Digital Foundry Article Technical Discussion Archive [2016 - 2017]

[Clukos]

Interesting. I have the SSHD DF is using myself and i can say i noticed improvements overall.

 

[goonergaz]

yeah, me too...I just wish there was a 2tb version

 

[orangpelupa]

I'm curious, DF is using OLD or NEW ps4?

The old one's sata was hardware limited by usb. The new ones are not hardware limited.

 

[Deleted member 11852]

The old one's sata was hardware limited by usb. The new ones are not hardware limited.

There are other hardware limitations. If games are compressed using zlib then the decompression chip will limit throughout.

 

[Rikimaru]

Bandwidth is software limited to equalize PS4s. Seek time is not.

 

[Deleted member 11852]

Bandwidth is software limited to equalize PS4s. Seek time is not.

Do you have a source for this?

 

[novcze]

Bandwidth is software limited to equalize PS4s. Seek time is not.

I don't know if there is some software in the play, but bandwidth certainly is limited with the USB/SATA bridge they are using in PS4. Although in the newest PS4 model, USB/SATA bridge is no longer on the motherboard. Will be interesting to know, which PS4 model DF tested.


edit:
ooops, I sort of skipped previous discussion

There are other hardware limitations. If games are compressed using zlib then the decompression chip will limit throughout.

And are games stored on the HDD compressed?

 

[Deleted member 11852]

IAnd are games stored on the HDD compressed?

That was the idea:

To further help the Blu-ray along, the system also has a unit to support zlib decompression -- so developers can confidently compress all of their game data and know the system will decode it on the fly. "As a minimum, our vision is that our games are zlib compressed on media" said Cerny.
​

Now he's talking about Blu-ray media but in terms of preserving space there's no reason why individuals files shouldn't be zlib compressed when installed on the HDD. zlib compression is no harm, no foul - if can't compress the file it only adds a few bytes the original. The only downside would be if the decompressor was slower than reading raw data from the HDD (without compression) or reading raw data from the HDD and decompressing with the CPU - then you need to factor in, do you want that hit on the CPU at the time you're decompressing? Possibly not for streaming.

 

[novcze]

The only downside would be if the decompressor was slower than reading raw data from the HDD (without compression) or reading raw data from the HDD and decompressing with the CPU - then you need to factor in, do you want that hit on the CPU at the time you're decompressing? Possibly not for streaming.

It was your idea how SSD transfer rates are limited ...

There are other hardware limitations. If games are compressed using zlib then the decompression chip will limit throughout.

 

[Clukos]

Impressive performance for Primal :smile:

 

[London Geezer]

Looks brilliant, still not too sure about the game though so I'll wait for reviews.

 

[pMax]

nvm, answered above.

 

[AlNom]

Snuffleupagus!

 

[Ike Turner]

Rise Of The Tomb Raider DF face PC vs Xbox One: http://www.eurogamer.net/articles/digitalfoundry-2016-rise-of-the-tomb-raider-pc-face-off
Another quality port by Nixxes. But this also highlights the great work done on the Xbox One version given that a relatively more powerful PC (vs Xbox HW) is required to get the same performance/visuals compared to the Xone version.

 

[Deleted member 11852]

It was your idea how SSD transfer rates are limited ...

What was my idea? I'm lost. What are you saying?

Impressive performance for Primal :smile:

I'm actually really looking forward to this. I really like the core gameplay in Far Cry 3 and Far Cry 4 it is the stories I can't abide, to the point where I just stopped playing Far Cry 4 entirely. I get the feeling their teams think they're doing something clever or edgy but the stories are really just shit IMHO. I'm hoping with a more basic setting with a more primitive (literally) culture, they'll just keep it simple and don't try to do something weird with 10,000 BC drugs or visions or other nonsense that really puts me off progressing these games.

I'll be reading the reviews carefully

 

[Deleted member 11852]

http://www.ps3devwiki.com/ps4/★_Debug_Settings
Slow HDD mode (retail mode presumably)
Was not present in first versions of OS. There is a story where devs were confused why SSD did not speed up load times on devkit.

I'm certain this is so devs can use faster drives but mimic the performance of the stock 5400rpm drive that Sony include in shipping consoles. This is why you can turn it on and off.

 

[Ike Turner]

Console version of RotTR

Yup everything is identical on the Xbox One besides the resolution (900P for cut scenes on Xbox vs whatever you want on PC)

 

[Clukos]

Used your shot and one from PC at 1080p for comparisons sake

Similar but the native resolution helps, plus better AO + higher quality textures it seems. In cutscenes it doesn't seem like the game changed much though.

 

[Ike Turner]

Used your shot and one from PC at 1080p for comparisons sake

Similar but the native resolution helps, plus better AO + higher quality textures it seems. In cutscenes it doesn't seem like the game changed much though.

Texture res during cut scenes is the same AFAIK but the Xbox cut scenes have a "glowy filter post effect" dans smears the whole picture (this in addition of the lower 900P res and the fact that you can't pause them to take screenshot IIRC so there's constant motion blur..)

 

[AlNom]

Used your shot and one from PC at 1080p for comparisons sake

Can you get a shot @ 900p? Keep the settings maxed out otherwise.

Why does she have a dimple/scar on her forehead on console?