Comparison of 6th generation game console hardware

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Originally Posted by stu

AFAIK all the GeForce GPUs have Hardware T&L onboard, it was the Geforce256 that was first Nvidia consumer cards to feature it. Geforce 3 introduced the Pixel and Vertex shaders. The NV2a chip is a variant of the Geforce 3 but also includes the "northbridge" architecture, which in PCs is a series of chips that allows the CPU to access it's Level 2 cache and also the main memory controller. Nvidia developed the Nforce series of PC motherboard chipsets from their work on the Xchip/NV2a chip.

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That is interesting. I'm really not that familiar with the NVidia and Ati graphics cards from the time as I was using Matrox and then Videologic until I got my All in Wonder 7500. I usually check Tomshardware's Graphic Card Heirarchy list when making purchase decisions, I'm guessing we're talking about the second from the bottom tier of Nvidia cards here. I used to have a bunch of links comparing the Xbox graphics chip to whatever prior and next discrete graphics card came out from Nvidia but I seem to have lost it.

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Originally Posted by Crazyace

Hi Sheath,
The numbers are millions of polys/second for different models - the 2nd number is the number of vertices ( less than 3x the triangle count as the platforms see vertex reuse ) - the bunny model contains more small triangles, so it runs a bit more closer to the theoretical numbers.
So read it as real game examples:

Xbox 47.2MTriangles/second
PS2 17MTriangles/second
Gamecube 24.1MTriangles/second

you can compare that against the 7M figure for dreamcast.

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Crazyace, thanks for that clarification. That Gamecube number is the PC, which is cited as an AMD 1300Mhz and Radeon 8500, which should be three full tiers above whatever is in the Xbox but performs half as well on EA's engine. Also, how did they get to 17-40 million polygons per second with a single 3998 polygon model? I guess if they were just benchmarking they were seeing how many frames the system could render in a second. To get to even the lowest end figure we're talking about over 4000 frames in a second.

Sorry Sheath, wrote the PC number by mistake - Gamecube is the NGC line ( PC was a 'reference' ) - the times are extrapolated, ie. Drawing one 3998 triangle model in 235microseconds implies a 17million triangle/second figure.

I guess since that's EA's article this isn't an uncommon practice. Still, there's a lot of assumptions in that figure. Do we have a single confirmed developer quote of any Xbox, Gamecube or PS2 game surpassing 5 million polygons per second? I have no delusions that the Dreamcast wasn't going to achieve that in a sustained way, but from what I've seen the later consoles benefit more from their RAM advantage than from any clear rendering advantage.

Hi Sheath,
EA's article represents an internal engine tech, so it would appear in games - and it covers things pretty comprehensively. You also have this ( http://research.scee.net/files/prese...rHaveWeGot.pdf ) where there's a quote of a game drawing 7.5M( 125k at 60fps ) triangles on screen on PS2 - using a tool that only shows drawn triangles - game draw numbers would be higher as they also cover backwards facing or clipped triangles.
There are other quotes - just google search if you want ( although some are getting old now I guess )

Hi Sheath,
EA's article represents an internal engine tech, so it would appear in games - and it covers things pretty comprehensively. You also have this ( http://research.scee.net/files/prese...rHaveWeGot.pdf ) where there's a quote of a game drawing 7.5M( 125k at 60fps ) triangles on screen on PS2 - using a tool that only shows drawn triangles - game draw numbers would be higher as they also cover backwards facing or clipped triangles.
There are other quotes - just google search if you want ( although some are getting old now I guess )

( Another one here http://develop.scee.net/files/presen...leYourself.pdf shows a sample running 33Million triangles per second - look at page 29 )

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Originally Posted by sheath

That is interesting. I'm really not that familiar with the NVidia and Ati graphics cards from the time as I was using Matrox and then Videologic until I got my All in Wonder 7500. I usually check Tomshardware's Graphic Card Heirarchy list when making purchase decisions, I'm guessing we're talking about the second from the bottom tier of Nvidia cards here. I used to have a bunch of links comparing the Xbox graphics chip to whatever prior and next discrete graphics card came out from Nvidia but I seem to have lost it.

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As for a comparative PC chip what I recall the Xchip/NV2a was roughly the same league as the Nvidia Geforce 3 Ti500 (I think the Ti500 was clocked slightly higher though), which at the time was Nvidia's top GPU. As for that list you linked to it would probably be somwhere between the 4th and 5th tiers fom the bottom of the list where it covers Geforce 3 Ti200, the stock GF3 and the top end Ti500.

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Originally Posted by Crazyace

Hi Sheath,
EA's article represents an internal engine tech, so it would appear in games - and it covers things pretty comprehensively. You also have this ( http://research.scee.net/files/prese...rHaveWeGot.pdf ) where there's a quote of a game drawing 7.5M( 125k at 60fps ) triangles on screen on PS2 - using a tool that only shows drawn triangles - game draw numbers would be higher as they also cover backwards facing or clipped triangles.
There are other quotes - just google search if you want ( although some are getting old now I guess )

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I thought I had searched ever possible way to find articles like these, I guess I didn't. Page 13 is pretty decisive, even at 25 frames per second 52,000 per frame is 1.3 million per second. It's interesting that the average framerate is 25/30 or below, with only half of the games hitting that. I noticed that about that generation of games, they didn't seem to target a solid framerate in most games. Page 32's summary is interesting as well. VUO was the PS2's "SCU DSP", but some games hit 125k polys at 60FPS with only 8% of the VUO, I'd like to see those games. I guess Gran Turismo 3 is one of them, that's the only 60FPS game I know of besides F355 Challenge.

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Originally Posted by stu

As for a comparative PC chip what I recall the Xchip/NV2a was roughly the same league as the Nvidia Geforce 3 Ti500 (I think the Ti500 was clocked slightly higher though), which at the time was Nvidia's top GPU. As for that list you linked to it would probably be somwhere between the 4th and 5th tiers fom the bottom of the list where it covers Geforce 3 Ti200, the stock GF3 and the top end Ti500.

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So way above the Radeon 7500? That is interesting, I upgraded my PC to an All in Wonder 7500 in 2003 or 2004, shortly after I bought the Xbox. PC games looked clearly superior to PS2 games after that and the Xbox was sometimes better sometimes worse. I couldn't run Doom 3 at all even after I upgraded again to an AiW 2006 and 1300Mhz Duron.

Melbourne house did a F1 game on PS2 - which is interesting to compare with their dreamcast efforts ( There's an interview about it here http://uk.gamespot.com/grand-prix-ch...912020/?page=2 )

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Originally Posted by Crazyace

Melbourne house did a F1 game on PS2 - which is interesting to compare with their dreamcast efforts ( There's an interview about it here http://uk.gamespot.com/grand-prix-ch...912020/?page=2 )

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I forgot to mention this, the game looks interesting. Melbourne House did wonders with the PS2 Transformers Armada game. I will have to see if I can snag Grand Prix Challenge sometime, Test Drive Lemans did not make the port all that well.

Moved from the Xbox 720 16-core thread:

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Originally Posted by TVC 15

Riva TNT2 - Early '99
180 Megapixels/second
6 Million polygons per second peak

Voodoo 3 - Mid '99
183 Megapixels/second
8 Million polygons per second peak

PowerVR2 - 98'
100 Megapixels/second (200 to 300 Mpixels/sec deferred rendering rate)
Over 3 Million polygons per second (some homebrew demos have indicated the PowerVR2 absoloute maximum it can setup is 4.2 Million)

I realise thats a bit of a feature checklist but at the end of the day PC hardware before the Geforce 256 relied on the host cpu for Geometry rendering, and the SH-4 with its FPU/Vector unit was faster (at least on paper) than contemporary mainstream PC CPU's until '99. The SH-4 could theoretically calculate at peak efficency around 7 Million polygons a second, but thats most likely 100% maxed out, with no integer caculations i.e A.I Game Logic etc. burdening the CPU. The real hard limit of the DC is how many Polygons the PowerVR can setup, at around 4 Million the PowerVR along with the frame buffer eats up practically all VRAM leaving non behind for Textures etc.

Only until the PS2 (Emotion Engine), Pentium 3, Athlon and T&L chips such as those on the Geforce 256 and Radeon did PC hardware leave the DC in the dust. Before that the DC was very competative.

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While looking for a case for what was to be my 90s game box I landed a Pentium III 500Mhz system with a Riva TNT AGP card. I just got it cleaned up and ran 3DMark 2000 with all non-crucial services off. I thought the results were somewhat interesting:

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3DMark Result: 1866 3D marks
CPU Speed: 152 CPU 3D marks
Game 1 - Helicopter - Low Detail: 36.9 FPS
Game 1 - Helicopter - Medium Detail: 26.6 FPS
Game 1 - Helicopter - High Detail: 13.6 FPS
Game 2 - Adventure - Low Detail: 33.6 FPS
Game 2 - Adventure - Medium Detail: 26.9 FPS
Game 2 - Adventure - High Detail: 18.0 FPS
Fill Rate (Single-Texturing): 140.8 MTexels/s
Fill Rate (Multi-Texturing): 144.6 MTexels/s
High Polygon Count (1 Light): 2557 KTriangles/s
High Polygon Count (4 Lights): 2248 KTriangles/s
High Polygon Count (8 Lights): 1934 KTriangles/s
8MB Texture Rendering Speed: 60.1 FPS
16MB Texture Rendering Speed: 59.9 FPS
32MB Texture Rendering Speed: 59.3 FPS
64MB Texture Rendering Speed: 43.9 FPS
Bump Mapping (Emboss, 3-pass): 59.9 FPS
Bump Mapping (Emboss, 2-pass): 60.1 FPS
Bump Mapping (Emboss, 1-pass): 60.1 FPS
Bump Mapping (Environment): Not supported FPS

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I guess not much of that makes sense, but the 2.5 million polygons per second with one light is an interesting return in comparison to the Dreamcast. This is the last generation Nvidia card before hardware transform and lighting was added with the Riva TNT 2 cards, I think. I'm not sure how the MTexels/s rating compares to the Mega Pixel speeds TVC was talking about above either.

Hi Sheath,
This brouchure for Riva TNT quotes a 5M triangle limit - maybe the 2.5 is lower due to direct x overheads :)

http://web.archive.org/web/199707060...28/index3.html

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Originally Posted by sheath

I guess not much of that makes sense, but the 2.5 million polygons per second with one light is an interesting return in comparison to the Dreamcast. This is the last generation Nvidia card before hardware transform and lighting was added with the Riva TNT 2 cards, I think. I'm not sure how the MTexels/s rating compares to the Mega Pixel speeds TVC was talking about above either.

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Egads! I've been quoted! I think those details came from a few technical discussion threads over at Vogons I did some lurking on. In fact Sheath if your thinking of making a retro PC I'd recommend joining or at least doing some thread searches, a lot of great info and posters over there.

In the company of people who know what there talking about (i.e Crazyace, Chilly Willy) do take those specs with a small pinch of salt, otherwise I'll feel embarrassed!

Oh yeah, maximum spec capabilities should always be regarded as "in a vacuum". I just thought it was interesting given that discussion over whether PIII based PCs had clearly surpassed the Dreamcast. Even with a Pentium III 500Mhz this PC doesn't technically outperform the Dreamcast's launch titles. 3DMark 2000 pushed systems harder than ANY PC game I saw at the time, at least in per scene detail and texture mapping. Actually all of the 3DMarks did that, so I consider them fairly accurate to true performance. I even tried overclocking this Riva TNT at Barone's request, but it just scrambled everything and crashed Windows.

I'll run 3DMark 99 Max with my new Matrox Mystique 8MB as soon as I figure out how in the heck to get Windows 98 to treat my Ultra ATA hard drives with respect. I'll probably also install the TNT in the 98SE partition as well just to see if 98 or XP is more resource unfriendly. I stumbled over some threads on Vogons already, thanks for reminding me. Currently I am having a hell of a time getting a boot menu that actually allows me to select XP or 98SE, right now I'm having to use a boot manager that loads from CD-ROM to select them, and have downright broken 98SE trying to update the IDE drivers. Man, I remember how much of a pain 95-98SE were to keep running with any sort of reliability. I've been spoiled by all of the plug 'n play that XP uses.

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Originally Posted by sheath

Oh yeah, maximum spec capabilities should always be regarded as "in a vacuum". I just thought it was interesting given that discussion over whether PIII based PCs had clearly surpassed the Dreamcast. Even with a Pentium III 500Mhz this PC doesn't technically outperform the Dreamcast's launch titles. 3DMark 2000 pushed systems harder than ANY PC game I saw at the time, at least in per scene detail and texture mapping. Actually all of the 3DMarks did that, so I consider them fairly accurate to true performance. I even tried overclocking this Riva TNT at Barone's request, but it just scrambled everything and crashed Windows.

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Wether PC's where behind or equaling the Dreamcast at 1999/2000, the Dreamcast was bleeding edge. Its no surprise people canonised it after death, such a great piece of hardware.

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I'll run 3DMark 99 Max with my new Matrox Mystique 8MB as soon as I figure out how in the heck to get Windows 98 to treat my Ultra ATA hard drives with respect. I'll probably also install the TNT in the 98SE partition as well just to see if 98 or XP is more resource unfriendly. I stumbled over some threads on Vogons already, thanks for reminding me. Currently I am having a hell of a time getting a boot menu that actually allows me to select XP or 98SE, right now I'm having to use a boot manager that loads from CD-ROM to select them, and have downright broken 98SE trying to update the IDE drivers. Man, I remember how much of a pain 95-98SE were to keep running with any sort of reliability. I've been spoiled by all of the plug 'n play that XP uses.

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Amen! I have completely forgot how to dual boot windows 9x, I did once get Vista and 98SE to play nice, but all I can very vaguely remember was command line stuff, such a faff. Maybe my psyche has buried it as some traumatic event!

My pet project at the minute is finding a Voodoo 2 for my old Power Mac. Get this, earlier and up to including version 3 copies of Virtual PC for the classic Macintosh (OS 9/8/7.6) allow the use of a standard PC PCI Voodoo 1 or 2 to provide 3D acceleration in virtualised windows 95/98! I have some mad cap experiment in mind to see how it works and see if I can get 3d accelerated Half-Life working, since I don't have any decent pre-2000 PC hardware anymore. I even managed to get Half-Life running in software mode on Virtual PC, it was hideously painful!

I would defiantly root around on Vogons, some one wise should very quickly solve any hardware problems your having, and can offer some of there own anecdotal info regarding performance benchmarks, they love comparing benchmarks. I'm sure the Matrox Mystique whilst decent back in, when was it 97-98? Would get eaten for breakfast by the DC PowerVR and Riva TNT.

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Originally Posted by TVC 15

Wether PC's where behind or equaling the Dreamcast at 1999/2000, the Dreamcast was bleeding edge. Its no surprise people canonised it after death, such a great piece of hardware.

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That's what I think, but I've been wrong before. If my VGA-S-video converter works as I expect it to I should be able to make videos comparing the performance differences.

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Originally Posted by TVC 15

Amen! I have completely forgot how to dual boot windows 9x, I did once get Vista and 98SE to play nice, but all I can very vaguely remember was command line stuff, such a faff. Maybe my psyche has buried it as some traumatic event!

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What I am finding odd is how few resources are returning from a simple bing or google search. Maybe I should search on yahoo for Windows 98 tips. oldapps.com has been useful, but finding motherboard specific drivers for this stupid Gateway has been a pain. That's why I wanted to use my old Asus board, but the jump from a Celeron 300A to a Pentium III 500Mhz was too good to be missed. Ah the days when part numbers told you something about the processor.

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Originally Posted by TVC 15

My pet project at the minute is finding a Voodoo 2 for my old Power Mac. Get this, earlier and up to including version 3 copies of Virtual PC for the classic Macintosh (OS 9/8/7.6) allow the use of a standard PC PCI Voodoo 1 or 2 to provide 3D acceleration in virtualised windows 95/98! I have some mad cap experiment in mind to see how it works and see if I can get 3d accelerated Half-Life working, since I don't have any decent pre-2000 PC hardware anymore. I even managed to get Half-Life running in software mode on Virtual PC, it was hideously painful!

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That sounds like an experiment, whether or not it will be fun is up to the daemons.

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Originally Posted by TVC 15

I would defiantly root around on Vogons, some one wise should very quickly solve any hardware problems your having, and can offer some of there own anecdotal info regarding performance benchmarks, they love comparing benchmarks. I'm sure the Matrox Mystique whilst decent back in, when was it 97-98? Would get eaten for breakfast by the DC PowerVR and Riva TNT.

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Defiantly I will root! Yeah, I don't expect the Matrox Mystique to compete, but I do expect it to represent pre-3dFX hardware accelerated 3D PC graphics at its best in 1997. That is the highest I will feel compelled to compare Saturn and PS1 games, any better and I might as well compare them to what my octal core W7 64-bit machine can do.