was the Xbox more powerful than the GameCube?

Ok, I was at bestbuy showing an employee how my phone had better graphics than the vita, and I dont know why but he said the ps2 had the strongest graphics chip of its gen nd I corrected him. Before I knew it 5 employees got into the discussion and a few customers. It turnned into a gc vs xbox hardware war. Both sides made valid points but I couldn't believe  an argument would break out over decade old console hardware. Apparently the xbox gpu was more powerful than the gc's but it could do stuff the xgpu couldn't and the xbox's programmble shaders took a hit on performance whereas the gmecube's fixed function shaders didnt. The gc had a better cpu and faster ram altho less. apparently the xbox wouldnt be able to handle wind waker due to slow ram but jet set radio future looks way better imo. I still have both consolez and I dont think one looks better thn the other graphically, but gc exclusives do run better with less frame drops than the xbox. So, was the xbox really the most powerful console or was it like a ps3 vs 360 situation? 

I think last gen went like this in power terms

Xbox >>> GC >> PS2 > DC 

Xbox was the only console I never owned. So I never got to play it much because I only knew one person who owned one. 

Xbox was more powerful, but that doesn't mean a whole lot. 

Xbox was more powerful but I still think Metroid Prime 1+2 look MUCH better than Halo 1 or Halo 2. YoshiYogurt

What you said makes sense, TC. Both had their advantages and weaknesses.Hseptic

They were pretty close - they had different architecture and the graphics on some of the games were on par with each other, but the Xbox had the advantage in DVD space and its internal hard drive. 

[QUOTE="Hseptic"]What you said makes sense, TC. Both had their advantages and weaknesses.Jakandsigz

[QUOTE="YoshiYogurt"]Xbox was more powerful but I still think Metroid Prime 1+2 look MUCH better than Halo 1 or Halo 2. superclocked

After playing these games in recent times on the OG Xbox, i found Halo 2 to look astronomically better than Halo CE, so i honestly cannot comprehend such an opinion. The performance was the exact same as CE, aswell.

[QUOTE="Jakandsigz"][QUOTE="Hseptic"]What you said makes sense, TC. Both had their advantages and weaknesses.Kaszilla

It deff. had a better GPU and more RAM.

Xbox's GPU was a modified GeForce 3 and very advanced for it's time.

In comparison, GC had a GPU developed by ArtX, who were later acquired by ATi (now AMD) and it had, like you said, fixed-function shaders and was more in the performance ballpark of the GeForce 2. (PS2's GPU was somewhere in in the middle of GF1 & GF2, performance-wise)

GC's strong points were the fast 1T-SRAM and PowerPC CPU architecture which was better for graphics related stuff than the modified Pentium 3 in Xbox.

Still, more RAM and a better GPU gave Xbox the graphical edge over NGC and several games showcased it. (not so much GC games whose most impressive games came out rather late, e.g. Rogue Leader 2 & Resident Evil 4)

The CPU debate is also under question since Xbox showcased physics and AI not seen in GC games which may lead to conclusion that it's Pentium 3 derivate was actually better for those calculations than the PowerPC in GC.

The GameCube had more raw power, in terms of floating point performance and polygon fill rate.

However, the Xbox had superior shading capabilities (programmable hardware pixel shaders versus the GameCube's fixed-function pipeline shading).

Xbox was more powerful. However I wonder what would of happened if both systems lasted longer.

There used to be a website that listed the 'tech specs' of every system from every console generation (pcvsconsole.com - but it seems like it doesn't exist anymore).

At least from what I remember, the main CPU speed in the Xbox was something like 750MHz vs the one in the GameCube was somewhere around 400, or 450MHz. The Wii is/was actually very similar in power to the original Xbox. PS2 was around 300, and DreamCast was 233. Not that CPU power is everything, just the main thing I remember.

Edit:  It seemed like most multiplatform games either had smoother framerates and/or more graphical touches available on the Xbox version.  It may have also been said that games like Doom 3 and Half-Life 2 could only be run on the Xbox.

Even if you go by the bare minimum of speed Nintendo Gamecube run a 485 Megahertz and Xbox ran a 733 megahehertz. Plus the Xbox had a 8GB HDD which ended up being quite revolutionary for videogame consoles at the time this was new. Today Xbox One and PS4 will come with 500GB HDD's back way back in 2001. It was a brand new idea of a HDD coming with your videogame console out of the box.

Xbox was basically a Pentium 3 computer. While Gamecube used the processor of a 1997 Power PC 1 computer. Which began Nintendo's tradition of PowerPC tech for their game consoles as seen in Wii and Wii U.

Yes.

Even if you go by the bare minimum of speed Nintendo Gamecube run a 485 Megahertz and Xbox ran a 733 megahehertz. Plus the Xbox had a 8GB HDD which ended up being quite revolutionary for videogame consoles at the time this was new. Today Xbox One and PS4 will come with 500GB HDD's back way back in 2001. It was a brand new idea of a HDD coming with your videogame console out of the box.

Xbox was basically a Pentium 3 computer. While Gamecube used the processor of a 1997 Power PC 1 computer. Which began Nintendo's tradition of PowerPC tech for their game consoles as seen in Wii and Wii U.

Megavideogamer

[QUOTE="Megavideogamer"]

Even if you go by the bare minimum of speed Nintendo Gamecube run a 485 Megahertz and Xbox ran a 733 megahehertz. Plus the Xbox had a 8GB HDD which ended up being quite revolutionary for videogame consoles at the time this was new. Today Xbox One and PS4 will come with 500GB HDD's back way back in 2001. It was a brand new idea of a HDD coming with your videogame console out of the box.

Xbox was basically a Pentium 3 computer. While Gamecube used the processor of a 1997 Power PC 1 computer. Which began Nintendo's tradition of PowerPC tech for their game consoles as seen in Wii and Wii U.

Kaszilla

Xbox was more powerful. However I wonder what would of happened if both systems lasted longer.

Seabas989

[QUOTE="Seabas989"]

Xbox was more powerful. However I wonder what would of happened if both systems lasted longer.

LittleMac19

[QUOTE="LittleMac19"][QUOTE="Seabas989"]

Xbox was more powerful. However I wonder what would of happened if both systems lasted longer.

Yo-SUP

It would be cool if MS went with a 1 GHz CPU and 128 MB RAM with the first Xbox.

They were already loosing cash on it so why not give gamers that extra bit of power? ;) (you could upgrade the console with a 1 GHz CPU and 128 MB RAM but games didn't take advantage of it)

GameCube would also benefit from more RAM.

I actually think the next-gen consoles will be the first time consoles won't run out of RAM so fast or that it would bottleneck development.

Xbox was known as the graphics king that gen, right? Didn't some of its games even run in 720p?

[QUOTE="superclocked"][QUOTE="YoshiYogurt"]Xbox was more powerful but I still think Metroid Prime 1+2 look MUCH better than Halo 1 or Halo 2. Lucianu

After playing these games in recent times on the OG Xbox, i found Halo 2 to look astronomically better than Halo CE, so i honestly cannot comprehend such an opinion. The performance was the exact same as CE, aswell.

xbox 1. gamecube was a piece of shit.

xbox 1 came out at a time that i was still devastated from the dreamcast's violent death. it was nice having a hardcore gaming console back. i liked it better at for its time than 360 now

If the xbox was more powerful, why do the gc exclusives look as good if not better than xbox exclusivez while running at smoother framerates?Kaszilla

Because Nintendo are very talented when it comes to their games.

[QUOTE="Kaszilla"]If the xbox was more powerful, why do the gc exclusives look as good if not better than xbox exclusivez while running at smoother framerates?Seabas989

Because Nintendo are very talented when it comes to their games.

If the xbox was more powerful, why do the gc exclusives look as good if not better than xbox exclusivez while running at smoother framerates?Kaszilla

Depends which ones.

The Rogue Squadron and Resident Evil games on NGC look fantastic to this day, still.

But Xbox had Doom 3, Far Cry Instincts, Panzer Dragoon Orta, Otogi, Ninja Gaiden, SC: Chaos Theory which gave GC's best a run for their money.

[QUOTE="Kaszilla"]If the xbox was more powerful, why do the gc exclusives look as good if not better than xbox exclusivez while running at smoother framerates?nameless12345

Depends which ones.

The Rogue Squadron and Resident Evil games on NGC look fantastic to this day, still.

But Xbox had Doom 3, Far Cry Instincts, Panzer Dragoon Orta, Otogi, Ninja Gaiden, SC: Chaos Theory which gave GC's best a run for their money.

Even if you go by the bare minimum of speed Nintendo Gamecube run a 485 Megahertz and Xbox ran a 733 megahehertz. Plus the Xbox had a 8GB HDD which ended up being quite revolutionary for videogame consoles at the time this was new. Today Xbox One and PS4 will come with 500GB HDD's back way back in 2001. It was a brand new idea of a HDD coming with your videogame console out of the box.

Xbox was basically a Pentium 3 computer. While Gamecube used the processor of a 1997 Power PC 1 computer. Which began Nintendo's tradition of PowerPC tech for their game consoles as seen in Wii and Wii U.

Megavideogamer

The GameCube's PowerPC CPU was faster than the Xbox's Pentium III. It's not the clock rate that matters, but how many instructions it could process with each clock cycle. The PowerPC was superior to the Pentium III in that regard, hence why the Xbox 360 abandoned the Pentium III and went with a PowerPC architecture like the GameCube. In addition, the GameCube's 1T-SRAM was also faster than the Xbox's SDRAM. When it came to speed, the GameCube was the faster console, with practical polygon fill rates pushing up to 15 million polygons per second in game, while the Xbox was barely able to push beyond 10 million polygons per second in game. The Xbox's main advantages over the GameCube lied in its more advanced 3D graphical capabilities, particularly the use of programmable pixel shaders, and of course the PC-like architecture which made it easier to develop games for.

[QUOTE="Kaszilla"]If the xbox was more powerful, why do the gc exclusives look as good if not better than xbox exclusivez while running at smoother framerates?nameless12345

Depends which ones.

The Rogue Squadron and Resident Evil games on NGC look fantastic to this day, still.

But Xbox had Doom 3, Far Cry Instincts, Panzer Dragoon Orta, Otogi, Ninja Gaiden, SC: Chaos Theory which gave GC's best a run for their money.

[QUOTE="nameless12345"]

[QUOTE="Kaszilla"]If the xbox was more powerful, why do the gc exclusives look as good if not better than xbox exclusivez while running at smoother framerates?Jag85

Depends which ones.

The Rogue Squadron and Resident Evil games on NGC look fantastic to this day, still.

But Xbox had Doom 3, Far Cry Instincts, Panzer Dragoon Orta, Otogi, Ninja Gaiden, SC: Chaos Theory which gave GC's best a run for their money.

If they were running in HD res, yes.

But 360 still had better-looking launch games like Perfect Dark Zero, Kameo, PGR3, GRAW, ect.

You wouldn't catch me dead ever touching the XBox, so I prefer the GameCube.BigBen11111

I think this question is kind of inherently flawed.
 

Are you asking "what machine has better graphics, sound, and processing capabilities?" That is a question with a surefire answer, and not an opinion as people tend to treat it. "The GC is more powerful," some people say, "because Super Metroid looked graphically better than Halo." That's not a reason. That's called a Hasty Generalization, which is a form of logical fallacy. "One game looks better than another, therefore the entire system must be better than another."

The only people I can think of who are technically capable of answering this question are game developers and product designers, and I'm not one of those and I don't think that many of us are. If you were to ask "which console was the better gaming system?" then that'd be more up to opinion and would probably run smoother; better yet, "which console had better titles?" Then some could all say "I preferred Super Metroid to Halo," and others could disagree. But I haven't seen much talk about graphics cards, RAM capacities, or anything else that sounds technologically sound--it's mostly talk about specific games outperforming other games. One console is more powerful than the other, and although I don't know which one is, I would rather spend my time debating which games I thought were better, rather than declaring one console more "powerful" than another. 

[QUOTE="BigBen11111"]You wouldn't catch me dead ever touching the XBox, so I prefer the GameCube.YoshiYogurt

[QUOTE="YoshiYogurt"][QUOTE="BigBen11111"]You wouldn't catch me dead ever touching the XBox, so I prefer the GameCube.BigBen11111

[QUOTE="YoshiYogurt"][QUOTE="BigBen11111"]You wouldn't catch me dead ever touching the XBox, so I prefer the GameCube.BigBen11111

[QUOTE="BigBen11111"]You wouldn't catch me dead ever touching the XBox, so I prefer the GameCube.YoshiYogurt

[QUOTE="Megavideogamer"]

Even if you go by the bare minimum of speed Nintendo Gamecube run a 485 Megahertz and Xbox ran a 733 megahehertz. Plus the Xbox had a 8GB HDD which ended up being quite revolutionary for videogame consoles at the time this was new. Today Xbox One and PS4 will come with 500GB HDD's back way back in 2001. It was a brand new idea of a HDD coming with your videogame console out of the box.

Xbox was basically a Pentium 3 computer. While Gamecube used the processor of a 1997 Power PC 1 computer. Which began Nintendo's tradition of PowerPC tech for their game consoles as seen in Wii and Wii U.

Jag85

The GameCube's PowerPC CPU was faster than the Xbox's Pentium III. It's not the clock rate that matters, but how many instructions it could process with each clock cycle. The PowerPC was superior to the Pentium III in that regard, hence why the Xbox 360 abandoned the Pentium III and went with a PowerPC architecture like the GameCube. In addition, the GameCube's 1T-SRAM was also faster than the Xbox's SDRAM. When it came to speed, the GameCube was the faster console, with practical polygon fill rates pushing up to 15 million polygons per second in game, while the Xbox was barely able to push beyond 10 million polygons per second in game. The Xbox's main advantages over the GameCube lied in its more advanced 3D graphical capabilities, particularly the use of programmable pixel shaders, and of course the PC-like architecture which made it easier to develop games for.

[QUOTE="YoshiYogurt"][QUOTE="BigBen11111"]You wouldn't catch me dead ever touching the XBox, so I prefer the GameCube.Kaszilla

Gamecube was the most powerful but once people decide something they stick with it.

[QUOTE="Jag85"]

[QUOTE="Megavideogamer"]

Even if you go by the bare minimum of speed Nintendo Gamecube run a 485 Megahertz and Xbox ran a 733 megahehertz. Plus the Xbox had a 8GB HDD which ended up being quite revolutionary for videogame consoles at the time this was new. Today Xbox One and PS4 will come with 500GB HDD's back way back in 2001. It was a brand new idea of a HDD coming with your videogame console out of the box.

Xbox was basically a Pentium 3 computer. While Gamecube used the processor of a 1997 Power PC 1 computer. Which began Nintendo's tradition of PowerPC tech for their game consoles as seen in Wii and Wii U.

Kaszilla

The GameCube's PowerPC CPU was faster than the Xbox's Pentium III. It's not the clock rate that matters, but how many instructions it could process with each clock cycle. The PowerPC was superior to the Pentium III in that regard, hence why the Xbox 360 abandoned the Pentium III and went with a PowerPC architecture like the GameCube. In addition, the GameCube's 1T-SRAM was also faster than the Xbox's SDRAM. When it came to speed, the GameCube was the faster console, with practical polygon fill rates pushing up to 15 million polygons per second in game, while the Xbox was barely able to push beyond 10 million polygons per second in game. The Xbox's main advantages over the GameCube lied in its more advanced 3D graphical capabilities, particularly the use of programmable pixel shaders, and of course the PC-like architecture which made it easier to develop games for.

No, actually gamecube games had way more polygon's and detail.  Xbox games had much lower polygon counts and detail with those advanced shaders slathered over things.  It was unbalanced, Microsoft just threw the biggest and most power hungry components in the Xbox that was available for PC (which is exactly why people think Xbox was the most powerful, big and power hungry = powerful), Gamecube was a perfectly balanced gaming machine.  It's different with PC components nowadays, (Ps4) but back then it paid to make a fully customised gaming console.

[QUOTE="YoshiYogurt"][QUOTE="Kaszilla"] Huh?? Didnt you say the xbox has the worst library of any console?Kaszilla

HA! The xbox doesn't come close to either of those...

Let's just agree to disagree...

[QUOTE="Kaszilla"][QUOTE="YoshiYogurt"] There are still good games on it. Every other console just has MORE good games.YoshiYogurt

HA! The xbox doesn't come close to either of those...

Let's just agree to disagree...