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Xbox Velocity Architecture - 100 GB is instantly accessible by the developer through a custom hardware decompression block

Bernkastel

Ask me about my fanboy energy!
Proprietary has always been more expensive than generics, do you remember HDDvd extension for 360? Or even 360 Hdd were more expensive than generic solution used by Sony.

Sony is giving you the choice of getting any nvme that support PS5 blazing speeds.
I am hearing 7 GB/s in this thread now. That choice would be like 400 USD at this point. Why would Microsoft even price their memory cards like that ? The Seagate official Xbox hard drives are not that expensive
 
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DaGwaphics

Member
7GB/s NVMe drives will cost even more. Eventually Microsoft will also release 2 TB or 4 TB memory cards.

I hear you, there will be some sticker shock for those looking to upgrade the PS5. These high-end drives are where SSD makers make their money, they will be reticent to manufacture a budget priced unit for Sony (talking about upgrade parts not the internal) that could be slotted into PCs and cannibalize their most important market. This is where proprietary can offer more flexibility, the expansion "cards" for XSX could never Cannibalize Seagate's other interests, even if the pricing is out-of-line with similar products.
 
I remember game foundry and everyone counting pixels, and in theory you are right. But in console war, every straw matters.

Personally I don't give a shit myself, but can't help but laughing about those crying ps fanboys who's bullied Xbox players all these years now crying over getting their own medicine.
Dont laugh cause micros fanboys will be right back there again with the amount of hype they keep boosting themselves. I remember when the 360 was king and xbox fanboys would be relentless with the superior multiplat threads and ps3 george foreman memes. FANBOYS in general suck.
 

nowhat

Member
I thought Cerny said that the PS5 required 7GB/s NVMe drives? Maybe I misunderstood, I thought they needed the overhead to match performance with their custom solution.
The issue is (and this is from what I've been able to parse from the presentation/articles, do correct me if I'm mistaken), PS5 offers six levels of priority. Like, "get me file X at priority 1, but I'll be satisfied with file Y at priority 6". And everything in between. But the official standard for NVMe drives offers no such granularity. As such, an expansion drive needs to be much faster to accommodate for that feature.
 
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Aceofspades

Banned
I am hearing 7 GB/s in this thread now. That choice would be like 400 USD at this point. Why would Microsoft even price their memory cards like that ? The Seagate official Xbox hard drives are not that expensive

Once next gen consoles releases, prices of all generics will go down as economy of scale effect start applying across the industry. Same effect cannot be applied to proprietary solutions sold in limited quantities.
 

Three

Member
Those memory cards have the same NVMe drive as the one inside XSX. Digital Foundry and Austin Evans already showed us the memory cards, they dont look like cheap plastics at all. Microsoft has moved away from the cheap hardware deisgns of 360 days.
You're completely missing the point here. There is a competitive price on fast storage when something isn't proprietary. The XSX is tech made by other companies sold as proprietary inside a plastic caddy. It is either much lower performing or much more expensive for the consumer. Maybe even both as was the case with 360 drives.
 
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Bernkastel

Ask me about my fanboy energy!
Once next gen consoles releases, prices of all generics will go down as economy of scale effect start applying across the industry. Same effect cannot be applied to proprietary solutions sold in limited quantities.
Its the same drive as the one inside XSX, so its not being produced in limited quantities.
You're completely missing the point here. There is a competitive price on fast storage when something isn't proprietary. The XSX is tech made by other companies sold as proprietary inside a plastic caddy. It is either much lower performing or much more expensive for the consumer. Maybe even both as was the case with 360 drives.
Its not lower performing. They said its the same one as the one inside XSX.
 
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The_Mike

I cry about SonyGaf from my chair in Redmond, WA
Dont laugh cause micros fanboys will be right back there again with the amount of hype they keep boosting themselves. I remember when the 360 was king and xbox fanboys would be relentless with the superior multiplat threads and ps3 george foreman memes. FANBOYS in general suck.

Can't argue with that.

Were x360 ever king though? I remember Xbox 360 selling hot but Sony evening out with their loyal fans. Every time I read someone saying Xbox 360 was king some other people say they got evened out and PS3 surpassed it.

But what do I know about this nonsense I'm just here for the laughs🤷‍♂️
 

MarkMe2525

Gold Member
Yup, 4.8GB/s sounds ok, but it's COMPRESSED, with raw being 2.4GB/s only. PS5 is doing 5.5BG/s RAW, so around 11GB/s compressed.

Still, like a minivan, you can drive it to work. :messenger_winking_tongue: That's how too much steroid hinders your agility.:messenger_sunglasses:
Minivan?
2.4 gbs raw puts you in the top four nvme available. It's more like a sports car. Sony is like a Tesla with extreme mode enabled.
I know it's nitpicky but a comparison to a minivan just seems like one is trying to marginalize a really good console SSD solution.
 

Andodalf

Banned
absolutely great explanation.. are you a dev from sony?

what happens when 399 people come to you station and you fast car has only 200 seats?
i think... big problems happen... .

It’s simple what you do then. You make two trips! The question is, when devs are used to only having room for 5, how long will it take them to make games that need 200? And then 400? This is such a leap I think it will be a while before it’s a fully realized change, and it’s one that both consoles will experience. The obvious exception is PS5 exclusives, which will trailblaze and be indicative of how and where things can continue to improve. In the meantime, XSX will enjoy the benefits of their SSD while also having a bit more grunt behind it. This is why their console is the more balanced one right now.
 
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Von Hugh

Member
Nah, having fun. Throwing banter, and taking some. All good sport. Too much spare time, no school, no work. :messenger_winking_tongue: (y)

DsdmJf0VAAAo_B6.jpg:large
 

Three

Member
Its the same drive as the one inside XSX, so its not being produced in limited quantities.

Its not lower performing. They said its the same one as the one inside XSX.
You're making no sense. The proprietary XSX SSD cards are the same as the ones inside the XSX?

Ok but that's not what anyone is discussing.

Well it is Microsoft that has shown games taking advantage of XSX, not Sony. Godfall is timed exclusive.
Sony showed loading of Spiderman on their SSD last year.
 
No..xbox one getting thrashed by the competition made them step their game up. Microsoft shouldve never softened up after the 360 launch years. We shoukd wait to see what those studios pump out before declaring anyone on fire.


You can say that. I'm sure Phil reads the forums and had enough of the SONY lot having a field day. Thank you so much, you made Team Xbox into a monster

Can't wait to see the irony of DF going on about sound next-gen, despite totally overlooking it for this gen comparisons
 

GymWolf

Member
Then why the hell are you assuming XSX will cot 600 USD or more.
where exactly i said that?:lollipop_neutral:
i think sex is gonna be 500-550 dollars (pathetic, you can legally fuck literal top models in amsterdam with 50 euros)😆

but M has 2 advantages here, even if the sex is 600 dollars, they have far more money than sony so he can sell at big loss (or at least on a big loss than sony) and they probably have lockhart console for not hardcore gamers to get money from casuals.

i bet my name and avatar for 1 year if sony comes up with a 600 dollars ps5.
 
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DaGwaphics

Member
There is always that possibility that Sony also has proprietary "cards" available, and the m.2 is just another option. This could be very likely, the "Sony" cards would be non-threatening to the SSD market as a whole, which would lead to better pricing.
 

Ascend

Member
Haha! In all honesty, I gave a dislike to the reveal video in the first day, after watching DF take and looking more into it I went back and flipped to like. If PS5 is sold at $400, which is very doable, then that's HUGE. The differences between the two should be minimal with one beating the other from game to game or on aspects. Enjoy :messenger_tears_of_joy:(y)
I doubt $400 is doable with that SSD.
 

Bernkastel

Ask me about my fanboy energy!
You're making no sense. The proprietary XSX SSD cards are the same as the ones inside the XSX?

Ok but that's not what anyone is discussing.


Sony showed loading of Spiderman on their SSD last year.
The NVMe SSD drive inside XSX, is the same one as the one in the memory card. The memory card contains a NVMe SSD drive which is inserted into PCIe 4.0 m.2. slot and the XSX has a NVMe SSD drive embedded on the board.
Expandable Storage 1 TB Expansion Card (matches internal storage exactly)
My post was about actual next gen games in response to "Xbox has no games". Like how Xbox has shown Halo Infinite, Hellblade II, Project Mara, Everwild and Flight Simulator. PS5 has only shown Godfall which is timed exclusive. Ofcourse, they both have more that will be shown later.
 
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Bo_Hazem

Banned
I doubt $400 is doable with that SSD.

We still don't know who made that, is it Samsung? Is it Sony "they do all kind of memories"?

But remember, the BOM of 2080Ti is $219 in 2018, so don't compare to consumer prices as they sell those console with a loss or minimal profits.
 
I haven’t been on GAF for a long time, but in my experience, this has to be some all-time mental gymnastics.

People really expected MS to just throw an SSD in there and wipe their hands, proclaiming “that’s it!”

of course they were gonna have their own tech to rival Sony.

We need to face reality. Cerny went all-in in an SSD drive that is faster than XsX but both drives are so fast it’s a real question of diminishing returns. The XsX is fast as hell and can do fun things with its ultra fast storage too, just like the PS5

The XsX is wonderful hardware, hopefully they get the games this time around
 
Can't argue with that.

Were x360 ever king though? I remember Xbox 360 selling hot but Sony evening out with their loyal fans. Every time I read someone saying Xbox 360 was king some other people say they got evened out and PS3 surpassed it.

But what do I know about this nonsense I'm just here for the laughs🤷‍♂️
The first 2 -3years of 360 life it was KING...soooo many quality, fun exclusives. One of my favorite all time systems. We would get laughed at for even owning a ps3. The ps3 came back into the fight with first party exclusives price drops and improved OS. Microsoft started chasing the Wii success and put their resources into Kinect.
 

DunDunDunpachi

Patient MembeR
I haven’t been on GAF for a long time, but in my experience, this has to be some all-time mental gymnastics.

People really expected MS to just throw an SSD in there and wipe their hands, proclaiming “that’s it!”

of course they were gonna have their own tech to rival Sony.

We need to face reality. Cerny went all-in in an SSD drive that is faster than XsX but both drives are so fast it’s a real question of diminishing returns. The XsX is fast as hell and can do fun things with its ultra fast storage too, just like the PS5

The XsX is wonderful hardware, hopefully they get the games this time around
Quite the opposite is happening:

Sony has been beating their chest about their SSD since at least April of last year. Microsoft has kinda-sorta said "yeah we have that too" and now they are trumpeting it louder because people realize that it's an important innovation.

Meanwhile, lots of downplaying of the value of SSD suddenly goes up in smoke in this thread. Even funnier that many of the same posters roamed the boards like a hungry wolf doing everything to mock people who dared espouse the value of an SSD as "Sony fanboys".
 
I think they're actually placing a big bet on NAND prices falling due to the huge volume the consoles are expected to sell in. A similar kind of bet they placed on the PS4 with the 8GB of GDDR5


100MHz deficit is not gonna affect things much on the CPU front.
300 MHz. 3800 vs 3500
 
Yup. A 5.5 GB/s NVMe 1 TB SSD will cost around 300 USD.
Upto 4.8 GB/s, costs 240 USD.
Many people will have to contend with the included 825 GB SSD.

The SSD alone may drive PS5 price to around 600 USD.

Yeah, something tells me both systems will come in at the same MSRP. PS5's SSD and cooling system must be pretty notable in cost, the cooling in particular since Bloomberg specifically pointed that out when doing their BOM estimates.

Also according to Cerny the 3rd-party drives will actually have to be 7 GB/s in order to be compatible, because of the overhead the PS5's custom controller has to account for in making them function like the internal drive. I don't even think there are ANY 7 GB/s PCIe 4.0 NVMe drives on the market currently. If so, they're easily $400-$500 on their own.

Kinda feeling like the SSD this time is what BD was for PS3 back in 7th gen. It'll absolutely have its advantages and come to maturity in time, but for the early years it'll be awkward in finding its footing. Meanwhile I think XSX's additional CUs will be kinda like what Cell was for 7th gen (not nearly as complicated to get use out of tho); making smart use of them for things other than more graphics via GPGPU workloads that are smartly programmed to saturate them in parallel might be a learning curve to overcome, (there's a reason Cerny stressed narrow & fast in his speech) but 1st party that master use of those techniques could do some amazing things.
 

Bernkastel

Ask me about my fanboy energy!
I also forgot this
Also. from AMD
  • New gaming experiences with seamless content paging from the SSD to the GPU based on the revolutionary Xbox Velocity Architecture
 

Bo_Hazem

Banned
Quite the opposite is happening:

Sony has been beating their chest about their SSD since at least April of last year. Microsoft has kinda-sorta said "yeah we have that too" and now they are trumpeting it louder because people realize that it's an important innovation.

Meanwhile, lots of downplaying of the value of SSD suddenly goes up in smoke in this thread. Even funnier that many of the same posters roamed the boards like a hungry wolf doing everything to mock people who dared espouse the value of an SSD as "Sony fanboys".

Blame coronavirus, too much spare time. :lollipop_tears_of_joy:
 

Tripolygon

Banned
Can someone give me a clue as what all this compressed/non-compressed stuff means? Why wouldn't everything be compressed if it can ensure a greater I/O speed?
But loading raw assets means you pick it straight away without all that hassle, putting less stress on the CPU/GPU so potentially you can compensate for the gap between you and a higher spec hardware (CPU/GPU/Ram).

This is of course a raw image that doesn't need any processing, that's why Mark Cerny SKIPPED the compressed part and only talked RAW.

[/SPOILE]
Terrible explanation

Memory is a precious commodity in computer systems. Advances in memory architecture has been a lot slower than say everything else in a computer. Add on top of that, bandwidth is an even more precious commodity.

You have your CPUs and GPUs which process tons of information but if you don't have a fast enough Memory and bandwidth, they will be sitting idle most of the time waiting to be fed information.

You have 2GB storage to work with and you can transfer a file at 1GB/s from that storage to your CPU and GPU. it will take 2 seconds transfer 2GB worth of data. This is where compression comes in. If you compress the file, you can fit more things into the storage essentially giving you twice the storage. You can now fit 4GB worth of data into only 2GB worth of storage therefore you can transfer 4GB worth of data to your CPU and GPU giving them better utilization.

Compression comes at a cost of CPU performance because in say a regular computer, you have to use a CPU core or 2 dedicated to just compressing and decompressing data. That is not ideal in a console because you don't want to take away CPU cores that can be used for anything else. Here comes dedicated ASICs who's sole purpose is to be really good at compressing and decompressing data. The CPU is free to do other things while the ASIC will just keep compressing and decompressing data all day everyday without breaking a sweat.

To tie it to XSX and PS5.

XSX has a 1TB SSD that has a RAW bandwidth of 2.4GB/s they also have a decompression system that can handle doing 6GB/s. Meaning you can transfer 4.8GB worth of compressed data without breaking a sweat because they have 1.2GB/s overhead.

PS5 has a 825GB SSD that has a RAW bandwidth of 5.5GB/s, they also have a decompression system that can handle doing 22GB/s.
Meaning they can transfer 11GB worth of compressed data without breaking a sweat because they have 11GB/s overhead.

You always want to compress because you get more out of your storage and IO.
 
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KingT731

Member
Xbox is selling its own propitiatory memory card in partnership with Seagate. Incase of PS5, customers will have to buy 5.5 GB/s NVMe SSD drives for external storage, which will cost like hell. This also makes you question the retail price of PS5.
Why is everyone acting like these things are going to stay expensive forever. We've already seen dramatic price drops just over ththe last 2 years as well as significant improvement in the tech used.
 
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T-Cake

Member
Because then it needs to be uncompressed. That takes compute away from something else. No big deal with the XseX's killer specs though.

I thought this zlib/Kraken software had its own dedicated chip for decompression? So there would be no hit.
 

48086

Member
Terrible explanation

Memory is a precious commodity in computer systems. Advances in memory architecture has been a lot slower than say everything else in a computer. Add on top of that, bandwidth is an even more precious commodity.

You have your CPUs and GPUs which process tons of information but if you don't have a fast enough Memory and bandwidth, they will be sitting idle most of the time waiting to be fed information.

You have 2GB storage to work with and you can transfer a file at 1GB/s from that storage to your CPU and GPU. it will take 2 seconds transfer 2GB worth of data. This is where compression comes in. If you compress the file, you can fit more things into the storage essentially giving you twice the storage. You can now fit 4GB worth of data into only 2GB worth of storage therefore you can transfer 4GB worth of data to your CPU and GPU giving them better utilization.

Compression comes at a cost of CPU performance because you in say a regular computer, you have to use a CPU core or 2 dedicated to just compressing and decompressing data. That is not ideal in a console because you don't want to take away CPU cores that can be used for anything else. Here comes dedicated ASICs who's sole purpose is to be really good at compressing and decompressing data. The CPU is free to do other things while the ASIC will just keep compressing and decompressing data all day everyday without breaking a sweat.

To tie it to XSX and PS5.

XSX has a 1TB SSD that has a RAW bandwidth of 2.4GB/s they also have a decompression system that can handle doing 6GB/s. Meaning you can transfer 4.8GB worth of compressed data without breaking a sweat because they have 1.2GB/s overhead.

PS5 has a 825GB SSD that has a RAW bandwdth of 5.5, they also have a decompression system that can handle doing 22GB/s.
Meaning they can transfer 11GB worth of compressed data without breaking a sweat because they have 11GB/s overhead.

You always want to compress because you get more out of your storage and IO.

Thanks for the explanation. Where does the 1.2gb (xbox) and 11gb(ps5) overhead come from? I'm not sure I follow part.
 
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Because in this case we are talking about 2 quite different things.

One being a fairly standard SSD, made proprietary by way of its specific metal housing / heat sink. This has been done to ensure perfect performance across every SSD. (Performance degrades with heat)

The other requiring I believe Cerny said 7GB/s ‘off the shelf’ SSD. These are like rocking horse shit and very expensive. Better performance overall but is it worth it in the long run?

It wouldn’t surprise me if an Xbox expansion SSD is only $99. The right drive to work on the PS5 will be $200+, approaching half the cost of the console.
Even 1TB standard NVME Drives aren't $99 today; then add in Samsungs markup, MS mark up, no competition and it is the opposite of consumer friendly. The price will never drop and will cost more than a standard NVME drive. PS5 compatible drives may cost more initially but they will offer better performance, the market will set the price, and they will go down in cost over time. Cost/benefit is much better with the model Sony has chosen and future proofed. I have never heard anyone ever prefer proprietary storage vs bring your own storage.
 
Yeah, something tells me both systems will come in at the same MSRP. PS5's SSD and cooling system must be pretty notable in cost, the cooling in particular since Bloomberg specifically pointed that out when doing their BOM estimates.

Also according to Cerny the 3rd-party drives will actually have to be 7 GB/s in order to be compatible, because of the overhead the PS5's custom controller has to account for in making them function like the internal drive. I don't even think there are ANY 7 GB/s PCIe 4.0 NVMe drives on the market currently. If so, they're easily $400-$500 on their own.

Kinda feeling like the SSD this time is what BD was for PS3 back in 7th gen. It'll absolutely have its advantages and come to maturity in time, but for the early years it'll be awkward in finding its footing. Meanwhile I think XSX's additional CUs will be kinda like what Cell was for 7th gen (not nearly as complicated to get use out of tho); making smart use of them for things other than more graphics via GPGPU workloads that are smartly programmed to saturate them in parallel might be a learning curve to overcome, (there's a reason Cerny stressed narrow & fast in his speech) but 1st party that master use of those techniques could do some amazing things.
I agree. People are really just skimming over numbers and running to beat their chests. I think Sony is gonna suprise people what they can do with the SSD boosts. I think MS has to come out guns blazing. They have to show why people should buy the series X. This whole wait a few years to see the first party results for the series X is a mistake. By then I can assure there will be a PS5 pro with beefier specs and modifications and Sony first party studios will be lining up for release after release again.
 
Even 1TB standard NVME Drives aren't $99 today; then add in Samsungs markup, MS mark up, no competition and it is the opposite of consumer friendly. The price will never drop and will cost more than a standard NVME drive. PS5 compatible drives may cost more initially but they will offer better performance, the market will set the price, and they will go down in cost over time. Cost/benefit is much better with the model Sony has chosen and future proofed. I have never heard anyone ever prefer proprietary storage vs bring your own storage.

They will be cheaper than the SSD’s which are compatible with the PS5. They will also be hung on the racks right next to the Xbox controllers in the shop.

If that isn’t more consumer friendly than the choice on PS5, I don’t know what is.
 
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