Expected perceptual difference between Scorpio and PS4 Pro *spin-off*

[Silent_Buddha]

Scorpio would render at a higher native res that's for sure something like 1800p but not yet 4k, especially the 60fps games. It might also employ that checkerboard technique to upscale to 4k but would look a bit sharper than Pro's result. I expect more ultra settings to be used in Scorpio but not fully Ultra. The difference in multiplatforms would not be huge but noticeable if put side by side. As for exclusives, if devs are coding their respective title using PS4 and XBone as a baseline then there might not be much of a difference in the end. I think the difference in power between PS4 and Xbone as well as between Pro and Scorpio would cancel each other out. After all this is the what happens when a 6tf console is shackled by a 1.3tf console, the level design, assets, setpieces and physics would not deviate much if at all from the lowest common denominator. While in Pro's case, since its baseline is 40% higher, you would naturally enjoy say a bigger level design, more characters on screen etc on the get go, but only looses out in the resolution. Now of course it's hard to compare exclusives directly unlike multiplats but that's the underlying mechanics, more or less.
So in short, PS4 Pro first party games should hang graphically in the same ballpark as Scorpio first party games.

Considering that Microsoft developed games are already doing 4K@60 FPS on hardware that is of a similar performance level, what makes you think it won't be rendering games at 4K? Especially, if as you contend, the base game will still be limited by what the PS4/XBO can do?

Just a simple increase in rendering resolution without changing quality settings generally only requires 2.0-2.5x the performance when going from 1080p to 2160p. That is far less than the performance difference between the XBO and Project Scorpio. Even going from 720p to 2160p won't require more than about 3x the performance or slightly more. That still leaves plenty of performance on table to potentially increase framerates (30-60 fps) or better graphical IQ presets.

This also assumes that not just GPU FLOPs are being scaled up. IE - more ROPs are definitely required, higher bandwidth will be needed, etc. In some cases you'll also potentially need a significant boost in CPU speed, especially for increases in FPS versus resolution at same FPS if the game was fully or partially CPU limited on the older console.

Regards,
SB

 

[Silent_Buddha]

Part of the point is not all games will be "demanding".

It's so hard to score with goal posts constantly being shifted. First it was most games on XBO aren't 1080p. And then the goal posts moved to...most multi-platform games aren't 1080p on XBO. And then the goal posts shifted yet again to...demanding games aren't 1080p on XBO.

Next stop. All games that aren't 1080p on XBO aren't being rendered at 1080p.

Regards,
SB

 

[djskribbles]

Because I think that Pro and Scorpio will be held back a bit by the standard models, I think the differences will be about the same, if not a bit smaller than PS4 vs XB1. Just on resolution alone, I think Pro will render most demanding games at ~4M-6M pixels and Scorpio will be a bit higher (maybe 6M-native 4K), and the actual visible difference between ~5M pixels vs ~7M pixels is less than 1080p vs 900p; especially considering this checkerboard upscaling/uprendering seems to work quite well.

The odd time we may see a team take advantage of Scorpio's advantages, just like some teams did with PS4, but I think they will be fairly minor.

 

[Nesh]

As you can see in your own list, only non demanding games can run at 1080p on XB1. Once again, the hardware is what it is. There is no magic. Really, i don't get your point...

Read the whole post

 

[Arwin]

Spec difference is exactly the same as PS4 vs Xbox One (+40% flops). Why would't Scorpio be competing against PS4 Pro and be in the same price range? There's diminishing returns in flop increases. The difference will be even smaller than we see currently with 40% spec difference.

1.4x is nothing compared to usual console generation improvement of 6x to 10x. They as close to each other as consoles in the same generation tend to be: Xbox vs PS2 vs Dreamcast, Xbox 360 vs PS3 or Xbox One vs PS4. If it costs more than 100$ extra vs PS4 Pro, they need to bundle next Kinect or VR.

Of course the difference between Xbox One and Scorpio will be much bigger than PS4 and Pro. Scorpio is easier to sell for existing Xbox One owners, as the improvement can be clearly seen. If Scorpio adds support to VR, it will generate additional interest to buy it. PSVR games work on both PS4 and Pro.

Well the GPU difference isn't the only difference though, right? I was talking about the 12GB RAM, which should allow for more high-res textures. Already I think Digital Foundry compared Tomb Raider in PS4 Pro with the best 4K PC version, and noticed that the PC version was using better textures to suit the higher resolution, presumably because the 8GB doesn't leave enough space for them (unless the PS4 Pro version really didn't have time to 'compress' those textures, supposedly an improved feature but I am doubtful). We also don't really know how the memory bandwidth pans out. In the current systems, the CPU vs GPU bandwidth contention seems to be an additional issue on the CPU side, where bandwidth spent there can't be spent on the GPU side x2. The PS4 Pro seems to do very little to improve that situation, but Scorpio seems to have a serious bandwidth improvement that could have a rippling effect. Then again, perhaps we will once again see a move towards more CU use and that problem becomes smaller because of software changes.

Right now though we don't know about what system has what bottleneck in what instance, or what mandate the platform holders place. We can assume that for the time being all games need to be identical across Xbox One and Scorpio in all but graphics. It may also be that out of the four systems, Xbox One may suffer the most, as the total GPU rendering budget average increases by a lot, the weaker system is going to suffer more.



Sent from my iPad using Tapatalk

 

[sebbbi]

Well the GPU difference isn't the only difference though, right? I was talking about the 12GB RAM, which should allow for more high-res textures.

8GB -> 12GB is only 50% increase (1.5x). in comparison Xbox 360 / PS3 -> Xbox One / PS4 was 300% increase (4x). You should expect much smaller difference in texture quality as last gen vs current.

Ome extra mip level (2x2 resolution increase) requires 4x more memory. 1.5x isn't anywhere close to allowing a single mip level extra to textures. Texture resolution increase has hit a brick wall. Resolution increase requires n^2 (square) increase in memory. That's why techniques such as tiled resources (partially resident textures) and virtual texturing are adapted. There techniques only require a constant small memory amount for practically unlimited texture detail. But you still need to store the texture data somewhere. Blu-ray hasn't got any bigger lately, and all games can be downloaded from the internet. I don't expect we to see sudden 4x+ increases in game sizes. Double blu-ray discs adds manufacturing cost and broadband connections aren't yet fast enough for huge packages like that. HDD storage space of consoles isn't increasing that fast either.

 

[Arwin]

I never said we would get anything like a generational difference. Just that I would expect some perceptual difference. Perhaps I should have qualified - perceptual as defined by the average beyond3d forumite.

Anyway, I wouldn't be surprised if the console cycle pans out to something like a 2 yearly refresh, with software backward compatibility over the generations. I don't expect any new generation that breaks this pattern. For as long as they can do current games better than other (fixed) platforms cost effectively versus PC / Android, then having people keep access to all their previous games is going to be an important differentiator.


Sent from my iPad using Tapatalk

 

[Jay]

8GB -> 12GB is only 50% increase (1.5x). in comparison Xbox 360 / PS3 -> Xbox One / PS4 was 300% increase (4x). You should expect much smaller difference in texture quality as last gen vs current.

is most of your reasoning based on seeing generational differences, or Scorpio to the current gen machines?
as although I'm dubious about how visible the difference will be between the Scorpio and the rest, I would hope to be able to see something
just how big are the assets that's currently used on pc games, doesn't seem to be as big as your talking about, keeping in mind not talking generational leaps here.

edit : Ninjered!
I don't know if I agree it would move to a 2 year cycle though, possibly 3. Guess at this moment anything's possible though depending how all this pans out

 

[Shifty Geezer]

Spec difference is exactly the same as PS4 vs Xbox One (+40% flops). Why would't Scorpio be competing against PS4 Pro and be in the same price range?

More RAM, UHD, faster bus/RAM chips, larger die, more expensive cooling(?). Though it depends what one considers 'range'.

If it costs more than 100$ extra vs PS4 Pro

I think that's about the expectation. PS4Pro at $300, Scorpio at $400

 

[VGA]

8GB -> 12GB is only 50% increase (1.5x). in comparison Xbox 360 / PS3 -> Xbox One / PS4 was 300% increase (4x). You should expect much smaller difference in texture quality as last gen vs current.

Ome extra mip level (2x2 resolution increase) requires 4x more memory. 1.5x isn't anywhere close to allowing a single mip level extra to textures. Texture resolution increase has hit a brick wall. Resolution increase requires n^2 (square) increase in memory. That's why techniques such as tiled resources (partially resident textures) and virtual texturing are adapted. There techniques only require a constant small memory amount for practically unlimited texture detail. But you still need to store the texture data somewhere. Blu-ray hasn't got any bigger lately, and all games can be downloaded from the internet. I don't expect we to see sudden 4x+ increases in game sizes. Double blu-ray discs adds manufacturing cost and broadband connections aren't yet fast enough for huge packages like that. HDD storage space of consoles isn't increasing that fast either.

How does the difference in available memory between the proposed Xbox Scorpio and PS4 Pro compare to the practical Xbox 360 vs PS3 memory differential? My understanding is that the PS3 had significantly less available memory in practice than the Xbox 360.

 

[Nesh]

How does the difference in available memory between the proposed Xbox Scorpio and PS4 Pro compare to the practical Xbox 360 vs PS3 memory differential? My understanding is that the PS3 had significantly less available memory in practice than the Xbox 360.

Originally yes if I recall when the OS reservation was "huge". That memory was reduced significantly later on. The PS3 memory was split to 256MB XDR system memory which I think was very fast and 256MB GDDR3 memory. They say that the GPU could access the system memory if needed but I dont know at what cost.
I am not sure if the PS3 was significantly more memory starved compared to the 360 when the console became more mature eventually. But someone can shed some light.
The differential that may have existed the previous gen is small compared to the memory differential between Scorpio and Pro. We are talking about 50% more memory at higher bandwidth here.

 

[MrFox]

Higher bandwidth is proportional to the higher gpu requests, otherwise that advantage would dissipate in stalls. Generation gaps are 8 times the memory amount and 8 times the processing power. To think this 1.4x to 1.5x advantage will be anything more than the difference between ps3/360 or xb1/ps4 is just ridiculous.

 

[function]

Higher bandwidth is proportional to the higher gpu requests, otherwise that advantage would dissipate in stalls. Generation gaps are 8 times the memory amount and 8 times the processing power. To think this 1.4x to 1.5x advantage will be anything more than the difference between ps3/360 or xb1/ps4 is just ridiculous.

The biggest difference won't be in resolution - where once again most people won't be able to tell - but in assets and and frame rates.

And assets won't be a generational leap, they'll simply be a stepup in model and texture resolution - like going from a 2 to a 4 GB video card (or 4 to 8, etc). And frame rates may see no significant jump, especially if the CPU lacks the grunt and the developer will isn't there.

 

[iroboto]

The biggest difference won't be in resolution - where once again most people won't be able to tell - but in assets and and frame rates.

And assets won't be a generational leap, they'll simply be a stepup in model and texture resolution - like going from a 2 to a 4 GB video card (or 4 to 8, etc). And frame rates may see no significant jump, especially if the CPU lacks the grunt and the developer will isn't there.

if I read it correctly, from an asset perspective, Sebbbi's post above just indicated that this would not be the case.


Sent from my iPhone using Tapatalk

 

[MrFox]

How much memory will they reserve this time?

 

[dobwal]

Damn, are you telling me we have to go through this every 3 years instead of 6-8? I am used to the 2 years of speculation/rumors of unreleased and basically unknown hardware followed by two years of arguing over advantages/disadvantages highlighted by magnifying glasses, framerate and frame drop tests. All the while arguing over sales figures and monthly npd reports. At least we got a year or two of calm and quiet where B3D got kind of boring but served as a break before it all began again.

You're telling me a year from now when the Scorpio drops, we are going straight into debating about the Xbox two and ps5.

I am getting too old for this shit and I don't know if my heart is ready for system wars on steroids.

 

[Deleted member 11852]

I am getting too old for this shit and I don't know if my heart is ready for system wars on steroids.

Unless some new info appears these types of threads are an endless two party circle jerk of speculation with the signal to noise (or science to fantasy) noise ratio increasingly weighted toward the latter as time wears on.

I light skim these threads now. Problem solved.

 

[sebbbi]

4K intermediate buffers take 4x memory compared to 1080p intermediate buffers. You could lose more than 1GB just for that.

4K also requires 2x2 more detailed textures (= 1 mip = 4x memory). Otherwise graphics will look as blurry as 1080p up close. Far away graphics will look better, but only if you have enough memory to stream the textures at (2x2) higher quality. So you need 4x larger memory pools for texture streaming.

When we moved from 720p to 1080p we got 4x memory (for 2x pixel count increase). Now we are moving from 1080p to 4K (4x pixel count increase), but get only up to 1.5x memory. Needless to say, the extra memory is not going to be enough to even reach acceptable quality at 4K. Unless most engines are quickly adapting tiled resources / PRT / virtual texturing.

 

[iroboto]

4K intermediate buffers take 4x memory compared to 1080p intermediate buffers. You could lose more than 1GB just for that.

4K also requires 2x2 more detailed textures (= 1 mip = 4x memory). Otherwise graphics will look as blurry as 1080p up close. Far away graphics will look better, but only if you have enough memory to stream the textures at (2x2) higher quality. So you need 4x larger memory pools for texture streaming.

When we moved from 720p to 1080p we got 4x memory (for 2x pixel count increase). Now we are moving from 1080p to 4K (4x pixel count increase), but get only up to 1.5x memory. Needless to say, the extra memory is not going to be enough to even reach acceptable quality at 4K. Unless most engines are quickly adapting tiled resources / PRT / virtual texturing.

Thanks Sebbbi, learning a lot here. Just one question, but I recall your disappointment with hardware Tiled Resources fixed size on paging and the lack of control over it, does anything change now that the resolution is 4K? Or is it still better to run your own software variant of it?


Sent from my iPhone using Tapatalk

 

[Arwin]

4K intermediate buffers take 4x memory compared to 1080p intermediate buffers. You could lose more than 1GB just for that.

4K also requires 2x2 more detailed textures (= 1 mip = 4x memory). Otherwise graphics will look as blurry as 1080p up close. Far away graphics will look better, but only if you have enough memory to stream the textures at (2x2) higher quality. So you need 4x larger memory pools for texture streaming.

When we moved from 720p to 1080p we got 4x memory (for 2x pixel count increase). Now we are moving from 1080p to 4K (4x pixel count increase), but get only up to 1.5x memory. Needless to say, the extra memory is not going to be enough to even reach acceptable quality at 4K. Unless most engines are quickly adapting tiled resources / PRT / virtual texturing.

But the PS4 Pro only has 512MB extra memory. So compared to Scorpio it could be significantly more bottlenecked for 4K resolutions in that respect.

For me right now I am more interested in VR. By the time Scorpio comes out, who knows it will be able to drive higher resolution VR, which currently isn't on the radar yet but almost seems inevitable by late 2017. Meanwhile it will be interesting to see what PlayStation VR, launching in less than a month, will do to the importance of VR. If it becomes a success, if Scorpio can do it better by the time it launches that could be perfect timing or too late.

That's for another topic of course, but it will certainly be interesting to see where the actual perceived differences will end up mattering most - 1080p, 4K, VR?