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EuroGamer: More details on the BALANCE of XB1

KKRT00

Member
Dude, look at that screen. Those dudes in the background have no more than 10k polis. They look like ass. Seriously.

Do You know how LoD works? Actually getting 2 meters from characters in KZ:SF decreases their polycount to 20k, 5 meters to 10k, 10 meters to 3.2k and at 15 meters to 800 polys.

You cant run LoD0 in any game all the time on characters.

===
really? doesn't really look like it... like AT ALL.

Characters models are not only faces.
http://i3.minus.com/izttu8NyddV8N.png
 

JaggedSac

Member
The quote is weird though, those features are only free as in so far as they don't cost the game more performance but they do this by reserving the performance all the time, meaning games that don't use it won't get the performance they would of without the constant reservation.

That is true :)
 

cchum

Member
Any experts on dynamic resolutions out there? Is this any different than what Wipeout for PS3 did? Does this mean that developers can lower the resolution of the 3D content layer for even 1 individual frame in order to maintain a consistent frame rate? Is this exactly what Wipeout did, or could Wipeout not lower the resolution on a frame per frame basis?

He's talking about display planes there I believe (which the PS4 also has). I believe it allows you to have two independent streams for rendering (graphics and graphics overlay). Correct me if wrong GAF. Second part sounds like dynamic hardware scaling, so I'm not sure about that.
 
It doesn't and to be honest, they won't be able to because at least 2 of these are direct comparisons to things on the PS4, one of which is completely wrong (cache cohenrent bandwidth) and one is unannounced (CPU speed).

Albert already changed his mind on the 204 number but now it has been changed back, and they have revealed the best they've got to in specifically testing this bandwidth is 140-150. Then there's the 6% one which can be refuted by basic Algebra. Microsoft will abandon those points because they are unprovable and clearly wrong in cases.
To their credit they have detailed more how they arrived at the RAM numbers, but the whole adding them together thing was still a major part of what people were taking issue with, not necessarily because of whether they can simultaneously access the ESRAM and DDR3, but because it's still wholly disingenuous when you're comparing 32MB to 8GB.

I edited in that I think Penello simply had his talking point backwards with the 6% thing, where what he meant to say was probably more along the lines of "The 53MHz upclock was a 6% improvement across the GPU, not just to the CUs." which would mirror the line they're pushing in the interview.

But you're right regarding points 4-6, basically they'd need access to Sony's specs to know those (and point 5 DirectX! is basically meaningless...).
 

JaggedSac

Member
He's talking about display planes there I believe (which the PS4 also has). I believe it allows you to have two independent streams for rendering (graphics and graphics overlay). Correct me if wrong GAF.

I think that is correct. There is also a 3rd display plane in the Bone for the OS to overlay things as well. Could be wrong on that since it has been a while since I have read anything about the display planes.
 

Chobel

Member
He's talking about display planes there I believe (which the PS4 also has). I believe it allows you to have two independent streams for rendering (graphics and graphics overlay). Correct me if wrong GAF.

Correct, except we don't for sure about PS4.
 

EagleEyes

Member
Very informative article. I don't see how you can get more in depth than that and would like to see Sony explain their design also. I feel much more confident in what Microsoft is doing with the X1 seeing how passionate these two guys are about their work. I still think there tardiness with optimal drivers for X1 has been their biggest hurdle lately though.
 

kevin1025

Banned
Every time I read these sorts of articles, I get the feeling it's Microsoft only trying to do damage control rather than trying to be informative. Being this gen's PS3 isn't such a bad thing.
 

benny_a

extra source of jiggaflops
Only here on GAF. The average dudebro MS backers will eat this shit up.
The comment section on EG is relatively skeptical as well. They also mirrored complaints in previous Leadbetter articles on next-gen.

Very informative article. I don't see how you can get more in depth than that and would like to see Sony explain their design also. I feel much more confident in what Microsoft is doing with the X1 seeing how passionate these two guys are about their work. I still think there tardiness with optimal drivers for X1 has been their biggest hurdle lately though.
Cerny already did these interviews back in April. Is there a lot missing from those that you're looking to know about?

There is no special sauce in the PS4 that he can try to sell you in 10 different ways with ever-changing numbers.
 

thuway

Member
Can we get a master thread for MisterXmedia and SDF? This is the type of shit that truly cracks me up. Since finding out no Volanic Islands tech will be int he AMD GPU, he has posted this -

Misterx: Well, in that case Xbox One will be 1.31Tf console in people minds and sales will be low. Games will not make the justice because SDF will crush the media with brainwash and lie articles.
 
I am stoked for both consoles, but I think people will be surprised with what Microsoft pulls off with the Xbone. On paper though the PS4 should be a no brainer for multiplatform single player games. I will still go with Xbone for multiplayer games though because of Xbox Live.
 

Daishogun

Member
Seriously, the next person to use the term 'drivers' in a console thread may force me to gouge my eyes out. These aren't run of the mill PCs. 'Drivers' don't exist, there is no abstraction between the hardware and OS.
 

benny_a

extra source of jiggaflops
Seriously, the next person to use the term 'drivers' in a console thread may force me to gouge my eyes out. These aren't run of the mill PCs. 'Drivers' don't exist, there is no abstraction between the hardware and OS.
Andrew Goosen is writing asm all day long yo!

Alternative reply:

But Microsoft INVENTED DirectX!
 

kartu

Banned
Apparently this article is part of FUD campaign, but bazingas aside, those "reserved... for manufacturing CUs", is enabling them technically possible?

What I mean is, my understanding of the reason to have those CU is that sometimes you get faulty CUs, but normally not more than 2.

So if that's the case, how could you possible "enable 2 more CUs" on ALL Xbones? Were yields unexpectedly good?

That balance is what prevents XBO to be placed vertically...

It will "shift" the balance.

LOL
 
Very informative article. I don't see how you can get more in depth than that and would like to see Sony explain their design also. I feel much more confident in what Microsoft is doing with the X1 seeing how passionate these two guys are about their work. I still think there tardiness with optimal drivers for X1 has been their biggest hurdle lately though.

Part of the promise, so to speak was that this deep dive would also highlight points of direct comparison. No one doubts XB1 will be a technically competent console, but this only reason guns were pointed at Penello was because direct comparisons of power/performance were made with PS4, and that's why I at least, would had like to seen deep dives with what they know about PS4, technically.

It's unfortunate, though that this article, along with various previously shared details by Penello proved that they don't really know more than the basic spec details and leaked docs, or even if they do, they cannot outright reveal it, so it's kind of pointless to even make the comparison.

In terms of more details regarding their specs, it was always more welcome.
 

Durante

Member
Seriously, the next person to use the term 'drivers' in a console thread may force me to gouge my eyes out. These aren't run of the mill PCs. 'Drivers' don't exist, there is no abstraction between the hardware and OS.
There are probably at least 2 abstraction layers between a typical console game programmer and the graphics hardware.
 
I'd say this is one of the best snippets from the article and it makes very poor reading for Microsoft.

Fillrate is the area where Sony have their biggest advantage (they were straight up twice as fast before the recent clock bumps) so if Microsoft are bottlenecked here then it's a worst case scenario for Microsoft. It's an also an area that many people discounted based purely off current generation workloads (something I always felt was very naive at the time) and here we are with launch software painting a very different picture based off Microsoft's own internal tests.

Yes, buy the average reader isn't going to know this. Someone who doesn't dwell on forums will think they are reading something grand and mind blowing.
 

Guymelef

Member
Can we get a master thread for MisterXmedia and SDF? This is the type of shit that truly cracks me up. Since finding out no Volanic Islands tech will be int he AMD GPU, he has posted this -

Parasite Daily.Microsoft could still hide their secret after 27th and let PR dissaster to continue

AKA Let's the "insiders" joke continue for months.
 

Pain

Banned
Very informative article. I don't see how you can get more in depth than that and would like to see Sony explain their design also. I feel much more confident in what Microsoft is doing with the X1 seeing how passionate these two guys are about their work. I still think there tardiness with optimal drivers for X1 has been their biggest hurdle lately though.
Sony doesn't need the PR. The games will speak for themselves.
 

EagleEyes

Member
Part of the promise, so to speak was that this deep dive would also highlight points of direct comparison. No one doubts XB1 will be a technically competent console, but this only reason guns were pointed were Penello was because direct comparisons of power/performance were made with PS4, and that's why I at least, would had like to seen deep dives with what they know about PS4, technically.

It's unfortunate, though that this article, along with various previously shared details by Penello proved that they don't really know more than the basic spec details and leaked docs, or even if they do, they cannot outright reveal it, so it's kind of pointless to even make the comparison.

In terms of more details regarding their specs, it was always more welcome.
It sounds like from the article that Microsoft was just going by the leaked specs from VGLeaks as their basis for comparison. Like I said before I would love if Sony would go into more detail about their design. Sony has given us all these raw numbers but has yet to actually go into any details about them. I give Microsoft kudos at least for giving us more in depth explanation into there console design then Sony has so far.
 

Respawn

Banned
On the other hand the highest char poly count in Ryse is almost 4 times the one in KZ and there are more characters on screen as well. And Ryse lighting is 100% dynamic even their GI, which is pre baked on KZ...

I could go on and on, but my points is: You are constraining your comparison into a single spec, but there are lots of aspects where the goals and technologies from these two games differ, which means your performance compared is flawed because you are assuming everything they are doing is the same.
Oh my...
 

USC-fan

Banned
The last hope is gone! He sunk their battleship... he confirm xbone is based on sea island. Where do they go from here?
 
After reading this article:

- Not a single mention of the cloud. They've finally given up on the lie that it's going to improve graphical performance.

- People need to remember that multiple different devs have straight up admitted there is a noteworthy difference between these two consoles. At the end of the day you can listen to Microsoft spin and spin and spin all you want, but that doesn't change what some multiplatform devs (without any motive to lie) have said.

To clarify that, most developers either never comment on this stuff, or if they do, they say "they're comparable consoles etc, and our game will look the same on both", because they're really not supposed to say much due to NDA's, etc, and they never want to shit on one version of their game, as it's not good business.

However, some devs will be honest for a moment, and some have recently told us the truth. So in the end that's about all that matters to me. No amount of Microsoft tech talk is gonna change that.
 
Do You know how LoD works? Actually getting 2 meters from characters in KZ:SF decreases their polycount to 20k, 5 meters to 10k, 10 meters to 3.2k and at 15 meters to 800 polys.

You cant run LoD0 in any game all the time on characters.

===


Characters models are not only faces.
http://i3.minus.com/izttu8NyddV8N.png

"characters", not "character":

ryse_8.jpg
 

2MF

Member
Seriously, the next person to use the term 'drivers' in a console thread may force me to gouge my eyes out. These aren't run of the mill PCs. 'Drivers' don't exist, there is no abstraction between the hardware and OS.

Wrong. Are you from the 80s/90s? ;)

Heck, even the Nintendo 64 had abstraction layers (which is why the high-level emulation approach worked for its emulators).
 

EagleEyes

Member
Sony doesn't need the PR. The games will speak for themselves.
Thats the thing I don't get. These numbers leak on the internet about the X1 and the internet disagrees with them and calls the numbers BS and asks for a more in depth explanation for the designers themselves. Article comes out with a more detailed explanation from the designers and now its nothing more than a PR piece. At this point I don't think anything Microsoft does anymore is going to be taken as anything but PR.
 
Shots fired at you guys.



Interesting, I had never heard the Kinect skeletal computation system called Exemplar before. Also, latency. That should send GAF into a tizzy again.


Cool read.

Those are definitely some of the most interesting parts to me. The Kinect skeletal system and their insistence on the importance of latency for GPGPU for starters, but the real eye raiser for me was their experimenting with 2 extra CUs and determining that the 2 extra CUs were less effective at giving them more performance than the clock increase.

Had one of those "Ah ha!" moments, because I was literally talking with someone on this very site since earlier in the month telling them what I had heard about the possibility of MS going with 2 more extra compute units, or were at the least doing some kind of testing around it. I was pretty certain of its validity considering the source in question, but it was nice to hear more information about it in the article. And that scaler that can adapted on a per frame basis sounds mighty damn useful! A better scaler than the 360, which was pretty damn good, is music to the ears.

" We have a higher quality scaler than we had on Xbox 360. What this does is that we actually allow you to change the scaler parameters on a frame-by-frame basis."

The Move Engines help both the CPU and GPU, it seems, and SHAPE also, as suspected, seems to do work offloading the CPU. It's a pretty interesting architecture all things considered. Can't wait for a follow-up, which seemed to be hinted at regarding latency and GPGPU. I hope the stuff about the clock speed update on the CPU and the focus they seem to be placing on stable frame-rates hold true, because literally nothing would be more annoying than iffy framerate in games. And Microsoft is definitely going to be pushing pretty hard on dynamic resolutions, it seems, and if it helps ensure games perform great and don't miss a beat, I'm all for it. It fits perfectly with that DirectX 11.2 feature I was mentioning.
 

TrueGrime

Member
I am stoked for both consoles, but I think people will be surprised with what Microsoft pulls off with the Xbone. On paper though the PS4 should be a no brainer for multiplatform single player games. I will still go with Xbone for multiplayer games though because of Xbox Live.

After reading this article:

- Not a single mention of the cloud. They've finally given up on the lie that it's going to improve graphical performance.

- People need to remember that multiple different devs have straight up admitted there is a noteworthy difference between these two consoles. At the end of the day you can listen to Microsoft spin and spin and spin all you want, but that doesn't change what some multiplatform devs (without any motive to lie) have said.

To clarify that, most developers either never comment on this stuff, or if they do, they say "they're comparable consoles etc, and our game will look the same on both", because they're really not supposed to say much due to NDA's, etc, and they never want to shit on one version of their game, as it's not good business.

However, some devs will be honest for a moment, and some have recently told us the truth. So in the end that's about all that matters to me. No amount of Microsoft tech talk is gonna change that.

At the end of the day I'll simply play the games I enjoy playing without the console wars and spec wars.
 

Tycho_b

Member
It sounds like from the article that Microsoft was just going by the leaked specs from VGLeaks as their basis for comparison. Like I said before I would love if Sony would go into more detail about their design. Sony has given us all these raw numbers but has yet to actually go into any details about them. I give Microsoft kudos at least for giving us more in depth explanation into there console design then Sony has so far.

When You design something so complicated You need 10 page document to describe what it does. I don't think it's the case with PS4.
Almost everything was clearly laid out and explained already, in such a manner, that You can only laugh at 90% of effort MS is putting to spin the fact of having weaker hardware.
 

szaromir

Banned
It's cool to read that the ESRAM's effective bandwidth is 140-150GB/s. Once devs get a hold of the memory setup it should give decent results. Sony's system is superior still, but I thought that's a nice piece of news/
 
It sounds like from the article that Microsoft was just going by the leaked specs from VGLeaks as their basis for comparison. Like I said before I would love if Sony would go into more detail about their design. Sony has given us all these raw numbers but has yet to actually go into any details about them. I give Microsoft kudos at least for giving us more in depth explanation into there console design then Sony has so far.
Something like this?
http://www.gamasutra.com/view/feature/191007/inside_the_playstation_4_with_mark_.php

I thought Cerny had been doing the rounds for months now?
 

If that's accurate, then I stand corrected and acknowledge that I was wrong for doubting people on the matter. *awkward hug*

I'm sure the Tech Fellows are high-fiving every time they hear people say the same.

Kronks-Mission-Accomplished-Reaction-Gif.gif

Then they must be doing hand stands, because I'm loving all this info. It doesn't change the numbers, but it's hard not to be excited at all this information on the amount of work that's gone into putting the system together and helping it do its thing at various levels. If there's an ounce of truth to Microsoft's view that they were seeing in real games being developed that the CPU was a major limiting factor for frame rate, that the GPU clock boost was more effective than the 2 extra CUs, or even that the built in hardware support for dynamic resolution scaling is utilized as much and as effectively as they seem to be hoping, then at the very least stable performance should be quite common on the system, as it's hard for that to not be a concern. Dead Rising's framerate finally looks as if they really nailed the shit out of that game's performance judging by the PAX footage as well as the latest TGS impressions, and that game's performance concerned me the most.
 
The games will speak for themselves, it really is that simple. We will find out soon enough when Watchdogs, Battlefield 4 and other multiplat games that come out. They will be compared with great scrutiny. The exclusives like Drive Club and Forza 5 won't matter as much because gamers buy them to play on their respected hardware and comparing them on a technical level doesn't matter as much and is harder to do.
 

KidBeta

Junior Member
The Move Engines help both the CPU and GPU, it seems, and SHAPE also, as suspected, seems to do work offloading the CPU. It's a pretty interesting architecture all things considered. Can't wait for a follow-up, which seemed to be hinted at regarding latency and GPGPU. I hope the stuff about the clock speed update on the CPU and the focus they seem to be placing on stable frame-rates hold true, because literally nothing would be more annoying than iffy framerate in games. And Microsoft is definitely going to be pushing pretty hard on dynamic resolutions, it seems, and if it helps ensure games perform great and don't miss a beat, I'm all for it. It fits perfectly with that DirectX 11.2 feature I was mentioning.

You mean the DMA controllers right? I'd wanna hope they have some of those :p.
 
Contextualize good, when the article presented is clearly slanted to present the XBox One in a good light.

More information is always better than less. No one really expects MS to be brutally honest or unbiased in the presentation in the first place.

As for the presentation, well, it's for the readers to read between the lines and take note of the stuff excluded from the presentation.
 
At the end of the day I'll simply play the games I enjoy playing without the console wars and spec wars.

Well thanks for that input. I'll be doing the same, but I'll be buying those games on the PS4 because I want to enjoy my favorite games with the best possible performance.
 
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