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Digital Foundry: Microsoft to unlock more GPU power for Xbox One developers

Barzul

Member
So basically all this is saying was the X1 was weaker than we thought in the first place? It doesn't change the specs but it does show a change in attitude at MS. They are up shits creek and they know it.
Nope information on the reserve was already out there.
 

open_mouth_

insert_foot_
So, many people were theorizing a 20-30% "real world" power advantage for the PS4 on paper, but once you add in the 10% XB1 CPU boost + this 10% GPU boost on top of the esram to make up for the rest of the difference, we're probably looking at ps3/360 type parity for these machines when it's all said and done.
 
Good news indeed. With the recent PS4 news and now this, it seems that the difference between the platforms is shrinking. Don't get me wrong, the PS4 is still clearly more powerful, but it seems it will be a close race.
This article just confirmed the gap was bigger. What PS4 article closed the gap in recent memory? Come on, man. Facts is facts.
 
Seems like general long-term OS optimization. This is a story, why?

What this really tells me is that MS is becoming increasingly desperate to convey to the 'hardcore' that they're trying to reach some performance parity with its competition. I liked it better when they talked about the games.
 

foxbeldin

Member
This doesn't look like good news to me...

DF : "Hey guys, XB1 has even less gpu power for games than you expected but it's ok because they're gonna give back a little part."
 

onQ123

Member
These guys need to stop talking specs. It simply highlights a disadvantage.

Yep!

Xbox One GPU has 1.179 TFLOPS for games for right now vs PS4 1.84 TFLOPS.


Now we know why the devs are still saying that the PS4 GPU is 50% faster because it's 56% faster for games.
 
Not for any amount that would make a difference, If someone is making an app, they're making it knowing they have 10% of the GPU. Once app's are being made to these guidelines, there's not really much they can do, sure maybe some optomizations to get it down to 9% but that's it.

For this to be relevant in any meaningful way they'd need to claw back a lot more than 1% of their GPU.

Understood and agreed but the implication isn't that they would be taking resources from apps but rather optimizing the OS proper. Otherwise what you're saying is that apps can only call on 10% of the GPU at the moment or am I misunderstanding?
 

tkalamba

Member
Yep!

Xbox One GPU has 1.179 TFLOPS for games for right now vs PS4 1,84 TFLOPS.


Now we know why the devs are still saying that the PS4 GPU is 50% faster because it's 56% faster for games.

So the PS4 isn't reserving anything for the OS like the X1 is?
 
This article just confirmed the gap was bigger. What PS4 article closed the gap in recent memory? Come on, man. Facts is facts.

He's talking about the suggestion that using more than 14CU is kind of pointless. He conveniently ignores that if 18CU really does have awful scaling, the extra 4CU can still be used for raw compute.

I don't know how he can think that the gap is shrinking at all. One console still has 4 extra CU with dedicated modifications for compute and no 10% GPU reservation for the Snap feature.

So the PS4 isn't reserving anything for the OS like the X1 is?

There's no reason for it to. It doesn't have Snap so it doesn't need hardware acceleration for both games and apps. Microsoft prides itself on smooth system performance so they have to reserve GPU resources to ensure the Snap feature does not stutter.
 
So, many people were theorizing a 20-30% "real world" power advantage for the PS4 on paper, but once you add in the 10% XB1 CPU boost + this 10% GPU boost on top of the esram to make up for the rest of the difference, we're probably looking at ps3/360 type parity for these machines when it's all said and done.

And they would be wrong , people forget about this meaning the X1 had even less for games than they thought .
Just means the X1 is getting closer to it 1.31Tflop for games but the gap still there .
 

Vashetti

Banned
So, many people were theorizing a 20-30% "real world" power advantage for the PS4 on paper, but once you add in the 10% XB1 CPU boost + this 10% GPU boost on top of the esram to make up for the rest of the difference, we're probably looking at ps3/360 type parity for these machines when it's all said and done.

Not even close.
 

Skeff

Member
So, many people were theorizing a 20-30% "real world" power advantage for the PS4 on paper, but once you add in the 10% XB1 CPU boost + this 10% GPU boost on top of the esram to make up for the rest of the difference, we're probably looking at ps3/360 type parity for these machines when it's all said and done.

Maybe read the thread? This is bad news for xb1.
 

gofreak

GAF's Bob Woodward
So, many people were theorizing a 20-30% "real world" power advantage for the PS4 on paper, but once you add in the 10% XB1 CPU boost + this 10% GPU boost on top of the esram to make up for the rest of the difference, we're probably looking at ps3/360 type parity for these machines when it's all said and done.



It's not a 'boost'. It's a reduction that will get smaller in time.

Microsoft will give some x% of GPU to devs in the future - having taken 10% away for starters.

When people make paper comparisons between XB1 and PS4 they rarely have accounted for OS reserves because it wasn't quite confirmed what they'd be for both systems.

Taking into account this reserve would widen the gap. It's unlikely Sony's making the same reservation, and even if they are in absolute terms it would be a smaller slice of their GPU than it is of XB1's.
 

EGM1966

Member
Digital Foundry needs more PS4 coverage.

Jesting aside this is to be expected from both consoles so it's hardly a surprise. Both have reserves that are expected to be released over time accordingly to statements already made IIRC.
 

GameSeeker

Member
So 10% more for Xbone makes the PS4 only 40% faster?

Nope. The HW hasn't changed. PS4 was always 40-50% faster at the HW level, but Microsoft's 10% GPU reservation only made the gap bigger. Remember Microsoft has a 3 OS system design that reduces performance vs. the single OS design of the PS4. Reducing the 10% reservation will help relative performance of the Microsoft OS, but it will still lag PS4.
 

JaggedSac

Member
I think it was pretty silly of them to make a console that's focused around Kinect yet they didn't have a Image processing unit in the console just for Kinect. SMH.

They do have hardware for Kinect image stuff, jpeg decoding/encoding, but using GPGPU to do their skeletal system was probably their best bet. You are using up silicon budget for Kinect either way. With GPGPU they can at least improve their algorithms and give that for back games usage at some point.
 
He's talking about the suggestion that using more than 14CU is kind of pointless. He conveniently ignores that if 18CU really does have awful scaling, the extra 4CU can still be used for raw compute.

I don't know how he can think that the gap is shrinking at all. One console still has 4 extra CU with dedicated modifications for compute and no 10% GPU reservation for the Snap feature.



There's no reason for it to. It doesn't have Snap so it doesn't need hardware acceleration for both games and apps. Microsoft prides itself on smooth system performance so they have to reserve GPU resources to ensure the Snap feature does not stutter.


18-12 =/= 4


It's 6 CUs, broseidon.
 

mrklaw

MrArseFace
So, many people were theorizing a 20-30% "real world" power advantage for the PS4 on paper, but once you add in the 10% XB1 CPU boost + this 10% GPU boost on top of the esram to make up for the rest of the difference, we're probably looking at ps3/360 type parity for these machines when it's all said and done.

lol no.

it was supposedly around 40% difference (perhaps 50% 'faster' based on dev comments), with SOME people suggesting that might equate to a 25% real world impact.

that was taking the 1.31TF figure. This information confirms the 10% reserved for the OS, so the gap is BIGGER, not smaller. If MS manage to reduce that, then they will start to get back to how big the gap was - it'll never be smaller than it was originally.
 

Fantasmo

Member
With all the system reservations, they should have made the console more powerful and cheaper or drop the reservations and cable/kinect. They clearly learned nothing from PS3 and instead became arrogant 2006 Sony.
 

S¡mon

Banned
So what they are basically saying is that developers can only use 90% of the GPU power and in the future, maybe, just maybe, a little bit more?

So, the Xbox One has a GPU that does 1.31 TFlops, yet only 1.18 TF can be used?
 

Skeff

Member
Understood and agreed but the implication isn't that they would be taking resources from apps but rather optimizing the OS proper. Otherwise what you're saying is that apps can only call on 10% of the GPU at the moment or am I misunderstanding?

App's will be built with the idea they have a fixed amount of hardware available to them in Snap mode, Microsoft can only deal with the way that is managed not actually the amount used by the app, so they could increase the efficiency of the OS whilst managing it, but they can't cut into the amount the App is actually using, which will be the Vast majority of the 10%.

For example if the OS currently uses 2% to manage it and 8% for the app, they can only eat into the 2%, they can't touch the 8%.
 

mrklaw

MrArseFace
if they profile the current apps they have planned, and find they're only needing, eg 5% GPU to cover those, they could choose to draw a line under that and restrict apps to no more than that - handing back another 5% to games.
 

thuway

Member
So, many people were theorizing a 20-30% "real world" power advantage for the PS4 on paper, but once you add in the 10% XB1 CPU boost + this 10% GPU boost on top of the esram to make up for the rest of the difference, we're probably looking at ps3/360 type parity for these machines when it's all said and done.
Hahahahhahahahahahahah
 
Oh man, love the people saying "the gap is shrinking!".
Slower hardware, 10% of the GPU is allocated to Kinect and Snap mode. Yeap, that's an improvement alright.
 

gofreak

GAF's Bob Woodward
I'd change the thread title, tbh. It's only going to confuse some people, as has already happened.

XB1 OS reserving 10% GPU, may give back some in future would be more accurate.
 
I read that more like: "Microsoft locks some GPU power from Xbox One developers until further notice". ._.


So, many people were theorizing a 20-30% "real world" power advantage for the PS4 on paper, but once you add in the 10% XB1 CPU boost + this 10% GPU boost on top of the esram to make up for the rest of the difference, we're probably looking at ps3/360 type parity for these machines when it's all said and done.

Oh lord hahahahaha I knew this would happen.
 

darkwing

Member
wait a minute, if they are giving the 10% back, won't it mean Kinect won't run?

Kinectless console confirmed?!?
 
Both companies will likely reduce the reserves and memory footprint over time. I wonder if they'll cut any features to allow for this, or if it's just through optimisation?

One thing is to reduce os/footprint(ram). Which no doubt both consoles will do, and a whole nother is to free up gpu power.
 

foxbeldin

Member
I'd change the thread title, tbh. It's only going to confuse some people, as has already happened.

XB1 OS reserving 10% GPU, may give back some in future would be more accurate.

Yeah this. I came here for good news, i left only with disappointment.
 

tkalamba

Member
They're reserving CPU and RAM resources, but I would be really suprised if they reserved GPU resources. Sony even modified the GPU to have two graphics pipelines (one for the game, one for OS) which will increase efficiency even further.

Isn't this technically an assumption at this point? Or did I miss the confirmation on this?

We haven't really been told how much resources the OS will be using on the PS4 at this point have we?
 

onQ123

Member
So, many people were theorizing a 20-30% "real world" power advantage for the PS4 on paper, but once you add in the 10% XB1 CPU boost + this 10% GPU boost on top of the esram to make up for the rest of the difference, we're probably looking at ps3/360 type parity for these machines when it's all said and done.

Wrong!

right now it's 1.179 TFLOPS GPU vs 1.84TFLOPS GPU

for games PS4 is 56% more powerful than the Xbox One.
 
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