are these 4 CUs being reserved to compensate for Jaguar's potential performance shortfall?

They're not being reserved.

They just have to be used more explicitly in your code. If I'm writing my rendering code, I make library calls, and the library and hardware take care of the rest. The GPU splits the work up per vertex or per group of fragments, or whatever, and schedules the threads and executes them.

These 4 CUs won't operate under that regime. They won't mix in 'automagically' to the work you do through the graphics libraries. You'll have to set up the work explicitly, separately, for those 4 CUs.

The work could be whatever you want that a CU can do - graphics or GPGPU. So they're not being 'reserved' per se, they're not being prescribed for any one particular use. However the motivation for splitting the CUs out of a hardware managed regime is so that if you want to do GPGPU, you don't have to leave the scheduling and context switching up to a hardware balancer that might not do things optimally when mixing graphics and compute tasks.

"I think"
 

Dr Dogg

Member
UK is definitely feeling getting bent over. :/.

Ah I'm pretty sure chatting to the folks in work we're used to getting shaft for the $ to £ conversion and now there's the € to contend with. Just look at the evolution of console launch prices (rough estimates I'm afraid but close enough):-

Megadrive - £100
SNES - £150
Saturn - £200
PlayStation -£250
N64 -£250
Dreamcast -£200
Playstation 2 -£300
Xbox - £300
GameCube - £180
Xbox 360 - £200/£300
PlayStation 3 - £425
 
I would honestly not be surprised, but I don't think it'll happen. It's too late for a change. Unless... does anyone know when it is that Microsoft doubled the 360's RAM after Epic and others pushed for it ? How close were they to launch ?

2004. A full year before launch.
 
Actual serious question:

All these specs are fine and dandy.

Do we have any documentation about how easy is this to develop for?

If i'm not mistaken Ps2 and Ps3 were development hell.
 

Korosenai

Member
Current codename for the next PlayStation console, yes. Some people think it might not be called the PS4, just like the Vita wasn't the PSP2.
Oh ok. I havent really payed any attention to the next gen consoles so I wasnt sure exactly what it was.
 
It's all rather irrelevant. What I want to know is will the system still be home to the linear, cinematic snoozefests that plagued this generation. Specs by themselves are meaningless. Power won't necessarily correlate to creativity.

It'll also depend what's in Microsoft's box. The lower-spec machine will be the standard. Publishers aren't going to gamble on one platform with development costs being what they are.

Also, I agree that if Sony is only releasing one SKU and it doesn't follow the subsidy/subscription model, they're setting themselves up for a world o' hurt.
 

mrklaw

MrArseFace
1.8TFs was bad enough, now we're down to 1.4? Eugh... What did gamers do to deserve this?

developers can probably use it for rendering too, so you're back up to 1.8 if you don't need the power for physics or other stuff.

Interesting if Durango also has a reserved CU. Starting to get very similar other than RAM choice.
- 8 Jaguar cores at 1.6GHz
- 12/14 GCN CUs for graphics
- 4CUs for 'other stuff' (compute/GPGPU)
- ancillary hardware for audio/decompression/video encode&decode.
 
Yeah, I'm sure Don is in a real panic. LOL. Anything we're finding out about today, they've each known about each other for months.

src_1339335247814.jpg
 

Krabardaf

Member
Sony should should put 16Gig flash on all SKU's and sell one with no hard drive so we can add our own. At least with 16 Gig, you can still use the system if you stick to just Blu-Ray discs until you feel like adding a drive. This let's them have a cheaper SKU.

This will never never happen, not even in the craziest dream. It's 2013 and all games will be released online. No way all units, even entry price, doesn't come with a big HDD.
Although i agree a SSD could have been neat, but most likely a costly extra.
 

i-Lo

Member
They're not being reserved.

They just have to be used more explicitly in your code. If I'm writing my rendering code, I make library calls, and the library and hardware take care of the rest. The GPU splits the work up per vertex or per group of fragments, or whatever, and schedules the threads and executes them.

These 4 CUs won't operate under that regime. They won't mix in 'automagically' to the work you do through the graphics libraries. You'll have to set up the work explicitly, separately, for those 4 CUs.

The work could be whatever you want that a CU can do - graphics or GPGPU. So they're not being 'reserved' per se, they're not being prescribed for any one particular use. However the motivation for splitting the CUs out of a hardware managed regime is so that if you want to do GPGPU, you don't have to leave the scheduling and context switching up to a hardware balancer that might not do things optimally when mixing graphics and compute tasks.

"I think"

That was a satisfactory explanation. Thank you.

The triangles, and vertices rate.

A Pitcairn derivative being outperformed by Cape Verde derivative. This one needs to be seen.
 
Sony should should put 16Gig flash on all SKU's and sell one with no hard drive so we can add our own. At least with 16 Gig, you can still use the system if you stick to just Blu-Ray discs until you feel like adding a drive. This let's them have a cheaper SKU.
I totally agree, but think it very unlikely. I just hope the system retains the ability to swap the drives.
 

mrklaw

MrArseFace
Seriously this article looks like it was written by fanboys. GAF points out that 14CUs makes no sense and magically the article is updated with new info that says there are now 4 extra compute CUs to make 18.

I don't believe VGLeaks after this and getting the Blu-ray spec wrong.

or they're just clarifying because us and other readers were confused?
 

MaulerX

Member
not really.
since this whole 14 + 4 CUs thing is new, durango could be 8 + 4.



Durango doesn't have Compute Units. They have Shader Cores. LOL. At least that's what they're calling them. "12 Shader Cores providing a total of 768 threads". Not sure what that means though...
 

Orayn

Member
It's all rather irrelevant. What I want to know is will the system still be home to the linear, cinematic snoozefests that plagued this generation. Specs by themselves are meaningless. Power won't necessarily correlate to creativity.

It'll also depend what's in Microsoft's box. The lower-spec machine will be the standard. Publishers aren't going to gamble on one platform with development costs being what they are.

Also, I agree that if Sony is only releasing one SKU and it doesn't follow the subsidy/subscription model, they're setting themselves up for a world o' hurt.

There's a lot to be excited for, and a lot to fear. I feel that if Sony and/or Microsoft open things up on the DD front and catch up to some good practices currently employed by Nintendo and Valve, we'll see more and better independent games which will take the sting out of the current direction of retail software. If MS and Sony remain obstinate and things stay the same or get worse, well... I hope people like $60 games with $50 season passes and microtranscations everywhere.
 

RoyalFool

Banned
Don Mattrick in panic mode right now, changing the console's RAM as we speak

I'm pretty sure they all know each others plans pretty well, the dev kits are in plenty of hands and it'd be commercial suicide to attend E3 with a new console if you don't already have some idea of what your competitor is going to show, from what I'm aware they basically visit bars and buy people a lot of drinks until they get some specs.

After all, it's in the developers interest that both machines can run the same games without too many changes - so leaking the specs helps pretty much everyone.
 
I wonder if sony or wiiu will add voice control. Most of what the kinect does outside of games is voice control. Sony already has the pseye. It would be a way to cut into that market without the expense of kinect.

Sony already did it for Singstar in 2009. I think it's out now if you have the Singstar game, obviously they could work this to work with The Eye HD and the PS4 OS

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=5TaUsSy-f0Y

What are the advantages of a smaller but faster ram over a slower but bigger one?
would 8GB GDDR5 be very expensive? And 6GB?
I think that Microsoft with their living room console media box needs an huge amount of ram to run an heavy OS like a Windows Xbox.
Anyway why 5GB GDDR3 are inferior to 3.5GB GDDR5? The difference in speed is so relevant? And what's the role of the fast EDRAM?

I want to know this also.

IMHO, I still think it's a huge mistake for Sony to not include more RAM. 8GB DDR5 might be overkill, but 6GB DDR5 with 1GB (before optimization) dedicated to OS would be the sweet spot.
 
I would honestly not be surprised, but I don't think it'll happen. It's too late for a change. Unless... does anyone know when it is that Microsoft doubled the 360's RAM after Epic and others pushed for it ? How close were they to launch ?

yo might be right, but if a desperate buff if needed while not much time left, the RAM is the cheapest and fastest way to go.
 

Piggus

Member
Expected to say the least. It shouldn't much of a problem for Microsoft to outperform Sony going by these specs. The meltdowns will be glorious!

I don't know why you think this. Sony already said they'd let Microsoft make the first move. I don't think Sony wants to be in the position of having subpar 3rd party games again, and with the similar architectures this time around I don't see them having that issue. You also need to consider the possibility of the next Xbox having Kinect in every box. If that happens, what makes you think they can sell a more powerful system at a reasonable price without taking a big loss?
 

Razgreez

Member
If these numbers are right, the Durango GPU is actually better when it comes to pure graphics.

Expected to say the least. It shouldn't much of a problem for Microsoft to outperform Sony going by these specs. The meltdowns will be glorious!

Proelite seems to know very little for someone who indulges in a know-it all attitude (winks, vaguely assertive comments, flip-flop stances...), me thinks...

Fine to accept what he's typing when you agree with it. The contrary when you don't
 
I've stopped thinking i understand how powerful a system is since the dropping of "bits" as a measure of power.

But from what i do understand this looks quite nice.
 
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