What kind of hardware was in the Xbox Alpha kits?

[seismologist]

I'm trying to figure out where the 30% complete number comes from.

And how much better can we expect the final 360 games to look?

I'm sure they'll look somewhat better than what we've seen so far. But from my experience, games at E3 have almost never looked graphically different in the final release version. I can't think of any that have.

 

[Shifty Geezer]

And how much better can we expect the final 360 games to look?
.

You won't be able to work that out from Alpha specs. XB360 works differently. It's not like a CPU+GPU upgrade to a PC and suddenyl everythings running faster. The games need to be written to take advantage of the hardware, and the basic specs aren;t going to show where the improvements come from.

 

[SanGreal]

I agree with Shifty, but if you still care the specs were:

Dual 2.0ghz G5s
512MB Ram
ATi X800

 

[Farid]

The Alpha XeDK is a software developement platform, some sort of emulator if you will.

The main differences you'll see between a game running on an Alpha XeDK and a retail game will be IQ related (2/4X MSAA), framerate related (Obviously) and sometime CPU related (Physics, sound, etc).

And how much better can we expect the final 360 games to look?

For instance, Monolith works on an algorithm that will produce soft shadows in Condemned. This effect wasn't implemented on the E3 demo/video.
This example, plus the ones I cited earlier, are the kind of differences you can expect to see between a game running on an Alpha XeDK and an actual X360.

 

[seismologist]

Thanks for the answers. The specs seem almost the same (Power PC + ATI GPU)
Anyone know what exactly is being emulated in the SDK?

So far my understanding of the differences in final HW:

1. GPU maybe 2x more powerful?

2. will enable some more graphical effects like the free AA.

3. CPU will be split into 3 cores.

4. Clock speed increase

5. Take away some cache/branching features

6. Unified memory bus

 

[jvd]

Look. Take a psone launch game and compare it to the last big budget game released on it . Take the first ps2 or xbox launch game and compare it to the last big budget games for those systems .

That is what you should expect from all 3 consoles coming out

1) The new gpu had hdr , fsaa 4 free and seems to have the more powerfull shader set and also sm3.0 . Its much more powerfull in the shader area than the r420s

2) yup , but remember the launch games wont really take advantage of the hardware. You can already see a divison between the games . At launch you have kameo and others that are good looking games don't get me wrong but are below the quality of gears of war .

 

[ralexand]

But from my experience, games at E3 have almost never looked graphically different in the final release version. I can't think of any that have.

Bizarre seems to have bumped up the poly counts in their car models.

 

[mckmas8808]

Yes the car has more curves. The heat effect is kind of cool too.

 

[MuFu]

That Sagaris is so sexy.

 

[ralexand]

That Sagaris is so sexy.

Some love it, some hate it.

 

[blakjedi]

Yes the car has more curves. The heat effect is kind of cool too.

hmmm it comes across a fake.... that heat wave effect looked better on zelda WW on the dragon roost level... it has to be a joke.

no lol.

 

[Shifty Geezer]

That Sagaris is so sexy.

Some love it, some hate it.

Top Gear (UK car programme) test-drive the Sagaris today and said it was the first TVR with any control.

Thye also had a race between a man running and a car, and the man one, despite having a fraction of the horsepower of the car. Which ties in nicely with the whole idea that it's not just how big the numbers are, but where and how they are applied. Comparing component metrics really ain't that useful

 

[Urian]

Are you saying that all the X360 code running in the Dual G5 are emulated?

This is not what I heard.

 

[Farid]

Are you saying that all the X360 code running in the Dual G5 are emulated?

No. Hence the "some sort of".

 

[ralexand]

Are you saying that all the X360 code running in the Dual G5 are emulated?

This is not what I heard.

When you say emulated do you mean the alpha system is mapping the code targeted for the 3 different cores to the 2 cores in the alpha system?

 

[scooby_dooby]

Yes the car has more curves. The heat effect is kind of cool too.

hmmm it comes across a fake.... that heat wave effect looked better on zelda WW on the dragon roost level... it has to be a joke.

no lol.

it's real, and they mentioned this as good as they can get with an animated GIF, so i'm sure it looks muc hbetter on screen

 

[pc999]

Are you saying that all the X360 code running in the Dual G5 are emulated?

No. Hence the "some sort of".

I guess that this info is from the "docs", damm I hope that it dont take to long till a mass leak...

 

[Fox5]

That Sagaris is so sexy.

Some love it, some hate it.

Top Gear (UK car programme) test-drive the Sagaris today and said it was the first TVR with any control.

Thye also had a race between a man running and a car, and the man one, despite having a fraction of the horsepower of the car. Which ties in nicely with the whole idea that it's not just how big the numbers are, but where and how they are applied. Comparing component metrics really ain't that useful

Wait, the man won? Over what distance? Did they not push the gas pedal on the car?

 

[Megadrive1988]

the oldest Xenon Alpha Kits had dual G5s with ATI Radeon 9800 Pro / XT
(R350, R360 circa 2003)

later Alpha Kits were upgraded to Radeon X800 (R420 circa 2004)

the recently shipped Beta Kits have real Xenon tri-core CPUs and real Xenos (C1) GPUs, and while not FINAL as far as clockspeed and perhaps a tweak here and there, developers within the last month or so have real actual Xbox 360 architecture to work with, for the first time.

 

[Urian]

In other words, the code running in the G5 Alpha kits is only code running in 2 different threads.

This is why Microsoft said that the Alpha Kit has the 30% of the final hardware power.