Microsoft's Penello: No way is Xbox One giving up 30% power advantage t

[Showan]

Why are you having such a hard time with this?

 

Would you program a game that requires the current generation processor?  The latest card from nvidia or amd?  A crazy amount of memory (so you will need a 64-bit computer and OS)?

 

I do not need a multi-thousand dollar set up to play WoW.  Why?  They created the game to run at the lowest common denominator to still satisfy their needs of the game.  They did not build it to require SLI or require a very very expensive setup.

 

Why are games still offering resolutions below 720?

 

As a developer, you program your game to where you can get the most audience.  Therefore, you develop for the lowest common denominator.

 

 

I am having a hard time, because me being me... I would start HIGH and work low.. Sure you have to make $$$ on your work, but that does not mean you degrade your work either.

 

But this still cannot be proven... Just what, is written by us the end users... speculating...  I speculate as well... But I want it straight "from the horses mouth"

[JonnyLH]

I am having a hard time, because me being me... I would start HIGH and work low.. Sure you have to make $$$ on your work, but that does not mean you degrade your work either.

 

But this still cannot be proven... Just what, is written by us the end users... speculating...  I speculate as well... But I want it straight "from the horses mouth"

Then you've got two different sets of art assets, you've got to work by the lowest because its simply cheaper and less work. Its never 'whats best'.

[giantpotato]

I've played plenty of multi-platform games where the PC didn't have better graphics. 

I haven't played a single PC game that didn't let me set the resolution higher than consoles. Dead Souls being an exception to this rule, but that was fixed by mods.

[McKay]

I haven't played a single PC game that didn't let me set the resolution higher than consoles. Dead Souls being an exception to this rule, but that was fixed by mods.

 

 

I don't count fixing it by mods as looking better, for my it has to look better out of the box. For me the Mass Effect series had horrendously blurry textures, I downloaded 2k texture packs to rectify this. I noticed no difference in quality over the console versions. Obviously it'll let you set the resolution higher in Settings, but thats changes the UI elements etc, it doesn't solve the textures being rediculously low-res. Skyrim looked a little better to me, but still suffered from blurry textures everywhere, even the Higher Textures DLC barely changed a thing, I ended up getting 4k textures from SkyrimNexus.

[theyarecomingforyou]

The PS3 WAS COMPLETELY DIFFERENT FROM EVERYONE ELSE!!! using that as a testament for the x1 not working out only makes you look like a moron.

You can disagree with me all you want but resorting to all-caps text and insults does nothing to support your position. The point being made was that the X1 has a different architecture, which made the PS3 comparison apt.

 

The basic CPU architecture can be the same but the actual PCB choices with buffers etc can make a HUGE difference.

So much fail in this thread it hurts. GPU is not as big a factor as people make out, on PC with a haswell OC the cpu is the cap not the gpu in a lot of games (the worst being planetside 2, ha lets see that on ps4)

It's strange the way that you completely dismiss the differences in GPU and memory bandwidth?something we have real-world methods of comparing and know both favour the PS4?whilst arguing that the PCB will make a massive amount of difference, something that is complete supposition at this point. You come across as completely biased. That's not to say that you're wrong, it's just that you don't have any basis for your claims.

 

As I said earlier, I don't think that Microsoft upped the clock speed on the X1 because it thought it was in the better position performance wise. However, it doesn't matter if the X1 turns out to be 30% faster if developers don't take advantage of it. Sony went all out with the PS3 yet developers weren't able or willing to take advantage of it. It will come down to which consoles sells better and offers the better development tools - Sony is probably in the better position for the former (given its price advantage), Microsoft the latter.

 

At the end of the day there isn't going to be much in it and I wouldn't be surprised if the difference is even smaller than that between the X360 and PS3. It's interesting to discuss the details at this point but some people are taking this WAY too seriously.

[Lord Method Man]

I don't count fixing it by mods as looking better, for my it has to look better out of the box. For me the Mass Effect series had horrendously blurry textures, I downloaded 2k texture packs to rectify this. I noticed no difference in quality over the console versions. Obviously it'll let you set the resolution higher in Settings, but thats changes the UI elements etc, it doesn't solve the textures being rediculously low-res. Skyrim looked a little better to me, but still suffered from blurry textures everywhere, even the Higher Textures DLC barely changed a thing, I ended up getting 4k textures from SkyrimNexus.

 

Mass Effect series ran at twice the framerate of the choppy 360 versions.

 

I cant say much about the textures on the 360 as I got bored waiting for them to finally pop-in so I shut the console off and did something else.

[shifts]

Clocks, numbers and speed aren't the be all and end all.  Look at the iPhone as a shining example of using an "under powered" processor but by lordy do developers know how to cram some amazing results from it without needing a bajillion cores.

[+Warwagon MVC]

 

FIXED! :)

 

Much of the focus in the console war between the PS4and Xbox One has been the perceived power advantageSony's console has over Microsoft's. Following a published interview with Rev3Games Thursday, Microsoft Director of Product Planning Albert Penello explained why there's no way the company is willing to give the competition a huge performance advantage.

 

The advantages for the PS4 over the Xbox One currently stand with the console's GPU and memory. The Playstation 4 GPU is said to be capable of 1.8 TFLOPS while it also uses GDDR5 memory for fast memory access at 5500mhz. Meanwhile, the Xbox One's GPU is reportedly capable of 1.23 TFLOPS (before the 150Mhzclock speed boost) and uses DDR3 memory at 2133mhz. However, Penello says that there's more to the story than just numbers on paper.

 

"I?m not dismissing raw performance. I?m stating ? as I have stated from the beginning ? that the performance delta between the two platforms is not as great as the raw numbers lead the average consumer to believe," Penello wrote on NeoGAF. "There are things about our system architecture not fully understood, and there are things about theirs as well, that bring the two systems into balance."

 

"People DO understand that Microsoft has some of the smartest graphics programmers IN THE WORLD. We CREATED DirectX, the standard API?s that everyone programs against. So while people laude Sony for their [hardware] skills, do you really think we don?t know how to build a system optimized for maximizing graphics for programmers? Seriously?

 

There is no way we?re giving up a 30%+ advantage to Sony. And ANYONE who has seen both systems running could say there are great looking games on both systems. If there was really huge performance difference ? it would be obvious."

 

Penello then brought up similar instances where Sony and fans of the Playstation proclaimed superior performance with the PS2 and PS3 before concluding that, "in the end, games on our system looked the same or better."

 

"I?m not saying they haven?t built a good system ? I?m merely saying that anyone who wants to die on their sword over this 30%+ power advantage are going to be fighting an uphill battle over the next 10 years?"

 

Update: Penello followed-up with another post after some members of NeoGAF questioned his line of reasoning.

"I'm stating that not everyone knows all the facts. There are still a lot of important details about the platforms that are still unknown. I have many, many questions about what Sony is doing technically," he wrote.

 

"The question I posed earlier, and the statements I'm making now, will come out when we see the actual shipping boxes.

 

"The most obvious point is that anyone looking at games on both platforms do not see ANY difference, let alone this alleged 30% - 40%. Both systems are powerful. Both are capable of next-gen graphics. I'm merely saying the application of that performance will mean the actual difference will not be that great."

 

 

http://www.examiner.com/article/microsoft-s-penello-no-way-is-xbox-one-giving-up-30-power-advantage-to-ps4

 

[giantpotato]

I don't count fixing it by mods as looking better, for my it has to look better out of the box. For me the Mass Effect series had horrendously blurry textures, I downloaded 2k texture packs to rectify this. I noticed no difference in quality over the console versions. Obviously it'll let you set the resolution higher in Settings, but thats changes the UI elements etc, it doesn't solve the textures being rediculously low-res. Skyrim looked a little better to me, but still suffered from blurry textures everywhere, even the Higher Textures DLC barely changed a thing, I ended up getting 4k textures from SkyrimNexus.

 

Even if all the game assets, textures etc, are the same, it will still look better at a higher resolution. Take a single 1 diagonal line for example. It will be a lot more jaggy at lower resolution than at higher resolution.

[Athernar]

So you're telling me a basic OpenGL wrapper which sits on a bulky modified version of CentOS can outperform a 100% optimized version of DirectX which sits on HyperVM instances? 

 

Comparing OpenGL on the PC to anything on the PS3/4 is ridiculous.

 

So let me get this right, you're stating that the PS4 OS is "bulky", while getting the parent OS wrong. And then expecting people to swallow some marketing guff about DirectX being "100% optimised"?

 

FYI, "OrbisOS" is a fork of FreeBSD - the FreeBSD kernel running BSD userspace. CentOS is GNU/Linux and encumbered by the viral GPL license.

[BajiRav]

It's quite clear that Microsoft is under pressure from the performance of the PS4, hence why it has had to up the clock speed for the CPU.

This is just plain wrong. These tweaks happen during development. IIRC Xbox 360 was underclocked closer to release.

[theyarecomingforyou]

This is just plain wrong. These tweaks happen during development. IIRC Xbox 360 was underclocked closer to release.

That's why you shouldn't commit to numbers too soon, which is the strategy that Sony has employed. Meanwhile Microsoft has upped the clock speeds of both the CPU and GPU from the previously stated figures - the latter is particularly interesting, as the GPU increased from 800MHz (a nice rounded number) or 853 (a rather unconventional number). Obviously we can't know for sure if that is in response to the PS4 but that's what most reporters and spectators have assumed. Either way it was a mistake by Microsoft from a PR perspective, as it makes the company look like it's playing catch-up.

[BajiRav]

That's why you shouldn't commit to numbers too soon, which is the strategy that Sony has employed. Meanwhile Microsoft has upped the clock speeds of both the CPU and GPU from the previously stated figures - the latter is particularly interesting, as the GPU increased from 800MHz (a nice rounded number) or 853 (a rather unconventional number). Obviously we can't know for sure if that is in response to the PS4 but that's what most reporters and spectators have assumed. Either way it was a mistake by Microsoft from a PR perspective, as it makes the company look like it's playing catch-up.

Microsoft never said anything about both clock speeds till they said 853 and 1.75. The earlier figures were leaked.

It was one of their biggest criticisms that they did not give out specs in May reveal.

Damned if they do, damned if they don't indeed.

[Houtei]

Why is everyone acting like they know what the inner working of the ps4 and xbox one?  You do not know how well either system is optimized specially directx or opengl.   You are taking guesses for your consoles that's your favorite based on what you read online and from the papers that have been released by MS and Sony.  You can guarantee there are things we do not know that will affect performance on both systems a good bit.   We will not know jack until they are in our hands and everyone starts posting comparison videos.

 

Also although its nice to see a lot of the games are running at 1080p 60fps but it is not a requirement and you are in the minority if you think so.  The average person that plays console games does not have a clue what resolution a game is running at or fps.  The only people that nit pick about that crap is us PC users.

 

Also Panello only said that it may look that way on paper as in the current papers we have floating around. He said both systems have stuff that we have no idea about yet and also we dont know the exact inner working of what we do know exist.

[trooper11]

That's why you shouldn't commit to numbers too soon, which is the strategy that Sony has employed. Meanwhile Microsoft has upped the clock speeds of both the CPU and GPU from the previously stated figures - the latter is particularly interesting, as the GPU increased from 800MHz (a nice rounded number) or 853 (a rather unconventional number). Obviously we can't know for sure if that is in response to the PS4 but that's what most reporters and spectators have assumed. Either way it was a mistake by Microsoft from a PR perspective, as it makes the company look like it's playing catch-up.

 

We don't know for sure, but people with a bias in one direction or another will be happy to assume whatever makes their opinion look better.

 

Also, did MS ever officially announce any clock speeds before this announcement?  I seem to remember people complaining that MS was not laying out all the details so that it could be compared with the PS4.

[Yogurtmaster]

What utter nonsense. Both are using AMD for CPUs and GPUs, with largely similar architectures -
obviously there are differences but to suggest that the Xbox One is "95% non-off-the-shelf" is patently absurd.

 

You haven't seen the architecture at all I see.  If you follow what has been released from Hot Chips in August you will see what I mean.

What you think is absurd, is fact.   Microsoft heavily modified the CPU from AMD as well as created their own chipset with the help of AMD and IBM.

There is a lot going on that you don't seem to understand.  Google "Xbox One hot chips" and find out for yourself.

 

You have no way of knowing that, nor does anyone until we see it in the real world. Even developers aren't sure how they're going to utilise it, if at all.
You've clearly taken a position and are simply engaging in confirmation bias. It's quite clear that Microsoft is under pressure from the performance
of the PS4, hence why it has had to up the clock speed for the CPU. Still, even if the X1 is less powerful than the PS4 we all know that there are
other factors involved, like which platform is the lead and what the development tools are like - Microsoft has had an advantage in both areas for
the current generation, so there's no doubt it's going to be a close race.

 

The cloud processing is not a response to Sony.  Microsoft was making it about the cloud all the way back to 2010 and we have proper documentation on that.

The Xbox one has been built around the cloud completely.

 

1) I can't attach the document (it's too big even when I compress it), but I am going to give you the filename and you can Google it...  Google this document "92821757-XBox-720-9-24-Checkpoint-Draft-1.pdf"

find out for yourself.  This was a document in September 2010 talking about the Xbox 720 at the time and what the cloud was used for, which has drastically changed because of what happened on #2.

This was also before Sony bought out Gaikai and most likely was a response to this document.  Sony bought out Gaikai in July of 2012.

 

2) Here is some information about what Microsoft is doing with the cloud, 343 industries (Makers of Halo 4 at Microsoft Studios) is working together with Microsoft Research on "Server Processing" or "Cloud processing"

   

      http://www.zdnet.com/microsofts-orleans-cloud-programming-model-gets-a-halo-test-drive-7000009300/

 

3) Finally here is an article at what was shown at E3 with a demonstration of the "Cloud processing".    Notice how it says 4,000 asteroids being rendered for the Xbox 360, 40,000 asteroids being rendered on XB1 and, 330,000 asteroids being rendered by the cloud processing in real-time?  Well, there is your proof with no tricks and it's being done in real-time.

 

     http://www.eurogamer.net/articles/2013-06-19-microsoft-makes-the-case-for-xbox-ones-300-000-server-cloud-but-what-do-developers-think

[Yogurtmaster]

I have to confess that one of the things that I am so excited about is cloud processing or as Microsoft calls it "Cloud Compute".

This I feel is a game changer (pun intended)  and I am very excited about this technology.  It's not magic but it is science and it's a science that hasn't been used much thus far.

 

I mean a lot of the launch titles (as with all console launches) don't use this yet and I am excited to see how the next Halo uses it.

 

I look at Ryse 2 in 2015 and how you could use that A.I. on the enemy combatants and physics as well by using "Cloud Compute".  It's a very exciting time in video

games and entertainment and I look forward to it

[MikeChipshop Member]

They're both based on AMD architecture, so while they can play around with it there is inherently a lot of similarity between the two

 

I had fried eggs for breakfast and they were EXACTLY the same as the cake i'm having for lunch...

[JonnyLH]

So let me get this right, you're stating that the PS4 OS is "bulky", while getting the parent OS wrong. And then expecting people to swallow some marketing guff about DirectX being "100% optimised"?

 

FYI, "OrbisOS" is a fork of FreeBSD - the FreeBSD kernel running BSD userspace. CentOS is GNU/Linux and encumbered by the viral GPL license.

That's my bad, it is a fork of FreeBSD, my memory failed me. An opensource modified OS is not going to outperform an OS built specifically for that platform, logic should tell you that.

 

How is DirectX for a fixed platform being 100% optimised marketing guff? Seriously? Its one of the main reasons why this console has been producing 1080p60fps.

[JonnyLH]

I have to confess that one of the things that I am so excited about is cloud processing or as Microsoft calls it "Cloud Compute".

This I feel is a game changer (pun intended)  and I am very excited about this technology.  It's not magic but it is science and it's a science that hasn't been used much thus far.

Ditto.

 

The thing is with cloud is that for it to work off exceptionally well for any graphical compute tasks, it really needs to be baked in quite low down in the engine. That takes a lot of time and re-writes by the developers on a solution which probably wasn't available immediately when they started X1 game development. The more and more game developers learn how to off-load, the more games will get prettier and that's something which will really extend the lifespan of the box compared to like the Wii U and the PS4 which is limited by its local resources. By this I'm not saying it will gain magical powers, just slight computational off-load from developers understanding the logistics of it more to let the box work on more.

[vcfan]

Larry "Major Nelson" Hryb

 

http://www.reddit.com/r/xboxone/comments/1lt48f/albert_penello_there_is_no_way_were_giving_up_a/cc2nezu

 

As I said above, Albert is one of the most amazing people I work with - that's why I invited him on my podcast a few weeks ago. I jab him a bit about posting on 'GAF (fact: they would not approve my account of there) but he's smart and driven. He's also right: We have some of smartest programmers in the world working on Xbox One. I am very much looking forward to the next few months (and beyond) as the truth comes out.

 

so am i

 

[+Audioboxer Subscriber²]

MajorNelson has a great track record with tech...

 

http://majornelson.com/2005/05/20/xbox-360-vs-ps3-part-1-of-4/

 

http://majornelson.com/2005/05/20/xbox-360-vs-ps3-part-2-of-4/

 

http://majornelson.com/2005/05/20/xbox-360-vs-ps3-part-3-of-4/

 

http://majornelson.com/2005/05/20/xbox-360-vs-ps3-part-4-of-4/

 

You would have to be smoking crack to post those articles.

[spenser.d]

Larry "Major Nelson" Hryb

 

http://www.reddit.com/r/xboxone/comments/1lt48f/albert_penello_there_is_no_way_were_giving_up_a/cc2nezu

 

 

 

so am I

 

 

 

Same here.

[Sandor]

Want graphics performance? Use a PC.

[sagum]

This entire argument over the xbox one or ps4 being faster is flawed.

It's been flawed for the last 5 years where PC's, who have always and continue to have faster hardware get crappy ports the majority of the time with nothing added or changed to take advantage of the increase in speed the PC has.
Do you really think developers are going to go and add a bit more fluff to the PS4 version of their games? nah, they'll create a game that works on the lowest hardware and port it over. So we'll be getting Xbox one created games and PS4 will get crappy ports with that 30% boost making up for the 'it's good enough' lack-lustre support we, PC, gamers have seen for a long time.