Xbox One (Durango) Technical hardware investigation

It's more a case of jaguar being quite weak, due to low clock rate mainly. Xenon runs at 3.2GHz, double the rumored next-gen CPU clockrate after all and the vector unit is quite wide (and there's three of 'em), so you get a fair chunk of theoretical flops from that.

 

I suppose because we're talking of fixed functions, in the SHAPE block, really coded to metal and not a programmable chip, it should be several times more efficient and faster than a simple "100 GF general purpose cpu", I think that in real world we're in the realm of 2-4x or more depending on situations

 

There are some workloads where fast, fat, single pipe cores are the best solution. I still think Cell would be the best programmable audio processor available in terms of cost. A modern, large CPU could match it, but as a discrete component, Cell should be good for any task in the audio domain for a good while yet. But of course, custom hardware is capable and even smaller, so a very welcome addition to the full array of hardware features in a console.

Anyway, next-gen audio discussion moved here.

 

I know I'm a bit late to this party, but having some background in work within medical companies, I want to add that placebo is a very powerful force indeed. And if placebo can easily have physical consequences, it should be no surprise that it is extremely influential in something as subjective as perception of sound.

My audio interest stretches back three and a half decades, and my major disappointment with that interest is that when the audio industry had basically solved all challenges in terms of electronics and distribution, they could have turned their attention to the very real issues left in recording and in soundfield reproduction. Instead, they turned to selling placebo.

Blind testing is very educational....

 

Hmm, I posted this over on GAF...

 

Hm, I smell a 7790 incoming. Things would get much more interesting that way. I'll eat a bicycle if they gone passed the 2.0tf mark.

 

Aren't we always to think it's too late for fundamental changes? *shrug*

These are options:

-upclocks

-12Gb DDR3 (because 16 would just be too much overkill)

-They had some redundant CU's that could be enabled at the cost of yield

Or, since they unlike Sony haven't had a chance to confirm any specs yet, there's always a chance the accepted specs are just wrong in some way or another.

I was thinking, how shocking would it be if they got up there and announced "over 2.5 teraflops power" or something lol. Jaws would drop similar to Sony's 8GB.

 

That 2.5tf gpu would be so handicapped by the low bandwidth ddr3 ram assuming it's a unified memory architecture. It would be fun to see if Durango really is more than meets the eye.

 

Anybody who remembers E3 2005 should be wary of ANY claim made about Tflop performance numbers.

In 2005, MS had the 360 rated at just over 1 Tflop and Sony had the PS3 rated at over 2 Tflops in their respective charts!!!.


Which was quite clearly nonsense from both parties concerned.

 

5.3 Tflops, easy. Tell all your friends.

 

teraflop numbers now seem to be standardized. no more teraflop inflation. plus both use the same amd architecture.

 

I'm quite certain MS will find a way of ensuring they can claim the Durango has more than 1.85Tflops.

It will be fun seeing how they've gone about it, and whether it will stand up to scrutiny.

 

2.5 GF, Monster SHAPE audio, 12 GB, XBOX360 BC, for 500 €? Jaws would drop as rain

 

they can handle this a variety of ways...

say the rumored specs are all true, 1.2tf octo core 8gb ddr3

they need only announce 8 core cpu, 8gb ram, custom amd gpu. walla, no spec deficient to competition.

they could announce the tf number anyway, deeming it not relevant, good enough, etc.

if they do indeed do a nice little upclock, lets say to 960 mhz which gets you to 1.46 tf or something, probably no shame announcing " nearly 1.5 teraflops of power" or "~1.5 TF" (hell come to think of it the other guys rounded up more than that, "near 2tf").

just some of several ways they can do it...

 

Dual APU confirmed. LOL

I don't think they'll be any changes, too late for that.

 

I think this is the route they'll go, but they'll focus on features they believe are unique to their own console. We might see more tech detail for Kinect and the audio processor, for example.

 

I just received an interesting pastebin link about the Durango dev kits from a friend. He certainly isn't a game designer (but he works in IT), so I don't know where he got it, and he wouldn't tell. Does this make sense or is this fake? I'm not really a tech guy and I figured this would be the best place to ask. I hope it is true...

http://pastebin.com/CiKCVeiA

 

They could stick a bit more esram in there.

I'll go for slightly higher clocks all round if anything.

 

They could play that game, I guess the audio processing device packs quiet some "FLOPS".
Though I would more willingly believe that they just won't focus that much on specs or just not dive too much into the details, elusiveness for the win

Anyway I believe the systems are a lot closer than what people believes. Indeed the Playstation should be perceived as the most potent one but that was already the case this gen, I think that is something more marketing related than technical, there is more than "paper FLOPS" to set the average audience mind on the topic. Anyway that is more a "vs thing" it is not allowed here so I won't go in that direction too much but a proper "vs thing" should start on a ceteris paribus comparison, so far it is still not double confirmed which business model MSFT and Sony will embrace.

As for an overclock I wonder to which extend it would be a win, it would trigger extra costs (from lower yields to a beefier cooling solution with possibly an impact on the box form factor).
Ultimately the system would still be likely to rate below than the competition on some metrics. As it is the system should be able to run everything the competition does albeit a few downgrades here and there, a bump of 15% is unlikely to make the situation much different.
Imo it is a waste, if they wanted a monster and ensure lead as far as specs as concerned they would have come with a different system (assuming the specs we have are legit which they seem to be).

 

Is it at all plausible MS had it designed to yield very well with the understanding they could up the clocks (or even use CUs that would have been disabled?) in response to the competition, taking a lower yield and/or beefing up their stock cooling? Doesn't seem so to me.