| NextGen_Gamer said: although the chip itself will be much smaller than XSX (4TF "RDNA 2" GPU instead of 12TF), it will still need the exact same 1TB of SSD storage |
i don't see need for same storage size, high res assets not only wouldn't be needed, but would put excessive strain on the system, esp. with low RAM. i expect Lockhart would use specific version of games with asset resolution optimized for it's capabilities, even if most game code is generally identical. Lockhart may just not download (or copy from disc) the high resolutions, and download or copy the Lockhart-specific low resolution assets SX doesn't.
on potential scaling problems, besides games that run at sub-4K on series x probably needing to scale to sub-1080p (which is more noticeable relatively), there is also physics and other compute applications of GPU that don't really scale, so if not touching those Lockhart will need to scale the rest much harder. (i.e. if physics/etc uses 2 TF that leaves 10 on SX but only 2 on Lockhardt, forcing to scale non-physics GPU load worse than 1080p equivalent of SX) that is excessive example, and if stats are correct they are provisioning 1/3 the TF for 1/4 the pixels, leaving room for that... but will it always be enough room? although fair to say, plenty of games could probably have BETTER relative performance on Lockhart at 1080p than on SX at 4K, even if some have problems. (of course, games could also offer 'performance mode' on SX that lowers resolution/etc somewhat for better FPS or whatever is prioritized by that mode)
overall, find it weird if MS aren't launching with this, if devs will need to tweak games from day 1 to run on this sub-variant, weird to not actually sell it from day 1... although MS hasn't finished with all their pre-launch presentations eitiher, so who knows there. the more different specs within the platform, the more games will be held back by whatever lowest common denominator, even if bottleneck changes per game. dividing a gen like this doesn't seem like a good idea for the platform that has less than half it's direct competition, that much less payoff for the trouble it creates for developers. EDIT: also relevant to consider is how MS will continue to sell lastgen Xbox for awhile to price senstive consumers. selling Lockhart right away would get those consumers growing the newgen install base. although maybe 3rd parties are happier selling crossgen games to large lastgen base? /shrug
relatedly, i wonder about future high spec version of SX, if they will be doing that for one, but how it might play out... seems like the obvious way to address the performance benefits of Sony's advanced I/O architecture is expanding RAM capacity since that is what Sony's architecture "virtually" achieves basically. with consoles the baseline for much AAA development, also interesting to see if Sony's architecture leads to PC gaming embracing larger GPU memory size.
Last edited by mutantsushi - on 27 June 2020
