The Graphics Arms Race

I agree 100%. Just today I was looking at the latest round of benchmarking for the high end cards on Tom’s Hardware. The ATIs cause a ridiculous amount of confusion to me, and I try to stay up on this thing. It is not just that there are so many models, but the naming system is far to similiar. I kept getting the ATI X800 XT and ATI X800 XL mixed up for benchmark scores. With a price gap of nearly $150 that letter T is quite expensive.

The PE stuff too just doesn’t register to the eye sometimes and its just a visual mess. It also seems like a ridiculous amount of excess. The performance increases between the X800 line and X850 line are pretty negligible. So slim that one could actually probably render them mute with multiple benchmarking runs. We are talking 1fps difference usually. I was actually about to start making my own plain english “good, better, best” chart since anytime I looked back to a benchmark I got lost again. Just look at this.

Also the names don’t mean jack. Both ATI and Nvidia are guilty of this. GT, Ultra, Pro, XT, XL, in terms of suffixes all they mean is “better than”. But better than what is the question? In the Radeon 9800 pro days pro was king, a 9800 was just a 9800 but the pro made all the difference. Now pro is at the bottom of the barrel for ATI, a X850 Pro is a bad performer.

I think a company could do well if they would produce some quality cards and organize a simple naming scheme. I am not talking a new company like ATI or Nvidia even (although it’d be nice). If say MSI or Sapphire stopped naming the cards what ATI and Nvidia named them and introduced a sensible system. Three tires: standard, mid-range, enthusiast. Each tier could have a numbering system. The higher the number the more powerful the card. That is it. All the tech specs and chipsets could be on the back for tech heads. The company may have to restort to decimals since ATI and Nvidia both love to put out more powerful sounding models that are actually less powerful than even midrange cards (remember the 9600?).

So, as far as I can tell, when ATI released the X800 series it could have gone like this: X800 = 1, X800 PRO = 2 X800 XL =3 X800 XT = 4. Then as they added cards you just fit them in between. So the X800 XL 512 = 3.5, X850 = 1.5, X850 PRO = 2.5, see where I am going with this? Even reading this back it still has the potential to be confusing but most of the confusion is left to the company, not the consumer. All the consumer needs to know is “Bigger number = better” It would be so refreshing to see the corner of the box say “Enthusiast: 5″ and know that this was better than all the standard, all the mid-range, and all the enthusiast cards .1-4.99999 (knowing ATI).

I’m not sure if a decimal system it good - we could just multiply numbers by 10 or something and that’d make it easier to say. 15 is better than 1.5. But it is an idea.

The original X800 releases could have been more along the lines of X800, X850, and X890 if we keep the “X” for the generation, and “8″ to denote the fact it’s a high-end card, and then the different levels make up the next two numbers. The the midrange cards would be something like X700, X750, etc… and it leaves plenty of room to add cards in later.

The only problem is when we get to cards that have more advanced technology, but aren’t necessarily faster. Like the 9500Pro/9600Pro issue. It also happens with AMD’s chips. The Athlon 3400+ and 3500+ are really just the same speed, but the 3500+ is a newer socket. And the dual core CPUs… the 4400+ is slower in gaming than the 4000+. Granted, it is faster when you are using both cores, but still, it’s not quite right.

So when you think about it, it’s actually quite hard to come up with a naming scheme that continues to make sense even when unforseen additions are made to the lineup. Though in AMD’s case, the dual core CPUs had been planned all along. You want people to know it’s newer, even if it’s not necessarily always better.

I think that I’m at my stage of life where I don’t care. You can take SLI and Crossfire and shove it where the sun doesn’t shine as I’ll be damned if I’m buying more than one monumentally expensive graphics card that’ll be obsolete before the shrinkwrap comes off. In regards to the variations in the models, that’s irritating but ultimately I’d buy the “standard” version since I’m unlikely to notice any difference between it and the higher-end versions.

Of course, running a Mac and a laptop at that kinda renders the whole subject moot. Since only a few cards are made for Apple the subject is much easier to discuss and isn’t as silly, although the relative lack of choice may be derided (as noted earlier, however, how much difference does it really make anyway within a given generation of cards?). I used to follow these things but now I just don’t give a monkey’s…

This is one of the reasons I stay clear from PC gaming as much as possible. Lots of unnecessary, and usually expensive, hassle.

Indeed but it should be said how rewarding it is as well. This bitching is kind of like part of the territory. I’ll complain about this and that about PC gaming and the industry but I wouldn’t give it up for the world. There is a satisfaction in heavily researching your next upgrade. It creates this whole new sense of personalization about your machine.

When you own an Xbox or a PS2 you know its pretty much identical to every other Xbox and PS2 out there (until FUN, NEW, Xbox 360 face plates!!!!11one). However with a PC I can look at each part in my case (theres a window) and remember where it came from, the hassels or good deals or just plain luck in how it came to be a part of the system I use every day.

Not to mention that every single time I buy a part for my PC it is like getting a whole new console. No matter how small the part it still feels like my machine had a sort of “rebirth”. The new LCD panel I ordered is soon to arrive and it feels like the launch of the Xbox 360 to me. I am somewhat excited about the new consoles, but the buzz is wearing off. I am again realizing that the PC may forever be my king.

But with consoles you know when you buy a game, it is going to work. That is what annoys me about PC’s. I want to play Half Life 2, but I probably cant. Because my PC is not upgraded enough. And to do so would require me getting lots of things. Most of which I do not understand (as I am totally PC illiterate). Just reading the above posts makes my head swim.

Well, I wouldn’t say Unreal Championsip was exactly in working condition when I played it on the Xbox. With 4 players and some bots, the game had unplayably low frames, it was silly.

Console games usually work fine as their developers restrict what the games are capable of, so they run on the consoles. The PC might be more trouble, but at least with the last generation of Console-PC ports, the difference in qualitywas worth it (in my opinion). Especially when you consider everything else a console cannot do. It doesn’t let you brag about your ePenis, for instance. Your Xbox is just as powerful as everyone elses, silly mods aside.

Of course, when the price of a whole console can be less than the price of a new high end Radeon, I do sometimes question what is going on.

In fairness to the consoles, crappy performance is something that is more “acceptable” on a PC and I’ve played a few games where the performance was worse than it really should have been (Neverwinter Nights springs immediately to mind). The consoles have limited excuses, however, since the developer knows a) what their game needs to run on, and b) that everyone will have the same experience and cannot change it. The PC developers can have a somewhat carefree attitude (”people can upgrade”) to ensuring that performance is good and that’s definitely one of the things that annoys me about PC games.

It can certainly be said that the consoles have had a relatively short lifespan this generation and it adds more to the argument that PCs can be upgraded with less hassle (depending upon whether or not the different graphics cards confuses you or not) than buying a new console. However, I have a feeling that the next generation of consoles aren’t going to be changed for a while and this is definitely appealing.

I dont know about the next generation of consoles not changing for a while. I would like that to be true, but the call of money is probably too much for companies like Microsoft and Sony. They may feel they have to release another console in about 3-4 years in order to make more and more. Although how much further they can develop technology wise I do not know…

Well, let’s bare in mind that each manufacturer loses money on the console hardware so there’s not much incentive there to create a new system, not least because the R&D costs must be extortionate these days. The only reason to produce a new console pretty much comes down to the following:

1. You believe that there is a market for the new console (i.e. people will be sufficiently interested in it over the current offerings)

2. Your market share isn’t good enough OR your competition is developing a new console to take some of your market

I believe that the first reason will become less appropriate and that will negate the second. Unless the manufacturers can produce new systems with features that are sufficiently desirable over what customers have already bought then there will be no incentive to develop new systems. Once you have a top-selling console with a good library of games (both existing and incoming) then you effectively have a cash-cow and can live off the royalties.

To be honest, I think that this might be the last compelling generation of consoles and even then the incentive to upgrade is less than the one between (for sake of arguments) PS1 and PS2.

Portables, on the other hand (no pun intended), probably have a good few more generations in them before they hit the same situation.

Are you suggesting that consoles could possibly go the way of the PC? By this I mean that soon all we will buy will be updates for an existing console in order to make it work slightly better (a bit like the N64’s thingy-ma-bob that allowed you to play games with slightly better graphics).

Nope. I was rather suggesting that, with the exception of peripherals, that consoles would not change their core features nor would new consoles be produced and that the entire industry would standardise on the current models to focus on games production only. I think that consoles are getting to the point where the difference between the current and next generation is getting so small that it will become unnecessary to upgrade them at all since the potential market for a new model with limited additional features will not be sufficient to justify the R&D expenditure.

What you are getting in the next generation of consoles will probably be more than enough for many years and I’m not expecting to see any silly upgrade add-ons, with the possible exception of bigger hard drives.

I seem to recall that the ‘Playstation Generation’ of consoles was foretold as the one that would stick around ‘almost forever’

It - as we are all fully aware - didn’t. We delude ourselves into thinking that developers are actually capable of resting on their laurels with each and every console generation, but within 3 months of the final release we start hearing rumours about the next big thing (which will obviously be couple of years off, but no more than 3/4)

Part of it is simply that these hardware developers have to keep their staff employed, and part of it is fear of stagnation - you can’t market well if your company isn’t progressing… and none of them dare not develop a new system now, lest their competitors beat them to the punch with the next big thing.

I’m sure they all remember what happened to Sega, and - to a lesser degree - Nintendo. Complacency sure as fuck toppled them from their thrones…

I can see the point but just wonder whether, if a new console (for the sake of argument we’ll call it the PlayBox4) came along, would we notice the difference? There has to come a point when the difference between the current generation and the possible next is going to be so small that no one really cares. In that respect I’d include developers. For them it must surely be enough if the current consoles can do what they want since their is little benefit to them of having to learn an entirely new system. We already know that it “takes time” for developers to get used to a new console so that they can really make use of it so why bother starting from scratch again?

However, I do think that you may have a point. If developers themselves demand more power then the manufacturers will probably give it to them under the belief that it’d give them an edge over the rest. I just think that there will be a time (probably the next generation) when that demand ceases to justify a new machine.

From a consumer perspective, I’ve yet to see anything for the next generation of consoles that makes them look like a compelling purchase. I’ll probably end up getting one if the flow of titles to the current generation dries up (and a bit more graphical whump for the old PS2 would be nice) but it does leave me to wonder about whether there will be a generation after them.

At the end of the 19th century, the head of the patent office in London confidently predicted that ‘everything that could be invented, has been invented’. Then look what happened. More things were invented in the 20th century than were ever before.

My point is that we can never be certain that technology can go further and gurther. We may think that it cant get better, but maybe thats just us not being able to comprehend it. And also, graphics are not anything. They may also improve on other factors with new consoles, such as AI or overall game size.

As far as these consoles sticking around for a long time goes, I actually agree. Before when the Xbox and PS2 were released, their specs were substantially behind that of a high-end desktop PC. Despite that, these consoles were able to pump out framerates quite impressively, for a good long time. How long has the Xbox been around now? Like 4 years? And Doom 3 looks just as good on it as it does on a PC, really.

Now, in 6 months when the Xbox 360 hits shelves, it’s specs are still going to be far beyond a high-end desktop PC, because the fact is it’s architecture seems closer to that of a supercomputer than to a regular desktop. If the sub-par specs on the old Xbox were utilised to allow good performance for so long, imagine how long the Xbox 360 will last, being the powerhouse that it is.

I think it’ll have a longer lifespan than the current Xbox did, and that is quite a long time for any electronic entertainment device. And all of the above can be applied to the PS3 as well.

It’s probably worthwhile remembering that the primary driving force behind the various generations of consoles has been processing power and better graphics, with most of the other advances being pretty much secondary. Once you hit a limit on those aspects of the console that need an entirely new machine to take advantage then everything else can probably be added as peripherals or services instead.

It’s quite probable that there will be new advances in gaming in the future, but will you need an entirely new system to use them? To a degree, I guess it depends on how extensible the current architecture has been made.

I wouldn’t bet so much on Xbox 360/PS3 lasting any longer than other console generations. While we like to think the graphical ceiling is close at hand we aren’t even close. There is quite a lot of room for graphics to grow yet. The PS3 prerendered Killzone trailer is a good example. We just aren’t there yet, that may be PS4 games but not PS3 or Xbox 360. Aside from Gears of War I was actually underwhelmed by most things I saw at E3 (in retrospect). And by ‘most things’ I mean actual gameplay.

Also the console coup is always questioned and quickly dismissed months after launch. This fall we see the new line of graphics cards that are very similiar (if not more powerful) to what powers the new consoles. Gears of War will no doubt look better on a PC come early 2006. By this time next year high-end PCs will have eclipsed console graphics.

I also think just in the name of profit more consoles will be developed. Xbox live is a good example and I think Kelmon mentioned it earlier. Surely the features in Xbox Live for the 360 could easily be implemented on the current Xbox. But they aren’t, instead it is one of the 360’s flagship features.

Consoles are also an excellent way to push new media storage (blu-ray anyone?).

The only way I see consoles ceasing is when they fully assimilate into PCs. I see the entire console trend as a sort of mutation off of PCs. They came from PCs, seperated themselves completely and then slowly began forming back into their original form. The Xbox and Xbox 360 are very clearly moving into PC realm. The 360 is pretty much a media center PC with gaming as its prime function.

I don’t know. I’m still of the opinion that there has to be a limit and that this limit is fast approaching. Indeed, games on the PC in the next few years may indeed look better than there next generation console brethren, but will it be enough for anyone to care? I remember thinking how much better high-res PC games looked compared to the old PS1 and that PC games will always look better (TV vs. monitor) but Soul Calibur on the Dreamcast just blew me away (and, to a degree, still does). I am therefore quite convinced that there’s going to come a point where the level of difference between them isn’t going to be sufficient to justify shelling out a shitload of cash for a new PC graphics card (or all the associated bits that you inevitably end up buying so that you can “make the most” of what you’ve bought). When that point hits, who’s going to make a new console?

The XBox Live 360 thing does, I grant you, involve profits, and is just an attempt to wrest market share away from Sony. In terms of console creation, I guarantee that Microsoft would add it to the regular XBox if doing so was likely to get them the market share that they wanted since creating a new console just equates to new losses. I guess it remains to be seen as to whether they can demonstrate that the 360 is worth the upgrade (and is better than the PS3) before this “master” plan pays off. For some reason, at this moment, I doubt that there is going to be a major rush if the thing is so similar to the current system…

In terms of consoles into PCs, I tend to view it more as a merger in the other direction, i.e. PCs into consoles. Both items are seeking a place in amongst (or replacing) your existing home entertainment system. Consoles, however, have had a role here for the last few years (with design becoming ever more acceptable) and PCs have recently been making the transitioin (i.e. your Media PC). I have my doubts that the 2 will ever converge entirely since the consoles will never return to the office and PCs will never truly be 100% living room systems since you need to write your letters or do your accounts somewhere than on the sofa. Somewhat more likely is that the 2 systems will interface with each other to share desirable features but never full converge.

Stiil, just like most of the predictions of Tommorrows World, the above is probably a load of bollocks and both PCs and consoles will be replaced by iToasters or something.