News about Rambus and the PS3

[marconelly!]

Xbox games are 480p because the GPU renders progressive natively NOT because they think a lot of people will have HDTV hooked up to Xbox

Again, just to remind you that Xbox designers went to all the trouble to ensure that proper HDTV support is implemented from the very dashboard, as to be the easiest possible (no need to boot the game pressing button combinations to enable progressive mode) It's not like 480p support is haphazardly added to all the games - it's encouraged from the basic system interface. Their intention to make system support HDTV modes was very clear, and it's not just the product of developer's good will.

I can bet my ass that if MS went to all that trouble to support HDTV modes today they will strongly encourage supporting even higher resolutions in 2-3 years. There's just no reason not to. Even if not letting Microsoft better them is Sony's sole reason to do the same, I'm betting they will go for it (and knowing Kutaragi's lack of modesty, they would push for it anyways)

 

[jvd]

hdtv support will not be mandatory it will just be an option . Whats the point of putting out a new system if no one can play it or they need to buy a new 500$ tv . Its not going to fly well. The gen after this will be the hdtv gen .

As I've said, 480p and surround sound support is already *almost* mandatory in Xbox games made today (almost, because there's probably 1% games that don't support one or the other)

Going into the next generation, I cannot imagine 480p not being a requirement for all the console games, and 720p being a very recommended option. There's just no reason not to do it, as those resolutions are being supported even today.

*Obviously*, standard interlaced output will be there by default, it's just that games more likely than not will need to have support for HDTV resolutions also.

requirment and mandotory means you must have it or you can't play the game. This wont be. I really don't care what you think . You have no facts to back it up. Soyou can think monkeys controll the world. I still wont believe u unless you show facts . Its bad busniess to require your customers to upgrade to something in adition to the 300 bucks your making them spend allready (did i say 300... more like 400, system , extra controller , dvd remote (or blue ray), and a game... oh don't forget a memory card. ) THen another 500 bucks for a hdtv . Yea ... that sell... really badly that is

 

[marconelly!]

requirment and mandotory means you must have it or you can't play the game. This wont be.

I'm obviously not being clear enough.

See, if I'm Sony, I can say this to developers:

"Guys, if you want your new PS3 game to be approved, it will not be enough to make it just run in the interlaced mode - you will have to make it support additional HDTV modes, namely 480p and 720p. So, if your game doesn't support all: 480i, 480p, 720p, we will not approve it"


I hope that was clear enough to explain how HDTV support can be required and mandatory to addition to standard 480i TV mode that can be played on any TV, or else the game cannot be released.

 

[jvd]

requirment and mandotory means you must have it or you can't play the game. This wont be.

I'm obviously not being clear enough.

See, if I'm Sony, I can say this to developers:

"Guys, if you want your new PS3 game to be approved, it will not be enough to make it just run in the interlaced mode - you will have to make it support additional HDTV modes, namely 480p and 720p. So, if your game doesn't support all: 480i, 480p, 720p, we will not approve it"


I hope that was clear enough to explain how HDTV support can be required and mandatory to addition to standard 480i TV mode that can be played on any TV, or else the game cannot be released.

That makes sense. Although i don't see it happening till at least a year after launch. Remember they are going to want games at launch.

 

[marconelly!]

Probably not for the launch games, no. Actually, I doubt it will ever be required to support 720p or 1080i modes, probably just encouraged.

 

[jvd]

Probably not for the launch games, no. Actually, I doubt it will ever be required to support 720p or 1080i modes, probably just encouraged.

I mean we wont see those supported in launch games .

 

[Fafalada]

Xbox games are 480p because the GPU renders progressive natively

It's still a matter of encouraged direction (like Marc noted in regards to dashboard etc.) and we're obviously not only seeing 480p on XBox as result).
PS2 could have started off with progressive apps from the launch all the same, but it was in fact actively discouraged until Sony decided "they" wanted to introduce progressive.

 

[PC-Engine]

Xbox games are 480p because the GPU renders progressive natively

It's still a matter of encouraged direction (like Marc noted in regards to dashboard etc.) and we're obviously not only seeing 480p on XBox as result).
PS2 could have started off with progressive apps from the launch all the same, but it was in fact actively discouraged until Sony decided "they" wanted to introduce progressive.

The point is that it was a no brainer to have 480p because the GPU is a GF3 variant for PC which are connected using progressive displays. Also notice that very few games support 720p while almost all support 480p. Why is that?

 

[V3]

You would only transfer the subdivision suurfaces or triangle strips from main RAM... Let's say though that there is a 25.6 GB/s Redwood connection between CPU and GPU... the number should still work there...

Why not dice in GPU bit ?

 

[function]

PS2 could have started off with progressive apps from the launch all the same, but it was in fact actively discouraged until Sony decided "they" wanted to introduce progressive.

Why do you think they wanted to hold back on progressive scan? I can think of a few possible reasons, such as wanting there to be more prog. scan enabled TVs around before they made a big deal out of it, or wanting to have an "advanced feature" to hold back till the Xbox/GC surfaced, but none of them seem good enough.

 

[marconelly!]

Also notice that very few games support 720p while almost all support 480p. Why is that?

I guess, even with Xbox, the reason is that it puts more strain to rendering, just like PC game works faster in 640x480 than if you switch to 1280x1024. It also requires more memory for framebuffer which in most games can better be used for more textures, and also may require more artwork, to make hi-res versions of menus, interfaces, etc so they don't appear stretched and blurred (big aesthetic problem in all PC games, IMO)

 

[randycat99]

How about one reason could be they didn't want to "blow that particular marketing wad" until there was a considerable majority of their audience who could actually take advantage of it? So they are waiting for the console generation where a good deal of prospective buyers are already 720p-ready on their preferred viewing device. Then it will be a big deal once they [MS] announce this capability as a feature.

 

[London Geezer]

How about one reason could be they didn't want to "blow that particular marketing wad" until there was a considerable majority of their audience who could actually take advantage of it? So they are waiting for the console generation where a good deal of prospective buyers are already 720p-ready on their preferred viewing device. Then it will be a big deal once they [MS] announce this capability as a feature.

u guys can try and find any excuse, i still do not see what is so hard in putting an option at start up to choose 480p in any game on any console this generation. if people have the equipment to use it, good if they dont, who cares its just an option... i'm in europe by the way, as many of u might know 480p was scrapped completely from xbox and GC, leaving those 6 or 7 games on ps2 with pro-scan... and DC with its VGA support... hence the frustration...

 

[PC-Engine]

How about one reason could be they didn't want to "blow that particular marketing wad" until there was a considerable majority of their audience who could actually take advantage of it? So they are waiting for the console generation where a good deal of prospective buyers are already 720p-ready on their preferred viewing device. Then it will be a big deal once they [MS] announce this capability as a feature.

Yes I think so too.

 

[Evil_Cloud]

My PAL tv is around 10 to 15 years old and 60hz compatible... Would it support 480p or 720p? Or which tv's support 720p?

 

[wazoo]

My PAL tv is around 10 to 15 years old and 60hz compatible... Would it support 480p or 720p? Or which tv's support 720p?

In Europe, hardly nothing.

You can also think the other way. 60Hz PAL TV exist for 15 years, and only now we see (and it is not always a given, thx Square) 60HZ option in PAL games. Days of HDTV are yet to come.

 

[function]

u guys can try and find any excuse, i still do not see what is so hard in putting an option at start up to choose 480p in any game on any console this generation. if people have the equipment to use it, good if they dont, who cares its just an option... i'm in europe by the way, as many of u might know 480p was scrapped completely from xbox and GC, leaving those 6 or 7 games on ps2 with pro-scan... and DC with its VGA support... hence the frustration...

I read in a couple of places that some PAL Xbox games do support progressive scan, and that an increasing number will have the option left in. Not having a progressive scan TV to test this on I can't say say whether it's true or not.

I find it rather annoying that MS have removed VGA support from the machine (or at least the games) actually. It's practically the only way that most Europeans would get to play Xbox games none interlaced at the moment.

You can also think the other way. 60Hz PAL TV exist for 15 years, and only now we see (and it is not always a given, thx Square) 60HZ option in PAL games. Days of HDTV are yet to come.

Just a small point, but I think the Euro PS2 actually uses NTSC for it's 60hz games, which is supported by a far smaller number of TVs than 60hz PAL. Most of my PS2 owning friends are still stuck in 50hz mode, and there's a suprising amount of unoptimised games still coming out.

For propperly optimised 50hz games, I sometimes actually prefer the hi-res (ish) look that PAL50 gives over the smoother running but less well definied 60hz. How common are 100hz 720p tvs? I'm assuming they can take a 100hz (i.e. 100fps) input. Probably coming to Europe in 2050 ...

 

[jvd]

Just do what i did. I sent my cousin a 40 inch plasma tv from the usa. ( he lives in italy.) I dunno if your cable over there will let u use a usa tv but he has satalite and had to ask for a usa unit so he could use the tv.

 

[Panajev2001a]

V3, if the GPU is Cell based they can surely split dicing and even shading... that would work quite well if I can add

I oeiginally assigned slicing 'n dicing and Shading to the CPU thanks to its 1 TFLOPS of processing power, but if the GPU is indeed Cell based sharing this load should not be too complicated as Apulets/Software Cells are supposed to be able to migrate if there is need of additional processing power ( Intelligent multi-processing ).

 

[Squeak]

Tell me why would you want to keep using polygons as primitive, if you can do millions and millions of vertices per frame? Why not go with voxels or something similar?

It's all about the problem you're solving. Voxels trade space for computation. Verticies trade compuation for storage. Currently, we have LOTS of computing power but we have little space and the ability to compete with the locality of reference problems of using lots of space.

Okay, maybe I shouldn’t have mentioned voxels, as I’m not completely sure how they work, but what I meant was this: When you can generate multiple 3d points (that’s what vertices are, right?) per pixel, why bother sending all that extra information to draw triangles when you could just colour the 3d points and be done with it? In short, what is the advantage of having subpixel triangles?