current Playstation3 dev kit has twin 6800Us in SLI. final PS3 far more powerful

[retsam]

PS... I am not preaching. I am using common sense. The G70 will not beat the PS3 GPU. Take it to the bank...err, Nvidia is going to do that heheh you really dont know what your talking about ... look at the xbx2 specs ... the gpu is severly memory bandwidth starved....

[ninelven]

Thus, I once again ask you what was so revolutionary about NV30? What are you talking about? I never said it was revolutionary.

I could care less about the "flexibility" if it played games like shiiite.The whole point of R500 is shader unification. /boggle.

[borntosoul]

nicorulez u made some nice points, consistant with past history. anyway its gonna be real interesting to see how the new consol GPUs get used this time around and how much if at all they are handicaped by memory. i have no doubt they will be awsome tech wise:) ps3 has a fair few months to surpass the xbox2 gpu and 6-10 months can be a very long time. i hope the next version g80 or whatever its called (on 90nm) will be close to what the ps3 gpu will do--im sure nvidia will release the best gpu possible and i doubt they will hold back tech just because the ps3 will be out- PC business is still big money for them.

[nicorulez]

Borntosoul, you are correct. The PC did make Nvidia, but PS3 is going to take them globally. Also, the one who mentions that the XBox 360 GPU is bandwidth limited; have you read the specs. It has 10 mb of embedded DRAM with a bandwidth of over 256 GB/s. Here is a direct copy and paste for you so you can be enlightened.

Specs: Microsoft Xbox 360 General
Form Factor Console
Controller Wireless
Graphics Processor and Memory
Graphics Processor Custom ATI Processor
Graphics Core Clock Speed 500 MHz
System Memory 512MB, 700MHz DDR
Vector Units 1 VMX-128 unit per core (3 total)
CPU Math Performance 9 Billion Dot Product Operations per Second
System Memory Bandwith 22.4GB/s, 256GB/s to EDRAM
Memory Architecture Unified Memory Architecture
Shaders 48-way Parallel Floating Point Dynamically-Schedualed, 48 billion Operations/s
Video Memory 10MB Embedded DRAM
Fill Rate (pixels) 16 Gigasamples/s using 4X MSAA
Fill Rate (triangles) 500 Million/s


Now, why don't you tell me where the XBox 360 is bandwidth limited compared to todays chipsets. While you are at it, why don't you tell us why the PS3 GPU, which should be faster, is going to be beaten by a SLI 6800U or the like. People, it is not going to happen. The PC will catch up but it will not happen until early 2007 at least. ;)

[borntosoul]

im not sure how much impact it will have for them globaly(market awareness), im sure it will help them some but how much we dont know. they did the xbox GPU and failed with the nv30 shortly after which hurt their business short term. extra revenue from ms obviously was welcome hehe. most people who buy the ps3 arent gonna care too much if it has nvidia, ati or matrox GPU--they just gonna see the graphics and games and go wow- i want a ps3. what ps3 will do for their share price is another matter.

[nicorulez]

BorntoSoul, I see your point. However, consider that once PS3 comes out, Nvidia's name will be all over the press. Granted, if the PS3 is the same or only a little better than XBox 360, then the press may be negative. However, if PS3's power is anyway what is rumored to be is true, then Nvidia is going to get PUB in a major way. Consider this, the average Joe could care less about bandwidth, number of ALU's/pipelines, etc. However, almost every male PC owner under 40 plays some games. If the PS3 is dominant, a lot of people are going to take notice of the next gen Nvidia cards that are equivalent or even better than the PS3. Think of it as a PS3 in the box at work ;) .

Nvidia made a bad move with NV30. THey were caught with their pants down by the 9700pro. However, I believe ATI made a similar mistake this generation. Although their single slot solutions may have ultimately been the most powerful, they lacked SM3.0 and most importantly SLI. Thus, early adopters of consoles, high-end PC gear are going for Nvidia. This may hurt XBox 360 as some users may wait for the PS3 and its power. What if Nvidia is working on a multi-GPU set-up for PS3? Coupled with the cell, it could rule the industry. Besides, Nvidia's financials will be helped more by Sony than by MS. Nevertheless, the XBox did help make their name a little more ubiquitous.

BTW, I am not a Nvidia fanboy. I have owned their products up until the GF4. I now have an ATI x800xt PE in my system and love it. However, if Nvidia continues to innovate, I have no qualms about going back to them next gen. Reality, not loyalty, is what drives this market. Peace everyone. :D

[borntosoul]

hehe, we are both on the same page:)......... yeh im the same-ill buy whatever graphics card or cpu or consol suits my needs. i had amd athlon xp barton before my p4 and had a radeon 9800 before my 6800gt. i cant remember a time when the computer/game industry has been so active---we are all in for a very interesting year.

[superklye]

I'll believe it when I see it. PS has been traditionally inexpensive compared to high end gaming pc's. Loading up all that hardware will skyrocket the cost of this bad boy.
yeah no kidding...if this nVIDIA GPU is far more powerful than SLi-ed 6800Ultras, then I can't see the PS3 costing less than $800.

[nicorulez]

;) SuperKyle, that would be true but for one thing. I believe that both Sony and Microsoft are going to own the silicon this generation. I know for a fact that Sony is producing its own cell processors at its plants. The mistake that MS did with XBox is they bought allottments of chips from Nvidia directly. Over the course of the agreement, the cost of the chips varied up or down depending on the market climate. If you make your own, you will obviously not make a profit off of yourselfs. Jay Allard talked about this on Hard[O]P or Tom's Hardware (the owning the silicon bit). Therefore, even though both Sony and MS may take a small hit on hardware, they will still be very competitive in pricing. Consider, do you think Dell or HP really pay 500 dollars for the 6800 or x800 series. ;) I didn't think so. Be sure, both Sony and MS can produce unbelievably powerful hardware and still make a profit as the software is where it is at. Take care.

[Knot3D]

Well, maybe PS3 will have a G80 chip onboard, instead of a whole console custom graphics card. Rambus' XDRAM should be very very fast and could be used as videoram for the PS3 'onboard' graphics chip.

This would be a very efficient method maybe...

[nVestor]

I'm just curious why nVidia would give away the ability of the G80 to ATi? What I mean is "if" a form of G80 is in PS3, why wouldn't ATi say, "Hmmmm.. ok, so that's what they are going to do. Hey guys, time to make changes to R6xx or R7xx now so we can be competitive/performance king."

I dunno, sounds a bit early to me to give away the tech of G80. :)

[Knot3D]

of course it's very unlikely they'll copy paste a G80 gpu into PS3. It HAS to be able to work with Cell, so it'll be customized for that anyway.

[gmontem]

So how many nukes can the PS3 launch at the same time?! :D

[Raje]

Now, why don't you tell me where the XBox 360 is bandwidth limited compared to todays chipsets.

System Bandwidth: 22.4GBps
Memory Architecture Unified Memory Architecture

The GPU has really fast access to the 10MB of EDRAM, but that isn't going to act like normal GPU Memory.

The GPU is going to use System Memory as a normal graphics card would. 22.4 GB/s isn't going to cut it.

NVIDIA's 6800 Ultra has 33.6 GB/s GPU to Graphics Card Memory stock.

[Sazar]

So how many nukes can the PS3 launch at the same time?! :D

Probably several.

Even ps2's are governed by export compliance coz they have enough juice to power weapons guidance systems :)

[nicorulez]

:rolleyes: Raje, my friend you are wrong. The 10mb of EDRAM is going to be very useful and will be a way around the frame buffer. Look at this nice factoid provided by TeamXBox, then come back to me:

"10 MB of embedded DRAM

In today’s graphic chips, video memory bandwidth represents one of the most critical aspects. In order to increase memory bandwidth GPU manufacturers boost memory clock speed or implement a wider path.

The latest graphic cards from nVIDIA and ATI, such as the GeForce 6800 and the X800 series, use 256-bit interfaces to reach peak memory bandwidths above 30 GB/sec. Other methods to increase this resource are bandwidth saving techniques, such as data compression.

What if you could use find a way to eliminate current graphic architectures' bottlenecks? Well, ATI has found a way to do so.


They have developed a solution that allows them to break the bandwidth constraint of 30GB/sec found in today’s graphic cards and achieve a stunning 256GB/sec bandwidth. Although the use of embedded DRAM for graphics is not something new, with a failed attempt by BitBoys and a successful implementation in the Nintendo GameCube, this is the first time that someone has used such a large amount of embedded DRAM in this innovative way.


The Xbox 360 graphics subsystem includes 10 MB of embedded DRAM GPU to use it as a frame buffer. By using this embedded RAM, which is similar to a processor's cache memory, the Xbox 360 will be able to run games at 720p (1280x720) and 1080i (1920x1080) HDTV resolutions with full screen anti-aliasing and almost no impact on framerate.

The eDRAM chip is manufactured using 90nm technology in NEC Electronics' 300-millimeter (mm) wafer fabrication facility, which runs the company's most advanced processes. NEC is also the provider of the Nintendo GameCube embedded DRAM, but we talking about different generations of eDRAM."

As you can see, embedded DRAM will likely make its way to the PC in about 2 years. What was that I was hearing about being bandwidth limited :rolleyes:

[retsam]

They have developed a solution that allows them to break the bandwidth constraint of 30GB/sec found in today’s graphic cards and achieve a stunning 256GB/sec bandwidth. naaa bitboys developed this solution ...oy


The GPU has really fast access to the 10MB of EDRAM, but that isn't going to act like normal GPU Memory.

The GPU is going to use System Memory as a normal graphics card would. 22.4 GB/s isn't going to cut it.

NVIDIA's 6800 Ultra has 33.6 GB/s GPU to Graphics Card Memory stock.


ive been saying that 10 megs isnt enuff for a 4x msaa 1600x1080i scene. once the ten megs gets filled its got to go back to the slower shared memory frame buffer. its got to take a clock hit when it has to do this. remember the gamecube has inbedded memory on the gpu. last i checked the performance wasnt that great

[lightman]

The Xbox 360 graphics subsystem includes 10 MB of embedded DRAM GPU to use it as a frame buffer. By using this embedded RAM, which is similar to a processor's cache memory, the Xbox 360 will be able to run games at 720p (1280x720) and 1080i (1920x1080) HDTV resolutions with full screen anti-aliasing and almost no impact on framerate.

You, and the guys at XboxTeam have to check your math.

For 1920x1080 you need at least 1920*1080*3 (RGB) = 6220800 , short of 6MB. Now, this is *one* frame. If you want smooth gfx, you have to implement at least a double buffer, and that'd mean twice that memory, thus about 12MB, more than the 10MB or EDRAM. If you don't have both buffers in the EDRAM, you end up without being about to double buffer (unless you want to use the buffer in the EDRAM for one frame, and one in main mem for the other, thus slowing down to the lowest common denominator, thus the main ram, and thus vanishing the benefits of having the framebuffer on a incredibly fast mem).

Using the EDRAM as a framebuffer would be, imho, a waste.

It'd be prolly used as a cache for textures (but then, it seems not a lot, imho), unified fragment code and models. Imho, obviously.

[nicorulez]

Lightman, your math is completely wrong. 1080i is interlaced; the example you bring up is progressive (1080P). Just wait for E3 and you will see that the XBox 360 will render all of its games at 720p or 1080i at a minimum of 30fps and often at 60fps. Why is that PC gamers can't deal with having the second best hardware. It has been a fact of life for every console generation. Granted, last time, the PC overtook the XBox very shortly after it came out. However, the PS2 was still more powerful inherently than the PC GPU's of 1999/early 2000.

This time, Sony is using Nvidia and do you really think Nvidia would undercut their cash cow and market a graphics chip that would outdo the PS3 before it even came out? If you believe that, you don't know much about business or finance. Also, the ATI GPU is a generation ahead of R520/G70 so it is still superior to what we PC gamers have to look forward to next. Just deal with reality. Remember, within a year after any of the consoles are launched, a high end PC will eat them for breakfast. It is all good. :)

[lightman]

Lightman, your math is completely wrong. 1080i is interlaced; the example you bring up is progressive (1080P).

My fault. Didn't notice the "i" ;)

And I anyway still believe that the 10 MB of EDRAM will be best used as a texture (and code) cache.

See, even at 60fps, you don't need more of about 200MB/s of bandwidth for a framebuffer. So using a very fast EDRAM as framebuffer is pointless.

What you need bandwidth for is texture, code, and geometry data...

Just wait for E3 and you will see that the XBox 360 will render all of its games at 720p or 1080i at a minimum of 30fps and often at 60fps.

I never said *anywhere* in my post that it won't. And so ?


This time, Sony is using Nvidia and do you really think Nvidia would undercut their cash cow and market a graphics chip that would outdo the PS3 before it even came out? If you believe that, you don't know much about business or finance.

The console and the gaming pc markets are quite separated. I know lots of people who couldn't give a damn how fast the latest pc gfx cards are, they wouldn't use em anyway, 'cause they prefer to play on consoles. And the other way it's true, there are a number of people out there that only play on pcs, and would never shed a dime for a console. Differ kind of games, different target, different markets. They may overlap in some cases, but they aren't intertwined.

How many people out there do you really think there are that know that inside the xbox there is a nv chip ? Or that inside the gamecube there is an ati one ?

See, most people don't choose their gfx card based on what kind of gfx chip is in their consoles...

But anyway, time will tell what kind of perf the xbox360 will be really able to deliver, and the ps3 too. :)

[gmontem]

Lightman, your math is completely wrong. 1080i is interlaced; the example you bring up is progressive (1080P). Just wait for E3 and you will see that the XBox 360 will render all of its games at 720p or 1080i at a minimum of 30fps and often at 60fps.
I was under the impression that 1080i would still be rendered internally at 1080p and then broken down into odd and even fields. Are you suggesting that 1080i games will be rendered at 1920x540? If so it would be great if you can give an explanation how the heck a video processor can deinterlace a 480i source and recreate nearly 480 unique lines (and not 240).

Why is that PC gamers can't deal with having the second best hardware.
I was reading lightman's previous post and nothing he said concludes to this.

[nicorulez]

Lightman, I am sorry that you thought I was talking directly to you, but in reference to PC gamers it was in general they are quick to dismiss that a console can be more powerful. Sorry for the poor verbage :o .

Gmontem, in a nutshell 1080i really only has to render 540 horizontal lines every other frame. According to Dr. Alvy Ray Smith (co-founder of Pixar); 720p is actually far superior. In actuality, it appears that to run 720p is much more intensive on the video card. Link:

http://alvyray.com/DigitalTV/Naming_Proposal.htm

Lightman, you do make an excellent point about the average consumer. They wouldn't on average know Nvidia from ATI from Voodoo :D . In retrospect, Nvidia could release as powerful a card, but the press (which does have some weight) could vilify them for releasing a PS3 that can't even compare to a computer (remember, the press are idiots and still think Nintendo is number one ;) ) As a PC gamer and console user, I would love for the next gen ATI or Nvidia card to be bonkers. It would be great to have PS3 type visuals a year before the console is even out. Unfortunately, I am not holding my breath for this, but your point is well taken and it could ocur. Peace.

[gmontem]

Gmontem, in a nutshell 1080i really only has to render 540 horizontal lines every other frame. According to Dr. Alvy Ray Smith (co-founder of Pixar); 720p is actually far superior. In actuality, it appears that to run 720p is much more intensive on the video card. Link:

http://alvyray.com/DigitalTV/Naming_Proposal.htm

1080i yields 540 lines per FIELD not per frame. That link is bull. The worst case scenario for 1080i would be 540 lines in one frame but the best case (a static screen) would be 1080 lines in one frame. Look at the static background in the person's examples. That's 1080 lines when the two fields are deinterlaced into one frame.

[nicorulez]

1080i yields 540 lines per FIELD not per frame. That link is bull. The worst case scenario for 1080i would be 540 lines in one frame but the best case (a static screen) would be 1080 lines in one frame. Look at the static background in the person's examples. That's 1080 lines when the two fields are deinterlaced into one frame.

Gmontem, you are correct, but it was my poor wording that is at fault. An average broadcast on TV runs at 30 frames per second. However, in 720P, it shows all 720 lines in 1/60th of second. In 1080I, only 540 lines are shown in any one field (1/60 of a second). In slow pan broadcasts like the Discovery channel HD, 1080i is more detailed as the resolution is higher. However, in sports or videogames for that matter, 720p will be smoother as you will not have the flicker. I have a feeling that the holy grail will be 1080p; otherwise being 1080 lines shown every 1/60th of a second.

Wouldn't it be cool if PS3 had that little capability up its sleeve. If so, XBox 360 would be in a world of hurt. Although there are only like 3 sets around that are capable of that resolution now; within 18-24 months I bet you that will be normal on all HDTV's. If that is the case, PS3 could win just by coding all of their games in 1080p with high detail. MS would be screwed. Is it possible for a console to do so, I really don't have a clue. Guess we will see at E3 :D .

[|MaguS|]

Possible but would poeple care? only the hardcore gamers really since about less then 40% of the market even have HDTV's and ones capable of 720p are still pretty high up in price compared to the common cheap smaller sets.