Predict: The Next Generation Console Tech

[joker454]

I personally expect more than just raw performance from the next xbox, though. Besides the obvious advantage of developer tools from MS, I'd expect the next xboxs hardware to be flexible in order to prolong its life and detach it from the usual software upgrades.

Honestly I'm more interested in how the next xbox will tie in with Microsoft phone, tablet and pc. We know that the next xbox will have great tools and developer support already, and spec wise we're getting dangerously close to the point where hardware spec is mattering less and less in the grand scheme of things. I mean lets face it, a far better graphics alternative, the pc, already exists an no one cares about it. That's because what matters more now is the software experience, not graphics. People will ultimately live and play on the box they have even if it looks dated. Hence why for the next Xbox I'm far more interested in the software tech than the hardware tech. Microsoft nailed that with XBLive which is brilliant, but right now that's locked onto just the one device, the 360, which limits its grand scale appeal. I'm curious as heck to know how they bring XBLive to every device and tie them all together, I think that is where the money shot is. In an ideal world pc, tablet, phone and console all look and run similarly and all run XBLive, and all have cloud support from the get go. One XBLive account, one cloud, one set of money, one set of media, one experience across all devices along with some interoperability. Sharing music and movies across all devices is the obvious one, but i'd like them to go beyond the obvious. Aside from Apple I'd say Microsoft are the only people in the position to tie together the four main devices in use today (computer, tablet, phone, console) so it's their's to lose.

I'm guessing at the bare minimum we'd have to wait at least 6 months after Win8 and Windows tablets come out before we see another Xbox console. I figure they will want to get Win8 and their tablet out and iron out any issues with the new interface, and then transplant that experience to their next console, all of it being touch/kinect aware out of the box. I think that makes 2012 impossible for a new Xbox, but 2013 might be doable unless their year over year sales keep going up in which case no chance.

 

[pc999]

I would assume content generation will be further improved both technologically and economically. Maybe studios will make more use of dynamically generated content and of a shared content library.

If it is anything like audio production more and better tools that give higher detail always take more time, because there is a human being with more control over things, more things to do, more things to decide, more options to explore, more things to correct, more things to have attention...

Out sourcing a lot of the modeling to India and China would also make things cheaper.

Please no, that would increase even more our economical problems, plus we should never ever use that slave work for our entertainment (or anything else).

Also it may not be as easy, professionals need conditions to learn, that may not be the best place to get that, at least not as cheap, because there is many good professionals there but they charge more or less the same AFAIK.

 

[AlphaWolf]

I don't think so: 6850 (which these specs are from) is at about 125W, with Dieshrink to 28nm (and smaller will not happen until 2013) maybe around 90-100W. This is only the GPU!
Power7 will be another 50W+ if the processing power should fit the graphics card.
I don't know how much power RAM needs, but 4GB (estimated) aren't for free either.
I don't think they will do a >200W beast again, so the budget is already tough.

Techpowerup lists it at 118W maximum, but only 96W peak (that's running crysis2 extreme at 1900x1200, highest reading during test)
I don't think they'll use an add in board for a console. You can expect some savings there.

Just be prepared for big and loud units at launch.

edit: especially if they want to try and avoid RROD/YLOD.

I would hope they can do a lot better on both noise and overheating within the same power envelope as 360/PS3. You have to think they learned something, perhaps they have even discovered the existence of fans larger than 80mm in the last 5 years.

 

[Silenti]

Just be prepared for big and loud units at launch.

edit: especially if they want to try and avoid RROD/YLOD.

I'd settle for a unit that doesn't burn through optical drives at the rate of 1 every 2 years.

 

[bkilian]

Microsoft nailed that with XBLive which is brilliant, but right now that's locked onto just the one device, the 360, which limits its grand scale appeal. I'm curious as heck to know how they bring XBLive to every device and tie them all together, I think that is where the money shot is. In an ideal world pc, tablet, phone and console all look and run similarly and all run XBLive, and all have cloud support from the get go. One XBLive account, one cloud, one set of money, one set of media, one experience across all devices along with some interoperability. Sharing music and movies across all devices is the obvious one, but i'd like them to go beyond the obvious. Aside from Apple I'd say Microsoft are the only people in the position to tie together the four main devices in use today (computer, tablet, phone, console) so it's their's to lose.

This is one of the main reasons they gave us for the last huge reorg we had. Before, getting the experience across all our devices was essentially impossible due to organizational politics, now we're a single org, which gives us a much higher chance of making your vision possible.

People always wonder why we do strange things like compete with ourselves (Playsforsure, zune), miss opportunies (Live everywhere), and generally appear like the left hand has no idea what the right hand is doing. It's because microsoft does not behave like a single company, it behaves like a federation of a number of smaller companies. For instance, the first I saw of Win8 was in the same place everyone else saw it, on the net. The divisions have accounting walls between them. If we want to use Windows for something, we license it from the Windows division, and we log it as a cost, and they log it as revenue. Same with resources, collaboration, etc.

 

[Proelite]

If it is anything like audio production more and better tools that give higher detail always take more time, because there is a human being with more control over things, more things to do, more things to decide, more options to explore, more things to correct, more things to have attention...

Aren't game models made in much higher detail before being normal-mapped etc? I don't see why games would need models with more than few million polygons next generation if they won't be using them in game. For studios that will using them, they're clearly spending the memory, clock cycles on the wrong thing.

 

[AlNom]

I would hope they can do a lot better on both noise and overheating within the same power envelope as 360/PS3. You have to think they learned something, perhaps they have even discovered the existence of fans larger than 80mm in the last 5 years.

Well, just have a peek inside the original units and find the space for bigger heatsinks and fans.

The launch 360 had twin 80mm fans blowing out the back. That obviously imposes a height limitation (horizontal position). I think they should ditch the bi-placement (vertical/horizontal) and just go with horizontal, which would fit with the rest of the home theatre equipment. That way they can have a larger fan blowing out the top, but of course that poses an issue for stacking.

I'm not sure what the failure rate was for Zephyr, but just the heatpipe/extra fins seemed to do the trick. Next time they'll want to have multiple heatpipes to a larger heatsink. Potentially, they could place one of the chips underneath the optical drive and use heatpipes to immediately redirect the heat away to a larger set of fins.

 

[AlNom]

I'd settle for a unit that doesn't burn through optical drives at the rate of 1 every 2 years.

Can't say I've ever had optical drive issues on 360 (over four units, including friends'). *shrug* Maybe the full-disc installation played a role in that (for my own two units).

 

[3dcgi]

Aren't most of the assets created for games today much higher quality than the version used in game? They can basically use the high quality models that's in real time cutscenes in-game with better lighting, physics etc.

I would assume content generation will be further improved both technologically and economically. Maybe studios will make more use of dynamically generated content and of a shared content library. Out sourcing a lot of the modeling to India and China would also make things cheaper.

I agree that many devs already model in high detail to create normal maps, etc. I think there will not be as huge a cost increase for development as there was with the last generation. With Xbox360 and PS3 consoles first got advanced shading and multi-core CPUs. The next gen consoles will have new features, but I think it will take less effort to master them.

 

[AlphaWolf]

Well, just have a peek inside the original units and find the space for bigger heatsinks and fans.

The launch 360 had twin 80mm fans blowing out the back. That obviously imposes a height limitation (horizontal position). I think they should ditch the bi-placement (vertical/horizontal) and just go with horizontal, which would fit with the rest of the home theatre equipment. That way they can have a larger fan blowing out the top, but of course that poses an issue for stacking.

I'm not sure what the failure rate was for Zephyr, but just the heatpipe/extra fins seemed to do the trick. Next time they'll want to have multiple heatpipes to a larger heatsink. Potentially, they could place one of the chips underneath the optical drive and use heatpipes to immediately redirect the heat away to a larger set of fins.

Or ditch the optical drive, that saves a ton of room.

 

[Brad Grenz]

Next gen consoles are going to be so far above this gen it will be mind boggling, the visuals they will produce have not even been hinted at yet.

To our eyes everything will essentially look photoreal I think, at first.

This will be the biggest gen-to-gen graphics jump in the history of gaming.

PC's are already 10X consoles (at least, say 8GB RAM=16X XB360), and will be 40x-100x by the time next gen arrives, yet no game even begins to efficiently tax a high end PC. The jump in graphics will be almost unimaginable. It will make Crysis 1 look like a N64 game. Which granted, is no big deal since looking 10X-30x as good as a horribly coded 2007 PC game should be the minimum. Again. Crysis will look like a joke when next gen consoles are done, a very bad joke.

That's my stance, the opposite of the diminishing returns, no more high end console pessimism. And I do believe I will be closer to right.

Yes, I was saying this to someone just yesterday. Talking about "diminishing returns" is very popular right now, but the fact is the way this generation has extended itself means that by the time new high end consoles launch it will be the biggest leap the industry has ever experienced. Moore's law didn't stand still while developers endeavored to max out the PS3 and 360. It's marching along at the same rate as always. Imagine going strait from a Dreamcast to the PS3. That's the kind of leap we are looking at, here.

I got into a bit of an argument with someone who felt the WiiU will still be a viable port platform even after the PS4 and 720 are out. He couldn't quite grog the idea that the gap between those systems and the WiiU will be even greater than the gap between the PS3/360 and the current Wii. He also wanted me to tell him what new game design elements the increase in computational power could possibly allow which will be impossible on the WiiU. I had to explain that just because we can't foresee a revolutionary design doesn't mean they won't come.

Honestly I'm more interested in how the next xbox will tie in with Microsoft phone, tablet and pc. We know that the next xbox will have great tools and developer support already, and spec wise we're getting dangerously close to the point where hardware spec is mattering less and less in the grand scheme of things. I mean lets face it, a far better graphics alternative, the pc, already exists an no one cares about it. That's because what matters more now is the software experience, not graphics. People will ultimately live and play on the box they have even if it looks dated. Hence why for the next Xbox I'm far more interested in the software tech than the hardware tech. Microsoft nailed that with XBLive which is brilliant, but right now that's locked onto just the one device, the 360, which limits its grand scale appeal. I'm curious as heck to know how they bring XBLive to every device and tie them all together, I think that is where the money shot is. In an ideal world pc, tablet, phone and console all look and run similarly and all run XBLive, and all have cloud support from the get go. One XBLive account, one cloud, one set of money, one set of media, one experience across all devices along with some interoperability. Sharing music and movies across all devices is the obvious one, but i'd like them to go beyond the obvious. Aside from Apple I'd say Microsoft are the only people in the position to tie together the four main devices in use today (computer, tablet, phone, console) so it's their's to lose.

I'm guessing at the bare minimum we'd have to wait at least 6 months after Win8 and Windows tablets come out before we see another Xbox console. I figure they will want to get Win8 and their tablet out and iron out any issues with the new interface, and then transplant that experience to their next console, all of it being touch/kinect aware out of the box. I think that makes 2012 impossible for a new Xbox, but 2013 might be doable unless their year over year sales keep going up in which case no chance.

MS will need to be careful, after all, compromising a specialized device's design and capabilities in the interest of promoting platform synergy is something Sony is often accused of, and I'd argue Apple is walking a very dangerous road in that respect right now. People don't really want a common ecosystem from a single provider, they prefer their shit work on any device they might own.

 

[Alucardx23]

Don’t know if old but here is a translation from a Game Watch article talking about the Wii U GPU.

http://translate.google.com/transla...s.co.jp/docs/series/3dcg/20110611_452478.html

 

[DuckThor Evil]

Next gen consoles are going to be so far above this gen it will be mind boggling, the visuals they will produce have not even been hinted at yet.

To our eyes everything will essentially look photoreal I think, at first.

This will be the biggest gen-to-gen graphics jump in the history of gaming.

PC's are already 10X consoles (at least, say 8GB RAM=16X XB360), and will be 40x-100x by the time next gen arrives, yet no game even begins to efficiently tax a high end PC. The jump in graphics will be almost unimaginable. It will make Crysis 1 look like a N64 game. Which granted, is no big deal since looking 10X-30x as good as a horribly coded 2007 PC game should be the minimum. Again. Crysis will look like a joke when next gen consoles are done, a very bad joke.

That's my stance, the opposite of the diminishing returns, no more high end console pessimism. And I do believe I will be closer to right.

I hope you are right, but I think you are setting yourself for a letdown or living in denial after the consoles are out. I agree that PCs are 10x the consoles of today, but 40-100x in what 2-3 years? A high end PC in two years will be 4-10x more powerful than a high end PC today? I think not... High end PC from 2009 is still pretty good and if you look how performance per watt has developed, it doesn't look so good and this gen consoles already launched pretty close to the ceiling in that.

You can't just brush the cost of everything to side either. Do these companies really even want to go guns blazing again, when hardware superiority has never decided a generation? How much does it cost to develop these "photoreal" worlds?

I'm sure that in the right hands we will see some amazing content, but I'm not expecting much more than Xbox to X360 kind of jump.

 

[pc999]

Aren't game models made in much higher detail before being normal-mapped etc? I don't see why games would need models with more than few million polygons next generation if they won't be using them in game. For studios that will using them, they're clearly spending the memory, clock cycles on the wrong thing.

I cant really talk about gaming production, but what I can say is that if I have at my disposal a 8 band EQ I will always spend more time with it than what I spend with 3 band EQ. There is just much more things to do and much more fine "tuning" too, if my public demanded that used the best EQs (24 bands, mid/sid processing, variable phase, variable slops... like FabFilter EQ) to full extent, instead of just doing a good job, I would spend half a full day for EACH track. The same happens with photoshop/gimp/inkscape/... in my experience. I cant imagine that being diferent than any others multimedia production, games included.

Of curse that all depends on how demanding the public it is,and what that public demands, if it demands the best tools used to its full extent I cant see it being cheaper, but a lot pricier.

Then you need to factor more R&D for software new editores and tools, more artist time and education with the new tools, more fine tuning, more debugging time, higher capacity servers (?)...

Yes, I was saying this to someone just yesterday. Talking about "diminishing returns" is very popular right now, but the fact is the way this generation has extended itself means that by the time new high end consoles launch it will be the biggest leap the industry has ever experienced. Moore's law didn't stand still while developers endeavored to max out the PS3 and 360. It's marching along at the same rate as always. Imagine going strait from a Dreamcast to the PS3. That's the kind of leap we are looking at, here.

What if recent demos just dont impress anymore. (unlike the first UE3/D3/FC/HL2 demos
did)

Games keep getting "prettier" but their improved gfx just dont have the impact they used to have (or at all in many cases).

The only thing that still have any impact in me is some of the tessellation demos.

 

[clueless]

hey guys not to derail the thread, but would GT 5 photomode (the way the cars look) be playable on next gen consoles (ps4/xbox3) ?

 

[Entropy]

You can't just brush the cost of everything to side either. Do these companies really even want to go guns blazing again, when hardware superiority has never decided a generation? How much does it cost to develop these "photoreal" worlds?

There is another aspect aside from cost, and that is to what extent realism has a value for gameplay. I put the open question in another thread:
Imagine that the game graphics somehow wasn't rendered, but actually filmed actors. That would be the upper bound of rendering realism, reality itself. Now, how much would that increase your immersion in the game?
Take a second.

It really is an honest question, and answers will differ from person to person.
At the end of the day though, you're still sitting on your butt looking at pixels on the screen, so how much value is there in pushing the envelope in per pixel processing when doing so causes other aspects of a product to start to suffer?
(There is an unusually interesting interview with John Carmack here where he (among other things) expands on how they felt that the better responsiveness afforded by 60fps vs. 30fps was more important than displaying marginally prettier pictures. Now that has no bearing on console processing power per se - frame rate and resolution cost processing power as well - but argues that additional per pixel processing may not always be what gives the best return on your power/processing/money investment even in the eyes of graphics programmers.)

 

[DuckThor Evil]

I always greatly enjoy Carmack interviews. I also liked the part where he said that more interviews should starting to be with the art and content creation guys as the tech is starting to be less important, so the focus is shifting and already has quite a bit.

Your question is interesting, imo better tech will still allow better experiences for me, but my favourite games have never been my favourites due to the tech or graphics they have. If you had a system that is similar to the Matrix, I'd say it would be pretty immersive , but would of course require other things beside good graphics that'd be the day when people would stop working.

 

[Heinrich4]

I hope you are right, but I think you are setting yourself for a letdown or living in denial after the consoles are out. I agree that PCs are 10x the consoles of today, but 40-100x in what 2-3 years? A high end PC in two years will be 4-10x more powerful than a high end PC today? I think not... High end PC from 2009 is still pretty good and if you look how performance per watt has developed, it doesn't look so good and this gen consoles already launched pretty close to the ceiling in that.

You can't just brush the cost of everything to side either. Do these companies really even want to go guns blazing again, when hardware superiority has never decided a generation? How much does it cost to develop these "photoreal" worlds?

I'm sure that in the right hands we will see some amazing content, but I'm not expecting much more than Xbox to X360 kind of jump.

Im agree with you, because since the Radeon HD 5870, 2009 we not see a big jump performance,we see some developments on time (much better in tesselation GTX580) but nothing to indicate up to 10 times overall more performance over the next 2-3 years (unless something comes as leap Radeon 9700pro in 2002 ...).

And honestly I do not think we see a huge jump xbox to xbox360 (Ubisof in E3 2005 says something like 14/15 times), restrictions on TDP, transistor count to 2/3 billion costs, etc., is more likely that something in the 4-5 x maximum performance effective,without ... "1 to 2 Tflops, x360 and ps3 respectivelly anounched E3 2005 "inflated marketing flops,dot product" numbers here.

Perhaps we are on the way back to the time of optimization software.



http://www.guru3d.com/article/geforce-gtx-580-review/14
http://www.guru3d.com/article/geforce-gtx-580-review/15
http://www.guru3d.com/article/geforce-gtx-580-review/16
3D Mark Vantage
http://www.guru3d.com/article/geforce-gtx-580-review/17

 

[Lucid_Dreamer]

Hmm, if MS launches in 2012 or 2013, when can we expect the PS4? A year later like with the PS3?

It'll be interesting to see if the PS4 is significantly more powerful than the 360 (unlike the current gen) or whether MS can engineer a more efficient system once again.

Since True S3D, supposedly, requires around 30% more processing power; I guess the 360 was the more efficient system this gen. The games are definitely showing that they can have as much going on, at the same resolutions/IQ, in True S3D w/ motion controls and LPCM 7.1; just like top PS3 games. That doesn't take much more resources at all. We all know that, right?


I'm wondering what functionality will MS bring to their next gen console. I'm thinking the next Xbox will have, at least, the following features:

LPCM 7.1 audio
True S3D support
HDMI 1.3 or 1.4 support
Blu-ray Drive
Web browser integration

I wonder if the CPU in the next Xbox will be, significantly, more powerful than the Cell in the PS3. It should be interesting!

 

[function]

Since True S3D, supposedly, requires around 30% more processing power; I guess the 360 was the more efficient system this gen. The games are definitely showing that they can have as much going on, at the same resolutions/IQ, in True S3D w/ motion controls and LPCM 7.1; just like top PS3 games. That doesn't take much more resources at all. We all know that, right?


I'm wondering what functionality will MS bring to their next gen console. I'm thinking the next Xbox will have, at least, the following features:

LPCM 7.1 audio
True S3D support
HDMI 1.3 or 1.4 support
Blu-ray Drive
Web browser integration

I wonder if the CPU in the next Xbox will be, significantly, more powerful than the Cell in the PS3. It should be interesting!

Things like Digital Foundry (and the reality of actually playing games) continue to show just how little tech bullet points matter in terms of actually delivering the best gaming platform.