What do the 360 processor specs translate into?

[sirgrotius]

My friends are mostly console nuts, so when I see talk about the 360 I become suspicious. In particular, I'm suspicious about the "three cpus running at 3.2 GHz" huh? How's that possible for the price of the system, is MS really losing that much money, are these processors somehow limited compared to processors that a PC gamer would use in her/his machine?

I apologize if this is too tangential, but I figure it'd be a learning experience for a newb such as me!

Custom IBM PowerPC-based CPU
• Three symmetrical cores running at 3.2 GHz each
• Two hardware threads per core; six hardware threads total
• VMX-128 vector unit per core; three total
• 128 VMX-128 registers per hardware thread
• 1 MB L2 cache

CPU Game Math Performance
• 9 billion dot product operations per second

Custom ATI Graphics Processor
• 500MHz processor
• 10 MB of embedded DRAM
• 48-way parallel floating-point dynamically scheduled shader pipelines
• Unified shader architecture

Polygon Performance
• 500 million triangles per second

Pixel Fill Rate
• 16 gigasamples per second fill rate using 4x MSAA

Shader Performance
• 48 billion shader operations per second

Memory
• 512 MB of GDDR3 RAM
• 700 MHz of DDR
• Unified memory architecture

Memory Bandwidth • 22.4 GB/s memory interface bus bandwidth
• 256 GB/s memory bandwidth to EDRAM
• 21.6 GB/s front-side bus

Overall System Floating-Point Performance
• 1 teraflop

Storage
• Detachable and upgradeable 20GB hard drive
• 12x dual-layer DVD-ROM
• Memory Unit support starting at 64 MB

 

[uber_g]

IBM power pc CPU's r slow

:/

 

[Cartman0123]

I'm sorry...was there a question here that you couldn't google?

 

[uber_g]

i hate HP

 

[apt403]

IBM power pc CPU's r slow

:/

the cell processor isnt, with 8 synergistic processoring units it UBER fast!

 

[Natecannon]

yeah, okie dokie.

 

[qcmadness]

You should not compare a non-x86 CPU to another x86 CPU.

 

[uber_g]

IBM power pc CPU's r slow

:/

the cell processor isnt, with 8 synergistic processoring units it UBER fast!


why do u think they need eight for .........

its freaking slow if the 360 needs EIGHT of them

 

[Natecannon]

and still gets significant slow down in games... UBER FAST :roll:

 

[apt403]

its freaking slow if the 360 needs EIGHT of them

you mean PS3? the xbox 360 only has 3 cores, i only pointed out the cell processor because it's an example of a really fast processor from IBM. and what about the kentsfield? it needs four cores to be really fast! and clovertown needs 8 cores as well to be Uber fast!

 

[uber_g]

and on the news a baby gets punched in the FACE

ha

 

[weskurtz81]

So since the Cell processor has eight cores, it must be fast right? That is kind of like saying if I put 8 weedeater engines in my truck, it will be as fast as my V-8..... come on man.

 

[apt403]

each of the 8 cores runs at 3.2ghz.

 

[chameleon101]

Here is an rxample of how crappy console processor's are, we are looking at a next generation game for pc and the system requirements for the game to run then below that is a link about why consoles simply wont be able to run it.

Minimum Requirements

CPU: Athlon 64 3000+/Intel 2.8ghz
Graphics: Nvidia 6600/X800GTO (SM 2.0)
RAM: 768Mb/1Gb on Windows Vista
HDD: 6GB
Internet: 256k+
Optical Drive: DVD
Software: DX9.0c with Windows XP

Recommended Requirements

CPU: Dual-core CPU (Athlon X2/Pentium D)
Graphics: Nvidia 7800GTX/ATI X1800XT (SM 3.0) or DX10 equivalent
RAM: 1.5Gb
HDD: 6GB
Internet: 512k+ (128k+ upstream)
Optical Drive: DVD
Software: DX10 with Windows Vista


http://ve3d.ign.com/articles/728/728629p1.html

 

[weskurtz81]

Cell processors do not work quite like you think. It is not as powerful as Core or K8. As it has been proven in the past, clock speed is not the best judge of processor performance. A lower clocked K8 was kicking the high clocked P4's all over the place, there is much more to a cpu than clock speed. Not to mention, what are you going to be doing that would require a REAL 8 core cpu. Playing games? Negative. If the games were so intensive, we would not be able to play the pc games on a single core cpu. What is the most important part of a gaming setup playing at high resolutions? The video card is it not? So then..... even if the cell processor was so powerful, what would it matter, and when would you actually be able to harness all that power?

wes

btw: do a little research on cell....

Edit: Don't get me wrong, in certain applications I am sure the cell will shine, but it is not needed for gaming, and I highly doubt it will be as versatile as what we are currently using in the pc world for the simple fact that the main core is a power pc based core. It isn't litteraly 8 cores like you are thinking, it is quite a bit different than that. But as I said, in very specific tasks, scientific tasks, it might shine, but before I beleive it, I would like to see benchmarks from many of the tops sites..... if it they can find a way to accomplish this.

 

[rquinn19]

Here is an rxample of how crappy console processor's are, we are looking at a next generation game for pc and the system requirements for the game to run then below that is a link about why consoles simply wont be able to run it.

Minimum Requirements

CPU: Athlon 64 3000+/Intel 2.8ghz
Graphics: Nvidia 6600/X800GTO (SM 2.0)
RAM: 768Mb/1Gb on Windows Vista
HDD: 6GB
Internet: 256k+
Optical Drive: DVD
Software: DX9.0c with Windows XP

Recommended Requirements

CPU: Dual-core CPU (Athlon X2/Pentium D)
Graphics: Nvidia 7800GTX/ATI X1800XT (SM 3.0) or DX10 equivalent
RAM: 1.5Gb
HDD: 6GB
Internet: 512k+ (128k+ upstream)
Optical Drive: DVD
Software: DX10 with Windows Vista


http://ve3d.ign.com/articles/728/728629p1.html

not a good example...they'll never release a console game that looks like a pc game with all graphics to the lowest setting.

 

[darkstar782]

each of the 8 cores runs at 3.2ghz.

Yeah but the cores in Cell are not fully fledged independant CPUs that would run fine alone like an x86 core.

They are highly specialised units, originally Sonys plan with PS3 was to run all the Gfx processing on Cell too, so it has a parralel GPU-like design.

The 8 cores in cell are not ideally suited to general purpose calculation.

Plus, we all know GPUs have more influence on games than CPUs.

The ATi GPU in the Xbox360's closest PC equivalent is a x1900XT, except that the Xbox360 GPU is clocked alot slower, at 500MHz.

The PS3's GPU is almost exactly a G70.

By the time PS3 comes out, G80 will be out, and is approx 2-2.5x (and thats a conservative number) faster than the G70/7800.

R600 will follow in the next couple of months, and will run rings around the ATi GPU in the Xbox 360.

I wont mention SLi G80 and Crossfire R600.

Given a year, there will be even more powerful cards about, and we will be back to the stage where console gfx are shite. The games will still be way overpriced compared to PC games however.

Consoles have one advantage however : most people (in the UK at least) are still running them on shitty Standard Definition TVs, hence their output resolution is around 640x480. (PAL anyway)

Try playing games in that res on a PC, and you'll see that you dont need much Graphics power to do it.

Consoles always have amazing specs when they are announced, lightyears ahead of PCs. By the time they come out there are faster PCs about, and a year into their 5-6 year lifespan, most new PCs will be faster. A couple more years and Consoles just suck tbh.

 

[Cartman0123]

i hate HP

This gets my vote for most worthless post of the day. :roll:

 

[dasickninja]

You get mine for pointing out such. Let sleeping dogs lie.

 

[breedalot]

lots of people talk about games needing gpu more than cpu but this is just not true all the time.

The best selling game in the uk is football manager 2007 it doesn't use the gpu at all but maxes the cpu (and supports threading) it is also coming out on xbox360 in a few weeks.

well couldn't a comparison be done using this app it wouldn't be 100% but it would give an idea

 

[K8MAN]

Powerful enough to run UE 3.0 games smooth as butter. I cant wait for Gears of War in a few days

 

[NightlySputnik]

IBM power pc CPU's r slow

:/

the cell processor isnt, with 8 synergistic processoring units it UBER fast!

2 things:

Fast as long as you can get to program for it, which is gonna take a long time for game designer to exploit to it's maximum.

Fast but not flexible, as oppose to any x86 or Power achitecture.

Also, I'm not sure it look so "Uber fast" now that we have Kentsfield and shortly 4*4, all before PS3 is released. After that comes Barcelona and Nehalem, all within respectivly 6 and 12-15 months following PS3. They will just crush CELL. I might be wrong, but I'd be surprised.

 

[NightlySputnik]

Here is an rxample of how crappy console processor's are, we are looking at a next generation game for pc and the system requirements for the game to run then below that is a link about why consoles simply wont be able to run it.

Minimum Requirements

CPU: Athlon 64 3000+/Intel 2.8ghz
Graphics: Nvidia 6600/X800GTO (SM 2.0)
RAM: 768Mb/1Gb on Windows Vista
HDD: 6GB
Internet: 256k+
Optical Drive: DVD
Software: DX9.0c with Windows XP

Recommended Requirements

CPU: Dual-core CPU (Athlon X2/Pentium D)
Graphics: Nvidia 7800GTX/ATI X1800XT (SM 3.0) or DX10 equivalent
RAM: 1.5Gb
HDD: 6GB
Internet: 512k+ (128k+ upstream)
Optical Drive: DVD
Software: DX10 with Windows Vista


http://ve3d.ign.com/articles/728/728629p1.html

not a good example...they'll never release a console game that looks like a pc game with all graphics to the lowest setting.

Console do one thing: Play games!!!

PC do many things, for a price.

If you look at the last years of gaming, console always had the advantage of power for the first 6 or so months of their life. But it always change rapidly to the point that just before the new one gets released, the previous model look like crap. Seriously, how powerful is an XBOX original to you? It'll all be the same in 3 years from now when next generations of console will start to appear.

The only advantage a console has: it's price, and the fact that all games made for it won't be limited by hardware as long as you own it. I'd personally get a console if all I would do is gaming. But it's not the case.

About PowerPC inside XBox360, it surely beats any dual-core P4, but I wouldn't bet on A64FX62 and Core2Duo (most probably faster than XBox360 cpu), and I can assure you that new Core2Quatro outperforms it. And remember, it came out less than a year ago.

About the VPU, it's definitly more powerful than PS3 one. But both are limited by total amount of available memory. It limits what's possible. PC VPU will shortly easily surpass both, and will especially have more memory to do even more.

 

[captaincharisma]

heh how can cell be a crappy processor when IBM is using it in there blade servers

http://www.vnunet.com/vnunet/news/2164084/cell-servers-set-hit-market

 

[mr_fnord]

Cell is based on PowerPC architecture, 1 controller core and 8 processoor cores, all PowerPC derived. For things like vector processing, matrices, and repetitive linear calculations the cell processor is amazing. Only certain types of software can effectively use this type of processor, but those types are simulations, physics, polygon calculation, and other tasks where millions of points need to be calculated repeatedly. Will it make your Windows load faster? No, but it does have wide ranging applications.

Comparing the Cell to Conroe is a bit like comparing a Cyrix 6x86 to a Pentium. The Cyrix destroyed the Pentium at arithmetic tasks but the Pentium had an FPU so it could do all kinds tasks that a Cyrix was incapable of. If you were running windows and word, the FPU sat idle. Now, the Cell introduces a scale of staged calculation only seen in specialized processors like GPUs. Will it run Windows faster? No, but it will do tasks that x86 chips cannot, and it will do them very quickly.