Sony PS3 275,000,000 polygons per second vs Xbox 360’s 500,000,000
Filed under: News | By: Daniel
Posted on: November 6, 2007 | 167 Comments
Kim Naroz left a really long comment on the post about the amount of power the developers are using form the Xbox 360 and Sony Playstation 3, he pointed out that the Sony PS3 display’s 275,000,000 polygons per second, compared to the 500,000,000 polygons per second of the Xbox 360.
My question is does this really matter?
Here is Kim Naroz’s Comment:
Someone needs to point out that the Playstation 3 can only display 275,000,000 polygons per second, compared to the 500,000,000 polygons per second of the Xbox 360.
That is the reason why games like John Madden Football 2008, NCAA Football 2008, All-Pro Football 2008, and many other games from EA Sports, 2K Sports, and so many others all run at 60 frames per second on the Xbox 360, but only 30 frames per second on the Playstation 3.
Gamespot specifically said in the review of those sports games: “The Xbox 360 versions run smoothly at 60 frames per second at 1080p resolution, while the Playstation 3 versions struggle to run at 30 frames per second at 720p resolution.”
It isn’t just sports games with that problem. Look at all the Tony Hawk Skating games, Tom Clancy Splinter Cell: Double Agent, and F.E.A.R. They have frame rates that drop below 20 frames per second on the PS3 and go into slow motion it is so bad…even though the Xbox 360 versions have very smooth framerates.
Oblivion is NOW BETTER on the Xbox 360!!!
When Oblivion was released a year later on the PS3, it used a new shader design…that had NOTHING to do with hardware technology; it was just something put into the new version of the game as a software program. The download was released for the Xbox 360 later on, but the PS3 fanboys always pointed out, “But when you compare the actual discs, the PS3 one has some advantages (although the Xbox 360 version also has advantages, and was ALWAYS rated higher).
Oblivion: Game of the Year Edition is now available for the Xbox 360, and when you now compare Oblivion on the Xbox 360 to Oblivion on the PS3, there is NO DOUBT that the Xbox 360 version is significantly better; that is why it is rated higher!
The Playstation 3 version of Oblivon is a perfect example that what this man is saying about the Hard Drive of the PS3 being used to help out with memory limitations is NOT true. Consider the FACT that the Playstation 3 version of Oblivion does NOT allow the entire world to exist in the game at the same time, like the Xbox 360 version does. This is because of the Memory Bandwidth hardware bottleneck of the Playstation 3.
Also, when it comes to RAM, the Xbox 360 certainly DOES have fundamental advantages over the Playstation 3!
For example, the CPU of the PS3 can NEVER access more than 256MB of RAM at any point. The Xbox 360 CPU is free to access up to 512MB of RAM if there was a need. With the PS3, there are plenty of times when the CPU needs more than 256MB of RAM, and the Video-RAM of the PS3 is actually using less than 256MB of RAM, which means that if the PS3 had a Unified RAM environment–like the Xbox 360’s–then that unused Video-RAM could help the CPU, like it does on the Xbox 360. OBVIOUSLY, the Xbox 360 RAM design is much more flexible; it helps developers in ways that they enjoy working with.
Plus, it’s important to remember that the original design of the Playstation 3 called for the used of TWO Cell CPU processors–each with two Threads that could Send signals to the SPE subprocessors.
However, when Sony saw the design of the Xbox 360, and they saw how much better the Xbox 360 was, then Sony was forced to redesign the Playstation 3 very quickly in a way that hurt the PS3 system. This is nearly identical to what happened with Sega and the Saturn. Sega saw how much better the original PS1 was, and they were forced to quickly redesign the Saturn in a way that used parallel processing that was difficult to work with and was more expensive. This is EXACTLY what happened with the Playstation 3.
The original design of the PS3 was not even supposed to used a GPU, because it was going to have two of the Cell CPU processors. But when Sony saw the revolutionary ATI GPU in the Xbox 360 that was Custom designed for the Xbox 360, and was 1.5 years ahead of its time (since the PC didn’t see similar Unified Shader technology until January 30, 2007), then Sony was forced to removed one of the Cell CPUs in the PS3, and instead add a Nvidia GPU. But there was NOT time to custom design the GPU, so Sony was forced to included a four-year old generic GPU in the PS3. That is why people often point out the vast superiority of the Xbox 360 GPU.
Now that the PS3 only has one 3.2Ghz Cell CPU, it means that the PS3 has only two Threads capable of Sending signals to the six SPE sub-processors running parallel. Each of those six SPE processors is capable of Receiving a Threaded signal; however, the PS3 CPU is only capable of Sending two Threaded signals. This is where the hardware “bottleneck” of the PS3 reveals itself. Programmers often say that the PS3 has two arms (CPU Threads) that are trying to juggle six balls (SPE sub-processors). Obviously, that is NOT possible, and that is why the Playstation 3 hardware is such a BIG disappointment.
With the Xbox 360, Microsoft used a much newer and better form of technology. PCs often brag about their “dual-core” CPU design. The Xbox 360 actually takes that to the next level and used a “tri-core” CPU design, with each CPU using the most developer-favored videogame processor available–the PowerPC.
The Xbox 360 is literally the exact opposite when compared to the Playstation 3 in terms of hardware design and efficiency. The Xbox 360 has three 3.2Ghz CPUs, each with two Threads capable of Sending instructions. But the Xbox 360 doesn’t the outdated parallel processing environment of the PS3. There are no “sub-processors” to worry about with the Xbox 360. The signals can be focused on CPU and GPU commands. This literally means the Xbox 360 has six arms (CPU Threads) that are being asked to juggle only two balls (GPU and CPU functions).
THAT is why the developers absolutely LOVE the Xbox 360 and can design games so much more efficiently for the Xbox 360.
THAT is why games are released so much earlier for the Xbox 360.
THAT is why the overwhelming majority of Xbox 360 games offer better graphic and online performance on the Xbox 360.
THAT is NOT going to change!
It may be easier to port a PS3 game to the Xbox 360 than it is to port an Xbox 360 to the PS3 (since the Xbox 360 is more powerful in terms of videogame performance–500,000,000 polygons for the Xbox 360 is more than the 275,000,000 for the PS3), but the Xbox 360 will continue to be the Lead Platform this generation for two reasons:
(1) Because the Xbox 360 is so much easier for developers to develop games for and experiment with new types of gameplay.
(2) Because the Xbox 360 has sold over Eight-Million more systems than the Playstation 3, and that lead continues grow by hundreds of thousands of systems each month, in terms of Worldwide Sales.
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It’s common knowledge that the Playstation 3 has very inconsistent framerates, not only because of a lack of polygon power compared to the Xbox 360, but also because of the fact that the PS3 has only one Cell CPU, which has only two Threads to Send instructions to the six SPE subprocessors.
One person mentioned that the PPE chip in the PS3 also has two Threads to send instructions to the six SPE sub-processors; however, that is deceptive, because the PPE is a processor that does receive a Threaded instruction signal from the Cell CPU. The PPE is almost never used in PS3 games, because doing so would mean the Cell CPU has only ONE other Threaded instruction to send to the six SPE subprocessors.
It’s also important to remember that the Cell CPU used in the Playstation 3 is NOT the one that IBM originally intended to use in the Playstation 3. The Cell CPU that IBM uses in its computers is very different from the one that was downgraded to use in the Playstation 3.
The PPE focuses on physics, and works with the SPE subprocessors on Physics and Artificial Intelligence. As a result,PS3 developers often are forced to choose between Graphics or Artificial Intelligence. This is the reason why PS3 games have a reputation for terribly poor Artificial Intelligence.
Many people believe this is the reason why the Playstation 3 has been available for 1.5 Years and STILL does NOT have any games in the Real-Time Strategy genre.
I would also like to mention the superiority of the RAM in the Xbox 360.
There are several other reasons why the Xbox 360 has superior RAM.
Previously I talked about how both the Xbox 360 and PS3 are listed as having 512MB of RAM. I also talked about how the Xbox 360 RAM is Unified so both the CPU and GPU can access RAM simultaneously whenever it is needed. As a result, RAM is NEVER wasted in the Xbox 360. If the GPU needs 400MB of RAM, it can have it. If the CPU needs 400MB of RAM, it can have it.
The same cannot be said for the Playstation 3. The PS3 has RAM that is divided into two sections–one that is dedicated to the CPU, with the other dedicated to Video RAM. Each section is made up of 256MB of RAM.
Although the Video RAM of the PS3 can potentially make use of some of the CPU RAM, the FACT of the matter is that the CPU RAM of the Playstation 3 can NEVER have access to the 256MB of Video RAM. As a result, the Playstation 3 CPU can NEVER have access to more than 256MB of RAM.
There is another factor I didn’t mention before. It relates to the efficiency of the Operating System used for both systems.
The Xbox 360 Operating System is INCREDIBLY efficient! The Xbox 360 Operating System uses only 32MB of the systems RAM.
The Playstation 3 Operating System is TERRIBLY inefficient!The Playstation 3 Operating Systems WASTES 96MB of RAM that could be used for other purposes.
As a result, the Xbox 360 has 480MB of RAM to work with, while the PS3 has only 416MB of RAM to work with.
These reasons also play a role in the continuous advantages the Xbox 360 has over the Playstation 3 in terms of framerates that are much smoother and more consistent on the Xbox 360.
Certain games, like Call of Duty 4 run at a framerate of 60 frames per second on both systems. But Call of Duty 4 is a game that experienced technical problems with various bottlenecks due to the varying levels of action that occur on the screen. The game was originally designed to run at 60 frames per second at 720p, but it caused drops in the framerate. The proof of this is the fact that Call of Duty 4 runs at a resolution of only 640p on both the Xbox 360 and Playstation 3. This may be “equal” in terms of what is displayed on the screen, but the FACT is that Call of Duty 4 is putting a much larger burden on the PS3 than it is the Xbox 360.
Confirmation of this can be seen in the large number of games that “run smoothly at 60 frames per second on the Xbox 360, but struggle to run at 30 frames per second on the Playstation 3.” That was a quote from Gamespot.
It’s simple math: The Xbox 360 can display approximately 500,000,000 polygons per second, compared to 275,000,000 polygons per second for the Playstation 3.
Multi-platform games use what is called a “Lowest Common Denominator” form of programming.
Basically, what this means is the developers start out by saying to themselves, “We need to develop a game for the Xbox 360 and the Playstation 3.”
Then, the developers put limits on how many polygons they are going to put on the screen, and they determine what framerate the game will run at as a result of that number.
When the developers multiply the number of polygons displayed on the screen by the number of frames being displayed each second, they examine what that number is. Multi-platform games can NEVER display more than 275,000,000 polygons per second, or else they can’t be released for the Playstation 3, since the PS3 cannot display more than 275,000,000 polygons per second.
As a result, developers are often conservative with the number of polygons being displayed with multi-platform games, especially with the poor reputation of inconsistent framerates that the Playstation 3 has acquired over time.
It basically comes down to these THREE factors:
If a multi-platform game running at 30 frames per second on the Playstation 3 uses 250,000,000 polygons or less, it gives the developers the ability to allow the Xbox 360 version to run at 60 frames per second, since 500,000,000 is double the number of 250,000,000.
If a multi-platform game running at 30 frames per second on the Playstation 3 uses over 250,000,000 polygons per second, it means the Xbox 360 version is also forced to run at only 30 frames per second. This is an unfortunate situation, because it means the Playstation 3 will be using 90-100% of its power by displaying somewhere between 250,000,000 to 275,000,000 polygons per second, while the Xbox 360 will only be using 60% of its power, since the Xbox 360 has so much more polygon power.
If a multi-platform game is intended to run at 60 frames per second on the Playstation 3, the Xbox 360 version will also run at 60 frames per second. The Playstation 3 version will be limited to 275,000,000 polygons per second. The Xbox 360 will also be limited to 275,000,000 polygons per second, due to the fact that 275,000,000 is the Lowest Common Denominator. This is unfortunate, because it means the Playstation 3 version will be using between 90% to 100% of the systems power, while the Xbox 360 will be using only 60% of the systems power. Call of Duty 4 is an excellent example of this situation.
Also, the Xbox 360 uses 10MB of eDRAM. This new form of RAM technology is something that even Windows Vista-based PCs do not yet take advantage of. The next release of Direct-X on the PC will start to take advantage of eDRAM technology for gaming, but it still hasn’t happened yet.
This just goes to show you how incredibly far ahead of its time the Xbox 360 Unified-Shader GPU/Multi-Core CPU design is.
This one made me laugh, for some particular reason the poster for this assumes that unified ram is a good thing, for those of us who have ever tried to run a PC game that pushes your hardware limits of current technology that this is a load of crap. A GEFORCE 5400 with 10TB of VRAM will never perform better then a 9800 with only 512MB. By making memory unified for video and thread processing you bottleneck the entire system by overloading the bus transport system. For a simple number crunching separating the RAM from VRAM is engenious. It doesn’t take that much to do the actual processing for even the most current games and the dedicated VRAM allows a seperate bus for data transport. From a programmers perspective, the person who posted this is trying to convince people that a pile of excrement is cotton candy, integrated video processing will never surpass dedicated.
Unified RAM in the Xbox 360 is vastly superior to the Non-Unified RAM setup in the Playstation 3.
The reason why Unified RAM doesn’t work well with Nvidia GEFORCE Graphics cards on the PC is because the technology used by Nvidia was not custom designed in a way that is optimized to work with a multi-core CPU and GPU working together with Unified Shader technology. Even the overall PC setup is not designed in a way that is optimized for Unified RAM. From the point of view of the PC setup, it is better to just have 2GB of Non-Unified RAM and let a lot of it be wasted than to have 2GB of Unified RAM, because at least the Non-Unified RAM doesn’t create hardware bottlenecks.
…but that has nothing at all to do with the way the Xbox 360 is designed. Remember, the Xbox 360 is incredibly far ahead of its time in terms of design and technology.
For example, the Xbox 360 was the first hardware to ever use the revolutionary Unified Shader technology. PC graphics cards didn’t see Unified Shader technology until January of 2007, yet the Xbox 360 was using it in late 2005! That truly is revolutionary and amazing!
The same thing can be said with the multi-core design of the Xbox 360. The Xbox 360 has three 3.2Ghz PowerPC CPU processors. Ever since the PowerPC was used in Sega’s Model 3 arcade hardware in 1996, it has been common knowledge that the Power PC is the best CPU ever designed for videogame use. Using three PowerPC CPU cores was a revolutionary idea, because PCs in 2005 were bragging about “dual-core” technology…yet the Xbox 360 was already using a “tri-core” design!
eDRAM really is another incredible example of the RAM advantage that the Xbox 360 has over the PS3, and even the PC. eDRAM is something that PC games will not be optimized for until the Longhorn Operating System from Microsoft using DirectX 11 is released. Yet the Xbox 360 has been using it since 2005!
The reason why the Xbox 360 is so much superior to the Playstation 3 in all of these areas is because the Xbox 360 had so much more talent and skill involved in the engineering design of the system. Nearly 2,300 (yes, twenty-three hundred) engineers helped design the Xbox 360. But only slightly more than 200 people were involved in the design of the Playstation 3.
It really did hurt the overall design of the Playstation 3 when Sony saw how much superior the Xbox 360 was, and then was forced to quickly redesign the Playstation 3 in a way that made it more difficult to program and more expensive. Sony ended up using only one Cell CPU instead of the two that were originally planned, and Sony was forced to include a GPU that was not originally planned in the design. What’s worse is that even though Sony knew ATI was designing a custom GPU using the revolutionary new Unified Shader technology in the Xbox 360, Sony couldn’t afford to do anything similar. As a result, Sony was forced to include a generic Nvidia graphics card that really was based on four-year old technology that was outdated.
The fact is, Xbox 360 is the best piece of videogame hardware ever designed. Legendary game programmer John Carmack points out that nothing compares to the Xbox 360 in terms of videogame hardware and overall programming environment that is so developer friendly with virtually no hardware bottlenecks.
But, we can talk and argue all we want, the software is the proof. Here is what we know for sure:
* Xbox 360 games are rated higher than Playstation 3 games 95% of the time.
* Many times, the Xbox 360 versions of games aren’t just a “little bit” better…many times the Xbox 360 versions of games are a LOT better!
For example, Orange Box got scores of 95% on Xbox 360 and was Game of the Year. But the PS3 version was relesed two months later and received scores of only 80%…it wasn’t nearly as good as the Xbox 360 version.
* Playstation 3 receives virtually no third-party exclusive games
* Xbox 360 receives plenty of third-party exclusive games
* Even when the Playstation 3 is the “Lead Development Platform,” the Xbox 360 versions of games often end up better than the Playstation 3 versions.
For example, Soul Calibur 4 is a game where the PS3 was the Lead Development Platform. Yet the Xbox 360 version of Soul Calibur 4 has resolution that is 40% higher! The Xbox 360 version runs at a resolution of 1365×960p, while the PS3 version runs at only 1280×720p…Plus the Xbox 360 version includes rumble, achievements, and custom in game music…all things that aren’t supported in the PS3 version.
* Resolution and framerates are two of the areas that represent the performance of the RAM…and the Xbox 360 versions of software virtually always have smoother framerates and resolution that is equal or higher than the Playstation 3 versions. Sometimes, the Xbox 360 versions of games have TWICE the framerate as the Playstation 3 versions of games!
NO DOUBT ABOUT IT…Xbox 360 has superior hardware than the Playstation 3 in the area of RAM, GPU, CPU design, and every other important factor. The only key area where the PS3 has an advantage over the Xbox 360 is “space” on a disc; however, this is an advantage that is not noticed in over 99% of games, because literally less than 1% of games require more than one DVD of space…and now that the Xbox 360 lets games be placed on the hard drive, it doesn’t really matter anyways, because the discs can be written to the hard drive so that you don’t need to switch them at all.
That is the biggest load of crap that I have ever seen, first of all you continue to tell me that having unified ram is a plus but you cannot give me a single real reason why, and lets be honest there isn’t one. There will always be a bottleneck at the bus side when you integrate your VRAM, this holds true to both PC and Console. Second of all you need to look at the big picture, very few games suffer from framerate issues and the ones that do were either horrible ports i.e. Orange Box, or developed by tired companies who refuse to learn new API programming. Then we get to the PPC or Power PC Core which actually is the platform for BOTH consoles, the advantage with the PS3 is very simple if you have one master core at 3.2 Ghz completely dedicated to system management, then a second at the same speed dedicated to processing the content being streamed to it, the second core can fire of instructions to the 6 other cores for rudimentary operation such as different object’s physics movements. The 360 has 3 main cores two of which can process API data but one of which has to route both threads. I happen to be a strong supporter of good compression technology and the 360 supports a lot of it, the PS3 wasn’t designed for it so much of the data that isn’t API data must be fed RAW whereas the 360 can process compressed data, fortunately this is a firmware concept and not a hardware one, so with the video pipelines of which each can run uncompressed 1920×1080 resolution in progressive scan, is the PS3 was using compression technology it would not only have a leg up over 360 but it would make a huge leap over 360. But for me a lot of this was very little of the equation…
The Xbox in every way imaginable tries to get customers to pay more money for technology that is far cheaper market priced. For example, you have the 120GB hard drive which STILL retails for 150 dollars, lets be frank here a 120GB hard drive is what, like 60 dollars now? The PS3 allows user to install ANY hard drive they wish, just as long as it conforms to standard laptop SATA and considering a 320GB hard drive is only 129.99 right now I think in terms of hard drive space the PS3 has the advantage. Then we can start talking about multimedia, I have to say my elite was one of the best and cheapest network media players available, there was very little that is could not play, in fact the only thing I could that it choked on completely was DIVX video with AC3 audio, which for most people is not a huge deal BUT, the Xbox does not allow content to be stored to the local disk from ANY outside source other then audio CDs, which seems funny running concurrent with the ability to PAY for video and MP3s. The Elite was a bungle because it would likely cost a elite owner thousands of dollars to fill the drive based solely on the fact the user have NO other choice then go to Microsoft when they want anything. We also have to face another fact, media streaming uses an enormous amount of bandwidth which I much prefer the 10/100/1000 connection for the PS3 as opposed to the old 10/100 connection the xbox offers. Then we have something else to consider…
Peripherals: All and I do mean every single peripheral for the 360 is proprietary and fairly expensive whereas the ps3 uses all STANDARD peripheral technologies for everything except the camera which agreeably is a gimmick for both consoles. I bought a 30 dollar laser mouse and wireless keyboard for the ps3 and turns out the free bluetooth headset that came with my nokia works as a wireless headset, the 360 wireless headset is STILL 50 dollars, or if I prefer a wired one as they tend to be of far better quality I can use literally ANY one I like. And say I want to use an external hard drive which I do because I swapped the measely 40 for the 250 I had purchased and now the 40 is external, I can write to the external to which the 360 can not.
Online: There is no doubt that Xbox live out does PS3’s online experience in quite a few ways for me I liked the available Arcade classics like TMNT and Ikaruga which were both awesome games. The online community is also notably larger for 360. The important factor here though is that most of what I like is available free with a silver membership, and the one thing everyone wants is to play online and for the games that really count like COD4, the experience is literally identical so screw paying Microsoft 50 dollars a year to use my own already expensive internet connection.
Justin,
You are the one who is very incorrect, even when discussions basic concepts.
For example, the 120GB Xbox 360 hard drive does not cost $149; it now costs only $119…And you really would never need one that large now that the Pro system comes with a 60GB hard drive.
You are also making a fundamental mistake when you say that the Playstation 3 has 6 “cores.” Playstation 3 does NOT uses “multi-core” technology the way the Xbox 360 and the PC do. The Playstation 3 uses “parallel processing” the way the Sega Saturn did.
Xbox 360 has three 3.2Ghz Power PC CPU processors, each with two Threads to “send” instructions with. The Xbox 360 only needs to worry about “sending” instructions to the GPU and the overall CPU.
Playstation 3 has one 3.2Ghz CPU processor, and it has only two Threads that are capable of “sending” instructions with. The HUGE BOTTLENECK with this design is that the Playstation 3 has six SPE sub-processors, each with one Thread that is ASKING for a Threaded instruction from the CPU. Those SPE sub-processors to not “send” instructions; they receive instructions from the CPU.
The way the one person said that the PS3 has only two arms (CPU Threads) trying to juggle six balls (SPE sub-processors) is a perfect example of the Playstation 3 programming envrionment.
With the Xbox 360 it is literally the exact opposite. The example that says the Xbox 360 has six arms (CPU Threads) but only needs to juggle two balls (a CPU and GPU) is a perfect example of the Xbox 360 programming environment. The majority of programmers absolutely love designing games on the Xbox 360, but they hate designing games on the Playstation 3.
If we are being “honest” we need to state the facts. It isn’t just games like Orange Box that have framerate problems on the Playstation 3, even though the Xbox 360 versions of the games run perfectly smooth.
Everything from Assassins Creed, to F.E.A.R. to Splinter Cell have huge framerate advantages for the Xbox 360. In fact, some of those games are downright disappointing on the Playstation 3, even though the Xbox 360 versions run fine.
All-Pro Football is a game that runs at 30 frames per second on Playstation 3, but it doesn’t run at a “steady” 30 frames per second. The Xbox 360 version of All-Pro Football runs at 60 frames per second, and it is always “steady.”
F.E.A.R. is another game where the Xbox 360 version runs “steady” at 30 frames per second. The Playstation 3 version tries to run at 30 frames per second, but it often dips below 20 frames per second and gets so bad at times that there is “screen-flicker” and “slow-motion” similar to what used to happen in the 8-bit videogame era.
Splinter Cell on the Playstation 3 is absolutely terrible.
The list goes on and on and on…
I want to answer your question about Unified RAM, though.
The 512MB of Unified RAM is ALWAYS being used! There is NEVER a second when the RAM is being wasted.
The same cannot be said for the Playstation 3.
For example, 256MB of the RAM of the PS3 is devoted to the CPU, and 256MB of RAM is Video RAM. The CPU does have the ability to access the Video RAM when there is a need; although, it loses a great deal of efficiency. However, the GPU of the Playstation 3 can NEVER access the CPU RAM. This means 256MB is the absolute limit for the PS3.
The same cannot be said for the Xbox 360. There are plenty of times in games like Gears of War, Orange Box, Lost Planet, Halo 3, and others where more than 256MB of the Unified RAM is being used in a way that would normally be handled by the Video RAM.
ADVANTAGE: Xbox 360
Also, the way that you talk about a “bottleneck” when using Unified RAM does NOT apply to the Xbox 360, because it uses the INCREDIBLY EFFICIENT form of RAM known as eDRAM. 10MB of eDRAM is a HUGE amount! That right there is one of the reasons why the Xbox 360 games have such smooth framerates compared to the Playstation 3 games which often have unsteady framerates and lower resolution textures.
One final RAM advantage the Xbox 360 has over the Playstation 3 is the simple fact that the Xbox 360 Operating System is so much more efficient than the Playstation 3 Operating System. The Xbox 360 OS requires only 32MB to use. The PS3 OS uses 96MB of RAM, which is a total waste! This means the Xbox 360 has 480MB of RAM to use for gaming, while the PS3 has only 416MB of RAM to use for gaming.
But, none of this really matters…at this point in time it is ALL ABOUT GAMES…This is the THIRD HOLIDAY SEASON for the Playstation 3…yet the Playstation 3 still has ZERO games available in certain genres.
Real-Time Strategy is a genre that has gotten SO MUCH MORE POPULAR as a result of all the awesome RTS games on the Xbox 360…yet the Playstation 3 STILL has ZERO games in that genre!
Every Xbox 360 system comes with a headset…the same cannot be said for the Playstation 3. In fact, NO PLAYSTATION 3 system comes with high-definition cables of ANY KIND!
If you have a wireless Xbox 360 controller, you essentially have a wireless headset, too, because the headset plugs directly into the controller. That’s as easy as it gets.
Even new games like Soul Calibur 4 do NOT include features like Rumble for the Playstation 3, even though the Xbox 360 version does include Rumble. That means if you spent $60 on the PS3 dualshock 3 controller, it was a waste of money!
Xbox 360 is a much better game system. Xbox 360 has more games. Xbox 360 has far more exclusive games. Xbox 360 multi-platform games are rated higher. Xbox 360 has a better online service…Xbox 360 has Rumble, Achievements, and Custom Music in EVERY game…Playstation 3 cannot compare to all that.
Again you reasoning is tainted both in your facts and your reasoning. The Cell is a multi-core processor the difference is that when ps3 passes data from its processor to its XDRAM it can do so along two separate pathways as opposed to one (PS3). Only the 6 SPEs are linear, the two process cores are independant. The advantage of having two mother cores and 6 daughter cores is integral hyper threading. When hyper threading was introduced it allowed a single core instance to essentially twist the data from 2 separate threads, of coarse the added performance required a very high clock which the P4 offered in its P4 Extreme 3.2Ghz but this is still limited to the single core available and the processor still has to do all the work. The Cell is ingenious because it takes to hyperthreading cores and allows the daughter cores to do the grunt work whereas the process cores only divvy up the data. I can tell that you have never done any serious programming before because you are unfamiliar about the advantage of this concept. Using the same concept as you, in the form of juggling balls it would be equivalent to having 2 arms that can juggle six balls but juggling 3 balls per hand, at 3.2 Ghz per hand this is relatively easy and when the data must be passed on it can be passed via VRAM rather then unified system ram which is not nearly as efficient. You are right that developers embrace the 360 far more readily at least in the past they did, a lot of this has to do with it being far easier to program for but this has little to do with the technical capabilities but rather the complexity of the code, instructions that are sent to the cell cannot be easily debugged once it has left the original core and if the data is sent to the wrong SPC or routed back with wrong results it gets very complicated to resolve the issue or sometimes even find it. Fortunately we are starting to see a lot more developers hopping on board to the Cell PPC processor, as proven with 2008/2009’s PS3s 13 exclusives as opposed to 360’s measely 5. This is not me saying xbox sucks, I still loved my xbox, I just sold it because it seems RROD is eventually an inevitability.
Justin,
When all 12 months of 2008 have passed, the number of exclusives that the Xbox 360 has is FAR greater than the Playstation 3!…In fact, the Xbox 360 will have 24 exclusives that are 100% exclusive to the Xbox 360…that doesn’t count the third-party games that are released for both Xbox 360 and PC, but NOT for Playstation 3…it also doesn’t count the dozens of games released exclusively for Xbox Live Arcade.
For crying out loud, by the time 2008 comes to an end the Xbox 360 will have more exclusive games in the genre of RPG for 2008 than the Playstation 3 has in all genres for 2008…and the scary thing is, that is NOT an exaggeration.
Justin, once again you refuse to acknowledge that the Playstation 3 is based on “parallel processing.” Playstation 3 does NOT use “multi-core” processing the way that the Xbox 360 and PC do.
Sony might “refer” to it as a multi-core setup, but Sony’s definition is very definition of what Intel and Microsoft refer to as a “multi-core” setup.
Also, I think that your analysis of juggling is an excellent one.
Previously I said that I thought it was very accurate to say that the PS3 has two arms (CPU Threads capable of Sending instruction) that are being asked to juggle six balls (SPE sub-processors asking to Receive instructions from the CPU)…This really is an excellent example of the difficult programming environment of the Playstation 3.
You are now saying that the situation can also be described by saying that the PS3 has two arms (CPU Threads sending instructions to the six SPE sub-processors), with each arm having three balls to juggle (since six divided by two is three).
You claim that this will be easy, because juggling at 3.2Ghz is an easy thing. Unfortunately, that simply is not true, which is why most Playstation 3 games, including games that were released this month, still have plenty of framerate problems, even though the Xbox 360 and PC versions do NOT have those problems.
Justin, you NEED to realize that Sony’s original design for the Playstation 3 called for TWO of the Cell CPU processors. Sony originally wanted FOUR Threads to Send instructions to those SPE sub-processors. Ken Kutaragi basically said that the SPE sub-processors on the second CPU would almost never be used. He said that the whole reason for having a second CPU was to strictly use the extra two Threads to control the 6 SPE sub-processors on one of the chips more efficiently…The PPE also would have been used much more often with two Cell CPU processors.
If Sony would have kept the design of two Cell CPU processors, it would have resulted in a much easier program environment that is far more developer friendly than the current design of the Playstation 3 that shares so much in common with the difficult Sega Saturn development environment.
The problem was, with two Cell CPU processors, the PS3 didn’t have a GPU…and with no GPU, the PS3 had graphics that were not even close to the Xbox 360 with its custom-designed GPU. As a result, Sony was forced to add a GPU, which meant they were forced to remove one the Cell CPUs…it make the system way too expensive, and it made the system way too difficult to develop.
You NEED to realize that Playstation 3 programmers are NOT Harlem Globetrotter basketball players who can juggle 3 balls with one hand, while simultaneously juggle 3 balls with the other hand!… It’s not a matter of what Sony “claims” the Playstation 3 has the “potential” to do. We saw with both the Playstation 3 and the Sega Saturn that the “potential” marketing scheme is a joke that programmers don’t fall for.
Even if there are situations that don’t involve gameplay where we “can” juggle that way for a little while, once actual gameplay starts it will only be a short time before you see framerate problems and “muddy” looking textures.
RROD is something that hasn’t existed in the Xbox 360 for the last two hardware generations. The “Falcon” hardware generation eliminated the RROD, and the new “Jasper” generation that we are currently living in not only eliminated the RROD, but it also eliminated the noisy DVD drive.