And on top of this DF has shown that VRS alone in an early implementation can have performance gains of 10-15% in Wolfenstein. I think we will certainly see better results in the future especially since both major GPU manufacturers support all these features.
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Itâs kinda hard not to compare to PS5 when MSâs own statement invites that comparison. Itâs actually pointless to discuss this without the comparisons because at the end people have to make a hard choice of where theyâre going to drop those $500 on.
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I canât wait to see the performance (and in some cases, quality) gain weâll get with DirectMLâs super-resolution functions. I have used it enough on PC to know that I would rather have a ~2k image âupscaledâ with DLSS/DirectML, as the results can be staggering and the performance benefits canât be understated. I know AMD is working with Sony on their own implementation, and while I know itâll be a bit more limited because of the PS5âs hardware, it will still be fantastic to see. Plus, if it helps us move beyond the obsession with 4K, 8K, and all the in-between arbitrary resolution wars, Iâd be more than happy to welcome everyone about the super-resolution bus; I know Iâm not alone in the yearning for greater visual elements beyond just the resolution, which I think weâll be seeing blossom beautifully as a result.
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We canât discuss actual meaningful hardware differences between consoles unless itâs an SSD.
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Comparisons are far from useless, comparisons should be done on the level of the machineâs intention. Something Micorosft and Nintendo keep saying when they talk about their entries. Both the Switch and the Series S are aimed at a certain resolution and graphical fidelity. Now there are those that scream bloody murder about these systems âHolding their toy back!â, but this is something that reeks of elitism and is very similar to the time of the âWiiâ were you had a group of screaming manbabies whom hated the system simply as it wasnât as âpowerfulâ.
IN the case of the Series S, and these same man babies screaming it holds back their system, I love efficiency myself. The series S has been of interest to me for a long time, and Iâve been reading about it with much glee. And like I said in a later reply: It is NOT ABOUT the Series X or âthemâ, it is mostly abuot the Series S that this matters. Between the Series X and PS5, youâll mostly get visual parity in third aprty games, maybe a resolution difference or framerate difference in favou of the X, but nothing extreme. In this case your comparison of the PS 4 Pro vs the One X stands.
HOWEVER, it is wrong to compare it to that here. Both of those consoles were to be 4K versions of that Gen, MS needed those 6TF as it was required to fill up the screen at those resolutions. Sony decided to go for a checkerboard approach. Two different solutions to a problem. In most cases, the resolution was higher than 1080p and that was enough for those buying the system.
With the Series S however we are looking at a different target. A cheaper system for people that usually arenât early adopters to a new generation. There goal is the actual inverse of these âpro systemsâ. You want a PS5 quality picture, at a lower resolution. So while RPM was not used often with the Pro (as you loose fidelity that will be visible at higher resolution) at lower resolutions it suddenly starts to matter again (it is why it mattered on phone screens for so long). There is also a bit more going on than just packed math, the machine learning can smooth out a lot of the artifacts packed math would produce and make a 1080p image look a lot smoother. Of course the 4K native image of a PS5 will look better, but the Series S will get damn close.
So like said: It is NOT HOLDING the generation back, it is dragging it forward for faster adoption. As what before would be a few years in before non enthusiasts and families would buy such a system (again money is an issue for families. and 500 freedom bucks is a lot of money. 200 less means 2 more weeks of groceries!). Also the Graphics Engine will also obfuscate a lot of this and help developers out. It is why you use a third party engine, over your own. To help you with these specific problems.
So in short: It is not about the Series X vs the PS 5! It is about the Series S vs Holding back Next Gen. It wonât.
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I see where youâre coming from and I suppose the RDNA2 feature-set aids with that, but Iâd argue that the power advantages the Series X already has over the PS5 would sway the enthusiast-class of console gamers (especially when you remember that the PS5 numbers are boosted and SmartShift - and thermal physics - wonât allow simultaneous CPU/GPU boosts). I think the Bethesda and the bevy of studios Microsoft has now paint that advantage further, though if you primarily want third-person âcinematicâ titles the PS5 has you covered. I guess I could see RDNA2 info being more of a sway for the potential benefits itâll have on the Series S, if you were in the position to have to decide between it and PS5 DE.
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Xbox One TV TV TV 2.0
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I think that the key point many people are missing here is that these features are not exclusive to Xbox, they are also present in both of the PC card manufacturers latest cards. All of the DX12U features are supported by the AMD 6000 series and the Nvidia range from 2060 upwards. that means there will be a significantly larger userbase than Xbox alone. Which will a lead to a much wider adoption of the DX12 feature set than many are predicating.
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Thatâs precisely been my point, and the key differentiator to console hardware-level optimizations/features in the past.
Yep, these features are all supported on GPUs from AMD and Nvidia which will make the use and adoption if them more likely.
Edit: damn, sniped. 
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Both of you miss the point a bit - although you have a point that this is not Series S/X exclusive it is also on PC), this is not something you need to code for like Rapid Packed Math, if you use a third party engine. While it isnât press of a button easy, it will be a lot easier to implement than people give it credit for. Engine makers like Epic will make sure there is a âprofileâ available for Series S, that has the most used optimizations enabled, allowing you to fine tune it during development. You really donât have to âcode to metal!â -gosh I hated that term the last generation, no developer wantâs to develop that low level, unless itâs required for optimization. It takes away valuable time-. All youâll need to do is do testing to see if there are artifacts that really stand out and correct them in a way that is âclose enoughâ.
Again, I over simplify, but you donât need to change entire shaders and calculations to use RPM to take advantage of these optimizations. While the Series S supports it (RPM), and you can if you want use it, most of the features that will simplify parity at a lower resolution of it will be taken care of by the profile provided, if you then want to you can fine tune it furhter⌠(for your material shaders for instance were you can then choose to use RPM (but again itâs not needed)). But thatâs not the biggest gains here are things that can be obfuscated by an engine.
Also please remember that Microsoft owns an Engine maker now, one that is quite big. Not Unreal big, but big enough. An engine that runs on PC, PS5, Mac and Xbox. The Zenimax purchase makes a lot more sense once you start to realize the patents and technology are included in this as well. (Streaming patents, engine knowhow etc). I really hope MS will keep developing this, and will offer it to the âcommunityâ for free with a great feature tool set that also takes advantage of the PS5.
Not missed the point more that this is a different point altogether :).
I was saying that the more widely adopted a feature set is the more likely developers are to implement it in their game design. E.g. a game that uses SFS will be put together in a different way to one that doesnât due to memory bandwidth constraints when itâs not used.
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Sorry Iâm just really excited that efficiency returned a bit to design. Last generation was just⌠sigh⌠overpowered graphical processors with an under powered general processor with efficiency completely thrown out of the window. I mean from the perspective of an engineer/computer scientist, these consoles barely performed better (outside of the graphical/parts and the amount of memory) than the previous. Yes they had out of order execution now, but the processor was highly inefficient. I mean just look at the One X vs Series X in power usage. The Series X is using LESS power, and Iâm sure the Series S will be a really efficient little machine.
Itâs not only that. PS4 Pro had some more advanced features, but it was going against a GPU with a lot more raw processing power, more and faster memory, even a slightly faster CPU. So those advanced features were not enough to entirely close the gap, of course, but when properly utilized they might have made the gap slightly smaller than it wouldâve otherwise been.
Itâs not really a comparable situation because Series X now has both the raw processing power advantage AND seemingly more advanced features implemented in hardware.
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Precisely! Meetings all day, so I appreciate the succinct distillation.
Isnt a big point for this too is devs. dont have to migrate much work going from PC to XSX/S? Per the article: âNow, with the upcoming release of Xbox Series X|S and the new AMD Radeon RX 6000 Series GPUs, developers have a common set of next-generation tools and performance capabilities that will empower them to deliver transformative gaming experiences across both console and PC.â
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But PS5 is part of the conversation⌠And the community here clearly agrees. You know when discussing 2 platforms its not always console wars.
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And even then the difference wasnât that staggering really - between the XBox One S and the PS4 Pro -, for most people this was not something major. It was to run a 1080p game of that generation at 4k. So you needed 4 times the fill rate, 4 times the bandwidth and 4 times the operations. Something Microsoft seemed to realize, and if you look at what the Xbox One X could do, it is exactly that, having a 900p/1080p Xbox One S game run at 1800p/4k resolutions. Sony couldnât do that, first of all they wanted to release before the One X, so the machine would have been a lot more expensive, and 4 times what the PS 4 could do would mean a 7.2 a 8 teraflop machine, combined with the fill rates and memory bandwidths required to reach that target.
People forget that Microsoft had a far lower bandwidth to itâs memory set up, with a small little 32MB sub section of memory as a âsemi frame bufferâ, to compensate. For Sony this would not be possible to achieve without breaking the consumerâs bank account, again they also released their 4K enthusiast machine earlier. It then makes sense to go for optimizations like Checker boarding and RPM to compensate for the difference. This means you can also use lower resolution textures and thus save some bandwidth again.
There was no way Sony would have been able to release a machine with 4 times the PS4 bandwidth, Filtrate and shader operations. Microsoft wouldnât have been able to either if they had the performance crown that gen. But since their One S/Xbox One system was lower on the performance scale, it was a bit more within reach. 4K is expensive as a render target, both in performance and in price :P.
But again: For me it is mostly interesting for the opposite reasoning. PS 5 quality games on a 299 Dollar console at a lower resolution. It is perfectly within reach at those resolutions, band widths and operation performance. As remember: You only need 1/4th of it for most of the things you need to do (with exceptions to that rule of course.) And the optimizations will get it damn close in Image quality, even on par.
I canât wait for the Digital Foundry comparisons, itâll be fun to watch. Especially when you compare side by side image qualities and itâs like âerm⌠okay this is not worth the extra 100/200 buckaroosâ.
The series S might be a sleeper hit with families and kids bedrooms :P, especially after it getâs lowered in price a bit when the âNext gen Buzzâ goes down. When that thing reaches 199? Itâll fly.
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I knew when xbox was doing all that hand waving in 2013, something was not right. I didnât get an xbox until the One X. Itâs so clear sony is doing the same thing in 2020. I find it hard to believe people are so blind to it.
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They âjustâ refuse to acknowledge that - including gaming media.
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