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Forums - Nintendo Discussion - NeoGAF: Wii U GPU 160 ALUs, 8 TMUs and 8 ROPs

curl-6 on 10 November 2013
Dr.EisDrachenJaeger said:
The Wii itself was never even fully utilized^

True.

But the games did push it the furthest, (Jett Rocket, Conduit 1 & 2, Metroid Other M, Modern Warfare 3) were all 2009-2011 games.



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Scoobes on 10 November 2013
Wyrdness said:
fatslob-:O said:

Sorry but that optimization excuse don't work out bra. The PS360 could out their own predecessors so why isn't the WII U doing the same thing to EVERY game. Even the PS4 and X1 could shit on their current gen counterparts easily bra. If the WII U had more bruteforce power to out the PS360 why ain't it performing better ? All that's needed to make a game look and run better is a significantly more powerful GPU an clearly the WII U lacks this. This generation ain't exactly over yet. Consoles altogether this generation started to use the GPU more and became more PC like in their philosophies and consoles altogether next generation are even dressed up PC's. Hell it's thanks to the WII Us different CPU that it ain't branded as a dressed up PC yet but that don't matter too much when much of it's power comes from an off the shelf PC GPU LMAO. If your referring to even older consoles like the PS1 and the N64 they also relied alot on CPU too and the N64 didn't even have a graphics processor! 


Did you see the first few 360 games? They were far from a huge leap I even named one earlier, this is what calls you out on your damage control, selective memory is a common trait with people doing this, it wasn't until Oblivon and Gears arrived (two games that were optimized for the hardware setting) that we saw a big leap, you're starting to sound desperate at this point and you should look up what off the shelf actually means. The N64 had a GPU for you to even try and pass that off shows how off key you are N64 had one of the first programmable GPUs in the RCP it had features that even PCs were just getting, look up how Ken Kutaragi fought tooth and nail to make sure PS3 had a GPU because Sony wanted it to run purely off a CPU and he said it just can't work with out it, consoles have to have a GPU of some kind. Forethought and Hynid have adressed everything else so need for me to repeat their posts.

Scoobe

GCN is a GPGPU architecture like I said, AMD supplied each company with a base GPU which is GCN hardware and each company made their custom changes to them depending on their console design. MS have a video of their customization that they released before E3 for reference, the closer to PC then before term is referance to how both consoles aren't using ground up propriety hardware to allow GCN which makes development across all platforms a lot easier that's all it means, AMD introduce Mantle soon as aswell for better optimization for all platforms.

What customizations though? The APUs are based nearly entirely of parts normally found in PC architecture. Based on what's been revealed I only know of 2 customizations on the APUs themselves. On PS4, the increase in ACEs and the number of compute queues each ACE can handle, whilst the X1 has the eSRAM. On both you have a few minor additions (mainly for audio which would normally be handled on the motherboard anyway).

They're as PC-like as you can get.




Get your Portable ID!

fatslob-:O on 10 November 2013
curl-6 said:
bonzobanana said:
curl-6 said:
bonzobanana said:
With any discussion about the latte fabrication you have to bear in mind the huge amount of stuff included in the latte, not only is a huge part the edram but there is also the arm cpu, audio dsp, 1MB wii u texture memory, 2MB wiii frame buffer, wii gpu, sections designed for high speed compression of the wii u gpu frame buffer and downscaled to fit in the wii gpu frame buffer. There is a huge amount of additional stuff.

The 176 gflops figure is completely realistic, not only does it fit in with the power consumption figures but it fits in with how the wii u is actually performing. Let's not forget the generational difference between 360/PS3 gpu's and the later radeon's is quite significant in performance.

If the latte really is 352 gflops and the architecture is much improved plus you have 32MB of high speed edram then what the hell is going wrong that the wii u that it is struggling to outperform 360/PS3 graphically? The figure of 176 gflops makes total sense, it simply works with all the information we have. If the latte really is 352 gflops then something has gone horribly wrong in the design of the wii u that is creating major issues. I don't believe this. I believe Nintendo have a designed a console at the absolute minimum price to merely match current gen performance overall. However as a wii u owner I'm more than happy to be proved wrong but the evidence surely dictates that of the possible range of gflops performance 176-352 gflops where once we were clinging on to believing it was 352 gflops infact the lower figure is much more realistic.

I guess an alternative view is that CPU is so weak that the compute functionality of the radeon gpu is being utilised for practically every game and compromising graphic output. I don't believe this myself. I also don't believe the wii u console is hard to develop for, I believe the complete opposite is true and I don't believe all developers are being lazy on wii u either.

Ultimately I believe the wii u is a low performance console designed to a specification for good quality cartoon graphics for Nintendo games and a huge profit for Nintendo and its shareholders (if it sold well). A continuation of their 'withered technology' philosophy that was so successful for gameboy, wii etc.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Gunpei_Yokoi

Current PS3/360 games are built on 8 years of optimization for their specific hardware. Wii U hasn't even been out for a year yet, no console is maxed out that fast. You need exclusives designed around a console's  specific hardware to really show off what it can do, and no Wii U exclusive so far has aimed for high end graphics, they all adopt simpler styles that preclude technological boundary-pushing.

The Wii U has yet to have its Uncharted 2, its Gears of War, its Mario Galaxy, that one game that really puts its chipset through its paces and shatters its established graphical standards.

We don't know how mature the development software is but the wii u is not a complicated design. It's using a well known and well documented radeon gpu (which one we aren't sure of) and I don't think there are any surprises when it comes to the 32 bit CPU which dates back to 1997. The wii u is not a ps3 or even a xbox 360 its a much simpler design. When the ps3 and 360 came out they were cutting edge hardware and new to market that is not the case with wii u. Also just about the most impressive gamecube/wii title is Rogue Squadron despite being a launch title.  Also Halo represents a very level of optimisation on the original xbox. The wii u is not cutting edge its a combination of well documented and mature components clearly this will have an effect on what level of optimisation it achieves. Did the wii make great strides over the gamecube in optimisation beyond the extra 64MB memory and 50% overclock plus dvd storage capacity. I certainly don't think so.

The gamecube itself hit the ground running with great performance unlike the ps2 because it was a much better design to develop for as is the wii u.

We don't know for a fact that Wii U GPU is well documented; Nintendo traditionally uses customized parts, the same is likely true here.

Also, it is very different from PS3/360, which all current multiplats are designed around. Forcing a game designed for one architecture onto another never gets the best results.

Wii was familiar hardware yet it did not show it's full power at launch. Its most technically advanced games came in its 3rd, 4th, and 5th years.

Rogue Squadron 2 was a freak occurance, and was in fact surpassed technically by its sequel two years later.

Halo 1 was nowhere near the most advanced Xbox game, it pales in comparison to its sequel, and to games like Conker Live and Reloaded, which came much later in the system's lifespan.

Actually nintendo doesn't customize it's design a whole lot. Hence, why the WII/GC emulator performs alot better than the PS2 emulator despite the fact that the WII is more powerful than the PS2. So if the WII U is anything to go off of It's probably pretty similar to off the shelf PC graphics card. The WII is more closer to a PC than the PS360 so I don't know why development should be harder on the WII U. 



curl-6 on 10 November 2013
fatslob-:O said:
curl-6 said:

We don't know for a fact that Wii U GPU is well documented; Nintendo traditionally uses customized parts, the same is likely true here.

Also, it is very different from PS3/360, which all current multiplats are designed around. Forcing a game designed for one architecture onto another never gets the best results.

Wii was familiar hardware yet it did not show it's full power at launch. Its most technically advanced games came in its 3rd, 4th, and 5th years.

Rogue Squadron 2 was a freak occurance, and was in fact surpassed technically by its sequel two years later.

Halo 1 was nowhere near the most advanced Xbox game, it pales in comparison to its sequel, and to games like Conker Live and Reloaded, which came much later in the system's lifespan.

Actually nintendo doesn't customize it's design a whole lot. Hence, why the WII/GC emulator performs alot better than the PS2 emulator despite the fact that the WII is more powerful than the PS2. So if the WII U is anything to go off of It's probably pretty similar to off the shelf PC graphics card. The WII is more closer to a PC than the PS360 so I don't know why development should be harder on the WII U. 

GC/Wii did not use off the shelf GPUs, they were heavily customized chips. This precedent suggests Wii U will be the same.



fatslob-:O on 10 November 2013
Scoobes said:
Wyrdness said:
fatslob-:O said:

Sorry but that optimization excuse don't work out bra. The PS360 could out their own predecessors so why isn't the WII U doing the same thing to EVERY game. Even the PS4 and X1 could shit on their current gen counterparts easily bra. If the WII U had more bruteforce power to out the PS360 why ain't it performing better ? All that's needed to make a game look and run better is a significantly more powerful GPU an clearly the WII U lacks this. This generation ain't exactly over yet. Consoles altogether this generation started to use the GPU more and became more PC like in their philosophies and consoles altogether next generation are even dressed up PC's. Hell it's thanks to the WII Us different CPU that it ain't branded as a dressed up PC yet but that don't matter too much when much of it's power comes from an off the shelf PC GPU LMAO. If your referring to even older consoles like the PS1 and the N64 they also relied alot on CPU too and the N64 didn't even have a graphics processor! 


Did you see the first few 360 games? They were far from a huge leap I even named one earlier, this is what calls you out on your damage control, selective memory is a common trait with people doing this, it wasn't until Oblivon and Gears arrived (two games that were optimized for the hardware setting) that we saw a big leap, you're starting to sound desperate at this point and you should look up what off the shelf actually means. The N64 had a GPU for you to even try and pass that off shows how off key you are N64 had one of the first programmable GPUs in the RCP it had features that even PCs were just getting, look up how Ken Kutaragi fought tooth and nail to make sure PS3 had a GPU because Sony wanted it to run purely off a CPU and he said it just can't work with out it, consoles have to have a GPU of some kind. Forethought and Hynid have adressed everything else so need for me to repeat their posts.

Scoobe

GCN is a GPGPU architecture like I said, AMD supplied each company with a base GPU which is GCN hardware and each company made their custom changes to them depending on their console design. MS have a video of their customization that they released before E3 for reference, the closer to PC then before term is referance to how both consoles aren't using ground up propriety hardware to allow GCN which makes development across all platforms a lot easier that's all it means, AMD introduce Mantle soon as aswell for better optimization for all platforms.

What customizations though? The APUs are based nearly entirely of parts normally found in PC architecture. Based on what's been revealed I only know of 2 customizations on the APUs themselves. On PS4, the increase in ACEs and the number of compute queues each ACE can handle, whilst the X1 has the eSRAM. On both you have a few minor additions (mainly for audio which would normally be handled on the motherboard anyway).

They're as PC-like as you can get.

Actually the the PS4 is probably based off of the volcanic islands architecture. It's essentially a cut down R9 290X with the same features. The R9 290X feature the same amount of ACEs and compute queues. By "cut down" I mean it has the same architecture but at a different scale. It basically means that they scaled down the design of the R9 290X by things such as lowering amount of ROPS, TMUs, and shaders. The eSRAM is just a form of software managed cache. All in all they don't deviate at all from the PC. In fact their so close to PCs that they can most definitely run windows LOL. 



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fatslob-:O on 10 November 2013
curl-6 said:
fatslob-:O said:
curl-6 said:

We don't know for a fact that Wii U GPU is well documented; Nintendo traditionally uses customized parts, the same is likely true here.

Also, it is very different from PS3/360, which all current multiplats are designed around. Forcing a game designed for one architecture onto another never gets the best results.

Wii was familiar hardware yet it did not show it's full power at launch. Its most technically advanced games came in its 3rd, 4th, and 5th years.

Rogue Squadron 2 was a freak occurance, and was in fact surpassed technically by its sequel two years later.

Halo 1 was nowhere near the most advanced Xbox game, it pales in comparison to its sequel, and to games like Conker Live and Reloaded, which came much later in the system's lifespan.

Actually nintendo doesn't customize it's design a whole lot. Hence, why the WII/GC emulator performs alot better than the PS2 emulator despite the fact that the WII is more powerful than the PS2. So if the WII U is anything to go off of It's probably pretty similar to off the shelf PC graphics card. The WII is more closer to a PC than the PS360 so I don't know why development should be harder on the WII U. 

GC/Wii did not use off the shelf GPUs, they were heavily customized chips. This precedent suggests Wii U will be the same.

Then why is it so easy to run WII games on my computer than it is for PS2 game ? Somebody is not telling the truth here. It's either the PCSX2 developers that are wrong or it's the nintendo fans that are wrong. 



Hynad on 10 November 2013
fatslob-:O said:

Then why is it so easy to run WII games on my computer than it is for PS2 game ? Somebody is not telling the truth here. It's either the PCSX2 developers that are wrong or it's the nintendo fans that are wrong. 


I think you may be the one that's wrong. PS2 games run really good on my PC compared to Wii games. 

You probably haven't configured PCSX2 properly.



curl-6 on 10 November 2013
fatslob-:O said:
curl-6 said:
fatslob-:O said:
curl-6 said:

We don't know for a fact that Wii U GPU is well documented; Nintendo traditionally uses customized parts, the same is likely true here.

Also, it is very different from PS3/360, which all current multiplats are designed around. Forcing a game designed for one architecture onto another never gets the best results.

Wii was familiar hardware yet it did not show it's full power at launch. Its most technically advanced games came in its 3rd, 4th, and 5th years.

Rogue Squadron 2 was a freak occurance, and was in fact surpassed technically by its sequel two years later.

Halo 1 was nowhere near the most advanced Xbox game, it pales in comparison to its sequel, and to games like Conker Live and Reloaded, which came much later in the system's lifespan.

Actually nintendo doesn't customize it's design a whole lot. Hence, why the WII/GC emulator performs alot better than the PS2 emulator despite the fact that the WII is more powerful than the PS2. So if the WII U is anything to go off of It's probably pretty similar to off the shelf PC graphics card. The WII is more closer to a PC than the PS360 so I don't know why development should be harder on the WII U. 

GC/Wii did not use off the shelf GPUs, they were heavily customized chips. This precedent suggests Wii U will be the same.

Then why is it so easy to run WII games on my computer than it is for PS2 game ? Somebody is not telling the truth here. It's either the PCSX2 developers that are wrong or it's the nintendo fans that are wrong. 

Because PS2's architecture was more complex and unconventional than Wii/GC.



fatslob-:O on 10 November 2013
Hynad said:
fatslob-:O said:

Then why is it so easy to run WII games on my computer than it is for PS2 game ? Somebody is not telling the truth here. It's either the PCSX2 developers that are wrong or it's the nintendo fans that are wrong. 


I think you may be the one that's wrong. PS2 games run really good on my PC compared to Wii games. 

You probably haven't configured PCSX2 properly.

It may be just your PC then. PS2 emulation has ALWAYS been more CPU limited and that's due to the fact that the PS2 was prettty reliant on it's emotion engine and vector units. Increases in CPU performance these past serveral years have been incremental at best whereas GPU's have being just exploding in performance gains. What makes easier emulation for WII is it's graphics chip is pretty similar to a PC compared the PS2s special inhouse graphics synthesizer chip. 

What's your GPU anyways ? 



curl-6 on 10 November 2013
fatslob-:O said:
Hynad said:
fatslob-:O said:

Then why is it so easy to run WII games on my computer than it is for PS2 game ? Somebody is not telling the truth here. It's either the PCSX2 developers that are wrong or it's the nintendo fans that are wrong. 


I think you may be the one that's wrong. PS2 games run really good on my PC compared to Wii games. 

You probably haven't configured PCSX2 properly.

It may be just your PC then. PS2 emulation has ALWAYS been more CPU limited and that's due to the fact that the PS2 was prettty reliant on it's emotion engine and vector units. Increases in CPU performance these past serveral years have been incremental at best whereas GPU's have being just exploding in performance gains. What makes easier emulation for WII is it's graphics chip is pretty similar to a PC compared the PS2s special inhouse graphics synthesizer chip. 

What's your GPU anyways ? 

The Wii GPU isn't remotely similar to any PC GPU released since the DX7 chips of the late 90s. It uses register combiners instead of the programmable pixel shaders used in DX8 and up. Like you said, PS2 emulation is CPU bound. With Wii/GC, CPU emulation isn't as difficult, as they use single core, single threaded PowerPC 750 cores.