• Hey, guest user. Hope you're enjoying NeoGAF! Have you considered registering for an account? Come join us and add your take to the daily discourse.

Xbox boss says hardware analysis between consoles is “meaningless”

W

werks

Banned
EvB said:
You do realise that Gaikai is actually a selection of patented browser plugins for low latency video encoding/decoding?

It actually has nothing to do with Servers or graphics cards or whatnot.
That was just one thing that the patents can deliver, the purchase of Gaikai is more than likely going to be used to stream Sony games to Sony TVs.
Click to expand...
What did the video encoding/decoding plugins do? Decode video of games running on a server and play it to a client? Take client input and play the game on the server?

So you want us to believe that gaikai can run an entire game on its server but can't be used for dedicated servers?
 
R

Raymo

Member
werks said:
What did the video encoding/decoding plugins do? Decode video of games running on a server and play it to a client? Take client input and play the game on the server?

So you want us to believe that gaikai can run an entire game on its server but can't be used for dedicated servers?
Click to expand...

The reason gaikai was worth anything is because they could do encoding and decoding efficiently. Having servers is nothing special and just part of the pipeline. The valuable technology that was purchased was the patents regarding the fast encoding and decoding of video. That's why they said gaikai technology is built into the PS4 in February . You can't build the cloud servers into the PS4, that wouldn't make sense. So, you can assume gaikai means the encoding/decoding streaming technology.
 
A

Argyle

Member
badb0y said:
This is correct to a certain point. Once the resolution gets high enough it's starts taking a toll on the VRAM (or in this case the unified memory pool) but if a game was running 1080p at 60 FPS at 4 GB going to 8 GB will not help the frame rate at all on the other hand if a game was running at 1080p with 30 FPS and the VRAM was tapped out at 4GB than adding VRAM definitely helps the framerate.

A good way to see this is with the multi-monitor setups people have or the new 4K displays. Most of the current gen cards run out of VRAM before the processing power is tapped out. Take a look at these benchmarks http://www.anandtech.com/show/7120/some-quick-gaming-numbers-at-4k-max-settings , you can see that in a lot of these benchmarks the 7950 performs better than a GTX 680 even though GTX 680 is the faster card, the reason that is happening is the 2 GB VRAM is too little to drive those resolutions.

Back to the PS4, I don't think we will have VRAM problems until the GPU starts doing some heavy duty compute processing. Cerny said in his presentation that they specifically made the RAM easy to work with so developers don't have to feel like they are solving a puzzle. On the other hand Sony doesn't want the console to stop evolving within the first few years so they beefed up the GPU so that the developers who want to go the extra mile have an option to push the system further. Cerny specifically mentioned modifications to the GPU was to make the compute performance stronger.

As for going to 8 GB over 4 GB of RAM, Sony should absolutely thank Gearbox for talking some sense into them. With only 4 GB of RAM I think Sony's console would have been tapped out in ~2 years. Some games on the PC are already pushing VRAM usage to 3 GB+. I know BF3 and Skyrim with mods has some really high VRAM usage and those games bring even the strongest systems to their knees.

I have no idea what the Xbox One has planned because they are so secretive about their consoles specifications.
Click to expand...

This is kind of a PC specific thing, though. The reason why is that if a game tries to use more VRAM than the card actually has, I'm pretty sure it will pull the missing data from main memory over the (slow) PCI-Express bus, causing slowdown.

On a console not only is this bus missing, but the only place to get the data if it doesn't fit in memory is from disk - and pretty much no one is gonna ship a game that doesn't fit in memory on a retail box. So the first case (1080p30 but slowing down because not enough memory) is not a situation that you'd start with on console - it would either be like 1fps (since it is paging to disk) or 0fps (crashed because it's out of memory).
 
mckmas8808

mckmas8808

Mckmaster uses MasterCard to buy Slave drives
Okay guys, so what exactly is compute in today's GPUs? And what will they be used for in practical terms in the PS4 and Xbone?
 
K

Kung Fu Grip

Banned
Kung Fu Grip said:
Upgraded specs are being talked about again on B3D. When is everyone going to learn to let this go? I thought we were past that stage? It's getting desperate now.

Do people really think MS can make such drastic changes this late? I see 12GB RAM and higher clock speeds mentioned. :lol.
Click to expand...

People have officially gone bonkers! Now we have new "sources".

http://beyond3d.com/showpost.php?p=1762521&postcount=4518

thats-funny.gif


KuGsj.gif
 
S

specialguy

Banned
so we go from downclock confirmed to now talking about upclocks/spec increases for xb1? ...next we will hear about ps4 downclocks confirmed if the trend hold haha that's hilarious
 
AgentP

AgentP

Thinks mods influence posters politics. Promoted to QAnon Editor.
I wish the B3D mods had the balls to call the fake insiders out, but they like the misinformation. Reality doesn't favor MS.
 
Lactose_Intolerant

Lactose_Intolerant

Member
I H8 Memes said:
Heh.

Wasnt B3D at one point a respectable site? I've never visited the site before now but it has been around for awhile and I think it used to be spoken of highly..
Click to expand...

Yes, I stopped going there when the owner got a job at ATI/AMD. It had a lot of people that knew their shit back in the day.
 
F

Freki

Member
specialguy said:
so we go from downclock confirmed to now talking about upclocks/spec increases for xb1? ...next we will hear about ps4 downclocks confirmed if the trend hold haha that's hilarious
Click to expand...

Not nearly as hilarious as this:
specialguy said:
So if the ESRAM BW is now 192 GB/s, at times XB1 has 260 GB/s BW feeding 1.2 TF.

When you compare that to 176 GB/s feeding 1.8 TF, the XB1 can have more than double the bandwidth per flop as PS4...

XB1=260 GB/s/1.2 teraflops= 216 GB/s/TF

PS4=176/1.8=98 GB/s/TF
Click to expand...
 
T

The Librarian

Banned
I don't think Microsoft should be saying that Sony is wasting their time spouting off numbers when they have been doing the same thing with the Cloud and however many servers they have now for their games.

I wouldn't say hardware analysis between consoles is meaningless, but in the long run I don't think it has ever mattered if console X was more powerful than console Y. If I had to guess, I'd say the average Joe couldn't tell the difference between Microsoft's best-looking game and Sony's. As long as they can tell the graphics have improved from the previous generation, they're not going to hassle over the specs. That's why they're playing consoles – so they don't have to worry about that kind of stuff. What really draws them to a console is what their friends have and the games they're interested in.
 
D

dofry

That's "Dr." dofry to you.
You've all been reading the original comment wrong.

Xbone specs are lower than of the PS4. Meaning less. Hahaha...haha...ha. I'll go back to my corner now.
 
C

CLEEK

Member
EvB said:
You do realise that Gaikai is actually a selection of patented browser plugins for low latency video encoding/decoding?

It actually has nothing to do with Servers or graphics cards or whatnot.
That was just one thing that the patents can deliver, the purchase of Gaikai is more than likely going to be used to stream Sony games to Sony TVs.
Click to expand...

You do realise that Gaikia runs from servers, in datacentres. You know, like everything else in the cloud. Before Gaikia was bought by Sony, they already had their own datacentre.

The hardware side is as much a part of Gaikia as the software/streaming/encoding tech.
 
U

Unknown Soldier

Member
I H8 Memes said:
Heh.

Wasnt B3D at one point a respectable site? I've never visited the site before now but it has been around for awhile and I think it used to be spoken of highly..
Click to expand...

Beyond3D drank the MS Kool-Aid and went straight to hell. A shocking repeat of what happened to AVS Forum during the circa-2005/2006 HD optical disc format war that Blu-ray won. Lessons not learned.
 
F

Fergie

Banned
SPE said:
You do realise that Gaikia runs from servers, in datacentres. You know, like everything else in the cloud. Before Gaikia was bought by Sony, they already had their own datacentre.

The hardware side is as much a part of Gaikia as the software/streaming/encoding tech.
Click to expand...
It's supposedly in this article - http://m.joystiq.com/2010/03/11/gaikai-will-be-fee-free-utilize-300-data-centers-in-the-us/
Although its quite old (2010, also can't find any other sources.), the situation is probably much different now with Sony's backing.
 
S

Spongebob

Banned
specialguy said:
uh oh, did u guys see this about infamous second son from b3d? (framebuffer analysis)\




it's kind of off topic but this seems to be the degenerate talk/compare next gen hardware thread anyway so i shoved it here. maybe somebody else wanna put it in some old infamous 2nd son thread they find.

so a sub 1080 game.

people may cry about this but realistically, it's a ton better than 720p. I for one will be happy with that next gen.
Click to expand...
HAHAHA

He was talking about GT6.....Looks at the images he quoted..

Read carefully before you post.

specialguy said:
oops, wrong.
Click to expand...
You're agenda is pretty clear.
 
C

Cidd

Member
specialguy
Banned
(Today, 09:29 PM)


good riddance I really hope it's permanent, I've never met anyone more delusional Jesus Christ.
 
T

TheD

The Detective
Raymo said:
The reason gaikai was worth anything is because they could do encoding and decoding efficiently. Having servers is nothing special and just part of the pipeline. The valuable technology that was purchased was the patents regarding the fast encoding and decoding of video. That's why they said gaikai technology is built into the PS4 in February . You can't build the cloud servers into the PS4, that wouldn't make sense. So, you can assume gaikai means the encoding/decoding streaming technology.
Click to expand...

Well the fact that the encoding is done by x.264 using features that the x.264 devs themselves put in means that it would not patents.
 
C

CLEEK

Member
Of course the hardware side part of Gaikia is important. To ensure compatibility, scalability and cost-effectiveness, as well as balance power usage. The choice and configuration of back-end hardware is a massive piece of the puzzle. The hardware side is one reason why Gaikai flourished and OnLive crashed and burned. OnLive didn't have a sustainable, scalable hardware platform, so they bled money.

Question: how do you think they will achieve PS3 game streaming? Just use any old server?
 
T

TheCloser

Banned
Raymo said:
The reason gaikai was worth anything is because they could do encoding and decoding efficiently. Having servers is nothing special and just part of the pipeline. The valuable technology that was purchased was the patents regarding the fast encoding and decoding of video. That's why they said gaikai technology is built into the PS4 in February . You can't build the cloud servers into the PS4, that wouldn't make sense. So, you can assume gaikai means the encoding/decoding streaming technology.
Click to expand...

Wrong.
 
Melchiah

Melchiah

Member
charsace said:
There isn't a big enough technology gap between the systems for this to happen.
Click to expand...

If people chose the 360 for multiplatforms, and played mostly only exclusives on the PS3, the same is likely to happen next gen in favor of the PS4. Especially if the differences will be greater than they were then, like the released and leaked specs suggest.
 
vpance

vpance

Member
Unknown Soldier said:
Beyond3D drank the MS Kool-Aid and went straight to hell. A shocking repeat of what happened to AVS Forum during the circa-2005/2006 HD optical disc format war that Blu-ray won. Lessons not learned.
Click to expand...

What is up with that board? It's like a safe haven for delusional Xbox lovers like specialguy now.
 
A

Applecot

Member
Raymo said:
The reason gaikai was worth anything is because they could do encoding and decoding efficiently. Having servers is nothing special and just part of the pipeline. The valuable technology that was purchased was the patents regarding the fast encoding and decoding of video. That's why they said gaikai technology is built into the PS4 in February . You can't build the cloud servers into the PS4, that wouldn't make sense. So, you can assume gaikai means the encoding/decoding streaming technology.
Click to expand...

Intro to Gaikai is: Cloud based computing service.

It might be true that they developed some amazing encode/decode tech, but ultimately that is backed by servers. And while their servers are ordinary it's the tech behind those servers that makes it.
 
B

Brad Grenz

Member
AgentP said:
I wish the B3D mods had the balls to call the fake insiders out, but they like the misinformation. Reality doesn't favor MS.
Click to expand...

vpance said:
What is up with that board? It's like a safe haven for delusional Xbox lovers like specialguy now.
Click to expand...

Yeah, it's basically the last place on the internet where it's safe for a delusional Xbot fanboy circle jerk. Fantasy scenarios that have been debunked for months keep "popping up" as new "rumors", guys like Rangers and Cyan have a bad habit of making posts there to repost here as "rumors" and vice-versa, or they will drag statements like those Alberto made in this thread that were eviscerated as preposterous FUD and repost them on B3D as "proof" of a secret upgrade. The hilarious part is this cabal of clowns still think B3D has a Sony bias because occasionally I, or one of two or three other posters will deign to challenge their hysterics with factual counter arguments. And somehow I'm the one who keeps getting infractions from the mods for trolling or insulting other members.

And the dumbest part is the impossible upgrades they keep dreaming about wouldn't even make up half the deficit between the Xbox One and the PS4. The ESRAM could be a thousand times faster, but the rest of the system has no way to read or write enough for it to make a difference. Another 4GBs of RAM in a weird asymmetrical configuration would actually make the system slower, and the RAM is already too slow to ever make effective use of the added capacity. Oh, and cutting the GPU processing difference from 600GFlops to 500GFlops is probably the most pointless gesture ever conceived.
 
F

FINALBOSS

Banned
Raymo said:
The reason gaikai was worth anything is because they could do encoding and decoding efficiently. Having servers is nothing special and just part of the pipeline. The valuable technology that was purchased was the patents regarding the fast encoding and decoding of video. That's why they said gaikai technology is built into the PS4 in February . You can't build the cloud servers into the PS4, that wouldn't make sense. So, you can assume gaikai means the encoding/decoding streaming technology.
Click to expand...


Can't build cloud servers into the PS4...LOL.

It's just the transmission and receiving of data. You think the Xbone has some special "cloud" chip?
 
E

ElTorro

I wanted to dominate the living room. Then I took an ESRAM in the knee.
Brad Grenz said:
Yeah, it's basically the last place on the internet where it's safe for a delusional Xbot fanboy circle jerk.
Click to expand...

I find the fallacious reasoning funny. "Possible" evolves into "probable" and finally into "proven" without any reliable evidence whatsoever.
 
J

jhmtehgamr20xx

Banned
Albert Penello said:
Given the rumored specs for both systems, can anyone conceive of a circumstance or decision one platform holder could make, where despite the theoretical performance benchmarks of the components, the box that appears “weaker” could actually be more powerful?
Click to expand...
Of course; an exclusive game that takes advantage of every trick in the system. For you guys it could be Quantum Break. For Sony it could be Infamous. Artistry has and always will count too.

It's been that way since the dawn of consoles tho. I'm trusting XBO will have many games that look better than PS4 titles due to artistry, and vice-versa for PS4.

But the specs are there, and even those most knowledgeable of tech here on the forums (aka not me) who are the most level-headed and non-biased, still give the raw edge to PS4.
 
You must log in or register to reply here.

Similar threads

A handheld Xbox? Microsoft’s gaming chief can’t stop thinking about it
2 3
113
5K
Reallink replied
Xbox going OEM route for next-gen? 3rd party consoles in the making?
Rumor 6 7 8 9 10
493
31K
TheDreadLord replied
"Xbox Not Moving Away from Physical Games" says Phil Spencer
News Platform 2 3
130
6K
mckmas8808 replied
[Jez Corden] If Microsoft really IS bringing Steam, Epic Game Store, etc. to Xbox consoles, it needs to answer these big questions
2 3 4
155
8K
sachos replied
What will the next generation of Xbox be like?
Hardware Hype 2 3
133
4K
Topher replied
Top Bottom