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Wii U Speculation Thread of Brains Beware: Wii U Re-Unveiling At E3 2012

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Or you can register the nickname from the people you just played with and the system should know the underlying FC that is attached to it.
What if I want to add them so I CAN play with them to begin with.... I still don't know my friend code on my 3DS, I'd have to look that shit up every time I wanted to give it to someone. But my other tags I can whip out any moment, PyroX4. There it is. So short. So simple. Let ME HAVE IT. PS none of you better take that to stiff me.

But yeah I don't care how they get around the tediousness of codes, as long as there is a way.
 

BurntPork

Banned
Well looking briefly at the history of POWER and PowerPC, maybe the "PC" part of it is the key. "Power" is an acronym that means the same for both, and the "PC" stands for Personal Computing. Maybe the CPU for Wii U gains the PowerPC label because of its use, even though it comes from what we believe to be POWER7 which is used for commercial purposes? I say that since it seems the main divergence at the beginning was due to the way the chips were initially used. Since Wii U isn't a server, they wouldn't call it a POWER CPU. That's my take on it so far.

The "PC" stands for "Performance Computing."

When you guys have your tech discussions that probably fly over the head of most users, could you be so kind and end every post with the current rating of the hypothetical hardware in the Wii U from a scale of 1 to 10?

1 is awful, Wii equivalent, and 10 is awesome, capable of running Samaritan without any compromises.

Thanks!

-5, two N64s duct taped
 
The "PC" stands for "Performance Computing."

Yeah, I was thinking "Personal" as I was typing that since that was the original purpose of that line.

When you guys have your tech discussions that probably fly over the head of most users, could you be so kind and end every post with the current rating of the hypothetical hardware in the Wii U from a scale of 1 to 10?

1 is awful, Wii equivalent, and 10 is awesome, capable of running Samaritan without any compromises.

Thanks!

That's a pretty extreme range. If we used that, I'd guess a 5 or 6. But at the same time the gap between 6 and 4 is probably pretty big considering what you've identified as 1 and 10.
 

Shanadeus

Banned
Yeah, I was thinking "Personal" as I was typing that since that was the original purpose of that line.



That's a pretty extreme range. If we used that, I'd guess a 5 or 6. But at the same time the gap between 6 and 4 is probably pretty big considering what you've identified as 1 and 10.

Hm, good point.

Okay, Xbox360 is 1 on that scale and something capable of fully running Samaritian at 1080p60f is a 10.
 
Hm, good point.

Okay, Xbox360 is 1 on that scale and something capable of fully running Samaritian at 1080p60f is a 10.

Still wouldn't change that much IMO.

How about this:

PS360 = 1, my expected PS4/Xbox3 specs = 10

Wii U = 5. Can reach 7, maybe 8, depending on what the final GPU looks like.
 

Caramello

Member
What if I want to add them so I CAN play with them to begin with.... I still don't know my friend code on my 3DS, I'd have to look that shit up every time I wanted to give it to someone. But my other tags I can whip out any moment, PyroX4. There it is. So short. So simple. Let ME HAVE IT. PS none of you better take that to stiff me.

But yeah I don't care how they get around the tediousness of codes, as long as there is a way.

It might end up like this:

Wii U universal profile code: 1234 1234 1234 1234
Origin ID: PyroX4
Steam ID: PyroX4

So adding the friend code would add your friend to origin and steam and whatever other online services are available but just adding the origin or steam username would only register the person you're adding to that particular service.

That's if Nintendo are going down that path and I really hope they are..
 
It might end up like this:

Wii U universal profile code: 1234 1234 1234 1234
Origin ID: PyroX4
Steam ID: PyroX4

So adding the friend code would add your friend to origin and steam and whatever other online services are available but just adding the origin or steam username would only register the person you're adding to that particular service.

That's if Nintendo are going down that path and I really hope they are..
would be nice if you could just search "PyroX4" and it will add that friend code. But then they'd have to make it one nickname per user for that to work.
 

Yagharek

Member
It might end up like this:

Wii U universal profile code: 1234 1234 1234 1234
Origin ID: PyroX4
Steam ID: PyroX4

So adding the friend code would add your friend to origin and steam and whatever other online services are available but just adding the origin or steam username would only register the person you're adding to that particular service.

That's if Nintendo are going down that path and I really hope they are..

That's a good way of doing it. I just hope users arent required to sign up to third party online services at a system level. I mean, fair enough, if you want to play Fifa online you need an EA account. But I don't want to ever have to have an EA account as I wont be buying any of their games.

If that makes sense.
 

Caramello

Member
That's a good way of doing it. I just hope users arent required to sign up to third party online services at a system level. I mean, fair enough, if you want to play Fifa online you need an EA account. But I don't want to ever have to have an EA account as I wont be buying any of their games.

If that makes sense.

I'd imagine Nintendo wouldn't force that on people. They may simply have a store front for each service which you need to create an account for if you want to buy games from.

Or for example if you buy FIFA you'd need to sign up for Origin on the start screen if you haven't signed in/signed up at the store front.

I'd imagine they'd make it easy to sign up for the other services too when creating a Wii U account but it wouldn't be compulsory.



Wii U

Technical Specs:
- 3-core POWER7-based 3.5Ghz
- 640-800 ALUs (don't know which architecture) 600-800Mhz
- 1.5GB GDDR5, 32MB eMemory

Features:
- Pretty much known
- "Full-fledged" online component
- Some Kinect-type functionality in the controller

Launch Details:
- Jul. 2012 Japan (Rest of the world by Sep. 2012)
- E3 2011 announcement :p
- $349 ($329 minimum)


I think Nintendo are going to try to get the console on shelves for $299 and I also think they'll go for a worldwide launch like all of their modern systems. 640 ALUs is probably the sweet spot. I could have seen $349 prior to the 3DS launch but not now.
 

Yagharek

Member
I'd imagine Nintendo wouldn't force that on people. They may simply have a store front for each service which you need to create an account for if you want to buy games from.

Or for example if you buy FIFA you'd need to sign up for Origin on the start screen if you haven't signed in/signed up at the store front.

I'd imagine they'd make it easy to sign up for the other services too when creating a Wii U account but it wouldn't be compulsory.

Yeah thats the kind of setup I would find acceptable.
 
I think Nintendo are going to try to get the console on shelves for $299 and I also think they'll go for a worldwide launch like all of their modern systems. 640 ALUs is probably the sweet spot. I could have seen $349 prior to the 3DS launch but not now.

I don't see them reaching that point. I see them including other "cheap" stuff to justify a $329+ price point over trying to reach $299. I don't believe they have the flexibility to sell at $300 thanks in part to the controller.
 

Shanadeus

Banned
I don't see them reaching that point. I see them including other "cheap" stuff to justify a $329+ price point over trying to reach $299. I don't believe they have the flexibility to sell at $300 thanks in part to the controller.

$329 with a pack in game, demos, SD-card, and so on if we're going by the 3DS.
 

Caramello

Member
I don't see them reaching that point. I see them including other "cheap" stuff to justify a $329+ price point over trying to reach $299. I don't believe they have the flexibility to sell at $300 thanks in part to the controller.

Depends on how much you think it costs Nintendo to make.

I'd imagine the system costs around $200, the Wii U controller might be around $45, Wii Remote and Nunchuk is about $15, accessories such as controller cradle, cables, sensor bar etc should only be $20 right? So the whole package would cost Nintendo around $280 and if you add the cost of labor, packaging and shipping they'd be breaking even at $299.99.

That's my dodgy maths anyway.. How much do you think they'd budget for the console with the specs you expect?

EDIT: Remember with Wii and DS, Nintendo tried to hold its price for as long as possible. Iwata has stated that he isn't a fan of constantly changing the price of a product as it encourages people to wait for a price drop. I just feel that Nintendo will try to go for $299 and hold there for as long as possible. It'd certainly have a massive first holiday at that price and garner solid support before the arrival of the PS4/next gen XBOX
 

sfried

Member
Depends on how much you think it costs Nintendo to make.

I'd imagine the system costs around $200, the Wii U controller might be around $45, Wii Remote and Nunchuk is about $15, accessories such as controller cradle, cables, sensor bar etc should only be $20 right? So the whole package would cost Nintendo around $280 and if you add the cost of labor, packaging and shipping they'd be breaking even at $299.99.

That's my dodgy maths anyway.. How much do you think they'd budget for the console with the specs you expect?
I'd expect them to ship with the console and one U Controller, price it at $249.99 and call it a day if they feel they need to push it like the 3DS price drop.
I just feel that Nintendo will try to go for $299 and hold there for as long as possible. It'd certainly have a massive first holiday at that price and garner solid support before the arrival of the PS4/next gen XBOX
This is also one of the main reason why I feel "They have to go $300 or less otherwise nobody would want to buy one". Considering the burn they experienced from the 3DS launch, they would want to make it a sustainable yet attractive price that they wouldn't need to drop in quite a while.
$329 with a pack in game, demos, SD-card, and so on if we're going by the 3DS.
Pre-price drop 3DS or post-price drop 3DS?
 
Depends on how much you think it costs Nintendo to make.

I'd imagine the system costs around $200, the Wii U controller might be around $45, Wii Remote and Nunchuk is about $15, accessories such as controller cradle, cables, sensor bar etc should only be $20 right? So the whole package would cost Nintendo around $280 and if you add the cost of labor, packaging and shipping they'd be breaking even at $299.99.

That's my dodgy maths anyway.. How much do you think they'd budget for the console with the specs you expect?

Haha. Iwata wouldn't say they are considering selling it at a loss if it cost them that much. I mentioned a couple pages ago that I think it's somewhere between $340 and $370 for hardware (system and controller). They could include a Wiimote and a Wii U Sports-type game to "justify" the retail cost, while in reality they would be losing some money on it.
 

Caramello

Member
Haha. Iwata wouldn't say they are considering selling it at a loss if it cost them that much. I mentioned a couple pages ago that I think it's somewhere between $340 and $370 for hardware (system and controller). They could include a Wiimote and a Wii U Sports-type game to "justify" the retail cost, while in reality they would be losing some money on it.

So you think they're budgeting around $250 on the console alone then? I can't imagine the package costing them much more than $300 though.. It's not like Nintendo to have no room to move on price, especially when it's launching at such a high price in Nintendo terms.
 
So you think they're budgeting around $250 on the console alone then? I can't imagine the package costing them much more than $300 though.. It's not like Nintendo to have no room to move on price, especially when it's launching at such a high price in Nintendo terms.

Around $300 actually. I see the controller around $50 min. But this is also partially influenced by the first report that it could retail between 350 and 400.
 

Caramello

Member
Around $300 actually. I see the controller around $50 min. But this is also partially influenced by the first report that it could retail between 350 and 400.

That first report was made before the 3DS fiasco though and Nintendo had a very large margin on that system at launch. It's making a slight loss now at $170 when it launched for $250. They had even said they had spoken about launching the Wii for $299.99. Nintendo could have quite easily launched Wii U at $399.99 while making a profit of around $80 - $100 per system had the 3DS exploded at launch and the Wii U had been more well received at E3 this year.

You really can't take that first report into account, and if you do you have to see it as having a healthy profit at that price.
 
Children!! All we really know about the processor is that it can run Power instructions, or emulate them fast enough to emulate the Wii's processor, and it's being built by IBM. Actually we don't know that. They could just throw in a Broadway and otherwise dump the architecture, but that's really unlikely.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Power_Architecture#Specifications

Anything past that is rumor and/or speculation.

If you want to speculate, I highly suggest digging for lists of processors that run one Power ISA or another and extrapolate from there.

EDIT: And if there were any doubt, I still favor the 476FP core and the PowerPC A2 core as candidates for the basis of the processor for the Wii U. They're low wattage and can be highly parallel.
 
That first report was made before the 3DS fiasco though and Nintendo had a very large margin on that system at launch. It's making a slight loss now at $170 when it launched for $250. They had even said they had spoken about launching the Wii for $299.99. Nintendo could have quite easily launched Wii U at $399.99 while making a profit of around $80 - $100 per system had the 3DS exploded at launch and the Wii U had been more well received at E3 this year.

You really can't take that first report into account, and if you do you have to see it as having a healthy profit at that price.

That first report was supposedly based on those who had seen the BOM of the hardware. Unless we are seeing a hardware change (which I don't expect) to lower the manufacturing cost, there's not going to be too much of a price reduction on the retail side. There's quite a bit going on inside that console from what I see. It can't be compared to the 3DS and especially Wii when it comes to the hardware cost IMO.
 

BurntPork

Banned
Children!! All we really know about the processor is that it can run Power instructions, or emulate them fast enough to emulate the Wii's processor, and it's being built by IBM. Actually we don't know that. They could just throw in a Broadway and otherwise dump the architecture, but that's really unlikely.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Power_Architecture#Specifications

Anything past that is rumor and/or speculation.

If you want to speculate, I highly suggest digging for lists of processors that run one Power ISA or another and extrapolate from there.

EDIT: And if there were any doubt, I still favor the 476FP core and the PowerPC A2 core as candidates for the basis of the processor for the Wii U. They're low wattage and can be highly parallel.

I don't think that the 476FP has SMT.

(Someone quote this; he has me on ignore)
 
^ I just said the same thing so you're covered.

Children!! All we really know about the processor is that it can run Power instructions, or emulate them fast enough to emulate the Wii's processor, and it's being built by IBM. Actually we don't know that. They could just throw in a Broadway and otherwise dump the architecture, but that's really unlikely.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Power_Architecture#Specifications

Anything past that is rumor and/or speculation.

If you want to speculate, I highly suggest digging for lists of processors that run one Power ISA or another and extrapolate from there.

EDIT: And if there were any doubt, I still favor the 476FP core and the PowerPC A2 core as candidates for the basis of the processor for the Wii U. They're low wattage and can be highly parallel.

Well there's not much to the Power ISA aspect as I was looking at that earlier and both the POWER7 and PowerPC A2 are Power ISA v.2.06 compliant. So that angle does nothing.

And I won't rule those two out, but I don't favor them. The 476FP is like the Cortex-A9 and doesn't have SMT, while the A2 is in-order and only seems to have 4-way SMT.
 
^ I just said the same thing so you're covered.



Well there's not much to the Power ISA aspect as I was looking at that earlier and both the POWER7 and PowerPC A2 are Power ISA v.2.06 compliant. So that angle does nothing.

And I won't rule those two out, but I don't favor them. The 476FP is like the Cortex-A9 and doesn't have SMT, while the A2 is in-order and only seems to have 4-way SMT.

Forget the A2 then.

I still like the 476FP......
50 Watts is what I figure to be the max power budget for the CPU. At 1.6W per 1.6ghz core, it could be argued that a lot of cores could be included in that power budget.
 

Kenka

Member
I expect Nintendo to fuck up. Well, we all do, no ?

I think specs depend on what the developers want in each beast. In the current market climate, no manufacturer has a clear advantage I think. They will probably all go for a affordable machine that can appeal to the masses, which means 350$-ish manufacturing costs sold at a slightly lower price.
 

AzaK

Member
That's a good way of doing it. I just hope users arent required to sign up to third party online services at a system level. I mean, fair enough, if you want to play Fifa online you need an EA account. But I don't want to ever have to have an EA account as I wont be buying any of their games.

If that makes sense.
I sure hope we only have to have 1 login for the entire system when buying stuff. Having to log into Steam, Origin and maybe Wii U separately would be absolutely terrible. I also imagine that there's overlap on the stores with software being on both which would confuse people. I would think Nintendo would want to avoid headaches for consumers.
 

Yagharek

Member
I sure hope we only have to have 1 login for the entire system when buying stuff. Having to log into Steam, Origin and maybe Wii U separately would be absolutely terrible. I also imagine that there's overlap on the stores with software being on both which would confuse people. I would think Nintendo would want to avoid headaches for consumers.

That too, but I'm just concerned EA are trying to muscle in and force their infrastructure on everyone. I want nothing to do with them, and based on comments from EA (Moore in particular) I'm quite eager for more details from Nintendo to assuage my fears.
 

lherre

Accurate
What are you expectations on the Wii U vs. the competitions...a half the power? A third? A fuzzy number which does not violate any NDA's? lol

It is soon to judge this to be honest. It is difficult to calculate the performance of any of this machines right now and more difficult to compare them.

But I think nintendo will be behind again, but I don't know the size of the step.
 

DCKing

Member
Wii U Cpu is based in Power PC arquitecture, not more not less. Arquitecture is the important word here.
What is a PowerPC? Is it a POWER3 (Wii,G4) or POWER4 (G5) based chip, or is it a lean in-order tiny processor core? Being a 'PowerPC' could mean anything Power-related...
 

AniHawk

Member
I expect the Wii U specs to basically be almost exactly half that of the competition.

i think sony and microsoft will be handcuffed in different ways. sony due to costs (they've been bleeding for many years and need to turn shit around), and microsoft due to costs (for the same reasons, even though they can afford it), but also because they can't have their systems melt themselves again.
 

lherre

Accurate
i think sony and microsoft will be handcuffed in different ways. sony due to costs (they've been bleeding for many years and need to turn shit around), and microsoft due to costs (for the same reasons, even though they can afford it), but also because they can't have their systems melt themselves again.

And I will repeat (third time I think) that this time, Sony for example won't have Cell or Blu-ray costs-i+d that were the main problem in the costs of ps3 and its crazy design.

Make a powerful machine (in theory) will be easier if you cut this costs now.

But we will see.
 
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