Predict: The Next Generation Console Tech

Yes, just like what Xenos was.

 

Console gaming is has it's own needs, a few specific tweaks here and there that wouldn't make sense with the brute force of PC gaming, could give console gamers the graphical fidelity they want at preset resolutions and framerates without being easily comparable "flop for flop".

 

But, I think, not as forward looking as Xenos was.
The 360 came out at a time when GPUs were on the cusp of making a big architectural leap to unified shaders, I don't think there's a similar situation this time around.

What equivalent to Xenos' unified shaders could they put in Durango's GPU?

And did we know unified shaders were on the horizon before we heard about Xenos?
If not, maybe there's something AMD have brewing we don't expect.

 

I feel like even something the equivalent of a gtx 480 in a closed box could really pull off some amazing visuals at 30 fps. Just imagining what developers could do knowing everyone had something that powerful to squeeze the most out of. Just seeing how acceptably close games like Crysis 2 are from a console to my 480 powered PC on significantly less powerful hardware is impressive. If we got something in the ballpark of a gtx 670 I'd be thrilled. If every PC developer had a 670 to squeeze I can't imagine how far PC visuals would be ahead. We definitely wouldn't need tri sli to get decent framerates in Metro...

The tech that concerns me is this used game tech more so than the raw rendering power. Also please give Xbox controllers a functional dpad for us fighting game players...

 

I think all the tweaks will be related to bandwidth, embedded memory, and perhaps some fixed blocks/instructions for IQ enhancements (lets say MS versions of FXAA/TXAA). I wonder how much you could get out of a Cape Verde-type GPU if it had access to small memory pool (64-128MB) at 500GB/sec for the shaders, texture units, and rops as well as the amount of processing time spent on IQ of some variety of AA was drastically reduced.

Maybe I'm completely wrong, but it seems to me that most of the processing on high PC games goes to IQ and bandwidth needed for higher resolutions, so how can you achieve similar results in an embedded system with less hardware?

 

360 came out along with its unified shader architecture 19 months before any AMD or Nvidia part with Unified shader architecture debuted to the public.

So yeah, we can assume Microsoft has some sort of look at what AMD is coming up with in the future that they can implement into their console.

 

As opposed to something like the 680 which is also clearly designed to mine for diamonds. If only Nvidia had dropped that stupid mining crap and built a graphics card designed only to accelerate 3d graphics... doh!

 

Unified shaders were known to be on the horizon long before the current generation of consoles launched and in fact had been planned for a PC GPU (R400) even before the consoles launched.

What is currently on the horizon which could be used in the new generation of consoles? (to be fair I can actually think of at least 2 things although neither is really as revolutionary as unified shaders).

 

Calm down mate

 

very true, they've had company insight for years, I really hope they get their hands on something this time that's well focused on power but also temperature and durability. If it can hit all three birds with one stone, then i commend them big time on that. they should use some of their profits made to seek out those concerns.

 

We already have heard what Crytek feel about it. This is what they said a few weeks ago.

And they have been confirmed to know the specs since atleast early last year when Yerli said he did.

 

I see, looks like I'll keep my old bike a for a little longer too then. So for the new bike that you know, how many kilometers can you roughly ride in one session without burning out the tyres? 2500km sounds good? I hope you can at least ride more than 1200km. So nice to chat with a fellow bike lover.

 

To be fair, ATI did plan to put out unified shader R400 a long, long time before XB360, the manufacturing processes of the day just weren't ready for it (and possibly other issues)

 

correct, but it still points to microsoft(or whatever customer around) having access to AMD's roadmap if looking for a customized chip. The R520(X1000) series(which released at the same time and afterward) didn't even have that kind of priority.

 

Even devs like from software ( dark souls 2) was being played on a laptop . This is somewhat indicative that the gpu in the next gen consoles will house a mobile gpu !

 

Uh..not really? Of course i could be wrong, but what one developer happens to demo their game on has no bearing on what the hardware turns out to be. Especially considering that Dark Souls 2 just might be a current gen console game to begin with.

 

The leaked demo of cry engine 3 running on a laptop to show a tech demo of next gen rpj!

 

The EU regulation proposal for game consoles that is likely to pass has no limit whatsoever on active gaming power, but the limits on standby power will be pretty strict. (Not really relevant, but just a pet peeve of mine: the exact same thing was true of the regulations about GPUs that raised a lot of noise on the internet. EU has never, and likely never will limit active use power for devices that actually need it. However, they are trying to drive standby power of everything as low as they can.)

It's all just a proposal for now, so things can change, but I believe the latest draft requires the devices to have automatic power down to a standby state, with non-networked max standby power of 0.5W, and networked max standby power of 4W.

 

btrollian
...

When the first Durango numbers come out, I predict the vast majority of people who uses flops as a measure of power would be really disappointed.

They'll be fine once they see the games though.