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Forums - Microsoft - DigitalFoundry: X1 memory performance improved for production console/ESRAM@192 GB/s

SlyTurtle said:

@JustSaiyan No I'm not referring to GT. SSJ3 Goku is stronger than Kid Buu.

You're absolutely correct.

A better comparison would've been:
PS4 - Ultimate Gohan
One- SSJ3 Goku
WiiU- Yamcha



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Cirio said:
SlyTurtle said:

@JustSaiyan No I'm not referring to GT. SSJ3 Goku is stronger than Kid Buu.

You're absolutely correct.

A better comparison would've been:
PS4 - Ultimate Gohan
One- SSJ3 Goku
WiiU- Yamcha

I completely agree with your comparison, although I would say WiiU is more like Picollo. 

I like how you understand ultimate gohan is stronger than ssj3 goku. Most people don't understand that.



Sony could have done the same thing, but opted out of the 1tb theoretical yield bc it offers devs better quicker access to development steps. They learned their lesson from the cell and created a machine that would optimize performance as well as development hence why games already look better on ps4 than x1. I'll find link and post it here later, but to sum it up sony could have opted for 128 wide ram as opposed to 256 wide and then boosted potentials to 1tb. Instead they opted to listen to over 30 devs and streamline the system



Talal said:
I will permaban myself if the game releases in 2014.

in reference to KH3 release date

http://www.dualshockers.com/2013/06/29/mark-cerny-explains-how-the-ps4s-8-gb-gdrr5-ram-and-bus-work-and-why-they-were-chosen/

the link



Talal said:
I will permaban myself if the game releases in 2014.

in reference to KH3 release date

ethomaz said:

And the rumos begins or re-begins... from Reedit.

So this article at the top of /r/games sounds pretty rosy. They're claiming the esram on the XBO can actually push 192.0 GB/s. That sounds really great...

Except if we read the actual statement, it is this.

However, with near-final production silicon, Microsoft techs have found that the hardware is capable of reading and writing simultaneously. Apparently, there are spare processing cycle "holes" that can be utilised for additional operations.

No, they didn't wake up one morning and realize there was an extra data line in their memory module, so lets drill down to what that actually means.

Apparently, there are spare processing cycle "holes" that can be utilised for additional operations.

In other words, no, it isn't capable of bidirectional data transfer. Their trying to push through a few extra memory operations, but the it's still strictly read or write.

Now, look at the actual numbers. I have to give credit to R_K_M and Boreras for pointing this out. I'm just aggregating, so I'm going to direct quote.

If I am not mistaken, that just means that they lowered the clock from 800 to 750 and are using the bi-directonal bandwith number for marketing when everyone else is using the bandwith number in one direction. - R_K_M

you're right the numbers do match up perfectly for that (750 (GPU clock) * 128 (bus width)*2(read&write during same cycle) = 192.0 GB/s --- if it were 800 MHz you would get 204.8 GB/s) - Boreras

So we can basically confirm that cboat was correct. The numbers tell the truth. The esram has been downclocked, and Microsoft's PR department is trying to spin it as an increase in total bandwidth based on some cycle tricks that are probably being exaggerated.

http://www.reddit.com/r/Games/comments/1h9ix3/so_did_microsoft_just_spin_a_downclocked_esram/

I don't believe in downclock.... I believe in yields issues and that's what cboat said (he never said anything about downclock) but the numbers are wrong... the math don't compute and I will believe that the article is wrong with the numbers... if not then I need to begin to believe in downclock.

Downgrade or not... MS is trying to PR marketing bullshit again.

I still do not get why this is a MS PR marketing ploy.  It seems incredibly silly to believe someone in marketing is thinking that telling developers they have this extra bit of bandwidth will be the means to get this information out to the interweb were it will make some magical difference to people who will purchase the console.

In the grand scheme of things, this means absolutely nothing to consumers and instead means more to developers.  Why would MS BS people who are making games for their system just to make a few nerds believe the X1 has some secret magic sauce.  Developers will completely nix such a thing in the matter of days as they attempt to utilize the extra bandwidth so such PR Marketing sounds bogus to believe this is a marketing ploy.

Even in the article from Eurogamer it states the developer who was testing this out could only yield 133GBs.  So it does seem that developers are able to go beyond 102GBs but nowhere close to 196.  As time goes on, who knows maybe they will get to 156 or better.  I believe the key here is that there are a lot of speculation about pieces of hardware no one has any real clue how it works.

 

As to the cloud, if MS is sending that one belly up, spending almost a billion to get another datacenter up for X1 and Office 365 is a pretty expensive way to throw something away.



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Machiavellian said:

I still do not get why this is a MS PR marketing ploy.  It seems incredibly silly to believe someone in marketing is thinking that telling developers they have this extra bit of bandwidth will be the means to get this information out to the interweb were it will make some magical difference to people who will purchase the console.

In the grand scheme of things, this means absolutely nothing to consumers and instead means more to developers.  Why would MS BS people who are making games for their system just to make a few nerds believe the X1 has some secret magic sauce.  Developers will completely nix such a thing in the matter of days as they attempt to utilize the extra bandwidth so such PR Marketing sounds bogus to believe this is a marketing ploy.

Even in the article from Eurogamer it states the developer who was testing this out could only yield 133GBs.  So it does seem that developers are able to go beyond 102GBs but nowhere close to 196.  As time goes on, who knows maybe they will get to 156 or better.  I believe the key here is that there are a lot of speculation about pieces of hardware no one has any real clue how it works.

 

As to the cloud, if MS is sending that one belly up, spending almost a billion to get another datacenter up for X1 and Office 365 is a pretty expensive way to throw something away.

The Microsoft techs said they can get 133GB/s with alpha transparency blending operations to the source (dev)... the source (dev) didn't make any test.



Got a quick question;
Cerny said GDDR5 runs at 176 GB/s, this allowed devs to triangle in 1-2 months. Correct me if I'm wrong.
But then Cerny went on to say GDDR5 + eDRAM would be 1.088tb/s. Now my question is how long would it take to make triangle for GDDR5 +eDRAM, and what would of been the cost of a ps4 with GDDR5 + eDRAM.



SlyTurtle said:
Got a quick question;
Cerny said GDDR5 runs at 176 GB/s, this allowed devs to triangle in 1-2 months. Correct me if I'm wrong.
But then Cerny went on to say GDDR5 + eDRAM would be 1.088tb/s. Now my question is how long would it take to make triangle for GDDR5 +eDRAM, and what would of been the cost of a ps4 with GDDR5 + eDRAM.

The triangle time is more about the arch (PC like) and not the GDDR5...

About the GDDR5@256bits vs. GDDR5@128bits + eDRAM... he said that the first you can make games fast and easy like PC and expend time to use the full potential of the hardware or find others features to use in the games... now the second you need to learn how to use the eDRAM cache and each developer needs to develop special techs to handle it and try to reach the full potential of the hardware.

In easy term... in the first you use your time to only to develop the game... in the second you use it to make the game run on the hardware and to develop the game.

It's more easy to get the full potential of the hardware in the first case... in the second you need more work and time... you can make this comparison:

GDDR5@256bits: Xbox 360
GDDR5@128bits + eDRAM: PS3

That's what I understand from the presentation last week.

It is more easy and fast to reach the full potential of PS4 than the Xbone... and the PS4 have more potential than Xbone... the things is not good to Xbone in terms of development.



ethomaz said:

Machiavellian said:

I still do not get why this is a MS PR marketing ploy.  It seems incredibly silly to believe someone in marketing is thinking that telling developers they have this extra bit of bandwidth will be the means to get this information out to the interweb were it will make some magical difference to people who will purchase the console.

In the grand scheme of things, this means absolutely nothing to consumers and instead means more to developers.  Why would MS BS people who are making games for their system just to make a few nerds believe the X1 has some secret magic sauce.  Developers will completely nix such a thing in the matter of days as they attempt to utilize the extra bandwidth so such PR Marketing sounds bogus to believe this is a marketing ploy.

Even in the article from Eurogamer it states the developer who was testing this out could only yield 133GBs.  So it does seem that developers are able to go beyond 102GBs but nowhere close to 196.  As time goes on, who knows maybe they will get to 156 or better.  I believe the key here is that there are a lot of speculation about pieces of hardware no one has any real clue how it works.

 

As to the cloud, if MS is sending that one belly up, spending almost a billion to get another datacenter up for X1 and Office 365 is a pretty expensive way to throw something away.

The Microsoft techs said they can get 133GB/s with alpha transparency blending operations to the source (dev)... the source (dev) didn't make any test.

Here is a quote from that part of the article.  After reading it again, I actually do not know if this was from MS tech or a developer as its not clear which one in this paragraph

So how could Microsoft's own internal tech teams have underestimated the capabilities of its own hardware by such a wide margin? Well, according to sources who have been briefed by Microsoft, the original bandwidth claim derives from a pretty basic calculation - 128 bytes per block multiplied by the GPU speed of 800MHz offers up the previous max throughput of 102.4GB/s. It's believed that this calculation remains true for separate read/write operations from and to the ESRAM. However, with near-final production silicon, Microsoft techs have found that the hardware is capable of reading and writingsimultaneously. Apparently, there are spare processing cycle "holes" that can be utilised for additional operations. Theoretical peak performance is one thing, but in real-life scenarios it's believed that 133GB/s throughput has been achieved with alpha transparency blending operations (FP16 x4).

Eithe way it sounds more like info to Devs then some PR stunt from some marketing department on trying to deflect negative perception of the X1 on the sly.  If anything, MS would like for all info to just fade away as it keeps debates up and going which doesn't win them any favors.  I am sure MS would like to keep things about the games and their features then go into hardware stuff where most people do not understand anything that is going on and only speculation and misinformation exist.



Machiavellian said:

Here is a quote from that part of the article.  After reading it again, I actually do not know if this was from MS tech or a developer as its not clear which one in this paragraph

So how could Microsoft's own internal tech teams have underestimated the capabilities of its own hardware by such a wide margin? Well, according to sources who have been briefed by Microsoft, the original bandwidth claim derives from a pretty basic calculation - 128 bytes per block multiplied by the GPU speed of 800MHz offers up the previous max throughput of 102.4GB/s. It's believed that this calculation remains true for separate read/write operations from and to the ESRAM. However, with near-final production silicon, Microsoft techs have found that the hardware is capable of reading and writingsimultaneously. Apparently, there are spare processing cycle "holes" that can be utilised for additional operations. Theoretical peak performance is one thing, but in real-life scenarios it's believed that 133GB/s throughput has been achieved with alpha transparency blending operations (FP16 x4).

Eithe way it sounds more like info to Devs then some PR stunt from some marketing department on trying to deflect negative perception of the X1 on the sly.  If anything, MS would like for all info to just fade away as it keeps debates up and going which doesn't win them any favors.  I am sure MS would like to keep things about the games and their features then go into hardware stuff where most people do not understand anything that is going on and only speculation and misinformation exist.

I think that the biggest issue from MS about the Xbox One... the confusion about its features.

One dev say one thing... other another... and a third other complete different... why not release official specs and stop with all the talk. It's not about the hardware... it's about all the Xbone features like Cloud for example... puts the things clear without room to confusion.

The speculation will only get bigger and bigger at the point that damage the feature like happened with the "DRM", "Always Online", "Family Sharing", etc.