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Forums - Gaming Discussion - Xbox One vs PS4: ESRAM slower than GDDR5, It's Bottleneck"

Actually I'm hearing more like 260 GB/s of memory bandwidth for Xbox 3 - they upgraded the specifications, claiming a 192 GB/s bandwidth for the ESRAM. It has already been said though - the Xbox 3's GPU is definitely weaker - so there's no point in more bandwidth.



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Cyborg13B said:
Actually I'm hearing more like 260 GB/s of memory bandwidth for Xbox 3 - they upgraded the specifications, claiming a 192 GB/s bandwidth for the ESRAM. It has already been said though - the Xbox 3's GPU is definitely weaker - so there's no point in more bandwidth.

That's just added peak PR numbers never reachable in real tests.

- Esram: maximum bandwidth in real test done by Microsoft on a rare limited scenario: 145GB/s No developers in the world will ever go higher than those Microsoft numbers. You can see those numbers as peak (but possible) number, on average you can count on a 100GB/S for the esram.

- DDR3: maximum estimated bandwidth: 50GB/s

So if we could add those 2 numbers it would be 195GB/s of cumulated bandwidth but unfortunately we can't do that because when you feed Esram with DDDR3 ram you are using those 50GB/S just to shuffle data to the esram, not to display better graphics (the move engines unload only the CPU, not the DDR3 bandwidth!!). 

If you just use Esram as a glorified framebuffer (like probably most launch games did) then you just really have 50GB/s bandwidth for open world games and 100GB/S-ish esram for the framebuffer operations. You can't add those numbers too because those framebuffer operation only account for some % of the total processing.

But really if you look for proof, just look at the difference of performance in identical games between PS4 and X1 as there is an average objective 70% performance advantage on the PS4 (from 44% to 125%) not explained by the 41% PS4 GPU advantage.



Cyborg13B said:
Actually I'm hearing more like 260 GB/s of memory bandwidth for Xbox 3 - they upgraded the specifications, claiming a 192 GB/s bandwidth for the ESRAM.

These are completely bogus numbers as I have tried to explain in one of my lengthier posts just a few postings before yours...............



globalisateur said:

If you just use Esram as a glorified framebuffer (like probably most launch games did) then you just really have 50GB/s bandwidth for open world games and 100GB/S-ish esram for the framebuffer operations.

False in every respect. At this point, the esram is used by all software as render backend. Given some time, people will find more additional, creative uses for the esram within the space constraints..



Pemalite said:

I will ignore "a" it's mostly assumptions.

Redesign the motherboard? For what?

Please read about gddr5 memory design. Then please check the scans of the ms and Sony apu. You can scale both pictures to 100% and then overlay the ddr3 and the gddr5 controler areas. You will note there is a drastic size difference and an even more drastic complexity difference between the two technologies. If you insist "it's mostly assumptions" I can't help here. The motherboard has to be redesigned due to the different requirements of how the technology works (look at the boards and think about all those resistors around the XBox One apu which are missing on the PS4's board (and what clamshell mode implicates on the board design).



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mutantsushi said:

OK, what is it's 'inferiority'?
Besides displacing GPU cores, and 32mb window constraining rendering approaches, the real world memory thruput is SLOWER.
As I wrote, if MS believes otherwise, and wants to highlight an area where it is superior, it can publish real-game memory thruput stats.

They haven't done so, even for exclusives.
The title is in conformance with that reality. I don't see anything wrong with a thread title reflecting reality.

There is no rule that thread titles MUST ONLY exactly repeat a quote they reference, and cannot be 'made up' by the person creating the thread.
The 1st post contains the accurate quote, up-front for everybody to see and analyze, nothing is being hidden.


If the thread title bears no resemblance to the article it's supposedly refering to then it shouldn't be the thread title OR it shouldn't be refering to THAT article. In the article it clearly states and quotes that the ESRAM is faster than GDDR5 just not by much and that's 32MB is too small and so causing bottlenecks. Constrast that with the SPIN put in the thread title by the host which is not only nowhere to be found in the article but also poor grammar. 

It is not about what YOU think or believe to be true. It is about quoting from your own source accurately to provide the evidence. If you cannot see the spin and the fact that the host DID NOT QUOTE HIS OWN SOURCE CORRECTLY and REARRANGED THE QUOTE to suit his own bias WITHOUT PROVIDING ANOTHER SOURCE TO BACK UP HIS/HER CLAIM  than there's nothing more I can say to you on this matter. 



globalisateur said:
Cyborg13B said:
Actually I'm hearing more like 260 GB/s of memory bandwidth for Xbox 3 - they upgraded the specifications, claiming a 192 GB/s bandwidth for the ESRAM. It has already been said though - the Xbox 3's GPU is definitely weaker - so there's no point in more bandwidth.

That's just added peak PR numbers never reachable in real tests.

- Esram: maximum bandwidth in real test done by Microsoft on a rare limited scenario: 145GB/s No developers in the world will ever go higher than those Microsoft numbers. You can see those numbers as peak (but possible) number, on average you can count on a 100GB/S for the esram.

- DDR3: maximum estimated bandwidth: 50GB/s

So if we could add those 2 numbers it would be 195GB/s of cumulated bandwidth but unfortunately we can't do that because when you feed Esram with DDDR3 ram you are using those 50GB/S just to shuffle data to the esram, not to display better graphics (the move engines unload only the CPU, not the DDR3 bandwidth!!). 

If you just use Esram as a glorified framebuffer (like probably most launch games did) then you just really have 50GB/s bandwidth for open world games and 100GB/S-ish esram for the framebuffer operations. You can't add those numbers too because those framebuffer operation only account for some % of the total processing.

But really if you look for proof, just look at the difference of performance in identical games between PS4 and X1 as there is an average objective 70% performance advantage on the PS4 (from 44% to 125%) not explained by the 41% PS4 GPU advantage.

You're reading my mind, sir.



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Regional Analysis  (only MS and Sony Consoles)
Europe     => XB1 : 23-24 % vs PS4 : 76-77%
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drkohler said:
Pemalite said:

I will ignore "a" it's mostly assumptions.

Redesign the motherboard? For what?

Please read about gddr5 memory design. Then please check the scans of the ms and Sony apu. You can scale both pictures to 100% and then overlay the ddr3 and the gddr5 controler areas. You will note there is a drastic size difference and an even more drastic complexity difference between the two technologies. If you insist "it's mostly assumptions" I can't help here. The motherboard has to be redesigned due to the different requirements of how the technology works (look at the boards and think about all those resistors around the XBox One apu which are missing on the PS4's board (and what clamshell mode implicates on the board design).

The big problem is that this topic is way beyound most people in this thread.  Sometimes no matter how much you explain a topic people just cannot give up their opinion when its foundation is built on gut feelings instead of fact.



32MB ESRAM is just kind of small for HD with anti-aliasing, and especially with deferred rendering. If you don't know what that means, all you need to know is it's what Halo games on the 360 did, so it's pretty important to be able to do well.



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