EDGE: "Power struggle: the real differences between PS4 and Xbox One performance"

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Barzul said:
Show us then at launch. Differences should be significant and obvious then not 3 years from now.
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But that's what should be expected. Launch games are rushed, 2-3 years from now the advantages will be more noticeable on the released games. Notably in multiplatforms.
 
Inversive said:
Microsoft will be holding next gen games back (again)due to their weak console, the sad thing is that xboners will probably be happy about this.
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Oh great, now you know how original Xbox owners felt during the PS2 generation. And by "again" I assume you're talking about the PS3. I also assume you realize the 360 actually had a more capable GPU and RAM and a CPU that was actually designed by sane, rational human beings. Sorry for coming across as an ass but I'm sick of the myth of the PS3 being more powerful and being held back by the 360. Last of Us looked good but lets be honest, it had bad IQ and a shoddy framerate. Halo 4 compares favorably to any PS3 exclusive. Slightly off topic sorry..
 
tfur said:
There is a one day window to show the difference, otherwise it will never show.

What does this mean, and how do you extract any logic out of this notion.
In any case, it is already showing.
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According to the article the PS4 is a clear 50% more powerful, they showed clear examples with frame rate and resolution.

They also state it is much easier to code for than the XB1.

Logic dictates that these differences will be very apparent at launch, why wouldn't they be?
 
Dictator93 said:
How can anyone spin facts for that much longer?

Ps4's GPU and Unified RAM make X1 look like a gaffe.
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Because some people decided a long time ago they were buying an XB1 and Microsoft was the boss of the gaming world. So now they've got to try with everything they have to make that a reality.

This also explains many of the puzzling reactions from the gaming press over the last few months.
 
Our contacts have told us that memory reads on PS4 are 40-50 per cent quicker than Xbox One, and its ALU (Arithmetic Logic Unit) is around 50 per cent faster. One basic example we were given suggested that without optimisation for either console, a platform-agnostic development build can run at around 30FPS in 1920×1080 on PS4, but it’ll run at “20-something” FPS in 1600×900 on Xbox One. “Xbox One is weaker and it’s a pain to use its ESRAM,” concluded one developer.
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Is either of this points surprising? We knew PS4 had the greater memory bandwidth, especially if the eSRAM is not optimized at this point with decent API's. We also knew the PS4 had more ALU capabilities in it's GPU. None of this is surprising.

Xbox One does, however, boast superior performance to PS4 in other ways. “Let’s say you are using procedural generation or raytracing via parametric surfaces – that is, using a lot of memory writes and not much texturing or ALU – Xbox One will be likely be faster,” said one developer.
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Procedural generation or raytracing that uses a lot of memory and not much texturing or ALU is better on Xbox One. Hmmm. I guess this is the first concrete evidence we have that the reduced latency on the DDR3/eSRAM combination does in fact offer advantages over the GDDR5 solution. Yes Cerny stated that GPU's aren't latency sensitive, but iterative processes that uses repeated calls to memory perform best on a lower latency setup.

Based on the fact that the first quote tells us nothing we already didn't know, and this second revelation confirms something we didn't know, regarding memory latency, I am actually more comfortable with the Xbox One today than yesterday. Optimize the eSRAM with specific task API's and you hopefully close the memory bandwidth gap. The ALU gap is never closing though.
 
funkystudent said:
Your totally right. 9 times out of 10 tge cheaper console always outsells the competition.

.... oh right PS4 is cheaper as well.



Is this the first time the clearly more powerful system was also the cheapest? Seems like a bit of a historical abnormality
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Certainly an anomaly here in terms of power to cost. The PS4 seems to have the advantage across the board and its lopsided in all categories.
Sony but importantly consumers, will put pressure on devs that choose parity over optimizing for the better hardware.
 
godelsmetric said:
Well there's;





360 was consistently praised for being the best console (at the time) to work with in terms of ease of use. Obviously there are confounding factors now but the fact that people are even bitching about the eSRAM should be alarming.

As for over-dramatising, I dunno, immediately after the DRM 180 I thought things might look up for MS but there's just been a deluge of bad news. Nothing about this console has been positive. Literally nothing. The launch games are looking decent but obviously rushed (Forza) or so shoddy that they're already a joke (Ryse). The PR has been a mixture of vagueness, obfuscation and outright lies. It's $100 more expensive than the competition with only Kinect (so far) to justify the price difference. Sources are reporting a minimum of a 2:1 pre-order disparity, and it's difficult not to think that even if you put the DRM stuff aside, based just on the products that that reflects on them pretty accurately.

I'm honestly beginning to think that the Xbone is going to be Dreamcasted out of the industry in a few years. People say Sony recovered from the PS3, but they had guaranteed sales in Asia and Europe that helped keep them afloat, which MS wont have. They're already losing games to PS4 exclusivity (Deep Down, scores of indie titles), which is only going to accelerate momentum. And the counter-argument appears to be little more than 'wow you're overreacting that wont happen'.
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Lol at Dreamcasted. Hyperbole much? If the original Xbox, GC Or Wii U have not been "Dreamcasted". The Xbox One which is likely to be more successful than any of these won't be.
 
I can tell you right now that if I suspect a developer is gimping their game on PS4 so that the XB1 doesn't look bad.... I WON'T BE BUYING THEIR GAME! And I'd suggest others do the same.
 
TechnicPuppet said:
The article says that the differences are massive. What will happen between now and launch to bridge a gap that gap?

The PS4 is easy to get the power out of, the XB1 is hard.
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Again, read the damn OP and my post a few posts back. Not saying certain multiplatform titles won't show a difference, but I doubt it'll be large. We may even get some games looking better on the XO off the bat since certain titles (COD, Fifa etc) Have been shown off primarily on the Xbox One at public events etc, which means they likely had to have more priority and polish, and likely are further ahead in development comparative to other versions in order to get them looking as best as possible for public show.

At launch there's far more factors that are just as important if not more important than a straight hardware difference, but I guess we'll have to wait and see. There could be a difference, I just wouldn't expect a massive one.

If the PS4 version of a game hits a certain target first whilst the Xbox One version hasn't, all they'll do is transfer resources and development to the Xbox One version to bring it up to matching the initial target. We'll see.
 
I am getting both system this gen X1 first then Ps4. I would switch my ore order from X1 to PS4 if BestBuy was not sold out. I have a $200 gift card at BestBuy.
 
If people are going to use launch games as metrics to what we will see in 1-2 years then I think some will be disappointed or grasping to an argument when these comparisons happen with launch games. The launch games are only really the start of things. Once devs get their grips with the platforms, I think we will see the disparity come in increments.
 
I'm also wondering how many multiplats will have the Xbox One as the lead platform. They did the same on PS3 because it was a 'difficult' platform to work on.
 
TechnicPuppet said:
Logic dictates that these differences will be very apparent at launch, why wouldn't they be?
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Because your logic lacks some ingredients. Power needs to be unlocked and that is only possible with skill, hard work and efficient programm code. Devs need experience with the arcitecture and a libary of tools has to grow to get more and more out of a system. That is why games like Last of Us are possible at the end of a gen and not at the begining.
Corto said:
Because that's stupid and if proven that money was exchanged to achieve it, it will be liable to anti-trust laws. Also a PR nightmare for everyone involved.
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I dont think such laws really exist. Nobody is forced to develop for any system or is forced by law to produce same results. Its up to the developer what he does and how could one prove that there was some moneyhating?
 
godelsmetric said:
Well there's;





360 was consistently praised for being the best console (at the time) to work with in terms of ease of use. Obviously there are confounding factors now but the fact that people are even bitching about the eSRAM should be alarming.

As for over-dramatising, I dunno, immediately after the DRM 180 I thought things might look up for MS but there's just been a deluge of bad news. Nothing about this console has been positive. Literally nothing. The launch games are looking decent but obviously rushed (Forza) or so shoddy that they're already a joke (Ryse). The PR has been a mixture of vagueness, obfuscation and outright lies. It's $100 more expensive than the competition with only Kinect (so far) to justify the price difference. Sources are reporting a minimum of a 2:1 pre-order disparity, and it's difficult not to think that even if you put the DRM stuff aside, based just on the products that that reflects on them pretty accurately.

I'm honestly beginning to think that the Xbone is going to be Dreamcasted out of the industry in a few years. People say Sony recovered from the PS3, but they had guaranteed sales in Asia and Europe that helped keep them afloat, which MS wont have. They're already losing games to PS4 exclusivity (Deep Down, scores of indie titles), which is only going to accelerate momentum. And the counter-argument appears to be little more than 'wow you're overreacting that wont happen'.
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awesome post
 
One source even suggested that enforcing parity across consoles could become a political issue between platform holders, developers and publishers. They said that it could damage perceptions of a cross platform title, not to mention Xbox One, if the PS4 version shipped with an obviously superior resolution and framerate; better to “castrate” the PS4 version and release near-identical games to avoid ruffling any feathers.
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This would be extremely upsetting. Please, devs, please do not gimp the PS4 version of your games.
 
Ken Masters said:
Microsoft won't allow devs to release better PS4 multi plat games
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Uh.. No. Microsoft are in a position (console launch) where they need every game they can get on the system. They won't turn them down because the developer can get it to run at a better resolution and framerate with sharper assets on the PS4.
 
So last gen PS3 was more powerful but more expensive and harder to program for. This gen PS4 is faster, cheaper, and easier to program for. PS3 it started a year late and almost caught up. PS4 is launching first this time around. Pretty much every advantage MS had last gen is gone.
 
nib95 said:
Again, read the damn OP and my post a few posts back. Not saying certain multiplatform titles won't show a difference, but I doubt it'll be large. We may even get some games looking better on the XO off the bat since certain titles (COD, Fifa etc) Have been shown off primarily on the Xbox One at public events etc, which means they likely had to have more priority and polish, and likely are further ahead in development comparative to other versions in order to get them looking as best as possible for public show.

At launch there's far more factors that are just as important if not more important than a straight hardware difference, but I guess we'll have to wait and see. There could be a difference, I just wouldn't expect a massive one.

If the PS4 version of a game hits a certain target first whilst the Xbox One version hasn't, all they'll do is transfer resources and development to the Xbox One version to bring it up to matching the initial target. We'll see.
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Like I said, how convenient. They can flick a switch and bump the resolution up on a PC game but not on PS4? Would frame rates not be 50% better all else being equal?
 
TechnicPuppet said:
The article says that the differences are massive. What will happen between now and launch to bridge a gap that gap?

The PS4 is easy to get the power out of, the XB1 is hard.
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Not all games are going to look identical. There's going to be a edge (ha!) for the PS4 version of several multiplats, but we won't see a blow-out of quality until 2 years into the cycle, when devs have completed tools and actually understand the unique nature of each platform. What's so hard to understand about that?
 
Ebomb said:
Procedural generation or raytracing that uses a lot of memory and not much texturing or ALU is better on Xbox One. Hmmm. I guess this is the first concrete evidence we have that the reduced latency on the DDR3/eSRAM combination does in fact offer advantages over the GDDR5 solution. Yes Cerny stated that GPU's aren't latency sensitive, but iterative processes that uses repeated calls to memory perform best on a lower latency setup.
Click to expand...

Reduced latency for eSRAM sure, but the DDR3 is practically on par with the GDDR5.
 
Jack cw said:
If they get the right amount of money, why not?
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Because it's going to take a lot of goddamn money to have devs purposefully gimp a version of their next big game. I'd like to believe there's a little bit of integrity left in this industry.

If it were to happen, news would get out very fast and developers' will gain a lot of bad press from all sides. Also, these developers would have to compete with plenty of other developers that don't take the money and deliver comparatively visually stellar PS4 titles. Kind of makes you look bad, doesn't it?
 
Bluemercury said:
Why would anyone choose Xbone over Ps4 beats me...
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Why would anyone choose an N64 over a PS1? Maybe some people prefer what they've seen of the Xbox One's games? You know the things people buy these machines for. If it wasn't for the games I wouldn't buy either of them and just stick with a PC.
 
Corto said:
But that's what should be expected. Launch games are rushed, 2-3 years from now the advantages will be more noticeable on the released games. Notably in multiplatforms.
Click to expand...
Why if the differences are so glaring? What's the point of all this talk if massive differences aren't present at launch.
 
Jack cw said:
Because your logic lacks some ingredients. Power needs to be unlocked and that is only possible with skill, hard work and efficient programm code. Devs need experience with the arcitecture and a libary of tools has to grow to get more and more out of a system. That is why games like Last of Us are possible at the end of a gen and not at the begining.
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They will be improving games for both systems over the generation. Why would an easily accessible 50% power not show?
 
LiquidMetal14 said:
If people are going to use launch games as metrics to what we will see in 1-2 years then I think some will be disappointed or grasping to an argument when these comparisons happen with launch games. The launch games are only really the start of things. Once devs get their grips with the platforms, I think we will see the disparity come in increments.
Click to expand...

Honestly, I don't get the 'the disparity will become more obvious over time', it makes no sense. That was true last generation because the PS3 was more difficult to program for. This generation the PS4 is much easier to program for. Hence, assuming that the developers for each are of equal skill and improve equally well over time, we would expect the PS4 to pull away more quickly because the ease of development, then the Xbone would close the gap somewhat towards the end of the generation as they get more used to the more complex architecture.
 
Jack cw said:
Because your logic lacks some ingredients. Power needs to be unlocked and that is only possible with skill, hard work and efficient programm code. Devs need experience with the arcitecture and a libary of tools has to grow to get more and more out of a system. That is why games like Last of Us are possible at the end of a gen and not at the begining.

I dont think such laws really exist. Nobody is forced to develop for any system or is forced by law to produce same results. Its up to the developer what he does and how could one prove that there was some moneyhating?
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Uhm, still does not stop the faster console being faster.
 
Hoo-doo said:
Because it's going to take a lot of goddamn money to have devs purposefully gimp a version of their next big game. I'd like to believe there's a little bit of integrity left in this industry.

If it were to happen, news would get out very fast and developers' will gain a lot of bad press from all sides. Also, these developers would have to compete with plenty of other developers that don't take the money and deliver comparatively visually stellar PS4 titles. Kind of makes you look bad, doesn't it?
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I absolutely agree but it also costs money to have team that pushes the ps4 version of a multiplat too. Most devs are of integrity but Microsoft did allocate devs not to mention the PS4 version during e3...
 
BruiserBear said:
Because some people decided a long time ago they were buying an XB1 and Microsoft was the boss of the gaming world. So now they've got to try with everything they have to make that a reality.

This also explains many of the puzzling reactions from the gaming press over the last few months.
Click to expand...

This is true.

They (who probably won't by a PS4) won't change their mind at any given fact or circumstance.
 
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