sieanr said: Speaking of which, its hysterical that he brings up Mass Effect and its problems with texture streaming, yet ignores how Uncharted has the exact same problem.

Mmm....I've played through the whole of Uncharted and have only noticed texture popup once.  Yet looking at a few Mass effect videos I've seen the popup loads of time.

I'm sorry, but going by various reports, Mass Effect has huge problems with texture popup/in and framerate issues to boot.  Uncharted does not, or it is negligble.

PS3 not that powerful comfirmed.

:(

Entroper said: MikeB said: @ Entroper There is always an advantage to unified shaders. Unified shaders is an advantage, but not an advantage over the PS3. If you have 50 people who can either be a doctor or a dentist, does not mean there's advantage over having 100 people, 50 of them only being able to be a doctor and 50 people only able to be a dentist. You get more work done in the latter case. The RSX/Cell vs Xenos/Xenon is like such a situation. Except it isn't 50+50 vs. 50, it's 48+8 vs. 48.  :P  And I never claimed Xenos was faster!  I claimed the difference is less than the specs would indicate at face value.

And then there's also the Cell. The SPEs are way more flexible compared to current vertex shader engines. A SPE can create or destroy vertices, assemble primitives, and so on. Cell + RSX (bandwidth, etc) > Xenon + Xenos

From an older study: 

"This paper studies a deferred pixel shading algorithm implemented on a Cell-based computer entertainment system. The pixel shader runs on the Synergistic Processing Units (SPUs) of the Cell and works concurrently with the GPU to render images. The system's unified memory architecture allows the Cell and GPU to exchange data through shared textures. The SPUs use the Cell DMA list capability to gather irregular fine-grained fragments of texture data generated by the GPU. They return resultant shadow textures the same way. The shading computation ran at up to 85 Hz at HDTV 720p resolution on 5 SPUs and generated 30.72 gigaops of performance. This is comparable to the performance of the algorithm running on a state of the art high end GPU. These results indicate that a hybrid solution in which the Cell and GPU work together can produce higher performance than either device working alone."

makingmusic476 said: Soriku said: shams said: Wasn't the PS3 going to run two monitors, full 1080p - at 100fps locked? What happened to that? Note that this *was* originally promised by Kaz, when the PS3 was first announced. And now it doesn't even have true 1080p games - and even fewer that run 1080p at 60fps (locked). Kaz promised 120 FPS IIRC. Why they would do 120 FPS I don't know because LCDs and HDTVs can only render 70 FPS MAX so having more than 70 FPS is a waste of time and effort. Actually, the latest LCD HDTVs have 120hz refresh rates, so they can display 120fps. :P And I thought it was Krazy Ken that was trumpeting the 120fps stuff?

120 Hz refresh rates I can understand, but I don't see the use for more than 60 FPS. locked 30 FPS is enough for slower paced games and 60 FPS can be of benefit to fast paced games, but smoother motion we cannot distinguish with our eyes/brains, that's why 24 FPS in combination with motion blur for fast paced movie scenes is enough for silky smooth fluent movement perception.

MikeB said: Entroper said: MikeB said: @ Entroper There is always an advantage to unified shaders. Unified shaders is an advantage, but not an advantage over the PS3. If you have 50 people who can either be a doctor or a dentist, does not mean there's advantage over having 100 people, 50 of them only being able to be a doctor and 50 people only able to be a dentist. You get more work done in the latter case. The RSX/Cell vs Xenos/Xenon is like such a situation. Except it isn't 50+50 vs. 50, it's 48+8 vs. 48. :P And I never claimed Xenos was faster! I claimed the difference is less than the specs would indicate at face value. And then there's also the Cell. The SPEs are way more flexible compared to current vertex shader engines. A SPE can create or destroy vertices, assemble primitives, and so on. Cell + RSX (bandwidth, etc) > Xenon + Xenos From an older study: "This paper studies a deferred pixel shading algorithm implemented on a Cell-based computer entertainment system. The pixel shader runs on the Synergistic Processing Units (SPUs) of the Cell and works concurrently with the GPU to render images. The system's unified memory architecture allows the Cell and GPU to exchange data through shared textures. The SPUs use the Cell DMA list capability to gather irregular fine-grained fragments of texture data generated by the GPU. They return resultant shadow textures the same way. The shading computation ran at up to 85 Hz at HDTV 720p resolution on 5 SPUs and generated 30.72 gigaops of performance. This is comparable to the performance of the algorithm running on a state of the art high end GPU. These results indicate that a hybrid solution in which the Cell and GPU work together can produce higher performance than either device working alone."

I wouldn't argue that the PS3 isn't more powerful on paper than the 360.  The question is, how much more powerful, and how accessible is that power.  The PS3 has been on the market for more than a year, now, and yet very few games on the PS3 look better than what's available on the 360.  What good is a better engine if it's too expensive/difficult to take advantage of it?

Instead of trying to beat that PS3-power horse into the ground, perhaps you could spend more time helping to spread useful info to correct some of the misunderstanding in the posts in this thread, such as:

1. Why you don't need Blu-ray to display at 1080p in a game

2. Why 1080p does actually refer to 1920x1080 progressive scan instead of just any old resolution with 1080 lines

I know you know all that stuff and could help those guys out by explaining it.

 

MikeB said: makingmusic476 said: Actually, the latest LCD HDTVs have 120hz refresh rates, so they can display 120fps. :P And I thought it was Krazy Ken that was trumpeting the 120fps stuff? 120 Hz refresh rates I can understand, but I don't see the use for more than 60 FPS. locked 30 FPS is enough for slower paced games and 60 FPS can be of benefit to fast paced games, but smoother motion we cannot distinguish with our eyes/brains, that's why 24 FPS in combination with motion blur for fast paced movie scenes is enough for silky smooth fluent movement perception.

Okay, I stand corrected.  You are trying to help out.  

"yet ignores how Uncharted has the exact same problem."

texture popup in Uncharted? Did you actually play that game? I didn't notice a texture popup ONCE. (Not to say that there isn't any but it is definitely only an academic problem) And the framerate is unbelievably smooth, After Assassin's it almost took some time to get used to it. No the 360 has one year headstart for developers (which is a huge advantage) and already PS3 games look at least as good as 360 games.

Of course marketing did promise more but who cares. Both 360 and PS3 deliver awesome results (and the PS3 will have an edge IMO)

@ HappySqurriel

Less than 1 year here in Europe, I think the PS3 is gaining ground. A game like Unreal Tournament 3 specifically designed for the PC is already performing remarkably well on the PS3. Let's wait and see what the Crytek team is able to achieve on the PS3.

But the exclusive games is where you will see massive gains, because the PS3 is very different from other platforms. One thing to note though, a huge milestone blockbuster isn't built in a day, for example the original God of War took 3 years to complete.

Games developed on 360 using 3rd party middleware, those devs often don't possess much low-level insight with regard to the PS3 architecture. Rein stated some UT3 levels could already run in 1080p on the PS3 and they are still making enormous gains, according to Epic 1080p UT-like PS3 games are feasible, not bad coming from a company pushed to spread the Microsoft gospel.

crumas2 said: MikeB said: Entroper said: MikeB said: @ Entroper There is always an advantage to unified shaders. Unified shaders is an advantage, but not an advantage over the PS3. If you have 50 people who can either be a doctor or a dentist, does not mean there's advantage over having 100 people, 50 of them only being able to be a doctor and 50 people only able to be a dentist. You get more work done in the latter case. The RSX/Cell vs Xenos/Xenon is like such a situation. Except it isn't 50+50 vs. 50, it's 48+8 vs. 48. :P And I never claimed Xenos was faster! I claimed the difference is less than the specs would indicate at face value. And then there's also the Cell. The SPEs are way more flexible compared to current vertex shader engines. A SPE can create or destroy vertices, assemble primitives, and so on. Cell + RSX (bandwidth, etc) > Xenon + Xenos From an older study: "This paper studies a deferred pixel shading algorithm implemented on a Cell-based computer entertainment system. The pixel shader runs on the Synergistic Processing Units (SPUs) of the Cell and works concurrently with the GPU to render images. The system's unified memory architecture allows the Cell and GPU to exchange data through shared textures. The SPUs use the Cell DMA list capability to gather irregular fine-grained fragments of texture data generated by the GPU. They return resultant shadow textures the same way. The shading computation ran at up to 85 Hz at HDTV 720p resolution on 5 SPUs and generated 30.72 gigaops of performance. This is comparable to the performance of the algorithm running on a state of the art high end GPU. These results indicate that a hybrid solution in which the Cell and GPU work together can produce higher performance than either device working alone." I wouldn't argue that the PS3 isn't more powerful on paper than the 360. The question is, how much more powerful, and how accessible is that power. The PS3 has been on the market for more than a year, now, and yet very few games on the PS3 look better than what's available on the 360. What good is a better engine if it's too expensive/difficult to take advantage of it? Instead of trying to beat that PS3-power horse into the ground, perhaps you could spend more time helping to spread useful info to correct some of the misunderstanding in the posts in this thread, such as: 1. Why you don't need Blu-ray to display at 1080p in a game 2. Why 1080p does actually refer to 1920x1080 progressive scan instead of just any old resolution with 1080 lines I know you know all that stuff and could help those guys out by explaining it.

The performance isn't that difficult to tap, it's just a different approach than most devs are used to (it requires a bit more thought). You can't expect old locomotives to do very well on modern railways, similarly the best results will be achieved with newly built engines (from scratch, a lot of work to do in one go) and those which are adapted step by step into a fully PS3 orientated game engine (like Resistance 2).

1. You don't need Blu-Ray to output 1080p rendering resolution, you can have an OS on a single diskette supporting such a resolution. However as high definition sound and high quality textures take up a lot of space, it's certainly a huge plus to have far more storage space. You can have more varierty without dragging down the quality to fit on disc.

2. 1080p refers to 1080 lines, progressive scan.

A Full HD TV supports 1920 by 1080 pixel resolution.

MikeB said: Entroper said: MikeB said: @ Entroper There is always an advantage to unified shaders. Unified shaders is an advantage, but not an advantage over the PS3. If you have 50 people who can either be a doctor or a dentist, does not mean there's advantage over having 100 people, 50 of them only being able to be a doctor and 50 people only able to be a dentist. You get more work done in the latter case. The RSX/Cell vs Xenos/Xenon is like such a situation. Except it isn't 50+50 vs. 50, it's 48+8 vs. 48. :P And I never claimed Xenos was faster! I claimed the difference is less than the specs would indicate at face value. And then there's also the Cell. The SPEs are way more flexible compared to current vertex shader engines. A SPE can create or destroy vertices, assemble primitives, and so on. Cell + RSX (bandwidth, etc) > Xenon + Xenos From an older study: etc.

Go back and read my first post.  I wanted to put one little detail into perspective.  I'm not coming at you with a laundry list of links, I'm just talking about one detail, and I'm not even making the claims you seem to be arguing against.