Kaz Hirai (SCEA) Interview - 1up/EGM

[Qroach]

That is probably one of the most false statements said today. Most (if not all successful ones) developers want to push the limits of the hardware they work with (that is usually the mentality that keeps them in their jobs). I have never known a programmer/developer that only wanted to match what was availible 5 years ago (especially not ones on million+ dollar projects).

How is that false??? have you seen how many xbox games supported 720p or 1080i when developers have the choice? not many! Explain to me how that's a false statement regarding console game development! Develoeprs had a choice what they wanted to support from 480i/480p/720p/1080i And the majority, like 98% chose 480p. You know why? because it didn't cost them anything. They chose the best resoloution with the least impact.

All develoeprs could include 1080i on the ps2 since they had the option of doing that, but how many did? ONE! that's right one developer.

why is it going to be any different now?

 

[Edge]

Because I say so.

Xbox did 640x480 just fine. 1920x1080 is 6 times that resolution, but PS3 has:

8 times the memory (512 MB vs. 64 MB)
7 times the external memory bandwidth (47 GB/sec vs 6.4 GB/sec)
28 times the pixel shader power (don't forget dual pixel shader's per RSX pipeline ((24 pipelines vs 4 pipelines) x 2.36 clock rate advantage x dual shaders))

Notice all that is more than 6 times, so it could easily do 1080p, all the while having games that are more complex than a typical Xbox game.

You guys really hate the power of the PS3. Be prepared to be amazed.

 

[Qroach]

You guys really hate the power of the PS3. Be prepared to be amazed.

Edge, do us all a favor and don't add fanboyish troll posts like your last one. your argument is nonesense.

It might (and I mean that lossley make some sense if they were rendering the same types of scenes on PS3 as they are this in hte current generation. However that isn't even close to the case.

 

[Edge]

I'm just excited about the PS3, and can't relate to all the nonsense against 1080p. You think that it would excite people, but I believe people are downplaying it here for obvious loyalty to MS reasons.

I re-wrote this post, to tone things down. Things are getting out of hand here.

 

[Sonic]

What is the argument here? If everything is correct then Sony will have a required 720P minimum resolution for the PS3. Isn't this the same as MS is having for the Xbox 360?

 

[blakjedi]

I think the issue is two fold:

1) Some people are arguing that 720p is or isnt the sweet spot of next gen HD resolutions regardless of system.

2) Sony's claims of 1080p on PS3 are nice but not really that meaningful because (x360 could do it but MS chooses not to support it) and most people even with brand new HDTV's couldn't see that resolution in its full glory so its a nice but fairly wasted capability.

Every other argument is derives from those two I believe.

A 12 page thread it should not be.

 

[two]

You guys really hate the power of the PS3. Be prepared to be amazed.

Edge, do us all a favor and don't add fanboyish troll posts like your last one. your argument is nonesense.

Please do the same

 

[jvd]

4xAA is only 'free' to the devs in that the hardware handles it automatically. That's not what the "AA for free" means though. 'AA for free' means running the same polys and shaders etc. as without AA, but with AA and at no (or little) performance hit

Not really

http://www.beyond3d.com/articles/xenos/index.php?p=04

Despite references to 192 processing elements in to the ROP's within the eDRAM we can actually resolve that to equating to 8 pixels writes per cycle, as well as having the capability to double the Z rate when there are no colour operations. However, as the ROP's have been targeted to provide 4x Multi-Sampling FSAA at no penalty this equates to a total capability of 32 colour samples or 64 Z and stencil operations per cycle.

Bear in mind that going from one FSAA depth to the next one up in the same resolution shouldn't affect Xenos too much in terms of sample processing as the ROP's and bandwidth are designed to operate with 4x FSAA all the time, so there is no extra cost in terms of sub sample read / write / blends, although there is a small cost in the shaders where extra colour samples will need to be calculated for pixels that cover geometry edges

So as you can see the xenos can do 4x multi-sampling fillrate wise at no penalty .

http://www.beyond3d.com/articles/xenos/index.php?p=05#tiled

ATI have been quoted as suggesting that 720p resolutions with 4x FSAA, which would require three tiles, has about 95% of the performance of 2x FSAA.

So 4x fsaa isn't free , should take about a 5% hit in power . Not very bad .

Some interesting stuff

ATI's calculations lead to a colour and z bandwidth demand of around 26-134GB/s at 8 pixels with 4x Multi-Sampling AA enabled at High Definition TV resolutions. The lower end of that bandwidth figure is derived from having 4:1 colour and Z compression, however the lossless compression techniques are only optimal when there are no triangle edges intersecting a pixel, but with the presumed high geometry detail within a next generation console titles the opportunities for achieving this compression ratio across the entire frame will be reduced

26-134gb/s is alot of bandwidth