Developer: PS3 = 360, no to Wii

[Abulia]

Stolen from DailyTech (http://www.dailytech.com/article.aspx?newsid=4847):

Denis Dyack is the president of Canadian-based developer Silicon Knights. The developer previously had close ties with Nintendo, developing Eternal Darkness: Sanity's Requiem and Metal Gear Solid: The Twin Snakes for the GameCube, before going with Microsoft's platform to develop its Too Human trilogy.

"The 360 and the PS 3 are equal in power in my eyes. Maybe the PS 3 has more processing power. The 360 has more available memory. It's pretty much a net, net," Dyack said in an interview with The Mercury News. "The public perception of the PS 3 was that it was much more powerful. To developers, they look even."

Dyack did say that there could be more potential in the PlayStation 3 architecture, but timing it so that all the cell processors work together efficiently is the greatest challenge.

On the topic of high-definition gaming, Dyack adds, "It is questionable if there is a difference between 1080P and 720P. All of our games are likely to be 720P because of the faster refresh rates. There are all kinds of trade-offs. It takes a lot more RAM to do 1080P. You'll reserve RAM for the textures. 720P is just less pixels. There is definitely a huge difference from 720P and analog."

His statement about 720p leaves Nintendo's console out of the running for Silicon Knights, as the developer isn't even exploring the Wii at the present time.

For Dyack's company, the question is down to Microsoft vs. Sony.

"It's a tough one. Microsoft is looking really good. Everyone is looking pretty good. At the beginning, everyone thought Sony would walk away with it. We won't know for sure for two years."

If memory serves, this is pretty much what GFLPraxis (and others) have been saying all along. So, kudos to them.

Discuss, berate, flame, invalidate or whatever floats your boat.

[raggedjimmi]

Twin Snakes was a nice remake and Eternal Darkness was an alright game (though never pushed enough to finish it). Good developer but with Prime 3, TP and Smash Bros Brawl coming out I don't care what happens to much else in the gaming world :D

I can't stand all this resolution jazz though. As the developer says - there are trade offs. Please someone wake me up when games consoles are running fluid in 1080p. when it's the damn standard.

[zero2dash]

Please someone wake me up when games consoles are running fluid in 1080p. when it's the damn standard.

It probably never will be; eventually people will get bored with 1080p and electronics companies will want to pack their wallets further, and then the new "standard" will be 1400p (or something) and we'll see a mass exodus of people buying new tvs and media players to get back on the "cutting edge". :)

[Abulia]

It probably never will be; eventually people will get bored with 1080p and electronics companies will want to pack their wallets further, and then the new "standard" will be 1400p (or something) and we'll see a mass exodus of people buying new tvs and media players to get back on the "cutting edge". :)
/me raises hand.

"My name is Abulia and I am a tech whore." ;)

Hopefully once the push to digital is complete (a decade from now?) things will be easier. This transition we're in right now is rough, trying to move from analog to digital.

[MacRumorUser]

Technology is constantly evolving.

As for the usual PS3/360/Wii arguments. I'm sick of hearing them at this stage.


:o

In communist ideology. All consoles would be treated equally ......

[greatdevourer]

It probably never will be; eventually people will get bored with 1080p and electronics companies will want to pack their wallets further, and then the new "standard" will be 1400p (or something) and we'll see a mass exodus of people buying new tvs and media players to get back on the "cutting edge". :) 7680p :D http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ultra_High_Definition_Video

[zero2dash]

/me raises hand.

"My name is Abulia and I am a tech whore." ;)

I (sorta) used to be myself, but now we're too broke to cater to my affliction. :D
LOL guess it's better for me that way

7680p :D http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ultra_High_Definition_Video

Good grief!
Suddenly I'm reminded of a time when, in 1981, Bill Gates said [about memory] "640K ought to be enough for anybody."

Now you're in hell with less than 512 megs. :D

[lmalave]

/me raises hand.

"My name is Abulia and I am a tech whore." ;)

Hopefully once the push to digital is complete (a decade from now?) things will be easier. This transition we're in right now is rough, trying to move from analog to digital.

Wouldn't that be a tech John? You're the one paying the money, right? ;)

[GFLPraxis]

Stolen from DailyTech (http://www.dailytech.com/article.aspx?newsid=4847):



If memory serves, this is pretty much what GFLPraxis (and others) have been saying all along. So, kudos to them.

Discuss, berate, flame, invalidate or whatever floats your boat.

Yup, pretty much...

Hopefully this kills off the Cell hype. I like the PS3 as much as the next guy (what does that even mean?) and will buy one when the price drops eventually, but the Cell hype has GOT to stop. I still see people running around proclaiming that the Cell is a "supercomputer" and will blow away everything in the universe on some boards (thankfully it's mostly stopped here, but it still comes up in some rare threads with people thinking Apple will switch back to PowerPC for Cell...yeah, right).

Yes, the Cell has certain advantages when properly utilized, but it's not 1000x better than the 360. You will not be able to tell an XBox 360 and PS3 game apart by watching a trailer or looking at screenshots.

[MacRumorUser]

I still see people running around proclaiming that the Cell is a "supercomputer" and will blow away everything in the universe on some boards


Just makes you want to slap some sense into them ;)

I've said all along the PS3 & 360 will be pretty much even. With some multiformat games being better on the 360 (apparently Rainbow 6 vegas is according to the developers) than PS3... and some will be Vice Versa...

It's the exclusive titles that will pursuade people to swing one way - or the other - or in a lot of our cases, we'll swing both way... :D :D

[Chone]

Poor PS3... I thought it at least had more power than Xbox360

I hate how Sony is ruining the PlayStation with these PS3, spend millions of dollars, delay the release one year, use extremely new and undeveloped technologies, all for what? crappy games (which even if you do like, the X360 has them too anyways) and all developers flocking to x360 and not very much of them saying PS3 actually has a tangible performance difference...

I thought the difference this gen was going to be like Xbox>PS2 is the hardware department but in favor of Sony's PS3 but it really doesn't look like it will be that way... hmm maybe there is more to be seen but I'm afraid Sony's console might turn out to be a failure. Sony is doing EVERYTHING wrong.

[LethalWolfe]

There is a segment at gametrailers.com (http://www.gametrailers.com/bonusround.php) (make sure you are watching episode 2) where a developer talks about how 3rd parties will pretty much give the PS3 and the 360 the same game because there is no incentive for them to make a "bigger" build for the PS3. So it looks like only PS3 exclusive titles will try to take advantage of the things that Sony says make the PS3 a superior console (such as Blu-ray).


Lethal

[raggedjimmi]

Would be nice if these direct conversions could be put on DVD so us consumers would pay less. 360 games are going for £40 here now. PS3 for £50.
Be nice if PS3 DVD games were 40 and BluRay at 50. but no. even the smallest games will be on BluRay. Because that's clever.

[Sky Blue]

I love how the propaganda in the thread title bears no relation to the article!

[Mackilroy]

I love how the propaganda in the thread title bears no relation to the article!

You must be reading a different article than I am… or just not paying attention. :p

[Counterfit]

In communist ideology. All consoles would be treated equally ......

"In Soviet Russia, game plays you!"

[Abulia]

I love how the propaganda in the thread title bears no relation to the article!
I did it just for you.

[rhsgolfer33]

I can't stand all this resolution jazz though. As the developer says - there are trade offs. Please someone wake me up when games consoles are running fluid in 1080p. when it's the damn standard.

I doubt if it will be the standard for quite a while. 1080p TVs arent even the standard in high def tv's yet and though there are alot more 1080p TVs than there were 6 months ago I doubt if it will be the standard for all HDTVs with in the next 2 years. TV stations dont even brodcast in 1080p and I havent heard that any have plans at all (or if its even practical/possible). I would love for 1080p to be the standard, 1080p looks amazing (atleast on the Mitsubishi I viewd it on), I have a 1080p TV, but unfourtunately until I obtain a blue ray drive I will not have seen it on my TV.

[sikkinixx]

Nice avatar MRU, lol Feels like the 1980's all over again.

This battle will rage on though, GoW just came out "WOW! its the best looking console game ever!" Then <insert future PS3 killer ap> "WOW! NOW THIS IS THE BEST EVER!", then Halo 3 "ZOMG!!! PS3 SUXX0R n PHAILZ, 360 = W1N!11!1!!!!!!!11", Then <insert PS3 killer ap> " ZOMG x 101!!1! PS3 RULZ!!!"....you get the idea.

[ieani]

/me raises hand.

"My name is Abulia and I am a tech whore." ;)

Hopefully once the push to digital is complete (a decade from now?) things will be easier. This transition we're in right now is rough, trying to move from analog to digital.

April 2008 all TV goes digital.

[LethalWolfe]

/me raises hand.

"My name is Abulia and I am a tech whore." ;)

Hopefully once the push to digital is complete (a decade from now?) things will be easier. This transition we're in right now is rough, trying to move from analog to digital.
Going from analog to digital is the simple part. How many people have video game consoles, DVD players, or digital cable boxes hooked up to their analog TVs? It's the transition from standard def to high def that's the killer. And when we transition from HD to UHD (or whatever sometime in the future) it will be just as painful as the move from SD to HD is today.

April 2008 all TV goes digital.
The date got pushed back to Feb. 17, 2009 for analog b'casts to end. There'll still be a ton of existing analog TV sets and the government mandate on the consumer end is just that X amount of TVs above a certain size available for sale have to be able to receive a digital signal (not necessarily HD, but just digital). Existing analog sets will need a converter box to receiver the digital OTA (over the air) signals, but if you already have cable or satellite then no worry's 'cause, just like today, your cable box will take the digital feed and convert it to analog.


Lethal

[MacRumorUser]

Nice avatar MRU, lol Feels like the 1980's all over again.

Its more like 1917 my comrade ;)

[2nyRiggz]

What the hell are we talking about here...I know I'm late to the party and MRU is russian now but damn guys I only went away for a week.

Note: I don't get the "no to wii" part.

Bless

[ericsthename]

Technology is constantly evolving.

In communist ideology. All consoles would be treated equally ......


Haha, no, in communist ideology gaming consoles would not exist - as they only serve as part of the "opium of the people" that is entertainment and religion.

[raggedjimmi]

Hang on. Is this the same as some developers saying "yes to Wii, no to 360 and PS3"? or "yes to DS no to PSP"?

[blitzkrieg79]

Yup, pretty much...

Hopefully this kills off the Cell hype. I like the PS3 as much as the next guy (what does that even mean?) and will buy one when the price drops eventually, but the Cell hype has GOT to stop. I still see people running around proclaiming that the Cell is a "supercomputer" and will blow away everything in the universe on some boards (thankfully it's mostly stopped here, but it still comes up in some rare threads with people thinking Apple will switch back to PowerPC for Cell...yeah, right).

Yes, the Cell has certain advantages when properly utilized, but it's not 1000x better than the 360. You will not be able to tell an XBox 360 and PS3 game apart by watching a trailer or looking at screenshots.

Actually you are a bit wrong about the Cell processor, when fully optimized it pretty much oblitirates even Itanium and high-end Opteron processors, scientists at Berkeley did an interesting project (http://www.cs.berkeley.edu/~samw/projects/cell/CF06.pdf) Cell by average was 4x to 12x faster at the same clock rate while producing a lot less heat, while fully optimized apps were even up to 40x faster. It's not stuff I make up, those are experiments done by top end computer scientists. No one said that the Cell is 1000x faster than anything else (yet) but in my opinion 10x faster than anything else is pretty damn good and worth of attention.

As far as comments made by Denis Dyack, he is a programmer, most programmers are rather lazy and don't like new architectures, especially as demanding and radical as Cell is. Another thing is each game has a timeframe and a budget (which means that games usually are not fully optimized to a given architecture), because of Cells new approach to programming it is more difficult to get some real performance out of it but 2-3 years from now you'll see the real difference between the triple-core XBox360 and PS3 Cell.

Last thing, check this out (http://www.anandtech.com/cpuchipsets/showdoc.aspx?i=2379&p=12) and take a look at the diagrams of Intels Platform 2015, and carefully look at year 2010-2011. Isn't it similar to Cells architecture but yet it's about 5 years behind Cell?

[GFLPraxis]

Actually you are a bit wrong about the Cell processor, when fully optimized it pretty much oblitirates even Itanium and high-end Opteron processors, scientists at Berkeley did an interesting project (http://www.cs.berkeley.edu/~samw/projects/cell/CF06.pdf) Cell by average was 4x to 12x faster at the same clock rate while producing a lot less heat, while fully optimized apps were even up to 40x faster. It's not stuff I make up, those are experiments done by top end computer scientists. No one said that the Cell is 1000x faster than anything else (yet) but in my opinion 10x faster than anything else is pretty damn good and worth of attention.

As far as comments made by Denis Dyack, he is a programmer, most programmers are rather lazy and don't like new architectures, especially as demanding and radical as Cell is. Another thing is each game has a timeframe and a budget (which means that games usually are not fully optimized to a given architecture), because of Cells new approach to programming it is more difficult to get some real performance out of it but 2-3 years from now you'll see the real difference between the triple-core XBox360 and PS3 Cell.

Last thing, check this out (http://www.anandtech.com/cpuchipsets/showdoc.aspx?i=2379&p=12) and take a look at the diagrams of Intels Platform 2015, and carefully look at year 2010-2011. Isn't it similar to Cells architecture but yet it's about 5 years behind Cell?

Arstechnica absolutely tore the Berkley study apart. Those numbers are purely theoretical; you'll never get that kind of performance in real world tasks, only in EXTREMELY specialized tasks, and the Cell is actually very much inferior to conventional processors in certain types of work.

Realistically the Cell does NOT blow away everything out there.

[MacRumorUser]

Realistically the Cell does NOT blow away everything out there.

But it does Blow ;) :D

[blitzkrieg79]

Arstechnica absolutely tore the Berkley study apart. Those numbers are purely theoretical; you'll never get that kind of performance in real world tasks, only in EXTREMELY specialized tasks, and the Cell is actually very much inferior to conventional processors in certain types of work.

Realistically the Cell does NOT blow away everything out there.

Can you provide me with a link? IBM is currently selling Blade servers using the Cell processor and they are quite fast. Mercury Systems also has a high-end systems used for rendering, imaging, and other compute-intensive applications based on the Cell which they claim are 8-10x faster than any other mass produced processor currently available, military will also be using Cell processor for defensive systems. IBM is planning to build the fastest supercomputer based on Cell processors which will not only be the fastest system but also occupying less space. So all in all Cell seems to be holding it's own and considering it is a new architecture there is still a lot of room to grow.

Cell has a highly parallel nature, tuff for programmers but even Intel is slowly going in that direction with it's multicore designs so it's not something IBm just made up but it seems the entire industry is slowly going in that direction. Anyway, I have followed the Cell processor very closely and the only thing I remember ArsTeshnica rip was the Blachford's analysis of the processor.

You say that Cell processor will only achieve those numbers in exteremely specialized tasks, last time I checked MS Word and the internet were flying on my P3 1.0Ghz computer, what I really would like to speed up is the audio/video editing as well as to see more relistic gaming environments and that is what the Cell was designed to speed up. Apps such as Photoshop, Final Cut, Maya, 3Ds Max, 3D gaming would definately greatly benefit from the Cell. Mainstream apps wouldn't see much of an improvement but then again those apps don't need any improvement to begin with as they are running fine on 3-4 year old computers anyway.

First peopel were saying that Cell will be a specialized processor when in fact it is also a general purpose processor. In order to take full advantage of a given processor it needs to be somehow optimized, you think that Core Duo would be so fast with lets say Photoshop if it wasn't optimized for SSE instruction set? It always has been about optimizations.

[takao]

First peopel were saying that Cell will be a specialized processor when in fact it is also a general purpose processor. In order to take full advantage of a given processor it needs to be somehow optimized, you think that Core Duo would be so fast with lets say Photoshop if it wasn't optimized for SSE instruction set? It always has been about optimizations.

so using a optimized cpu for a general purpose pc is going to usefull ? yeah right

actually the top super computer is running on 0,7 ghz cpus and making up simply by mass... believe it or not: having 8 general purpose cpus are better than having 1 cpu with 1 GP core and 6-7 floating point cores

the cell simply is too bad in term of power usage for using in supercomputers

if the were usefull ibm would have released them already.... the ibm blade with the cell is already on the market for like.. a year ? ... and it's not really selling that good as far as i heard
and for other big machines there are simply more powerfull chips available... after all IBM will release the POWER6 next year (which without a doubt will beat the _36mb_ of cache the POWER5 units had)

edit: that aside it's normally in the best interest to keep something like a prozessor rather general than specific ... you know after all very little optimization is done nowadays simply because there is rather little time for it ...

[raggedjimmi]

the cell simply is too bad in term of power usage for using in supercomputers

Whereas Sony were rambling on about using them in everything from toasters to TV's not so long ago. Because I want to be running machines hell bent on destroying the world. Glad Apple and IBM have adopted the "low power usage" mantra.

[blitzkrieg79]

so using a optimized cpu for a general purpose pc is going to usefull ? yeah right

actually the top super computer is running on 0,7 ghz cpus and making up simply by mass... believe it or not: having 8 general purpose cpus are better than having 1 cpu with 1 GP core and 6-7 floating point cores

the cell simply is too bad in term of power usage for using in supercomputers

if the were usefull ibm would have released them already.... the ibm blade with the cell is already on the market for like.. a year ? ... and it's not really selling that good as far as i heard
and for other big machines there are simply more powerfull chips available... after all IBM will release the POWER6 next year (which without a doubt will beat the _36mb_ of cache the POWER5 units had)

edit: that aside it's normally in the best interest to keep something like a prozessor rather general than specific ... you know after all very little optimization is done nowadays simply because there is rather little time for it ...

IBM is going to build a supercomputer for The U.S. Department of Energy's National Nuclear Security based on Cell and Opteron procesors (Administrationhttp://www-03.ibm.com/press/us/en/pressrelease/20210.wss) which will become the fastest supercomputer to date.

Second of all, IBM recently found a way to double the frequency of a processor while not increasing the power consumption (http://www.eetimes.com/news/semi/showArticle.jhtml?articleID=193105767). Current top-10 supercomputers are running on Power4 processors at approximately 1.5-1.8GHZ each. I really don't know what was your point with supercomputers running at 0.7GHZ and the Cell.

Third of all, Intel is planning a Cell-like processor in 2011-2012 (http://www.anandtech.com/cpuchipsets...px?i=2379&p=12).

Fourth of all, this is the first generation of Cell processor, somehow I have a feeling that the next version will be much more general purpose computing friendly than the current one.

Having 8 general purpose cpus is not better than having 1 cpu with 1 GP core and 6-7 dedicated vector processors. Just look at what Altivec did for Apple, helped to hide the fact that the G4 processors were so outdated by the Intel standards that it actually made the processors competetive and in some tasks much more powerful. The vector units found in Cell have the raw potential of todays high-end GPUs and those are much more powerful than even Core Duo processors, except GPUs are not general purpose where Cell's APU's are capable of general purpose processing.

IBM just recently released it's own Cell based Blade servers and those not meant for home computing but for professionals so they will never sell in large numbers to begin with (http://www.networkworld.com/newsletters/servers/2006/0918server2.html) so they definately are not a year old. Mercury systems did realease Cell based systems a while ago but those were meant for medical field only.

Cell at 3.2GHZ supposedly uses 45-50 watts so considering it's raw performance potential I think it's not too bad.

[takao]

Second of all, IBM recently found a way to double the frequency of a processor while not increasing the power consumption (http://www.eetimes.com/news/semi/showArticle.jhtml?articleID=193105767). Current top-10 supercomputers are running on Power4 processors at approximately 1.5-1.8GHZ each. I really don't know what was your point with supercomputers running at 0.7GHZ and the Cell.

IBM BlueGene
look it up if you don't know it .. at the moment are 3 of them in the top 10

Having 8 general purpose cpus is not better than having 1 cpu with 1 GP core and 6-7 dedicated vector processors. Just look at what Altivec did for Apple, helped to hide the fact that the G4 processors were so outdated by the Intel standards that it actually made the processors competetive and in some tasks much more powerful. The vector units found in Cell have the raw potential of todays high-end GPUs and those are much more powerful then even Core Duo processors, except GPUs are not general purpose where Cell's APU's are capable of general purpose processing.

so pretty much all cpus nowadays have vector units .. actually they also did back in the past when apple called theirs Altivec ... thing with cell is that the vector units are fine but 1 GP core is essentially crippling the CPU (would they made it at least 3 gp and 5 vector units or something like that it would be much better)
vector CPUs/units have been around in super computer since quite a long time. problem is programming them compared to multi processors/multi cores...

don't hype the cell that much ..it's not like other developers are sleeping (and IBM is notorious for developing a good processor architecture and then not being able to keep up with speed)


that aside in consoles stuff like graphic chips,memory-bandwidth are much more important anyways

[blitzkrieg79]

IBM BlueGene
look it up if you don't know it .. at the moment are 3 of them in the top 10



so pretty much all cpus nowadays have vector units .. actually they also did back in the past when apple called theirs Altivec ... thing with cell is that the vector units are fine but 1 GP core is essentially crippling the CPU (would they made it at least 3 gp and 5 vector units or something like that it would be much better)
vector CPUs/units have been around in super computer since quite a long time. problem is programming them compared to multi processors/multi cores...

don't hype the cell that much ..it's not like other developers are sleeping (and IBM is notorious for developing a good processor architecture and then not being able to keep up with speed)


that aside in consoles stuff like graphic chips,memory-bandwidth are much more important anyways

But the difference between most processor vector units and Cells SPUs is that Cells SPUs are independent from each other, they can run different OSs simultaneously where Altivec in G4/G5 or SSE in Intel offerings is dependent on the main processor. And talking about good design, Altivec was developed/released at around 1998 and to this day on Intel with SSE4 still hasn't caught on and it's almost 9 years now.

It is difficult to program for CELLs architecture but when you optimize the software for it the gains are worth it, especially in the scientific or audio/video field where time equals big money. Most people are used to routines and don't like to readjust to radically new things but when the gains outweight the negatives they'll eventually catch on.

[SirJavelin]

When you talk about the PS3/360, please make sure you talk about the whole system, that is GPU, Memory and CPU.

The interesting difference is not the PS3’s CPU at all, but is actually the 360, being the unified nature of both the Memory and the GPU’s shaders. In order for the memory to be unified it’s GDDR, not DDR, so it’s much, much faster RAM. That means getting data shunted around is faster for starters. Secondly the unified shaders in the Xbox’s ATI Xenos GPU are a very misunderstood but critically important concept.

Let me remind you that AMD bought ATI for a reason. See Fusion (http://www.reghardware.co.uk/2006/10/26/the_story_of_amds_fusion/), Stream Processing (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Stream_processing) and GPGPU (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/GPGPU) for details. The basic concept is the GPU is a vastly more powerful Floating Point calculator than any CPU – you’re talking 10x.

The Xbox has 48 unified shaders, all or any of which can be programmed to make FPU calculations. Think physics, graphics and audio. You still need a CPU to ‘control’ the data that’s calculated, but then you have 3 PPUs, so use 1 core to manage the GPU, and you still have 2 cores left and then you have 512MB of really fast RAM to play with.

The PS3, on the other hand has to use it’s 1 PPU to read from the slower system RAM and use that same PPU to manage the 7 SPUs and feed data to the GPU which then has to process what it reads in a passive manner. Remeber the SPUs do not have access to RAM directly.

Looking at it, you have 48 fpu processors calculating at up to 250 GFlops versus 7 calculating at about 30GFlops in the SPUs. Granted, the SPUs are better processors at integer and general processing than shaders, but they aren't a patch on a PPU. Having 3 PPUs and 48 shaders, I think is better than 1 PPU and 7 SPUs on balance.

Nevertheless, the PS3 will still be excellent console. But for either console to be truly awesome, the developers will have to get to grips with using the SPUs and the GPU for programming. The difference between latest PS2 games versus launch titles justify this statement. We will see some amazing stuff down the line.

But again, this is where I have confidence in MS again and with the Xbox. MS very carefully designed the Xbox to encompass DirectX 10 technology. Not DirectX 9. DirectX 10 is all about the GPU, and something called ‘progressive processing’, Microsoft-speak for stream processing. And combined with the fact the PC is the dominant gaming platform, making an Xbox game from a PC game is simpler than ever. That’s not so with the PS3.

[SirJavelin]

The arstechnica link: Cell could offer dramatic boost for scientific computing (http://arstechnica.com/news.ars/post/20060615-7071.html)

[raggedjimmi]

But again, this is where I have confidence in MS again and with the Xbox. MS very carefully designed the Xbox to encompass DirectX 10 technology. Not DirectX 9. DirectX 10 is all about the GPU, and something called ‘progressive processing’, Microsoft-speak for stream processing. And combined with the fact the PC is the dominant gaming platform, making an Xbox game from a PC game is simpler than ever. That’s not so with the PS3.

From what I gathered, the 360 and PS3 are DirectX 9 only. DX10 has only just come out (the 8800).

[MacRumorUser]

From what I gathered, the 360 and PS3 are DirectX 9 only. DX10 has only just come out (the 8800).

Nope the 360's GPU actually has advanced features from the new R600 series that ATI will be releasing in January (its first DX10 PC card) , which means it does have support for some (if not all) the DX 10 accelerated effects...

PS3 doesnt.

[raggedjimmi]

Whoa, nice on MS. I hope Crysis hits the 360 along with keyboard/mouse, unless I can cram one of them DX10 cards in my iMac :D

[Chone]

Nope the 360's GPU actually has advanced features from the new R600 series that ATI will be releasing in January (its first DX10 PC card) , which means it does have support for some (if not all) the DX 10 accelerated effects...

PS3 doesnt.

PS3 doesn't even use DirectX to begin with... it uses OpenGL which can be used to do the same kind of effects you can on DX, its just not used by many developers... in fact, AT said that the new features and capabilites of G80 could be tapped with OpenGL but there are not much developers using OpenGL (idsoftware is one).

So don't compare apples to oranges.

[takao]

Nope the 360's GPU actually has advanced features from the new R600 series that ATI will be releasing in January (its first DX10 PC card) , which means it does have support for some (if not all) the DX 10 accelerated effects...

PS3 doesnt.

http://www.1up.com/do/newsStory?cId=3153097

What if you could upgrade DirectX? Xbox 360 certainly has the muscle to power Crysis. News4Gamers brought up this very point earlier today, which points to a Netherland-based Xbox 360 fansite claiming ATI announced it would be possible to upgrade Xbox 360 via patch. The move would be beneficial for Microsoft's push for cross-platform development on Vista and Xbox 360.

Unfortunately, none of this is true, according to ATI themselves. "Xbox360 cannot run DX10, and confirmed what I said earlier about the extended functionality. The Xbox360 has unique features including memory export that can enable DX10-class functionality such as stream-out," said an ATI spokesperson. "From what we're hearing, Crysis will support DX9 with some sort of use for DX10 features. It's likely that those DX10 visuals can be replicated on the Xbox360, but it can't be properly called DX10."

so it can do some effects/emulate them but it's clearly NOT DirectX10 compatible


and for the comment that ps3 is using openGL: problem of OpenGl is that it has to go through endless discussions untill features are set in stone (they are making a standard between lots of companies/organizations) and thus is / was always behind compared to directX features because microsoft can simply set those and everybody follows

sure not sympathic (i like opengl too.. after all i have tried opengl programming myself) but it's how the industry works

[MacRumorUser]

so it can be programmed to do the DX10 features and produce the same results but cant officially be called DX10... That's still not a major problem, it still opens the door to DX10 games making their way to the 360.

Come on it's microsoft, all it takes is them to update the development kit / tools with DX10 convertors for the 360 and hey presto.....

[takao]

so it can be programmed to do the DX10 features and produce the same results but cant officially be called DX10... That's still not a major problem, it still opens the door to DX10 games making their way to the 360.

sure but the question is as always a trade off thing ... you end up using horsepower for emulating the effects instead of conserving horsepower by using built in effects

Come on it's microsoft, all it takes is them to update the development kit / tools with DX10 convertors for the 360 and hey presto.....

we will have to see how many features can be emulated ... DirectX 10 (and it's graphics cards) is perhaps the biggest step forward in architecture since quite a few versions.. it's gonna be interesting how the differences between consoles and PC turn out

[MacRumorUser]

we will have to see how many features can be emulated ... DirectX 10 (and it's graphics cards) is perhaps the biggest step forward in architecture since quite a few versions.. it's gonna be interesting how the differences between consoles and PC turn out


Shadowrun should be good for comparison then.

First Live Anywhere title and should be one of the first Vista only titles, but of course it depends how much DX10 features the game exploits.

[Haoshiro]

I don't recall reading these effects would be emulated, they very well maybe hardware-supported only not in the same way.

[MacRumorUser]

I don't recall reading these effects would be emulated, they very well maybe hardware-supported only not in the same way.

That's actually the impression I got from reading that article. The ability to do the same thing is there on the hardware, accept the 360 doesnt do DX10 persay.

according to ATI themselves. "Xbox360 cannot run DX10, and confirmed what I said earlier about the extended functionality. The Xbox360 has unique features including memory export that can enable DX10-class functionality such as stream-out," said an ATI spokesperson. "From what we're hearing, Crysis will support DX9 with some sort of use for DX10 features. It's likely that those DX10 visuals can be replicated on the Xbox360, but it can't be properly called DX10.

replicated does not automatically mean emulated.

Like I say I expect M$ to release updated development tools which allow the 360 Ati Gpu to produce the same effects as they do on the PC, albeit not in the same api as DX10... That doesnt mean they are emulated, just the way they are programmed are different.

[SirJavelin]

Like I say I expect M$ to release updated development tools which allow the 360 Ati Gpu to produce the same effects as they do on the PC, albeit not in the same api as DX10... That doesnt mean they are emulated, just the way they are programmed are different.

You're hitting the nail right on the head, MRU!

Reading Wikipedia's description of DirectX 10 (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/DirectX#The_future_of_DirectX) and Shader model (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Shader_model), it's quite interesting that while in previous versions of DX, cards and drivers had to report 'capabilities', DX10 specifies a 'minimum standard' to be DX10 compatible. Chances are the 360 is a pretty damn good reference point for what that minimum standard is... and DX 10 is basically all about Shader Model 4.0, so with completely programmable unified shaders on the 360, you essentially have DX 10 already.

Nonetheless, you don't always need the raw-power 3D APIs to make a good game, and that's why XNA is also interesting: by sacrificing 2% of performance, you can do stuff in .NET, so far simpler to code.

Additionally, few people realise but the 360 also has a Flash player builtin to it, so us Mac web developers can actually port our Flash web-based games to the 360. You only need to see the main interface of the Xbox 360 Dashboard (which was created by AKQA, one of the leading UK web companies) or the Bejeweled game on Xbox live to see Flash being used on it.

So not only does it most likely have DirectX 10 compatibility but you can use far higher-level code like C# or ActionScript than low-level C++ to code games with. Hence it's much more accessible to a far broader range of developers, which is both a good and bad thing: top developers can make excellent games, but there will be an absolute flood of crap games as well, especially on Live Arcade... nonetheless, I think it's still a good strategy: Microsoft is making things so easy for developers, which means more choice and more content. No bad thing.