What if the 9th gen launched with Standard and Premium hardware!

[DonFerrari]

VAMatt said:

DonFerrari said:

Goal shifting at best

If you don't understand that consoles selling in line with or above expectations is evidence that the market wants those consoles, I don't know what else to say.  

It's goal shifting because you assumed it done good without having any numbers... when putting that it does 1/4 of the other version you then declare that to be the MARKET wanting it because the expectations of the MAKERS were met... that isn't how it works.

Yes PS4Pro satisfied what Sony said to be their expectations, and had enough acceptance. But to say that is what the market wants, when it sells 75% less than the other option isn't really true.

Pemalite said:

derpysquirtle64 said:

Yes, PS4 pro has just a cluster of two ps 4 gpus with higher clocks. Full hardware compatibility. Though just imagine the SoC size with 28nm. It would have been enormous.

And yet... 28nm could still have been pushed farther.
The Xbox One X has 7~ Billion transistors... AMD's Fuji architecture has 9~ Billion at 28nm.
The base Xbox One and Playstation 4 had roughly 5~ Billion transistors at 28nm.

But you are right, the Playstation 4 Pro would have been a big chip... A chip that is impossible to manufacture at 28nm? Not even near it.

Mr Puggsly said:

1. 720p - 1080p is HD. Do you think the average consumer knows the resolution running? At best they just know when it looks bad but effects can make it look better.

720P is HD.
1080P is Full HD or FHD.
1440P is Quad HD/2k.
2160P is Quad Full HD/4k.

Errorist76 said:

If you want more options and flexibility for fucks sake get a PC!

I did. ;)

freebs2 said:

As a customer I word rather have an eGPU released some year after launch (mid-cycle), when better technologies are avliable.

The thing with this console generation is that better technologies were already available when the consoles launched.

Intrinsic said:


better to make the best console you can make at $400/$500, then make a refresh 3-4 years later.

Agreed. Start off with the best hardware that you can have at the very start of the generation... Then release an iterative update later with the best hardware you can.

Mr Puggsly said:

I think there is an expectation that 9th gen specs will achieve 4K with ease. But I dont think thats gonna happen with graphics getting better, games aiming for 60 fps, and competitive pricing. The X1X is $500 and still struggles to achieve or lock at 4K in numerous titles. Some titles drop to 1080p simply to target 60 fps.

I have said it tons of time... If the technology doesn't exist on the PC in the mid-range, then it ain't happening on consoles.

Before the Playstation 4 Pro and Xbox One X launched it should have been common knowledge that 4k was not going to be achievable for either platforms as AMD just doesn't have a mid-range GPU that can reliably do it with decent details.

Next gen is still a few years away... And AMD has a couple of new GPU generations to go through, so that may change.

Mr Puggsly said:

I would hope 9th gen could always be above 1080p, even if its 1440p. I mean 4K is becoming more standard so there is more demand for a crisp picture. A good GPU and CPU should make 1440p and 60 fps fairly common with quality visual assets. If that was a goal of developers at least. More games could be 60 fps on consoles if that was a focus.

You're confusing Forza 7 on X1S with X1X. On X1X, Forza 7 has 4K AND improved graphics. DF said its like the PC at highest settings.

I think not hitting 1080P reliably on the Playstation 4 and Xbox One base consoles was obvious when the hardware was revealed... Despite people drooling over the 8Gb of GDDR5 Ram.
The GPU's those consoles were based on were struggling to reliably attain those resolutions with decent framerates... So it was a given that consoles which are derived from that exact same technology would have the same shortfalls.

Next gen though.. All bets are off.
I would be happy to assert that 1080P will be the lowest rendered resolution... Despite not knowing the exact hardware. - As low-end GPU's are getting surprisingly capable at handling 1080P and next-gen will be using GPU hardware orders-of-magnitude better than that.

DonFerrari said:

Yes optimizing for ALL PCs is hard, but to 2 or 4 Consoles not necessarily.

No developer has ever optimized for all PC's. There is literally zero point. :P

On the point of the size of the ship. Yes it would be big in a single chip, but considering the "butterfly" type of PS4Pro, it would just be the same size of PS4 original, but a little less than twice the thickness.

About the PC, yes I know they don't optimize for PC. But changing the optimization from 2 to 4 platforms (when the change between then will be mostly pixel count, texture, etc... which is already happening right now) isn't really a big issue.

potato_hamster said:

DonFerrari said:

Yes optimizing for ALL PCs is hard, but to 2 or 4 Consoles not necessarily.

Goal shifting at best

.... I don't think you understand how console optimization works, and how it literally does not occur at all on PC. Game developers do not optimize games for any hardware specifications on PCs, but make their games engines interface into much more bloated APIs instead. There's an entire layer of abstraction that does not exist in console programming that gives PC games their hardware compatibility.

I do know a little... but please explain, and put how it would be impossible to achieve on 4 platforms instead of 2 (curiously we have that now with PS4Pro, X1X, PS4 and X1) even more when they are launched together, with specs that scales from one another and the focus of the change is IQ output.