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[Proxy]

You guys do know that he has said that he has no idea what Sony is doing with their system right? And quite frankly you guys need to stop quoting these guys without the context of the discussion regarding the statement. I suggest you go through his other comments regard the 720, he seem to be echoing what thuway has been saying all along.

How can he echo what Thuway has been saying if he doesn't know what Sony is doing with their system?

 

[Hydrargyrus]

bkilian (former MS employee) said this on B3D :
Or you could just decide that pushing Kinect is worth launching with a less powerful console, and make the assumption that the Kinect benefits will make up for any perceived game quality differences.

hope its not what MS is going to do next gen

Oh god...

MS, What r u doin?
MS, Stahp!!

 

[mrklaw]

How badly do people think that current high end GPUs which are significantly more powerful than the Xbox 3 and PS4 GPUs will be bottlenecked by only having 2/3GBs of memory?

It's possible that you might start to want 4GB cards and even then might need to keep resolutions low (for PC at least). You really don't want to be transferring tons of data from main memory, PCI bus is too slow. Ok for buffer/cache though, so I think a 4GB you will be ok for a while


next big change is probably ram stacking as mentioned - any idea when that is likely to surface? Could really boost pc gpu performance, allow for more ram and potentially be cheaper

 

[mrklaw]

All this talk about how MS wants or will be making a profit from system launch, why? They have spent and lost billions previously. They can lose much more money from the start than Sony can if you look at the state and profits of their companies. It seems MS should try to get the killer console out there that Sony cannot make due to their financial status.

It doesn't make sense to me and if MS plays it on the safe side then this will make me sad. They really didn't help PC gaming since releasing the original XBOX and if they take a software approach then I am pissed.

They cannot simply write a blank cheque, they need to show a clear business plan to make money this gen to get the necessary investment approval.

 

[oversitting]

Why are so many people hung up on the sources not being credible? It only makes the rumor larger than life. Way too much effort trying to disprove people.

because its hard swimming through bovine excrement.

 

[Codeblew]

Depends on which one we're drinking:

The one where Durango has secret sauce that brings it in parity to Orbis.


or

The one where PS4 puts itself in a ballpark of power that mirrors XBox over PS2.

I agree. But with the specs as we know them now (which may not be final), the PS4 has a perceived slight advantage. In this thread, certain people seem to be making a somewhat hilarious attempt in reassuring us that the Secret Sauce / Wizard Jizz will make everything okay.

The same thing will happen later when the xbox3 is perceived to have higher specs than the ps4. I just find it funny is all.

 

[phosphor112]

Bookmarked. I still don't know why I should believe a self-proclaimed "Microsoft engineer from Redmond", who somehow is able to post the whole day on an internet forum and leak information, that there is a magical component in the Xbox 3 that increases the power of the CUs/the processing power by 50%, and that the RAM can somehow compete with RAM that is 3x times faster. And in my opinion, efficency is first and foremost a matter of good code. Developers will still be able to make very good use of the hardware of the PS4, no matter how "customized" the Xbox 3 is. I think this whole "Xbox 3 is super efficient and PS4 is a brute which has a lot of raw power"-thing is greatly exaggerated, because their architectures seem fairly similar. But good, we will see in a couple of months if those "insiders" were right.

I'm on the same boat. Sure, there is probably a chip that does some nice things for the system, closing the gap, but this seems way overblown.

As you mentioned, the GPU is down several CU's, the memory is 1/3 the speed... what can take care of BOTH of those problems in one fell swoop?

Also, what about the compute module that has yet to be revealed for Orbis? That's extra power right there... but... it's not Wizard Jizz I guess.

fixed

Glad it's catching on.

For once in my life, I'm a trend setter. Lol.

 

[Proelite]

Oh god...

MS, What r u doin?
MS, Stahp!!

Buzz Killian.

He does this regularly on B3d. If only we all had heeded his warnings to temper our expectations.

 

[CLEEK]

Lol wat?

You do know positional surround sound has been around for years?

Why does it need to fly off to clouds?

Because lag.

 

[TheOddOne]

bkilian (former MS employee) said this on B3D :
Or you could just decide that pushing Kinect is worth launching with a less powerful console, and make the assumption that the Kinect benefits will make up for any perceived game quality differences.

hope its not what MS is going to do next gen

Here is the full comment:

You could do something like what Apple has done, where the machines are backward compatible, and they just keep getting more powerful as time goes on. That way you don't mess up devs, who can recompile for the new hardware and choose whether to launch compatible with all previous owners, or ramp up engine features.

Problem there is install base, if you choose the newer console version, you have a smaller install base. Your install base is fragmented (like iphone) and you therefore have to make games with a lower budget to remain profitable. Unless you can get iphone like sales numbers, I wouldn't hold my breath for this.

Or you could just decide that pushing Kinect is worth launching with a less powerful console, and make the assumption that the Kinect benefits will make up for any perceived game quality differences.

 

[gofreak]

Latency benefits basically? But do programmers not work around that on current systems or is it inevitable for some processes?

They do, but it's another tool in the box.

If the latter, then there is an argument that PC GPUs should have esram embedded on them too. Potentially bigger rewards than using the same amount of silicon for more (underutilized CUs)?

Quite a lot of low level programmer burden. AMD/nVidia have spent many years refining their ratios of resources and improving latency hiding on more regular memory setups though, in an application transparent way. It's not to say a programmer-controlled scratchpad close to GPU wouldn't be an additional help, but it would require handholding you cannot necessarily demand on PC and would presumably require trading off against other resources, with no guarantee it would be a win overall.

 

[shinra-bansho]

Depends on which one we're drinking:

The one where Durango has secret sauce that brings it in parity to Orbis.

or

The one where PS4 puts itself in a ballpark of power that mirrors XBox over PS2.

The latter coolaid doesn't exist afaict. Unless to not drink Durante's wizard jizz automatically means that one is drinking the latter.

 

[Sid]

I'm on the same boat. Sure, there is probably a chip that does some nice things for the system, closing the gap, but this seems way overblown.

As you mentioned, the GPU is down several CU's, the memory is 1/3 the speed... what can take care of BOTH of those problems in one fell swoop?

Also, what about the compute module that has yet to be revealed for Orbis? That's extra power right there... but... it's not Wizard Jizz I guess.



Glad it's catching on.

For once in my life, I'm a trend setter. Lol.

No man it's i-lo,really seems like MS can do no wrong seriously.

 

[Lynn616]

Is the reason Microsoft is so focused on low power is because they intend for it to always be on?

Didnt we have a rumor about 2 GPUs? Using the low power GPU in pass-through mode, Skype, Apps and Arcade games. Both GPUs working together for the full 720 games.

It's like they think they have this magic bullet to equalize 50% different in FLOP output (mind you both are GCN based GPU's... you know same company and same family of cards), as well as a 3x difference in RAM bandwidth.

What if a second GPU is making up the difference in FLOP output? Also, cant the main RAM and esRAM feed the GPU at the same time? That would increase bandwidth.

 

[phosphor112]

No man it's i-lo,really seems like MS can do no wrong seriously.

It's not that they can "do no wrong" to these people. It's like they think they have this magic bullet to equalize 50% different in FLOP output (mind you both are GCN based GPU's... you know same company and same family of cards), as well as a 3x difference in RAM bandwidth.

It just doesn't make sense. Not ONE bit.

If they can close the gap a bit. Sure, I can believe it, but I do not see how it is possible for things to be "neck and neck" with these types of differences.

We aren't comparing cell/RSX and Xenon/Xenos, we are comparing AMD CPU to AMD CPU and AMD GPU to AMD GPU.

 

[dead monkey uk]

bkilian (former MS employee) said this on B3D :
Or you could just decide that pushing Kinect is worth launching with a less powerful console, and make the assumption that the Kinect benefits will make up for any perceived game quality differences.

hope its not what MS is going to do next gen

As much as we do not like it, this makes great business sense for MS. Kinect Dance, karaoke and party games along with DLC will be a big part of any new xbox launch. It has been clear for years now that MS wants to chase some of that family Wii market, which is possible with the WiiUs lack of impact on the market.

Saying all that I will buy the new xbox at some point, but looking at the studios developing exclusives for each console, it looks like the PS4 will be my first next gen console.

 

[darkistheway]

bkilian (former MS employee) said this on B3D :
Or you could just decide that pushing Kinect is worth launching with a less powerful console, and make the assumption that the Kinect benefits will make up for any perceived game quality differences.

hope its not what MS is going to do next gen

Say Kinect and Window 8 apps and I think you have hit the nail exactly on the head.

Microsoft's game has always been for the living room. I expect Smartglass and Kinect to be front and center at E3 2013, just like it has been for the last couple years. Bottom line is that in order for these consoles to be successful they need to appeal to a wide range of consumer groups.

Casual games, motion (and other non-traditional) controls, smartphone integration, streaming media - they will all have it and they will all push them as hard as they can. They throw gimmicks at the wall until something sticks.

The day of the pure gaming console is long over. Unless they resurrect Ken Kutaragi.

 

[oversitting]

you start with something like this:

once you add this. It makes some mad sauce.

 

[eso76]

I want sony's GPU and GDDR5, and MS's optimisations and amount of ram. Is that too much to ask?


Yes, you say? Oh ok.

i think gpu could change closer to release.

 

[CrunchinJelly]

Split controllers, both with IR/gyro and traditional buttons/sticks.

Split controller is interesting because it would give you a stick for control in Kinect games... that's what they've been missing from some of those games, just a small one-handed controller.

 

[mrklaw]

i think gpu could change closer to release.

too custom to change dramatically. Wonder if they could bump the CUs to try and match Sony, or maybe increase clock speeds (800MHz/1.6GHz seems on the conservative side)?

 

[Catchpenny]

Not overly impressive, especially if Durango is to last as long or longer than the PS3/360. It will not take long for the PC/console gap to become a chasm this time.

 

[Proxy]

i think gpu could change closer to release.

If these specs are real and if MS is launching this year then they're final.

 

[Jadedx]

Say Kinect and Window 8 apps and I think you have hit the nail exactly on the head.

Microsoft's game has always been for the living room. I expect Smartglass and Kinect to be front and center at E3 2013, just like it has been for the last couple years. Bottom line is that in order for these consoles to be successful they need to appeal to a wide range of consumer groups.

Casual games, motion (and other non-traditional) controls, smartphone integration, streaming media - they will all have it and they will all push them as hard as they can. They throw gimmicks at the wall until something sticks.

The day of the pure gaming console is long over. Unless they resurrect Ken Kutaragi.

Ken K? Pure gaming? Remember this was the guy who always wanted some sort of media functions in his consoles, cd - > dvd - > blu ray.

too custom to change dramatically. Wonder if they could bump the CUs to try and match Sony, or maybe increase clock speeds (800MHz/1.6GHz seems on the conservative side)?

If they did they would probably upgrade it instead of outright changing it, No I and 100% sure they would just upgrade it. Changing the gpu this late would be suicide.

 

[Reiko]

Not overly impressive, especially if Durango is to last as long or longer than the PS3/360. It will not take long for the PC/console gap to become a chasm this time.

The amount of rumored RAM could future proof the system if the bandwidth problem is sorted out.

That and obvious GPU bottlenecks.

 

[Snubbers]

Former enough to be bitter.

Yeah, he said this about one reason he left..

lmost all of the core gamers that created the Xbox that were in management have been forced out or left, and what's left over is MBAs with dollar signs in their eyes. I just found I could no longer believe in and agree with the direction the execs were taking the Xbox org.

http://forum.beyond3d.com/showpost.php?p=1696487&postcount=1314


For me, the initial reaction is:
- Orbis' Architecture is closer to the PC then Durango, which may have hardware that pretty much makes it like CELL (offloading normal GPU stuff to another processing block).. Inexperienced devs are going to get more out of Orbis with ease.

- The tools are much more mature and demonstrably up there with MS (See ERP's posts on Beyond3D) so no advantage there.

- Orbis dedicates only a fraction of Durango's reserved resources for OS duties, leaving more resources for the actual game.

- It seems most of the 'special sauce' for Durango is all aimed at Set Top Box or 'Living Room Media' duties, not games (It seems an advanced video/audio block are included, we have to assume normal HW accelerated audio/video is included in Orbis HW, that's a given)


MS have screwed the pooch on this one I'm afraid.. The more special sauce durango has, the more it ends up being like PS3 then the 360 was, which is not a good thing on many levels..

That level of disparity means that I fully expect (and MS bean counters have aimed for this) that multi-plats will by and large either be lower res, or lower framerate, or lower asset/geometry then Orbis, all of which mean you are going to get a sizeable swell leaning towards Orbis..

The 'casuals' they are supposedly after already have Wii-U/Tablets and smartphones, Good luck to MS on this one, as I've said before, most of their services are very region dependant, and the STB idea relies on you suddenly ignoring your TV's inbuilt hardware? Sure..

And this whole NUI always present crap.. I know very few that ever use Kinect on anything more then a passing fad interest for controlling anything on the 360, no voice recognition in the world works with young kids or noisy environments, and with people crowded together, gesture recognition goes down the pan.. it's a total fallacy that only exists in the sterile homes of the smiley marketing campaigns, and already the Kinect 'market' have been there and already decided it's nothing more then a fad in the majority of cases..

I do like kinect as a casual controller, the kids love it, it ticks all the 'exercise' while gaming parental goodness you could want, and it's fun in many ways, but trying to pretend that souping it up will somehow appeal to the hardcore is monumentally idiotic, when you are in a lazy gaming slouch, you just do not want to be 'tilting your head', or gesticulating in overtly exaggerated ways just to do something that a button press was always good enough before.. I tried Head tracking on Forza (and GT) and it was pants, and lo and behold, it never caught on..

 

[metareferential]

They could double the gpu. Would that make sense / close the gap?

 

[Wind's Howling]

Please just tell me MS is not going to be as stupid as they were with the 360 and release a console with a huge ass power brick attached to it. That decision alone made me choose the PS3 over the 360.

 

[shinra-bansho]

bkilian (former MS employee) said this on B3D :
Or you could just decide that pushing Kinect is worth launching with a less powerful console, and make the assumption that the Kinect benefits will make up for any perceived game quality differences.

This is the other part I'm not really getting. For a long time it was seemingly heavily implied that Kinect 2.0 would feature prominently and that Microsoft would be trying to target the former blue ocean.

Furthermore, the design seems to be around the idea of Trojan-horsing some form of W8 into the living room and integrating into said ecosystem - thus, larger slower pool of RAM with a substantial portion reserved for OS functions.

And then it's also supposed to function as a set-top box/cable box with lots of partnerships with providers.

But then it's also got magic secret sauce that makes up for the paper short-comings in processing power, so that it ends up on par or even better than Orbis, which appears at first sight to be geared towards being a game console first, before media functions.

And to top that all off, it apparently does all of this while being cheaper to build and easier to develop for - even though the design seems more esoteric.

Essentially, the implication appears to be that the next XBOX is somehow a jack of all trades and a master of all. Which can't help but breed skepticism.

 

[MCD]

Please just tell me MS is not going to be as stupid as they were with the 360 and release a console with a huge ass power brick attached to it. That decision alone made me choose the PS3 over the 360.

And not making it universal made it worse for importers.

 

[oversitting]

http://forum.beyond3d.com/showpost.php?p=1696487&postcount=1314

I have a hard time believing he worked at xbox and left because of something this stupid.

 

[Snubbers]

Please just tell me MS is not going to be as stupid as they were with the 360 and release a console with a huge ass power brick attached to it. That decision alone made me choose the PS3 over the 360.

I hope they do have a power brick it means I can hide that out the way and they can make the console smaller..

If your buying decision was primarily on who has a power brick, good luck to you.. if they both have power bricks, I guess it's Wii U for U..

 

[darkistheway]

Ken K? Pure gaming? Remember this was the guy who always wanted some sort of media functions in his consoles, cd - > dvd - > blu ray.

I like to pretend that Ken K is the saviour of gaming. It's a quirk.

 

[Proelite]

I have a hard time believing he worked at xbox and left because of something this stupid.

He did.

BKilian is 100% legitimate.

With the departure of JAllard, Peter Moore, Robbie Bach, XBox division doesn't operate the same way it used to operate. People are extremely focused on profitability, and I assume there is great ongoing debate of what will bring in the most profits.

 

[darkistheway]

This is the other part I'm not really getting. For a long time it was seemingly heavily implied that Kinect 2.0 would feature prominently and that Microsoft would be trying to target the former blue ocean.

Furthermore, the design seems to be around the idea of Trojan-horsing some form of W8 into the living room and integrating into said ecosystem - thus, larger slower pool of RAM with a substantial portion reserved for OS functions.

And then it's also supposed to function as a set-top box/cable box with lots of partnerships with providers.

But then it's also got magic secret sauce that makes up for the paper short-comings in processing power, so that it ends up on par or even better than Orbis, which appears at first sight to be geared towards being a game console first, before media functions.

And to top that all off, it apparently does all of this while being cheaper to build and easier to develop for - even though the design seems more esoteric.

Essentially, the implication appears to be that the next XBOX is somehow a jack of all trades and a master of all. Which can't help but breed skepticism.

This is exactly what happens when something is designed by management committees. There will probably be a pretty big disconnect between what it is supposed to be (master of all) and what it will be (master of none).

 

[Wind's Howling]

I hope they do have a power brick it means I can hide that out the way and they can make the console smaller..

If your buying decision was primarily on who has a power brick, good luck to you.. if they both have power bricks, I guess it's Wii U for U..

I do not recall the PS3 being significantly bigger then the 360 so I do not know where you are getting at.

 

[oversitting]

He did.

BKilian is 100% legitimate.

Wow guy must have been committed to his vision. I really couldn't care which way my company goes as long as Im not in danger of losing my job or anything.

 

[Terbinator]

He did.

BKilian is 100% legitimate.

With the departure of JAllard, Peter Moore, Robbie Bach, XBox division doesn't operate the same way it used to operate. People are extremely focused on profitability, and I assume there is great ongoing debate of what will bring in the most profits.

I forgot how glorious and full of wonder this gen was at one point.

Consider my seats bought on the hype-train.

 

[Proelite]

This is exactly what happens when something is designed by management committees. There will probably be a pretty big disconnect between what it is supposed to be (master of all) and what it will be (master of none).

Yep.

Everything is priority 1.

 

[TheOddOne]

He did.

BKilian is 100% legitimate.

With the departure of JAllard, Peter Moore, Robbie Bach, XBox division doesn't operate the same way it used to operate. People are extremely focused on profitability, and I assume there is great ongoing debate of what will bring in the most profits.

What is their reasoning for opening new internal studios then? Honest question.

 

[Proelite]

What is their reasoning for opening new internal studios then? Honest question.

Because AAA games bring in the most profits?

With a division as large as IEB, there is bound to be politics and debate over everything. Compromises will be made. Sacrifices will be made.

There is nothing we can do but hope for the best outcome.

 

[Chuck Norris]

I have a hard time believing he worked at xbox and left because of something this stupid.

What's stupid bout leaving because the staff and management you worked with have been removed for corporate shills with totally different ideals?

 

[TheOddOne]

Because AAA games bring in the most profits?

That is weird though, building a studio cost more than publishing or getting timed exclusive third party software. I’m not complaining though, if it means more games.

 

[darkistheway]

Because AAA games bring in the most profits?

So their market research has shown, and another box is ticked.

 

[Razgreez]

Wow guy must have been committed to his vision. I really couldn't care which way my company goes as long as Im not in danger of losing my job or anything.

If you worked in a company i owned i'd get rid of you asap with that attitude. A company without a definite vision and passionate drive amongst its employees is self desctructive. It's exactly what happened to sony

 

[Jadedx]

For me, the initial reaction is:
- Orbis' Architecture is closer to the PC then Durango, which may have hardware that pretty much makes it like CELL (offloading normal GPU stuff to another processing block).. Inexperienced devs are going to get more out of Orbis with ease.

- The tools are much more mature and demonstrably up there with MS (See ERP's posts on Beyond3D) so no advantage there.

- Orbis dedicates only a fraction of Durango's reserved resources for OS duties, leaving more resources for the actual game.

1. You think MS won't have a tools advantage, lol. MS tools will be better.
2. The 3gb of ram thing is just speculation, rather stupid speculation, full windows does not need that much ram so xbox 720 won't need anywhere near that much.

- It seems most of the 'special sauce' for Durango is all aimed at Set Top Box or 'Living Room Media' duties, not games (It seems an advanced video/audio block are included, we have to assume normal HW accelerated audio/video is included in Orbis HW, that's a given)

WTF are you talking about, the special sauce is used to enhance graphics, nothing else.

MS have screwed the pooch on this one I'm afraid.. The more special sauce durango has, the more it ends up being like PS3 then the 360 was, which is not a good thing on many levels..

That level of disparity means that I fully expect (and MS bean counters have aimed for this) that multi-plats will by and large either be lower res, or lower framerate, or lower asset/geometry then Orbis, all of which mean you are going to get a sizeable swell leaning towards Orbis..

This is why Tools are important, and nobody is better than MS when it comes to tools. And so far all the insiders have said they have heard that the 720 is easier to dev for.

As for the rest, you have no idea what you're talking about.

The 'casuals' they are supposedly after already have Wii-U/Tablets and smartphones, Good luck to MS on this one, as I've said before, most of their services are very region dependant, and the STB idea relies on you suddenly ignoring your TV's inbuilt hardware? Sure..

And this whole NUI always present crap.. I know very few that ever use Kinect on anything more then a passing fad interest for controlling anything on the 360, no voice recognition in the world works with young kids or noisy environments, and with people crowded together, gesture recognition goes down the pan.. it's a total fallacy that only exists in the sterile homes of the smiley marketing campaigns, and already the Kinect 'market' have been there and already decided it's nothing more then a fad in the majority of cases..

I do like kinect as a casual controller, the kids love it, it ticks all the 'exercise' while gaming parental goodness you could want, and it's fun in many ways, but trying to pretend that souping it up will somehow appeal to the hardcore is monumentally idiotic, when you are in a lazy gaming slouch, you just do not want to be 'tilting your head', or gesticulating in overtly exaggerated ways just to do something that a button press was always good enough before.. I tried Head tracking on Forza (and GT) and it was pants, and lo and behold, it never caught on..

Kinect will not be a mega focus, MS can already tell from the last few years that while it initially was a huge success, it is not selling that well and neither are the games. It will still be there for the people that actually like it, but MS has said time and time again that they are looking to focus more on core games.

 

[jbug617]

I thought he knew nothing about Orbis.

 

[Terbinator]

Given we're all but going octo-core this gen - are we expecting a nice step-up in animation, PhysX and the like, GAF?

 

[xenist]

This year is gonna be so much fun!

Watching console fans at each other's throats over technical specifications is going to be hilarious. People arguing over bandwidth and memory controller latencies is just more proof that the whole "It's not about specifications and graphics it's about the artstyle and the gameplay, meeeeuhhh!" was nothing but Koolaid powered FUD that we had to deal with whenever graphics quality was brought up. I can't wait for the launches so that the pixel and frame counting contests start.

Execpt for Nintendo fans. They have to stick with the "it's all about the art" defense.

 

[Proelite]

2. The 3gb of ram thing is just speculation, rather stupid speculation, full windows does not need that much ram so xbox 720 won't need anywhere near that much.

I wouldn't be so sure about this. It's at most 3GB but they could easily pare that down by .5-1GB.

WTF are you talking about, the special sauce is used to enhance graphics, nothing else.

True.

Kinect will not be a mega focus, MS can already tell from the last few years that while it initially was a huge success, it is not selling that well and neither are the games. It will still be there for the people that actually like it, but MS has said time and time again that they are looking to focus more on core games.

Kinect will be a big focus, IMO.