Forbes thinks the Switch is a Scorpio killer

PS4 games has zero copy advantage i.e. don't apply Windows PC's memory model on PS4.

CPU side AI logic and physics are not large.

http://www.dualshockers.com/2014/04/02/how-infamous-second-son-used-the-ps4s-8-4-5-gb-of-ram-cpu-and-gpu-compute-to-make-our-jaws-drop/

It's mostly VRAM related.

http://www.eurogamer.net/articles/digitalfoundry-ps3-system-software-memory

PS4 has 5 GB for game.

For Windows 10 DX12 and Vulkan, notice the following

1. Data uploaded into system memory pool. On PS4, there's only one memory pool.

2. GPU reads data from system memory pool e,g, to populate GPU's VRAM. This step is not necessary for PS4 ie. there's only one memory pool.

3. CPU's lacking direct access to GPU's memory pool indicates non-HSA i.e. no memory address GPU and CPU merging.

Blame non-HSA GPUs.

http://wccftech.com/intel-amd-nvidia-future-industry-hsa/2/

Nvidia introduced the capability to share virtual memory between the CPU and GPU with CUDA 6 and its Maxwell graphics architecture. The technology doesn’t offer a hardware-level unified memory access like AMD’s hUMA, which was introduced with Kaveri APUs and the GCN 1.1 graphics architecture. What it does is simplify the method by which programmers address CPU and GPU memory. What it does not do, however, is allow the processors to share data via pointers. Which is an essential part in addressing the most significant bottleneck in a heterogeneous design. Without reducing the huge latency dictated by data copies no tangible performance or efficiency gains can be realized from a a heterogeneous processor. So despite the memory pool being “virtually” unified in software, performance exhaustive data copies still have to be made between the CPU and GPU.

Windows 10 DX12 and Vulkan was designed for lowest common dominator i.e. non-unified address space hardware capable GPUs.

Radeon HD 7970's unified address space hardware.

AMD GCN's memory handling exceeds DX12 and Vulkan.

To minimise CPU's access to main memory tips from Naughty Dog, Read http://www.dualshockers.com/2014/03/11/naughty-dog-explains-ps4s-cpu-memory-and-more-in-detail-and-how-they-can-make-them-run-really-fast/

Keeping high performance data small helps thanks to this, as it can fit in the cache, which can be accessed extremely quickly. Having them small and contiguous in memory is even more beneficial.

If it's a Scorpio killer then Bore & Poo are not only gonna get killed but tortured, molested and stabbed with hot pokers before being killed. :P

I love when you bring those double edge sword arguments invented by you,so now a i7 6700k OC will bottleneck a R390X...hahhaahahahaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaa

Wow just wow i am in shock so is not bottlenecking a 12TF Titanfall pascal but it will bottleneck a damn 390X which is not even top of the line now.?

But hey let me turn this argument against you claim a i7 6700k OC would bottleneck a R390X which is 5.9Tf,that means that Scorpio will be 100% bottleneck by its CPU as there is no way the CPU inside scorpio is faster or more powerful than a 6700k OC,and scorpio GPU is 6TF.

So that means that unless Scorpio get a desktop Rysen 8 cores untouched there is no way that Scorpio GPU isn't bottleneck.

BY the way that Titan Pascal PC >>>>>>>> Scorpio and the difference is not big.

What the fu** does this has to do with my argument? Since i wasn't talking about chip size which mean shit,since we know the XBO soc is huge and weak as hell until you know what is in that soc you can't say shit even less based on a stupid render.

Bullshit the 5.5GB is for games not for CPU and GPU,already the system was 2.5GB you fool,on PC you install 4GB of ram and that is system and CPU memory,the GPU memory is out of limits to the CPU,so the chunk already use for OS which is 2.5 GB ass is CPU memory as well..lol

Why do you think Mark Cerny claim it was giving back that memory to the games?

That is bullshit how the fu** can BF use 4.5 to 5GB of Vram and 6 to 8GB of system ram on PC at 1440p?

lol It doesn't even hit 4GB of Vram in 4k let alone in 1440p and this is on ULTRA which the PS4 Pro isn't running so using high or very high use even less Vram.

And console don't run OS like PC does,they are more efficient on that front so they don't need 8GB of system memory.

Yes and when you show me that R6 on Pro uses Ultra textures you would even start to make sense fool,no PS4 Pro game is aiming for Ultra dude hell some games don't even aim for very high.

Your ram argument is moronic the 2.5 GB of ram the PS4 Pro devote for system is also CPU memory just like is the case on PC.

BattleField 1 was designed with Fury X in mind you stupid cow i.e. the game is AMD's Gaming Evolved. http://www.amd.com/en-us/markets/game/featured/battlefield-1#

This will change with Vega 10 8GB's release.

Resident Evil 7's memory usage

MSFT's first party game, Forza Horizon 3's memory usage at 4K.... 5.68 GB. Fury X hits a wall with 4GB.

MSFT's first party game, Forza 6 Apex memory usage at 4K.... 6.3 GB.

Rise of Tomb Raider at 4K and very high settings, consumed 7.655 GB of VRAM

Black Ops 3 at 4K extra, consumes 8.692 GB.

Yeah, those of us who've been around since the NES know that power doesn't win jack crap. Power didn't help the game gear or the neo geo or the dreamcast or the ps3. I think I can count on one hand the console winners who also had the most power, Snes and PS4...and...that's about it I think.

Here's the problem with that...the new devices will always be held back by the old ones because they all need to be compatible with each other. I think the Scorpio should pull a switch and be its own thing, with its own games, and exclusives. Sure it might piss people off but there's only 25 million xbox one owners that's not a big deal.

Look at the Pro and New 3DS. Nothing really takes advantage of the new hardware upgrades because they have to play on the old hardware.

Both of which had scorching hot exclusives that went on to be system sellers.

It's possible for the PC, aka the master race, so why wouldn't this be possible on consoles?

So by your logic, the Nvidia Shield is a handheld if we are going by the specs and how they have been marketing the Switch is to be Hybrid.

@xboxiphoneps3: I've argued with him SO much about this. He just doesn't get it. He insists on either equating 8GB GDDR5 FOR THE WHOLE SYSTEM with an 8GB GPU, or - as he has done above - saying the RAM is for games and 'not for cpu and gpu' (whatever the f* that means).

The Last of Us, Uncharted 3, GOD3, and KZ3 all look better than anything on the 360.

Switch even has games solely for touch... Which means you can't even play it when it's in the dock. Not a console.

Well handheld or not, the Scorpio is going to be dominated this holiday by this so called HANDHELD and us cows and sheeps are the only ones who will be laughing.

Thank you for concurring with me. I've said this from the beginning...

@xboxiphoneps3 said:

@tormentos said:

Bullshit the 5.5GB is for games not for CPU and GPU,already the system was 2.5GB you fool,on PC you install 4GB of ram and that is system and CPU memory,the GPU memory is out of limits to the CPU,so the chunk already use for OS which is 2.5 GB ass is CPU memory as well..lol

Why do you think Mark Cerny claim it was giving back that memory to the games?

That is bullshit how the fu** can BF use 4.5 to 5GB of Vram and 6 to 8GB of system ram on PC at 1440p?

And console don't run OS like PC does,they are more efficient on that front so they don't need 8GB of system memory.

Yes and when you show me that R6 on Pro uses Ultra textures you would even start to make sense fool,no PS4 Pro game is aiming for Ultra dude hell some games don't even aim for very high.

Your ram argument is moronic the 2.5 GB of ram the PS4 Pro devote for system is also CPU memory just like is the case on PC.

Man you write garble all day every day, I guess the GPU/CPU doesn't render the game out at all then ..... /s

Yes, only 5.5GB of RAM is availble for games, in a shared pool for the PS4 Pro, that leaves around 2.5GB of VRAM to 3GB of VRAM (can obviously dynamically scale around) and the same for the CPU depending on scene/type of rendering/etc, PS4 and PS4 Pro run many games with low to med textures only compared to PC settings(only few games run high textures, like BF1 on PS4 Pro, there is a higher ultra setting)

On a PC(Not a APU), a video card cannot touch the system RAM, it only uses it's dedicated VRAM that the GPU comes with, never touches DDR3 memory

Mark Cerny said that he is giving back some memory from the OS that was previously unavailble to usebefore he threw in last second extra 1GB of DDR3 RAM instead of 2-4GB of DDR3 RAM extra inside. It freed up 512 MB of RAM for games to use (CPU and GPU) and 512 MB extra to be able to render PS4 Pro UI in 4k that games cant touch

"“On PS4 Pro, we do things a bit differently. When you stop using Netflix, we move it to the gigabyte of slow, conventional DRAM. Using that sort of strategy frees up almost a gigabyte of our 8 GB of GDDR5. We use 512 megabytes [of that] for games, which is to say that the games can use 5.5 GB rather than 5 GB. And we use most of the rest to make the PS4 Pro interface 4K, rather than the 1080p it’s been to date. So when you hit the PS4 button, that’s a 4K interface.”"

Basically taking back some of the GDDR5 RAM from the pool to use for games(5GB available on PS4, 5.5 GB of RAM available for Pro because obviously the PS4 GPU would never use the DDR3 RAM in any scenario since its wildly slower then GDDR5.

Infamous Second Son resource usage before obviously Sony freed up a bit more RAM on the PS4 to game devs, this is a mix of GPU RAM usage and CPU RAM usage, this is basic knowledge in game development world man, PS4 Pro GPU at the very max will actively use about 4.0GB of VRAM the very most in only some scenarios(like cutscenes and stuff like that for some quite good looking character models and the scene)

PC GPUs can read system memory. Notice the memory pool column with system and upload, there's an entry for "GPU read once".

GPU's load/store units are superior to CPU's load/store units i.e. give the GPU the command list and let the GPU fetch the data from system memory. Doing CPU driven data transfers for GPU is very slow.

AMD GCNs has DMA/Move and TMU engines that are far superior to the CPU's version.

@Shewgenja:

If you look at it objectively you'll see it's mostly the Overzealous Sony guys that trash everything Xbox. The Xbox guys come in mostly to defend the Xbox from the hater propaganda. There are a few lemmings that decided to throw crap back at the Cows after being bombarded by stupidity and nonsense for so long. If the Zealots could just relax and see that Xbox isn't a Threat to the PS brand they probably wouldn't act so childish and might even enjoy the Xbox. I've owned consoles from all the major manufacturers. That includes Nintendo, Sony, Sega, Atari, Colecovision, Xbox and I even owned a Turbo GrafX 16. All of them were enjoyable to me.

@EG101: So, you want to pretend that MS didn't play the rumor mill like a fiddle by proclaiming bluray would make the ps3 cost a grand or Microsoft directly offering retailers vouchers for carrying HD-DVD to artificially leverage a format war to increase the bidding price for diodes? What about offering Ferrari laptops to game reviewers or that mysteriously planted story about Cell being broken?

Oh, and then there were the stories about PS3 overheating at TGS in 06. . . You're going to sit here and blow smoke up my ass about the lems here in System Wars and MS in general playing innocent when I saw this shit on literally every other forum I visited at the time?

Exactly how dumb do you think people are? Like, on a scale from 1-10. Give me a number.

MS's support for HD-DVD was "half assed" since they didn't include it as part of the standard X360.

X360 with external HD-DVD drive feels like a kit-bash.

@ronvalencia: Of course it was half ass. It was only a matter of time before more than two companies made diodes and used a far cheaper process. All HD-DVD was good for was pissing in Sony's cheerios. Just like Grqnd Thedt Auto tattoos and purposefully obtuse PR around it.

Hey, games are games. I just won't sit here while someone lays the blame on over 100 million gamers because they want to get high on their own ass cheese.

Nah its called being sarcastic, because I got tired of dealing with Mr. Clueless (you)

Go ahead and pretend that was MS.

What the fu** are you arguing here^^ because my argument you moronic and dishonets lemming is simple,you CLAIMED a i7 6700K OC would bottleneck a R390X (5.9TF).

So if a i7 6700K Bottleneck a R390X that means a gimped CPU on Scorpio would bottleneck its 6TF GPU,you can't spin this unless Scorpio get a full Ryzen CPU 8 core full speed that actually beat an i7 6700k it will be bottleneck..

I just love to turn you little shitty pull out of your ass arguments to the defend the xbox,if a i7 6700k OC bottleneck a 390X a lesser CPU on Scopio will surely bottleneck scorpio one..lol

What process there on that screen are CPU based.?

What memory CPU use on PC?

DDr3 DDR4 not Video memory,Vram is not only for 1 single process on game,Vram is use on PC for multiple process.

So again yes it is 5.5GB is more than enough as system memory which is what the CPU uses is already there,what little exchange between CPU and GPU that there is on PC is already accounted for.

By the way i showed you BF1 which uses on 4k not even 4GB of Vram even less in 1440p like you claim windows using 8GB of system memory mean shit the PS4 doesn't use windows.

It's been known since the day this thread was made that "Forbes" did not say this but rather it was just some fanboy blogger and yet the thread isn't locked?

We all know damn well had this been the other way around saying Scorpio is a Bait & Switch killer, this thread woulda been locked faster than you could say... SmearCampaign mod. :P

May 7th, 2006 interview with Shane Kim for Xbox-Scene. He said it. It was quite the bullet point for my fellow Lems at the time. Xbox 360 had 1000 downloadable items on Live while Sony had a potentially $1000 console. Your memory seems to be hazy.

Another bulls..hit post from tormented.

https://msdn.microsoft.com/en-us/library/windows/desktop/ee417025(v=vs.85).aspx

When in full-screen mode, the Desktop Window Manager (DWM) is disabled. DXGI can perform a flip to present the back buffer contents instead of doing a blit, which it would do in windowed mode. This performance gain can be undone, however, if certain requirements are not met. To ensure that DXGI does a flip instead of a blit, the front buffer and back buffer must be sized identically. If the application correctly handles its WM_SIZE messages, this should not be a problem. Also, the formats must be identical.

On laptops with hybrid IGP and GPU setup, the IGP handles DWM work loads while GPU handles the game works.

Full screen exclusive mode is needed for FreeSync and G-Sync.

Please correctly quote me on "you CLAIMED a i7 6700K OC would bottleneck a R390X (5.9TF).".

On most game console ports at 4K resolution with DX12 API, my i7 Haswell CPUs are not 100 percent in CPU usage i.e. more instances for the CPU waiting on the GPU to complete rendering task.

What I stated is, at higher resolution, R9-390X will bottleneck 6700K OC quicker than 980 Ti OC.

Hint: As long the frame rate scales higher with higher grade GPU and the same 6700K CPU, the system will be GPU bound.

Point 1; When frame rate doesn't increase (flat line) with increasing GPU power, then it's CPU bound. Solution: Upgrade CPU.

Point 2; When frame rate doesn't increase (flat line) with increasing CPU powers, then it's GPU bound. Solution: Upgrade GPU.

My existing i7-4770 based PC went from R9-290X to 980 Ti 25 percent OC and frame rate continues to increase, hence the system is GPU bound. i7-4770K's CPU performance can drive Titan X Pascal SLI (when it works) to higher frames.

CPU power increases while frame rates are nearly flat lined.... this is an example for GPU bound. Refer to my Point 2.

The test also shows PCI-E version 1 X16 bound and shitty G465 CPU bound issues.

@ronvalencia: I was wondering when someone would catch that he misunderstood your bottleneck point.

And they think Switch's hybrid feature is that innovative and will get Sony and Microsoft fans on board? Yeah, good luck with that.

God of War 3 and Killzone 2-3 are arguably better looking than any 360 game.

@emgesp: I'd argue Gears of War 3 and Halo 4 look as good as any PS3 gane.

The graphics and animation in Uncharted 2 make 360 games look like Beavis and Butthead.

@Shewgenja: The animations are no doubt better in Uncharted 3 but the graphics are of the same level. Halo 4 looks pretty fantastic.

@xboxiphoneps3: just to be clear, though, the amount of RAM available for the Pro isn't necessarily 5.5. The nitty gritty of how these systems manage their RAM is: PS4 - 4.5-5.5GB GDDR5 for games; X1 - 5GB DDR3 for games; PS4 Pro 5-6GB GDDR5 for games (well, ACTUALLY 5.5-6.5, but 0.5 of that is reserved for 4K HUD assets on 4K TV setups, so depending on how you want to define what "for games" means it varies by the use case)

http://www.eurogamer.net/articles/digitalfoundry-2016-inside-playstation-4-pro-how-sony-made-a-4k-games-machine

"On PS4 Pro, we do things differently, when you stop using Netflix, we move it to the slow, conventional gigabyte of DRAM. Using that strategy frees up almost one gigabyte of the eight gigabytes of GDDR5. We use 512MB of that freed up space for games, which is to say that games can use 5.5GB instead of the five and we use most of the rest to make the PS4 Pro interface - meaning what you see when you hit the PS button - at 4K rather than the 1080p it is today."

http://www.eurogamer.net/articles/digitalfoundry-ps3-system-software-memory

UPDATE #2: Sony has issued a statement:

We would like to clear up a misunderstanding regarding our "direct" and "flexible" memory systems. The article states that "flexible" memory is borrowed from the OS, and must be returned when requested - that's not actually the case.

The actual true distinction is that:

• "Direct Memory" is memory allocated under the traditional video game model, so the game controls all aspects of its allocation
• "Flexible Memory" is memory managed by the PS4 OS on the game's behalf, and allows games to use some very nice FreeBSD virtual memory functionality. However this memory is 100 per cent the game's memory, and is never used by the OS, and as it is the game's memory it should be easy for every developer to use it.

UPDATE: A new source familiar with the matter has provided additional information to Digital Foundry that confirms only 4.5GB of the PS4's 8GB GDDR5 memory pool is guaranteed to game developers right now, while also clarifying how the PS4's "flexible memory" works in practice.

In real terms, an additional 512MB of physical RAM may be available in addition to the 4.5GB mentioned in the SDK. Flexible memory consists of physical and virtual spaces, and the latter introduces paging issues which impact performance. In our original story we combined them together.

For practical game applications, the correct figures for this story, as we understand it now, are a guaranteed 4.5GB for development and a further 512MB from the flexible pool. We have updated the headline accordingly.

PS4's total memory storage for games is 5 GB ie. 4.5 GB direct memory and 0.5 GB flexible memory.

PS4 Pro's total memory storage for games is 5.5 GB ie. 5 GB direct memory and 0.5 GB flexible memory.

@ronvalencia: you basically restated what I did, except scaled the amount of flexible memory down by 512mb by restricting it to what Eurogamer SPECULATES is on-chip memory. We know there is 1GB of flexible memory. How much is on-chip is not confirmed AFAIK.

Note that the numbers I gave for Pro are accurate as well - whether it is 512mb or 1GB more for gameplay comes down to your perspective on whether HUD+GUI counts towards gameplay RAM (IMO it does - HUD+GUIs don't magically use their own secret pool of RAM on PCs that doesn't use that available on your VRAM+DRAM). Regardless of your stance, however, add between 512MB and 1GB RAM to the RAM figures for PS4 and you get yourself the Pro figures

Man stop you are a HYPOCRITE a freaking hypocrite if the 390X is bottleneck by a damn i7 6700K OC to 4.4ghz the damn scorpio GPU will be bottleneck as well and here are the reasons Hypocrite.

1-The CPU in scorpio will not be i repeat with not be full Rysen 8 cores desktop.

2-The Scorpio version will be water down probably in both IGP and clock speed.

3-Rysen Water down will not beat a i7 6700K OC to 4.4 Ghz,and since that CPU bottleneck a 390X which is 5.9TF a 6TF GPU would be even more bottleneck by a lesser CPU.

This ^^ is my argument all i care and the rest of your shitty argument is irrelevant.

From which pool CPU use memory on PC System or Vram...

Hahahahahaa Answer me that fool.

Medium textures vs high don't just require more memory they require more power and ever higher bandwidth.

Which is why when you increase textures quality performance drop fool.

You should stop your bullshit by the way post from your normal account..lol

@tormentos: Tormentos - he never said the 390x is bottlenecked by an i7 6700K. He said an i7 6700K is bottlenecked by a 390x.

They do which is what this people ignore hud rendering and gui rendering are part of your video memory if your GPU.

Some how this people think that Vram is just for textures and nothing more.

Advice don't argue with ronvalencia he simple will chance the argument in your face and you will end dizzy,is like you are talking to him about cars and he reply with 10 charts talking about fish.

I'm directly quoting Sony i.e. PS4 games has 4.5 GB direct memory and 0.5 GB flexible memory with virtual memory paging services, hence it's 5 GB GDDR5 for PS4 game.

PS4 Pro improves upon PS4's 5 GB with an extra 0.5 GB of memory, hence it's 5.5 GB GDDR5 for PS4 Pro game.

Gaming PC has both shared video memory and discrete video memory e.g. a game can consume the entire Fury X's 4 GB VRAM and paging to main memory can cause performance degradation i.e. PCI E version 3.0 16X only has 16 GB/s read + 16 GB/s write bandwidth.

Your "390X is bottleneck by a damn i7 6700K OC to 4.4ghz" assertion is fake news.

My i7-4770K OC to 4.0 Ghz is bottleneck by R9-390X since 980 Ti upgrade still yields higher frame rates.

1. Hence why I gave multiple selections e.g. Excavator v2

2. No shit Sherlock e.g. PS4 Pro's 4.2 TFLOPS GPU is water down from RX-480's 5.8 TFLOPS.

3. Under DX12, i7-4770K OC at 4.0 Ghz is overkill for R9-390X. Game consoles doesn't have PC's DX11 API overheads, but if PS4 game was designed for 30 hz with 1.6 Ghz CPUs, 60 hz version will require 2X the CPU e.g. Bristol Ridge's mobile Excavator v2's 4C/4T at 3.2 Ghz would do the job for +X2 GPU command list generation.

The reason why I shown you AMD Excavator's Alien Isolation benchmark is show the performance difference between PS4's 1.6 Ghz Jaguar to Excavator.

It doesn't need to be RYZEN to beat PS4's Jaguar CPU.

@xboxiphoneps3 said:

@tormentos: "From which pool CPU use memory on PC System or Vram..."

Lol what the **** are you saying homie? You are literally now trying to make something up completly here, I never made this once a question, a CPU on a typical Windows PC only has access to its DDR3 RAM, thats it.

And nope, higher textures do not always increase performance penalty, this has been proven countless times already, PS4 Pro could of used more RAM to have higher resolution textures in games. PC's have much more system RAM and VRAM to play with

Making something up?

No you claimed the 5.5 is shared between CPU and GPU which is WRONG as,memory use for CPU is always system memory,what is reserve for the OS is from where the CPU feeds not from Vram,which is why you try to pretend now to not understand my question video memory is not just for textures,and ultra textures have a hit on performance vs lower quality ones because is not just textures than increase in size is also the detail going alone with them,you will not find examples now where ultra runs exactly as high or very high.

Within 5.5 GB allocated for PS4 Pro game, CPU and GPU shares main memory.

For example (simplified),

1. For AI, CPU(s) fetches data from system, do it's calculations and update the game world. During this time, the GPU is waiting for the command list.

2. After game world update, four CPUs generated GPU command list. During this time, the GPU is waiting for the command list. CPU could read past frame buffers to optimise on what part of the screen needs to be shaded.

3. After the four CPUs generated GPU command lists, this four command list is then sent to the GPU. It can be either be via main memory or via fusion links.

4. GPU processes command list and render into frame buffers(s)

Steps 2 to 4 loop can have multiple passes, depending on graphics effects being layered on the frame buffer(s). For 30 fps, each frame render needs to be done within 33.33 ms.

The complication is with async compute and async threads, which makes memory access complicated. Fusion links and respect for CPU's cache size limits will be needed to minimise CPU's access to main memory.

Cache snoop function from any DMA end point client devices (e.g. GPU) triggers main memory update if there's any memory write changes.

GPU asks CPU for memory page $123. There's a look up table for memory pages being stored inside the CPU's cache. CPU's cache management hardware handles cache snoop request.

CPU replies, yes, I have memory page $123 in my cache and has been changed.

CPU gives updated memory data to GPU

----

CPU needs to write back any changes to main memory if the CPU switches to another problem scope.

X86 Northbridge chipsets has evolved to be smart. There are powerful processors within X86 NBs which manages and optimise memory accesses. My knowledge on X86 northbridge chipsets are based on NVidia nForce chipsets.