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greenmedic88 on 13 December 2011
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spurgeonryan said:
greenmedic88 said:

A HD4850 can run (native render) most games of the current generation at 1920x1080, typically over 30fps depending on the level of added effects and AA. 

Until I hear anything compelling that convinces me otherwise, I'll accept the concensus among most major reports that the AMD R700 design will be used for the final production GPU. 

As for costs, the R700 is mature technology (2008), meaning the per unit cost on chips from AMD will probably be about or under $50, which for a $300-400 retail price console design, is pretty consistent with former consoles. 

But yes, stating 1080p capable could mean anything from "plays 1080p video" to natively renders games visuals at 1920x1080. Quite a difference. 

Was that they sell their consoles at profit a joke or were you being serious?

As for plays 1080p video and rendering game visuals at 1920X1080 what is the difference?What does one do that the other does not?

I didn't say anything about Nintendo selling their hardware at a profit, but it is a given that they always engineer and price their devices for profitability from Day 1. Smart business. 

The difference between playing prerendered 1080p video or upscaling a 480p or 720p signal to 1080p and natively rendering game visuals at 1920x1080 resolution is pretty significant. They are not the same by any means.

In a gaming PC, a lesser video card would have to sacrifice frame rates or resolution (or GPU based visual effects) to one with a better/newer GPU with more VRAM. 

So to answer your question, higher specs (better GPU, more VRAM) means faster graphics processing capabilities and more memory for storing high res textures and more layers of textures (diffuse, specular, bump map, normal map, occlusion, etc. etc.). More layers of textures provide more realistic visuals and higher detail. Better GPU allows for more polygons, larger maps/geometry, faster frame rates and higher native resolution rendering.