Digital Foundry Microsoft Xbox Scorpio Reveal [2017: 04-06, 04-11, 04-15, 04-16]

[whome0]

http://www.eurogamer.net/articles/digitalfoundry-2017-project-scorpio-tech-revealed
http://www.eurogamer.net/articles/2017-04-06-scorpio-for-dummies-the-next-xboxs-tech-explained
- 8 "Custom x86 cores" at 2.3GHz EDIT: Digital Foundry claims an "upgraded Jaguar" with the same two 4-core modules with total 4MB L2

Is this Scorpio Jaguar CPU GHz kind of like AMD turbo mode peak value?

Scorpio supports variable refresh rates.

And that tweet is gone no longer available.

 

[Cyan]

Soooo... People are buying PC en masse now ? Given it's not remotely close to their wet dreams but a PS4 => PS4Pro like upgrade...

I liked what @function mentioned. The command processor on the GPU literally liberating the CPU from draw calls. Really loved that. However, specs wise I am still torn. We shall see. If Scorpio is half PC half console then I am going to buy it day one!! If not, I will get a PC with Ryzen and Vega.

 

[BadTB25]

Just a thought that I didn't hear answered, but will I be able to take my current external with my X1/X360 games on it and plug it into Scorpio and just have it work?

Or does it need to download a patched version of the game?

 

[-Sweeper_]

The GPU portion features 44 CUs (custom by M$/AMD), with only 40 of them active to improve yields. That's 2816 GCN cores, coincidentally the same as Hawaii.

The Scorpio Engine processor measures 360mm2 and features seven billion transistors. We got to see the chip plan, with the four shader engines occupying the majority of the die, skewed towards the left of the layout. Each SE actually has 11 compute units, with one disabled per block to increase chip yield on the production line. To the right of the GPU sit the two clusters of custom CPU cores, while the memory interfaces skirt the edges of the chip.

Microsoft suggests 6 TFLOPs here will be able to provide better performance than an equivalent 6 TFLOPs PC. Running Forza 7 at 4K60 on the equivalent to PC's ultra settings is really impressive.

The bottom line is that Scorpio's six teraflops will almost certainly go a lot further than an equivalent PC part. I asked Microsoft about this specifically, and they raise a number of good arguments that make the case strongly. Firstly, that their shader compiler is far more efficient than PC equivalents (think of shaders as native GPU code). Secondly, addressing the hardware directly via their API and with access to console-specific GPU extensions again adds to the advantage of a fixed platform box. And finally, they point to their optimisation software - PIX (Performance Investigator for Xbox) - as a tool that provides the path to console-specific optimisations that PC simply cannot get.

From what I've seen so far, there is some evidence that Scorpio's true 4K performance could pose a challenge to the likes of Nvidia's GTX 1070 and AMD's Fury X-class hardware. I've seen Microsoft's new console running a Forza Motorsport 6-level experience locked to 4K60 on the equivalent to PC's ultra settings - cranking up the quality presets to obscene levels was one of the first things developer Turn 10 did when confronted with the sheer amount of headroom it had left after a straight Xbox One port. Out of interest, we tested Forza 6 Apex with similar settings at 4K on GTX 1060, 1070 and 1080. Frames were dropped on GTX 1060 (and a lot of them when wet weather conditions kicked in), while GTX 1070 held firm with only the most intense wet weather conditions causing performance dips. Only GTX 1080 held completely solid in all test cases. It's only one data point, and the extent to which the code is comparable at all is debatable, but it certainly doesn't harm Scorpio's credentials: Forza 6 Apex received plenty of praise for the quality of its PC port.

http://www.eurogamer.net/articles/digitalfoundry-2017-scorpio-is-console-hardware-pushed-to-a-new-level

 

[babybumb]

Is there any reason this didnt come out last year? True console CPU leap is too close and Scorpio will not run those games

So there will be ANOTHER console in 2018?

 

[pipo]

Any educated guesses on the release? Looking at the current state of the machine, could a 'one more thing' surprise at E3 be possible? November sounds pretty far away...

 

[DavidGraham]

The GPU portion features 44 CUs (custom by M$/AMD), with only 40 of them active to improve yields. That's 2816 GCN cores, coincidentally the same as Hawaii.

Dave Baumann implied something about Fiji. Could this be a custom Fiji core?

 

[Cyan]

Yes, the large amount of work to customise the command processor and dramatically reduce CPU load is particularly interesting. Could Scorpio be able to hit 60 fps in 30fps X1/PS4 games? Could the 60 hz dream still be alive?

So much customisation for the "dead" cat cores is interesting too. Not just the improved clocks, but "extensive customisation to reduce latency" (an area where X1 implementation was already ahead of PS4). They should have higher IPC as well as higher clocks and lower workload in DX12 games.

4GB reserved for dash though.... damn.

those facts remain a mystery yet. What I liked is that it is not all about brute force power, but the balance of the system is really nice. What's going to make a difference is the DX12 specs built into the hardware, hopefully, and the sound. If you can play your PC games on it, well, that would be close to my wet dream as Roderic says.

 

[eastmen]

Any educated guesses on the release? Looking at the current state of the machine, could a 'one more thing' surprise at E3 be possible? November sounds pretty far away...

Fall , maybe Sept / OCT they need time for software i'd think if they only showed DF forza

 

[DeanoC]

Dave Baumann implied something about Fiji. Could this be a custom Fiji core?

I suspect Dave just meant Fiji beget Polaris, so its unlikely that Polaris lost anything in the process.

 

[Jay]

Just a thought that I didn't hear answered, but will I be able to take my current external with my X1/X360 games on it and plug it into Scorpio and just have it work?

Or does it need to download a patched version of the game?

just plug it in and play, it can run unpatched x1 games, just better

yes it would've been nice to be zen based, even better zen with the modified cp for the dx12.
but would zen be a lot better without the modifications made?
30%+ ipc would be nice, but with the updated cache sizes etc, we don't know how the jag performs for games, with games being 90% it's use case, where as zen has to be general purpose use cases.
also remember much of the zen benefits would have been striped from a console part.
plus the cp updates, and up clocks, how much difference does it make? (none to huge?)

so people just hearing it not having zen is being bit reactive when they imply may as well get rig.

if it was a bog standard upclocked jag, that's one thing, but let's wait and see if it's just talk or not.
may easily provide the best gaming performance esp at 4k you could get.

 

[Dave Baumann]

I'd been looking for a reason to spring for an "S". I'm glad I didn't find one in the end as I'm sold on this.

 

[Deleted member 13524]

Is this Scorpio Jaguar CPU GHz kind of like AMD turbo mode peak value?

Nope, those 2.3GHz are definitely sustained clock rates.

Microsoft suggests 6 TFLOPs here will be able to provide better performance than an equivalent 6 TFLOPs PC. Running Forza 7 at 4K60 on the equivalent to PC's ultra settings is really impressive.

Of course it will. As good as Vulkan/DX12 can be, games developed for consoles don't have to prioritize compatibility over low-level optimization or just choosing the assets according to hardware capabilities.

Is there any reason this didnt come out last year?

My thoughts exactly.
Xbox was the one who needed a mid-gen upgrade the most, yet it's coming a year later. And it's coming without a manufacturing process advantage or Zen or a newer GPU architecture or GDDR5X or HBM2 or anything that became or will be available between PS4 Pro's release and Q4 2017.

The theory during the past few months is that Microsoft was waiting for HDMI 2.1, but Digital Foundry mentioned HDMI 2 already..

Any educated guesses on the release? Looking at the current state of the machine, could a 'one more thing' surprise at E3 be possible? November sounds pretty far away...

Well the "variable refresh rate" twitter post got deleted, though until HDMI 2.1 TVs come to the shelves (somewhere in 2018?) this would only be useful for people willing to hook up their consoles to Freesync monitors.
There was also zero mention of VR capabilities, so we don't know if Scorpio's VR will be a single xbox-branded headset or you'll be able to choose among some of the $300+ headsets for Windows 10 that are coming up later this year.

 

[BadTB25]

I'd been looking for a reason to spring for an "S". I'm glad I didn't find one in the end as I'm sold on this.

I'm in the same boat and glad I waited.

 

[Dave Baumann]

"As you can see, we doubled the amount of shader engines. That has the effect of improvement of boosting our triangle and vertex rate by 2.7x when you include the clock boost as well. We doubled the number of render back-ends, which has the effect of increasing our fill-rate by 2.7x. We quadrupled the GPU L2 cache size, again for targeting the 4K performance."

Microsoft gets the benefit of AMD's delta colour compression (DCC) system, an element that wasn't present on Xbox One.

 

[Scott_Arm]

Deano's 101 on Command Processors

...

Wrote this quickly, so hopefully no major mistakes, though I expect my grammar, spelling and wrong words will be there as usual for when I write stuff.

HTH,
Deano

So if I understand what you've written correctly, Scorpio has a hidden 2nd-gpu that can be unlocked in the future to one-up the competition.

 

[pipo]

Fall , maybe Sept / OCT they need time for software i'd think if they only showed DF forza

I got the impression software is not that complicated / far off, considering what they've done already. September sounds good to me...

 

[eastmen]

I got the impression software is not that complicated / far off, considering what they've done already. September sounds good to me...

sounds like they only got parts in January I am sure some third party devs are just getting dev kits now . Even if its super fast to port I am sure MS wants more than just a port , they are going to want more textures /higher quality along with just the res bump

 

[iroboto]

sounds like they only got parts in January I am sure some third party devs are just getting dev kits now . Even if its super fast to port I am sure MS wants more than just a port , they are going to want more textures /higher quality along with just the res bump

Certification for games is in June for Scorpio. Cert is usually 2-4 weeks pending IIRC. (if true) That would imply Scorpio ready games could be available as early as August/Sep timeframe.

 

[Deleted member 11852]

Native 4k on this still doesn't make much sense to me. For multi-plats specifically.

I agree but they're doubling down on 4K with a generous 12Gb for assets as well. I wonder, would this require devs build separate One and Scorpio builds, one with 4K assets and one without? I have a bunch of Steam games with "4K" textures and these texture packs will range from 20Gb up to 60Gb (Fallout 4). Standard distributions and optional downloads of Scorpio?