So which is more powerful in terms of pure processing power or gigaflops? A 2.5 Ghz MacBook Pro or a game console like an Xbox 360 or PS3?
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Is a MBP more powerful than a game console?
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You have to be kidding right? The Xbox 360 has three cores running at 3.6 GhZ. Just google for game consoles specs.
Ditto can't believe this question was even asked. Plus game consoles logic boards are specialized for certain processing.
It's not even apples and oranges here, 2 totally different beasts.
The processors that game consoles use are very specialized at multithreading and are able to process a lot very quickly, though they aren't as suited for conventional computing as the processors used in a MacBook Pro, for example. Modern technology is still unable to rival the processing power of a PS2, so emulators for consoles are released many many years after it has become more or less obsolete. The game consoles of today are insanely powerful, but they are too hot and power hungry for practical use in computers, therefore to answer your question, PS3 > Xbox 360 > MacBook Pro.
And just think, the PS3, XBox and Wii all run with the PowerPC chip... Now if Macs were still on PowerPC.....
... we'd still be ripping DVDs at 12fps MAX.
mmmm....sorta. The Wii uses a PPC CPU, yes, but the Xbox 360 uses a (VERY) modified PPC CPU (three cores and whatnot), and the Cell processor used in the PS3 can hardly be called a PPC CPU. The main PPE or whatever uses the PPC instruction set, but that's not the point. The PPE just runs the 8 SPE's, as I understand it, which do not use the PPC instruction set. So just because all three game consoles have CPUs which use the PPC architecture, its hardly fair to say "if Macs were still on PPC...". The implementation of an instruction set says little about the strength or weakness of it.And just think, the PS3, XBox and Wii all run with the PowerPC chip... Now if Macs were still on PowerPC.....
I don't know what you mean by "modern technology is still unable to rival the processing power of a PS2." do you mean modern consumer computer technology still can't rival the PS2? because modern technology in general has obviously gone pass the PS2. I imagine the xbox 360 and ps3 is obviously more powerful than the PS2.
What?
Emulators are difficult. It's hard to get some old arcade games running full speed. The home computer and the console are two diverging markets and have been for years.
An xbox might not be good at photoshop or video editing or many other things a mac might be good at, but can play games well... very well.
he meant modern computer technology. the PS2 technical specs are still ahead of anything a computer could put out. thing is, game consoles are made solely to play GAMES~ wereas computers are much more complicated. if you COULD take the processor and everything else from a PS2 and put into a computer- you'd have a very, very fast computer on your hands. thing is, we can't- yet.
furthermore, yes, the 360 is superior to the PS2. but the same thing still applies. if you could take a 360 processor and put it into a computer it'd be far ahead ahead of a current top-of-the-line computer. but, it's not that simple, unfortunately.
Computers cant handle crysis at full either with full settings. (From what I hear Crysis doesnt take advantage of multiple cores but I could be wrong).
God why would you even ask this? I can understand you being curious or something but are you that much of an apple fanboy to even think that a laptop can rival the power of the PS3?
And just think, the PS3, XBox and Wii all run with the PowerPC chip... Now if Macs were still on PowerPC.....
Not really. The cell is not a PPC per say. It is based of the power architecture but is not a PPC chip. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Power_Architecture
I laugh at people still holding on dear to their old macs with PPC. They somehow think it is still superior to the intel. Intel macs are way better and more powerfull, even if you could build a ppc with 2008 technology.
Well, these consoles are outputting games like Bioshock in 720p, Halo 3 in 640p and Orange Box in 720p. My 2ghz C2D iMac with an x1600 runs Orange Box games in a higher resolution than the Xbox or PS3 with all the effects turned up.
It's not easy to say really.
Also neither of them 2 consoles will run Crysis in DirectX10, since neither graphics card supports it. A MBP will run Crysis just fine! So I'm going to say that yes (along with my iMac running crossplatform games better) - a MBP is more powerful than current gen games consoles. At least in real world results.
It's not easy to say really.
Also neither of them 2 consoles will run Crysis in DirectX10, since neither graphics card supports it. A MBP will run Crysis just fine! So I'm going to say that yes (along with my iMac running crossplatform games better) - a MBP is more powerful than current gen games consoles. At least in real world results.
Very few computers and they cost a fortune!
On the subject of what's more powerful, a good gaming PC will always beat a console because of the better GPUs. Multicore CPUs are fine for game mechanics, however, a Core 2 Duo or Quad is more than enough to deal with everything that can be thrown at it, powerful GPUs - particularly in an SLI or Crossfire arrangement - then pick up everything else.
Is it that obvious that a 300-400 gaming system could be more powerful than a 2500 laptop? I would have thought that most computers out there (PC or Mac) would be more powerful than consoles because they're more expensive and use uncrippled hardware. From everybody's comments, I guess I'm wrong.
But I can't imagine a 3000-4000 octo Mac Pro or similarly classed PC with SLI or Crossfire setup, or even a 8800GT beating the 3 year old hardware in the xbox 360 or PS3. But you guys are saying that even a PS2 can. So consoles = supercomputer? Am I getting that right?
Actually...sorta, yes.
Specifically, the Cell in the PS3 can do a (theoretical) maximum of ~2TFLOPS. The lowest ranked computer on the top 500 supercomputers list does a little less than 6TFLOPS, so the PS3 comes close. In fact, the world's first PFLOP (petaflop) supercomputer was just announced today, which essentially uses a crapload of Cell processors working together.Look guys, the original question was poorly framed. "Power" when it comes to computers means lots of different things. Are we talking about calculations per second? Then what kind? Single precision? Double precision? Floating point? What about instructions per second? The abbreviation MIPS (millions of instructions per second) is commonly known as "meaningless indicator of processor speed", as processors using different instruction sets cannot be compared at face value. The moral of the story is: don't ask a question about "processing power" unless you're doing a strictly apples-to-apples comparison.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Computer_performance