Dirt 5, AC and several other cases had all the look of conscious choices that the patch had to reduce some other aspect of the game to compensate, still DF gone with bug even if it was 100% occurence (versus CoD being occassional).

Dirt 5 seemed like a deliberate choice? LOL

Yeah, even the PC version would probably be smaller than 42 GB without the ultra + high textures.

hard to see difference

DF added there photo mode observations.

https://www.eurogamer.net/articles/digitalfoundry-2021-control-ultimate-edition-photo-mode-rt-benchmark

Running unlocked does show varying degrees of overhead and based on over 20 matched scenarios, Series X does have a rendering advantage, which on average delivers a 16 per cent lead over PlayStation 5. We go through those scenarios in the embedded video on this page and the variation from test to test is significant - so we should emphasise that the 16 per cent figure is indeed a mean average. Some tests show an even wider margin, others see the situation close up significantly.

The rest of the analysis is only in video form, I haven't watched it.

That the Series X has a faster GPU is not surprising. (16% faster in raw flops) However with everything frozen, shouldn't the difference always be the same percentage wise. Perhaps the video reveals why some scenes work better on either console.

Interesting since based on those numbers, 1080 60fps RT mode should be doable on both consoles. Then again, photo mode does have everything in a fixed place so who knows.

Rather, why waste unlocked frame rate on photo mode. Shouldn't it go full quality in photo mode? Does it have a 'shoot' button to render a high quality version? (using a full second or more to max out on ray tracing and super sampling) When the scene is paused everything becomes static. Much easier for RT to deal with. It can spend each pass making it look better and better with accumulative results. No need for a shoot button, quality should improve automatically, if coded right, when you move slower or stand still.

For me photomode should be fluid until you reach the position you want to go, and them it can take several seconds if needed to make the image the best possible to save.

It seems to be working exactly as MS said it would - lower resolution and other scalable graphics settings, but an overall similar gameplay feel to Series X.  I own both and X and an S, and I can definitely see a difference between them.  But, had I realized how good the S would be, I wouldn't have paid a scalper for the X.  

To put it another way, if someone wants an easier to find and more affordable next gen console than the X or PS5, the Series S is perfectly capable.  You may not want it as your primary machine 5 years from now.  But, its totally fine for now.  

If you're wondering why someone has two current gen consoles when its hard to even get one.....I got the S at retail by grabbing a pre-order, and figured it was a backup plan.  I didn't open it at launch, because I was playing some older games at the time. When the X came down in price to a less crazy level (I paid $710 with an extra controller), I bought one and thought about selling or returning the Series S.  But, I realized that I could get almost $200 for my XBone S during Xmas season, so I sold that instead and kept my Series S for my secondary TV.  

It looks like they both overhead overhead to increase some fidelity settings in RT mode a bring it closer to the PC version high settings, especially on SX.

This is a last gen port though, so understandably its not super optimised. I'd imagine they have rather spend this time working on whatever their new project.

RT+ 60fps mode would be nice. 1080p SX seems like it would kind of automatic. PS5 looks it might need slight tweaking to hit 1080p at 60fps.