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[DrKeo]

So baked lighting is still the best way to go next-gen. How about ray-trace sound? Why sound ray-tracing doesn't get the same skepticism?

Less computationally intensive.
Sound is essentially a one-dimensional wave (because of how pressure behaves).
Light is 3D...

I don't know specifics, but Audio RT is much cheaper on resources.

Audio RT requires an order of magnitude less rays than visual RT so it’s much cheaper. Cerny said that 1 million rays are enough (I actually don’t remember if it was per second or per frame, but both are a very low figure for both consoles). Just listen to this demo that uses 4000 rays per frame with 3 bounces (which is 480K rays per second for a 30FPS game):


Visual ray tracing requires millions of rays per frame, even well over a billion per second. So spending a budget of a few million rays per second on audio should be negligible for these consoles.

 

[Gediminas]

Everybody run to the bunker!

i hope, it is not a Fallout 76 comes out of it

 

[FeiRR]

If this happens, there will be beatings and robberies.

Nah, it's not toilet paper.

 

[thurnishaleygw]

Hey Bo_Hazem great to have you back.

 

[xool]

The new Bloomberg article is troubling. Devs expect the console to launch ah $499 to $549. Releasing a 10 tflops console at $549 is going to be a disaster.

That said, I'm not so sure if the Xbox is going to be $499 in that case. Maybe it's a $599 console after all.

Though Phil did say that they will not be outpriced this time around. Regardless, as i suspected, trying to save a few dollars on a smaller silicon was always going to be a bad idea. Now they have a weaker console with potentially the same BOM.

This one:

Sony Corp. plans to produce far fewer units of its upcoming PlayStation 5 in its first year than it had for the previous-generation console’s launch, according to people familiar with the matter.
The Tokyo-based tech giant is limiting its initial production run in part because it expects the PS5’s ambitious specs to weigh on demand by leading to a high price at launch, the people said, asking not to be identified because the subject is private. The global Covid-19 pandemic has affected Sony’s promotional plans for the new device but not its production capacity, they added.
The company has told assembly partners it would make 5 to 6 million units of the PS5 in the fiscal year ending March 2021, according to other people involved in the machine’s supply chain. When Sony released the PlayStation 4 in November 2013, it sold 7.5 million units in its first two quarters.
The PS5’s loftier price tag may also deter initial take-up. Game developers who’ve been creating titles for the next PlayStation anticipate its price to be in the region of $499 to $549, and Bloomberg Intelligence’s Matthew Kanterman points to increased component costs pushing up the price required for Sony to break even. Sony has struggled with its price-setting decision for the PS5 because of scarce components, Bloomberg News has reported.

[..]

I dunno. The bar graph in the article shows an estimated cost for SSD for ~150$ for both Series X and PS5 .. but that's about the price for a whole M2 1TB drive from Amazon i.. those aren't wholesale prices at all. I think the Bloomberg article has high-balled the price, probably for the sake of an article. Doubt.

...also Game Devs .. experts on games (tick), experts on price to manufacture consoles (doubt) .. ?

more

later in the article :

“I think both the PS5 and Xbox Series X may end up at US$450 even though they would lose money at that price,” said Damian Thong, an analyst at Macquarie Capital.

$450 = good imo.

Suppliers have started delivering components to PS5 assemblers, who are scheduled to begin mass-producing the product by June. Sony’s PlayStation chief Jim Ryan has stressed that the machine’s launch should be simultaneous around the globe, according to people in the company’s supply chain.

Specs leaks are mostly done at this point. We've entered phase 2. Grainy photos from Foxconn production lines. Start contacting your chinese relatives in Shenzen. We need data.

 

[xool]

We can try to make some maths.
4k @ 60fps uses how many pixels? ~500,000,000 pixels/s.

Xbox: 116,800,000,000 pixels/s
PS5: 142,720,000,000 pixels/s

I know it is a dumb math but the pixel fillrate is already way over what needed for 4k @ 60fps.

Rasterization is all about overdraw though (z depth checks).. that said "Geometry engine" or whatever either is calling theirs is all about better culling . reducing actual triangle draw. Looks like they have enough.

 

[Radical_3d]

I dunno. The bar graph in the article shows an estimated cost for SSD for ~150$ for both Series X and PS5 .. but that's about the price for a whole M2 1TB drive from Amazon i.. those aren't wholesale prices at all. I think the Bloomberg article has high-balled the price, probably for the sake of an article. Doubt.

But PCIe 4? At what speed?

 

[joe_zazen]

.

This one:


I dunno. The bar graph in the article shows an estimated cost for SSD for ~150$ for both Series X and PS5 .. but that's about the price for a whole M2 1TB drive from Amazon i.. those aren't wholesale prices at all. I think the Bloomberg article has high-balled the price, probably for the sake of an article. Doubt.

...also Game Devs .. experts on games (tick), experts on price to manufacture consoles (doubt) .. ?

more

later in the article :


$450 = good imo.



Specs leaks are mostly done at this point. We've entered phase 2. Grainy photos from Foxconn production lines. Start contacting your chinese relatives in Shenzen. We need data.

pubs may have been briefed on expected launch numbers, but yeah, if they are using devs as their source for prices...We really dont know how this is going to lay out.

 

[joe_zazen]

But PCIe 4? At what speed?

they will have a multi year, multi million unit contract. We cant know what they will be paying at all. Using Mousser or Amazon to price components like looking at cattle auctions to estimate Parisian big mac prices.

 

[xool]

But PCIe 4? At what speed?

PCIe 3.0 x4 and Series X speeds admittedly. .. oddly Bloomberg gives very similar estimates for SSD for both units .. they're definately way too high in their estimates for Series X SSD imo. The cost for Sony is an unknown for me.

 

[xool]

.


pubs may have been briefed on expected launch numbers, but yeah, if they are using devs as their source for prices...We really dont know how this is going to lay out.

Bobby Kotick and Yves Guiilemot will know prices I guess. The average dev nope.

 

[CrysisFreak]

Hey Bo_Hazem great to have you back.

The BoBo is back we're saved

 

[PaintTinJr]

How can sound be one dimensional? Sound is mechanical vibrations set in a medium(air usually). Light has dual nature, it is electromagnetic wave as well as particle(a tiny packet of energy, the so called quantum). So since both have wave nature both travel in a given space(3 dimensions)

Yeah, that comment has sort of got me thinking I’ll take everything psorcerer says about RT from here on in with a packet of Salt&Shake crisps. Anyone looking at RT and not being familiar with the basics of science to know that audio is a longitudinal wave and light is a transverse wave – and that their respective wavelength ranges relates to sample rate/number of rays in the path tracing – and both move in 3 dimensions is a bit of a flag for me(IMHO).

 

[thurnishaleygw]

The BoBo is back we're saved

 

[joe_zazen]

Yeah, that comment has sort of got me thinking I’ll take everything psorcerer says about RT from here on in with a packet of Salt&Shake crisps. Anyone looking at RT and not being familiar with the basics of science to know that audio is a longitudinal wave and light is a transverse wave – and that their respective wavelength ranges relates to sample rate/number of rays in the path tracing – and both move in 3 dimensions is a bit of a flag for me(IMHO).

he wrote ‘essentially’, implying oversimplification for the sake of form discussion

 

[Gamernyc78]

What agendas? If two systems do something exactly the same, isn't that the norm then? The standard they set? Hence the new normal. Why do Playstation fans always get so defensive about their system? It's a good console, but it doesn't have to be the best at every aspect.

Yeah thts what it is Captain Neutral.

 

[Bo_Hazem]

Hey Bo_Hazem great to have you back.

I was thinking about sending a farewell message

The BoBo is back we're saved

 

[Shmunter]

Yeah, that comment has sort of got me thinking I’ll take everything psorcerer says about RT from here on in with a packet of Salt&Shake crisps. Anyone looking at RT and not being familiar with the basics of science to know that audio is a longitudinal wave and light is a transverse wave – and that their respective wavelength ranges relates to sample rate/number of rays in the path tracing – and both move in 3 dimensions is a bit of a flag for me(IMHO).

Would those properties apply in a synthetic simulation tho? Seems a bit ott, but I’m not sure.

 

[Thirty7ven]

The idea that PS5’s SSD is more expensive to manufacture than XBX holds no water guys. Let it go. Speed doesn’t determine price.

 

[Evilms]

Maybe on PS5 and XseX too.

 

[PaintTinJr]

he wrote ‘essentially’, implying oversimplification for the sake of form discussion

But the person was looking to be informed and it is simple stuff that doesn't need reduced to something that is wrong. So, even discounting the comment on that basis had it been a slack comment in a post he was starting from scratch, instead (IMHO) it comes off as a comment by someone that doesn't know, because they might know a little about a lot where RT is concerned.

 

[PaintTinJr]

Would those properties apply in a synthetic simulation tho? Seems a bit ott, but I’m not sure.

Not from what Mark said in the GDC talk, he placed 3D audio at 1 Million rays/sec and Full RT at Giga rays/sec (by extrapolation from his slide and words). An RT reseach paper I glanced a few months back placed Full RT at 10 Rays per pixel (for multiple bounces/reflections and AA), so the numbers would suggest it isn't ott (IMO).

 

[Shmunter]

Not from what Mark said in the GDC talk, he placed 3D audio at 1 Million rays/sec and Full RT at Giga rays/sec (by extrapolation from his slide and words). An RT reseach paper I glanced a few months back placed Full RT at 10 Rays per pixel (for multiple bounces/reflections and AA), so the numbers would suggest it isn't ott (IMO).

Gonna have to watch that talk for a 3rd time dammit

 

[BluRayHiDef]

The new Bloomberg article is troubling. Devs expect the console to launch ah $499 to $549. Releasing a 10 tflops console at $549 is going to be a disaster.

That said, I'm not so sure if the Xbox is going to be $499 in that case. Maybe it's a $599 console after all.

Though Phil did say that they will not be outpriced this time around. Regardless, as i suspected, trying to save a few dollars on a smaller silicon was always going to be a bad idea. Now they have a weaker console with potentially the same BOM.

It may not be weaker. Its GPU runs at a higher frequency than the XSX's GPU and therefore may have a higher rate of rasterization if the XSX's GPU has the same number of ROPs as its own (64).

PS5's GPU:
64 ROPs x 2,230 x 1000 = 142,720,000 rendering operations per second

64 ROPs x 1,825 x 1000 = 109,500,000 rendering operations per second

In regard to other aspects of GPU performance (e.g. fillrate, compute performance, L2 cache bandwidth, etc), the PS5's GPU ranges from only 15.4% to 2.25% slower, which is negligible. So, graphical performance between the two consoles should be balanced, with one being a bit better in some areas than the other and vice versa. Consider my previous calculations.

Hence, when the PS5's significantly faster I/O system and 3D Audio, as well as Sony's fantastic first-party studios, are considered, I'd say that the PS5 is the better deal.

 

[Neo Blaster]

Guys, the release date for Ghost of Tsushima has been changed to August 1st, 2020 on the PlayStation Canada website.

PlayStation® Official Site: Consoles, Games, Accessories & More

Explore the new generation PlayStation 4 and PS5 consoles - experience immersive gaming with thousands of hit games in every genre to rewrite the rules for what a PlayStation console can do.

www.playstation.com

We actually might be getting TLOU2 in June! I think we might be getting an announcement tomorrow.

One of the universal truths is that retailer sites' placeholders are most definitely bogus. August 1st is a Saturday.

 

[Aceofspades]

The idea that PS5’s SSD is more expensive to manufacture than XBX holds no water guys. Let it go. Speed doesn’t determine price.

Customized determine price. Sony is creating a custom solution here.

 

[BluRayHiDef]

Customized determine price. Sony is creating a custom solution here.

I don't think that Sony would sell it at any price higher than $499 USD.

 

[Aceofspades]

I don't think that Sony would sell it at any price higher than $499 USD.

I don't think that either, 499 for both next gen consoles.

 

[FeiRR]

I don't think that Sony would sell it at any price higher than $499 USD.

I agree. Another interesting thing the article mentions is more focus on services. It makes me wonder what it could mean. I hope they're not going the XGP way.

 

[psorcerer]

How can sound be one dimensional? Sound is mechanical vibrations set in a medium(air usually). Light has dual nature, it is electromagnetic wave as well as particle(a tiny packet of energy, the so called quantum). So since both have wave nature both travel in a given space(3 dimensions)

As a physical phenomenon, this makes absolutely zero sense. Both light and sound are waves with varying frequencies. Both go from point a to point b making it already impossible to be one dimensional (a one-dimensional wave does not exist). And to that same point, not 3d.

Ok. Lesson in physics.
How do we hear?
Our ear detects vibrations in the medium (air, water, etc.)
What' is a "vibration" in a medium?
It's pressure change. Ear detects fluctuations in pressure. In the simple case: air pressure.
Air pressure is a scalar (i.e. 1 (one) number that describes it)
Hence "sound waves" for all purposes are one dimensional.
We hear sound coming from different directions only because of how brain interprets scalar pressure changes coming from both ears.
Cats (and other animals with moving ears) can detect direction of the change by moving their pressure detector. For them sound is 1.5 directional (they can only rotate and not the full 360 at that)

I was looking for that, thanks! I mean, for the name of the technique, not the article itself. When I called RT 'a gimmick', people jumped at me. What I wanted to say was there are many ways to achieve similar graphics fidelity without diminishing returns of full path tracing for which the consumer hardware isn't ready yet.

Yep. I agree.
Current NV attempts to make it sound that DXR (and RT) are better than The Second Coming are pretty pathetic.
But a lot of people are easily hyped it seems.

An RT reseach paper I glanced a few months back placed Full RT at 10 Rays per pixel

That's an absolute minimum to have some semblance of a real lighting.
Offline renders start at 1000 rays per pixel, AFAIR.

 

[CrysisFreak]

I think it is really smart for Sony to launch at 499 and drop to 399 when all the core gamers have bought already. Because the first year price does not matter, they'll probably sell everything they got, despite the economical situation. But man they need to get the hype machine going. We know they can if they want to, but they're so reluctant and passive lmfao.

I thought they want to get TLOU2 and GOT out of the way before the full reveal but now that those games are delayed I wish that's not the case.

 

[Bo_Hazem]

Ok guys, I'm 6 pages behind, but I saw this video and thought it would be interesting if no body posted it prior.

Timestamped




It's about the PSVR/PSVR2, and one of the features or patents found is about the usability of it to virtually attend events, shows, and be seated virtually there. It could potentially expand to other interesting uses as well.

Spoiler: 18+

I heard that some watch mammal documentaries in VR.

 

[Okami Haundo]

I agree. Another interesting thing the article mentions is more focus on services. It makes me wonder what it could mean. I hope they're not going the XGP way.

I just took that as meaning they want to get as many people as possible on PS+ and PSNow. That's a fairly achievable goal if they drop the PS4 slim down to $250 or below and maybe throw in a free month of both subs.

 

[3liteDragon]

One of the universal truths is that retailer sites' placeholders are most definitely bogus. August 1st is a Saturday.

That’s why I said in one of my posts that the actual date could be the day before. Friday, July 31st, 2020. The date makes sense if you want to postpone GoT by a month and let TLOU2 take it’s original June 26th slot, they still have a one month gap.

 

[Gamernyc78]

I agree. Another interesting thing the article mentions is more focus on services. It makes me wonder what it could mean. I hope they're not going the XGP way.

More focuses on services is not that interesting when we know that all companies to a degree are expanding on that front, that is the future. Just means they will be expanding psplus and rumors earlier were a psplus ultimate which included Psnow. Thy definitely will be expanding Psnow and already gave it a major update. Single player game focus will not wane but other things will expand, it's Par the course.

 

[Kusarigama]

Ok. Lesson in physics.
How do we hear?
Our ear detects vibrations in the medium (air, water, etc.)
What' is a "vibration" in a medium?
It's pressure change. Ear detects fluctuations in pressure. In the simple case: air pressure.
Air pressure is a scalar (i.e. 1 (one) number that describes it)
Hence "sound waves" for all purposes are one dimensional.
We hear sound coming from different directions only because of how brain interprets scalar pressure changes coming from both ears.
Cats (and other animals with moving ears) can detect direction of the change by moving their pressure detector. For them sound is 1.5 directional (they can only rotate and not the full 360 at that)



Yep. I agree.
Current NV attempts to make it sound that DXR (and RT) are better than The Second Coming are pretty pathetic.
But a lot of people are easily hyped it seems.



That's an absolute minimum to have some semblance of a real lighting.
Offline renders start at 1000 rays per pixel, AFAIR.

You are mixing up so many concepts of physics in order to support what you said.

 

[psorcerer]

You are mixing up so many concepts of physics in order to support what you said.

I'm just using models that work. Tracing sound particles is not something that anybody's doing even in the offline "renderers".

 

[Thirty7ven]

Customized determine price. Sony is creating a custom solution here.

Completely wrong, that only determines the cost of R&D. They get to control the cost of their manufacturing much better in fact. There's nothing particularly special about the SSD itself also, it's the controller that is making the difference.

There's too many misconceptions about this. XSX won't be more expensive to manufacture than PS5 because it's more powerful, it will be so because it's a bigger APU. It's not like Sony is going with a bigger SSD or more GDDR6. There's a reason why BOM estimates are as they are.

 

[Lunatic_Gamer]

Takashi Mochizuki (Bloomberg) on Twitter: "I am confident in the quality and quantity of games released at the same time as the PS5 release".

 

[saintjules]

I think $500 is fine. We've had enough time to save up for next-gen.

 

[scie]

Yes, please!!! Best game of the franchise. I never forgot the beach scene for the first time and it barely run on my gaming rig that time

 

[FeiRR]

I just took that as meaning they want to get as many people as possible on PS+ and PSNow. That's a fairly achievable goal if they drop the PS4 slim down to $250 or below and maybe throw in a free month of both subs.

PlayStation Now is currently available in 19 countries

First they need to do something about this.

 

[Thirty7ven]

Bloomberg is an American source and therefore as has been the trend every generation, they focus on what is possibly bad about that product coming from overseas. Keep all of that in perspective.

Any problems with the economy and production costs will affect everyone in the business.

 

[Neo Blaster]

The new Bloomberg article is troubling. Devs expect the console to launch ah $499 to $549. Releasing a 10 tflops console at $549 is going to be a disaster.

That said, I'm not so sure if the Xbox is going to be $499 in that case. Maybe it's a $599 console after all.

Though Phil did say that they will not be outpriced this time around. Regardless, as i suspected, trying to save a few dollars on a smaller silicon was always going to be a bad idea. Now they have a weaker console with potentially the same BOM.

Time for our daily dose of SlimySnake's patented FUD...

 

[SamWeb]

RDNA doubled the number of Rops
36>64
64>128
52>104

My bad))

There is no BigNavi yet and it is RDNA 2.

RDNA is limited to 64 ROPs.

And no AMD GPU ever had more than 64ROPs (excluding Dual GPU for obvious reasons)... it is a limitation of GCN that carried to RDNA.

To change that in RDNA 2 they need to increase the number of Shader Arrays to more than 4. But Xbox with 56 CUs doesn’t seems to be using more than 4 Shader Arrays.

And about the 2x Navi you don’t need to increase the number of Shader Array just increase the number of WGP in each Shader Array... for example from 5 WGP in Navi 10 to 10 WGP in BigNavi and you will have 80 CUs.

It is not clear what AMD will do.

Said it doesn’t seems to me that Xbox is using more than 4 SAs with 7 WGP each because both 6 SAs and 8 SAs doesn’t fit 56CUs.... 6 with 4WGP = 48, 6 with 5WGP = 60, 8 with 4WGP = 64, 8 with 3WGP = 48.

So the only option to 56CUs is 4SAs with 7WGP.

That means 64ROPs.
The chances to Xbox have more than 64ROPs lies in drastic changes to the Architecture that I don’t believe it will have.

XOX

https://en.wikichip.org/wiki/microsoft/scorpio_engine

XSX

https://news.xbox.com/en-us/2020/03/16/xbox-series-x-tech/

XSX looks more like a RX 5500 XT (minus cpu cores)



1-2 Shader Array (?) > 1 Shader Engine > 8RB > 32ROPs

"For scalability and performance, the RDNA architecture is built from multiple independent
arrays that comprise fixed-function hardware and the programmable dual compute units. To
scale performance from the low-end to the high-end, different GPUs can increase the number
of shader arrays and also alter the balance of resources within each shader array."
PDF
Yes, these words may refer to already released videocards. But they certainly do not limit the possibilities of architecture!

XSX is the most powerful of the currently known Navis. Its internal design should be different and rebalanced compared to weaker GPUs.

 

[Fake]

Little offtopic, but I love sashimi.

 

[ethomaz]

My bad))




XOX

https://en.wikichip.org/wiki/microsoft/scorpio_engine

XSX

https://news.xbox.com/en-us/2020/03/16/xbox-series-x-tech/

XSX looks more like a RX 5500 XT (minus cpu cores)



1-2 Shader Array (?) > 1 Shader Engine > 8RB > 32ROPs

"For scalability and performance, the RDNA architecture is built from multiple independent
arrays that comprise fixed-function hardware and the programmable dual compute units. To
scale performance from the low-end to the high-end, different GPUs can increase the number
of shader arrays and also alter the balance of resources within each shader array."
PDF
Yes, these words may refer to already released videocards. But they certainly do not limit the possibilities of architecture!

XSX is the most powerful of the currently known Navis. Its internal design should be different and rebalanced compared to weaker GPUs.

5500 XT has indeed 1 SE, 2 SA... 8RB... 32 ROPs.
It is half Navi 10.

That chip is a example that RDNA can have more than 5WGP per SA.... it has 6WGP.
I believe Xbox has 7WGP per SA.

 

[Rusco Da Vino]

Since we dont have any official info about the PS5 for a while now I would like to rescue this unnoted quote from the DualSense reveal:

Are they talking about loading times?

Our goal with DualSense is to give gamers the feeling of being transported into the game world as soon as they open the box.

Source:

Introducing DualSense, the New Wireless Game Controller for PlayStation 5

See the first images of DualSense, which will bring the sense of touch to PS5 gameplay.

blog.us.playstation.com

Spoiler: Booting Time?

1. Everybody understands this part:

"Our goal with DualSense is to give gamers the feeling of being transported into the game world"

2. Then it says:

" as soon as they open the box."

What does it mean, what box? It sounds like a hint for a ultra fast OS booting time

 

[DaGwaphics]

The idea that PS5’s SSD is more expensive to manufacture than XBX holds no water guys. Let it go. Speed doesn’t determine price.

Tell that to SSD manufacturers, it seems there are noticeable differences in production costs between 4 channel and 8 channel parts. We have no figures for 12 channels.

 

[Fafalada]

Rasterization is all about overdraw though (z depth checks)

Yea the most common cases of rasterization(fillrate) bound workloads are things like shadow-map generation, Depth Pre-pass, G-Buffer generation, and any other low-shading complexity work (certain clasess of particle draw as well as various mid-frame operations that don't necessarily have a name). Pretty much none of those benefit from early-Z in meaningful ways and are usually subject to overdraw.