Graphics Horse
Member
hah did I really type that?
I think I'd be OK if the OS was just a big Bowser.
I think I'd be OK if the OS was just a big Bowser.
Rumor: Wii U final specs
- Thread starter EatChildren
- Start date
If you're right about that, then I think this is a brilliant play on Nintendo's part.
Still not willing to stop beating around the bush in regards to the gain in framerate you were talking about a week or two ago?
Haint
Member
So you're saying U will surpass PS360 by a wider margin (graphically) than PS420 will surpass U? Are you basing this on the U being a secret power house--suggesting all the leaked developer comments are just made up bullshit by lazy/incompetent programers? Or are you assuming the PS420 are going to be cheap pieces of shit with barely 2-3x the processing power of PS360?
Apophis2036
Banned
Having just read a post by someone expecting a 12 x power leap over PS360 from PS4 / 720, does anyone think that if the Wii U is a massive success MS and Sony would cut back on the specs for the new consoles so they don't lose as much money per console sold.
How much would they be losing on a 12 x power leap console if it was priced at $400 ?, like $200 or something :O.
From what i have read Sony in particular would be in real danger and despite many people thinking MS have 'unlimited money' they are a business at the end of the day and want every product they sell to turn a profit.
How much would they be losing on a 12 x power leap console if it was priced at $400 ?, like $200 or something :O.
From what i have read Sony in particular would be in real danger and despite many people thinking MS have 'unlimited money' they are a business at the end of the day and want every product they sell to turn a profit.
specialguy
Banned
Umm, Wii U's GPU is likely Dx10, no matter what anybody says. PS4/720 are DX11.
2nd, lets say the Wii U's GPU is 600 gflops. I STRONGLY doubt this as the games to date certainly show NOTHING that indicates a GPU 2x-3x more powerful than PS3/360, but lets be optimistic and say it's actually true. Rumored PS4 specs put the GPU at 3X that as you note.
RAM, Wii U has 1GB for games versus rumored 2-4GB for PS4. Lets again be optimistic for Wii U and use 2GB for PS4. You still under this best case have a PS4 with 2X RAM, 3X+GPU, and a better CPU (given all the rumors of weak Wii U CPU).
I think that, best case for Wii U, would still leave a situation where Wii U is ignored by third parties and hardcore consumers. Especially when the 2nd screen will be sucking up a significant % of what few precious resources the Wii U has (if the Wii U really has 600 gflop GPU, then I must blame the 2nd screen for why it's early games look exactly like PS360 games. Sure 1GB of RAM is more than PS360, now what if 200-300 MB is sucked up by the 2nd screen?)
I mean, we pore over tiny differences between Xbox and PS3 multiplatforms, when the Xbox and PS3 are almost completely equal in CPU, GPU, RAM. Omg! The PS3 version looks exactly the same but has 5% more tearing! The sky is falling! What do you think will happen to the Wii U?
As someone else already mentioned, we can't keep going by multipliers to determine the power of a console. You also have no way of knowing if the Wii-U GPU really will have identical feature-set as the other the GPU in the other two systems. Besides just about every rumor I've seen indicates the GPU is DX10.1 spec where the GPU in the PS4/720 will most surely be DX11.1 spec.
Looks great but again not seeing any effects not done no current gen systems. Maybe the texture resolution would suffer on the other two systems, but not seeing much else.
Nostremitus
Member
I'm fine with these "specs". So we have "the all-new, Power-based microprocessor will pack some of IBM's most advanced technology into an energy-saving silicon package" with equivalent Broadway functionality tacked on... I don't think any amount of PR spin can call a trio of overclocked Broadways "all-new" or "most advanced." Without more info this CPU could literally be anything...
Everything I've heard about the (GP?)GPU has been good. If their Proprietary API is fine tuned for what it's capable of, we should see some things looking MUCH better than current PS360, we just won't see it done with launch titles... (Have we ever? ...Factor 5 doesn't count, they were wizards...)
Everything I've heard about the (GP?)GPU has been good. If their Proprietary API is fine tuned for what it's capable of, we should see some things looking MUCH better than current PS360, we just won't see it done with launch titles... (Have we ever? ...Factor 5 doesn't count, they were wizards...)
As blu mentioned (I defer to him because he knows a lot more about graphics programming than I do), he sees some Global Illumination trickery/fakery/simulation that he hasn't seen on current gen systems.
Remember also it's rendering two distinct scenes.
Can I ask what it is specifically you're looking for that would make you say "Current gen can't do that"?
What I will tell you, is that when Wii U games start to look better then 360/PS3 people will say "I can't tell the difference" or "LOL, welcome to current gen Nintendo"
All of this pretty much. The GPU is especially exciting with Arkam (one of the most rdent "curb your enthusiasm" type insiders) talking up features that exceed the API specified (Shader Model 4) in the spec sheet. It's as if Wii U could literally be anything, but as it stands it's more good anything than not. Still want to know what's up with the RAM though.
Yes, every generation of consoles has had launch titles that were much better than the prior gen. The Wii and now Wii-U look to be the only exceptions to this trend.
Edit:
I saw the faked GI, but that's in current gen games as well. Also, yeah you are right that it's rendering on the screen as well, but I would think it's rendering at much much lower resolution, and simpler effects/shaders.
As for what I'm looking for, well something that I see and think "yup can't do that on the PS360". Look at current high end PC DX11 games for a good indication what I'm looking for next gen.
Nah when that happens it'll be "Yeah but it doesn't look as good as the PS4 and 720 versions". =p
You are right though that the people who are highlighting the difficulties of these Wii-U ports may be the same to suddenly not notice or care about the difference. I'm looking forward to Retro's next game, I'm sure that will look amazing.
specialguy
Banned
Isn't using the Zelda demo a bit silly at this point? Just as you guys are quick to say "the new dev kits are more powerful!" or whatever, we really have no idea what Nintendo programmed that Zelda demo on, and it probably has little relation to the actual final Wii hardware. Plus, it was a tech demo. Show me a game...
Nostremitus
Member
That look much better? I think launch day hype has skewed some memories. Show me one?
Edit: Sorry, taking thread off topic. PM me?
This is true. I think for everything before Xbox-Xbox 360, the jumps were pretty mind blowing. I'm confident that we will see Wii U games look better than PS360 ones eventually, but it is unlikely that every piece of software will look like a AAA PS3 game at minimum. To look better, it will still take either a fantastic art direction or decent amounts of time and money.
I think Nintendo has a history of showing tech demos that are a little more realistic in terms of what we are likely to see from a game compared to others.
lwilliams3
Member
A few things there:
1) Arkam recently stated that there are some features beyond direct X 10-equilivant. We don't know what features those are atm, but that could make a difference comparing the feature set of the other consoles.
2) We are comparing the Wii U to systems that have not been announced yet. We, for example, don't know how much of PS4 RAM will be for background and OS. It is possible for the Wii U to get additional refinements to free up more RAM for games, so the difference of RAM for games may not be as big of a gap as you are saying.
This is likely what Nintendo is aiming for and how they hope we'll see it. With a little bit of a boost from current gen thrown in for good measure (And to support the GamePad)
JoshuaJSlone
Member
I don't know that anything happening now makes it clear. Other than specifics like Bing, this post probably could've been made at least any time since the GameCube reveal.fritolay said:
cartman414
Member
It's great that USB HDDs will be a thing. I just wish 3.0 was used for anyone who favors SSD.
KojiKnight
Member
You know DX11 is just DX10.1 with a unified shader architecture for tesselation and GPU acceleration. AMD and Nvidia BOTH had shaders for tesselation and GPU acceleration before DX11 (AMD had tesselation way back in the 9000 series of GPUs, nvidia had CUDA for a couple years), all DX11 did was make them both go a unified route to accomplish it and a few other things.
There is no reason why a "DX 10.1" GPU couldn't do all DX11 features via shaders... It's only a negative on the PC market because software can run on any number of hardware, and if there isn't a unified structure it makes code inefficient or incompatible between different hardware. On a console, this is absolutely null and void. ALL Wii U software will be designed specifically for Wii U hardware, thus you can easily create DX11 features even on "lesser" feature set hardware.
There is no reason why a "DX 10.1" GPU couldn't do all DX11 features via shaders... It's only a negative on the PC market because software can run on any number of hardware, and if there isn't a unified structure it makes code inefficient or incompatible between different hardware. On a console, this is absolutely null and void. ALL Wii U software will be designed specifically for Wii U hardware, thus you can easily create DX11 features even on "lesser" feature set hardware.
You are correct.
I would say one thing though in regards to tesselation, that will choke that Wii U GPU as it will obviously be lowered powered and slower (obvious power draw and heat concerns).
MadeInBeats
Banned
Nintendo wouldn't have included it if they were never or could never use it.
KojiKnight
Member
It depends on how tessellation is applied... again, it's not a new concept and was a part of ATi video cards for the last 7-8 years (though only a couple games like Return to Castle Wolfenstien were actually programmed to use it, since again, it wasn't standardized. Nvidia had no equivalent so only a few games used it).
It's not that tessellation is a horribly GPU intensive task. It's just a more advanced version of what 3D games have been doing since their inception (LOD).
It's not that tessellation is a horribly GPU intensive task. It's just a more advanced version of what 3D games have been doing since their inception (LOD).
Doubtful, and I hope not. Console gaming will die if all 3 of them go the underpowered route.
I mean, they would have learned that from the Wii if anything...and by the time the WiiU can really be deemed a success the 720/PS4 will be out. It's not like they just decide on specs one day and ship the thing the next.
Even the 3DS supports tessellation. There are a number of ways to use a tessellator, it's not just there to make things look smoother on powerful platforms. It can also be used to increase efficiency, especially on more limited hardware.
Is this a joke post? Why would the console market die if all he consoles have similar power? More powerful consoles can also kill gaming
Their expectations and reality are pretty far apart though, we might see a jump a bit more than half that amount.
I'm sorry but this isn't right at all. In fact, unless the devs were lying in their comments I've read, the jump to DX10 was less significant than the jump to DX11. You're ignoring the improvements to the tessellator units, introduction for new texture compression formats, compute shading (which the RV7x0 architecture does support to some extent), and so on.
As for what is and is not possible on a specific type of hardware, there are always hacks and ways to bend hardware in ways it wasn't intended. Plenty of PS360 games feature effects that otherwise required DX10 or DX11 API support on the PC to perform. Still there's a difference in the hardware level of support, and more importantly the efficiency in how the hardware runs these tasks.
What you're saying is no different than how devs were saying the Wii's TEV units can support a number of shaders found in the HD-twins. However efficiency was always in question and often a bottleneck.
Yup, for example the tessellator in the 360 is quite limited but devs still found a use in it.
Pancakes R Us
Member
You're kidding right? I only own a 3DS and Wii (PSP is no longer used except for video)...will only likely own a Wii U in future and do not think what you've suggested is remotely likely. I'm not a graphics whore or anything, and don't know anything about stuff like AA etc., but nothing I have seen on Wii U so far seems like it has surpassed PS360. Whether it ACTUALLY has or not doesn't matter to me, because I'm not technical enough to understand. The games just visually look like current gen games to me. I personally don't have a problem with this. Just hope Nintendo prices it right and there are some decent games.
Maybe you don't understand what I'm saying, but here it is in as plain of english as I can make it:
Wii U will be "2-3x" the PS360, that magical number you are stating above or 600-800GFLOPs.
PS4/XB3 is rumored to be no more than 2TFLOPs (PS4 is targeting 1.843TFLOPs) which is only "2-3x" Wii U.
Now the real problem is PS360 are high end 2006 PCs, they used state of the art GPU components at the time, and thus their GPUs were feature rich for 2006, but they are seriously lacking in 2012. Wii U's GPU is by all rumors, feature rich and has 2012 bells and whistles.
So even if PS4/XB3 have 2-3x the power of Wii U, the gap will seem closer thanks to the lack of features that exceed Wii U's, and I'm talking about some pretty important features they will share, Lighting, Tessellation and compute shaders, all the things this current gen is lacking. Just think about an effect that PS360 can't do and why it can't do it? Tessellation? Compute shaders? Better lighting?
Per nintendo's docs the GPU's API "GX2" Supports some features greater than SM 4. SM4 is just given as a point of reference. Ill post the detail later when I have the time.
and on a side note:
Wow vgleaks.com didnt even change a single word or my formatting... That part is kind of sad. I should have made something up just to make them(and who ever "shared" my discussion) look bad
This is the source of the article, He says Wii U's GPU exceeds DX10.1 (which isn't used in a console anyways)
Antonz a Wii U developer has said the GPU has 2012 bells and whistles. (this implies DX11 from a source who has actually worked with the Wii U, unlike Arkam who has only heard it from co workers)
and DX11.1 is a very minor upgrade over DX11, also DX10.1 is a HUGE upgrade over DX9, that virtually has to fake everything that was added in DX10 and DX10.1
Metalmurphy
Member
Who's changing them then? Next generation has always been related to an increase in power. 8 bit, 16 bit, 32 bit, etc..
There have been new iterations of old consoles that weren't consider to be in the next generation in the past, why should the Wii U be any different?
Developers themselves consider the Wii U to be a bridge between gerations.
The Wii U isn't a new iteration of an old system though. It's Nintendo's Next Gen system.
This I can believe.
specialguy
Banned
My guess is, I dont think you can just add a dab of DX11 to a DX10 GPU. Nor do I think Nintendo would bother with that expense. If they did that they would have used something besides R7XX to begin with.
My guess is it's a straight DX10 GPU with some trivial DX11 things allowed by Nintendo's API.
It is a shame some people are going to be able to use such things to consistently maintain there is a DX11 GPU in there though.
Metalmurphy
Member
That's debatable.
It will be playing the same games as the PS3/360. It will not be playing Next Gen games. It's Nintendo's current gen system.
N64 to GameCube were both 32bit systems.
Because the Wii U has extremely different innards to the Wii.
I'm sure Antonz can't get into the specifics, but talking about a GPU exceeding DX10.1 spec is rather vague and makes it hard to pin point the significance of such improvements. The tessellator unit can be improved to DX11.1 spec and that alone can be considered beyond DX10.1 spec. Also as I mentioned above, the RV7x0 architecture was a DX10.1 GPU with some compute shader capability, which could also be a considered DX11 feature. I'm not trying to downplay the GPU, but you guys are really upselling it IMO.
Also, who said DX11.1 was a massive update over DX11? I have read dev comments how the upgrade to DX10 was nice but the move to DX11 was much more of a leap.
The power increase was a matter of coincidence in past generations. Nintendo changed all of that but that doesn't mean their present and future consoles should not be considered next gen.
No... The fact that it 'plays the same games as 360/PS3' means nothing. The Wii is Nintendo's current gen system. The Wii U is their next. This is not debatable.
Yeah, it won't be the same size. It'll be much bigger than how much Wii U is over PS360. The saving grace for Wii U third-party platform support compared to Wii is that the architectures between Wii U and PS4/720 should all be along the same slider scale. Whereas Wii was a totally different architecture that usually required an entire separate team to "port" a game (since it was really a rebuild instead of a simple port), Wii U should actually be able to function for most games by using lower settings and some re-optimization. Much less cost/work to bring a multi-plat PS4/720 game to Wii U than it ever was to bring a PS360 game to Wii. With that hurdle pretty much cleared, it's just up to the Wii U to show that it can actually sell those games ...
TreasureHunterG
Banned
Once again, Nintendo is doing a short-life period machine like Wii was. They can manage to do a better hardware than this and still manage to profit. Iwata is completely lost in the dark with his "low costs, high profita" philosophy who's starting to get stale and can hurt Nintendo's credibilty as a console maker.
Metalmurphy
Member
So did SG-1000 and the Master System.
Yes, it's their next console. That's not debatable, what's debatable is if it belongs to this gen or the next.
Developers agree:
http://www.joystiq.com/2012/04/04/gearbox-boss-says-impressive-wii-u-a-really-nice-bridge-to-the/
lol. Short life span (between 5-6 yrs) is the norm.
Smurfman256
Member
It's a custom GPU. The point of a custom GPU is for the hardware maker to select a base model and upgrade and add components and features that they deem necessary. They are designed for maximum efficiency with minimal clock sppeds and power consumption.
Short-life? Like 5 years or so? Like every gen before this one? I'd say that's more... Average-life.
And Iwata lost in the dark? LOL. His interviews show he's one of the most level headed/intelligent people in this industry. But since he's not doing what you want, of course he's lost in the dark.
No it's not debatable. Power doesn't define generations. We've had this argument SO many times before. It's always been by release date before. Always. The idea that this should change this gen is ridiculous.Metalmurphy said:
TreasureHunterG
Banned
Huh? I guess you didn't understood what I said.
He may be good if you're a businessman or a shareholder, but as a gamer, he has a very restricted vision regarding the industry. No wonder there's so many 3rd-parties are reluctant to develop for Nintendo and gamer's trust in Nintendo's console is shaken.
It's been said, but it makes for poor discussion when people change the meaning of words and phrases to fit their argument.
Also, I assume that link takes you to an article about the oh so reliable "anonymous" devs.