The specs of the next consoles from Sony and Microsoft both use bits of AMD hardware that have very similar PC analogues, leading many to believe that the next generation consoles are little more than mid-range PC’s in a fancy branded box. That would be silly thinking, says AMD.
Speaking to Gamingbolt, PR Lead for Gaming and Enthusiast Graphics at AMD Robert Hallock said that it’s just “patently untrue” that the next-gen consoles are PCs-inna-box.
“People often compare the hardware of the next-gen consoles and the PC, compare specs on paper, and conclude that these consoles must be “PCs in a box.” That is patently untrue. While there are many commonalities, there were platform architecture decisions made for the consoles that set them apart from the PC in a significant way: how developers access the hardware, the Xbox One’s ESRAM, and the PlayStation 4’s UMA are all powerful examples of such decisions.
That’s all good and well, but how would they compare, if you attempted an apples-to-apples comparison?
“It remains to be seen how PCs and consoles will compare from the perspective of image quality–the consoles haven’t launched, after all–but we can certifiably say that the industry’s baseline image quality will make a quantum leap with the arrival of DirectX 11 in the mainstream. These next-gen consoles are working with state-of-the-art hardware: programmable shaders, large vbuffers, significant GPU compute resources and so much more.”
So it seems, even though the consoles are running modified bits of AMD hardware, those modifications make a big enough difference. Possible. Usually, when new consoles launch, it takes a little while for PC’s to catch up to them in terms of general fidelity, but from everything I’ve seen, that won’t be happening this generation thanks to some rather incredible, but rather incredibly expensive advances in PC gaming graphics technology.
Last Updated: August 26, 2013
Unavengedavo (aka. Frik)
August 26, 2013 at 11:40
Those Nissan “What’s in the box” radio ads remind me of that song…
ThatManOverThere
August 26, 2013 at 11:44
Can’t wait for the consoles to launch, soon after I will be upgrading me PC again coz of the graphic hungry gamezzz!!
FoxOneZA - X-Therminator
August 26, 2013 at 12:13
Elsewhere, Nvidia is forming “gaming alliances” of there own to keep the Maste Race as the Master Race… http://www.joystiq.com/2013/08/24/ubisoft-and-nvidia-form-alliance-to-give-pc-gamers-a-visual-ed/
HighlanderZA
August 26, 2013 at 12:54
I would like to see some comparison. Something like my nvidia gigabyte 670 oc running 16 gig ram and a i5 3570k vs ps4 or xbox one. All this talk confused me
ElimiNathan
August 26, 2013 at 13:11
I still rate that your setup will outperform a new gen console
SPDHUNTER
August 26, 2013 at 13:36
He speaks the truth. Technically the hardware is like comparing apples to apples but the difference is how the apples are accessed. And that is thanks to unified memory architecture, which most people keep forgetting or dont understand. Hence you cannot compare PC hardware setup’s directly to consoles.
Lolsofti
August 26, 2013 at 14:11
And yet Battlefield 4 will run on 720p with some details off or scaled down.
If you cant talk shop, shut up and dont lie about it.
mariano guntin
September 3, 2013 at 09:32
they say that because is what they need to say. He didn’t answer your question of the apples to apples. And the only thing he said about hardware is the ESRAM and UMA, but that is a boost to ram to CPU/GPU speed, that doesn’t make sense about “being better than what people say”. And PS4/XbonxOne CPU are LOW RANGE, while the PS4 gpu is mid range, the Xone gpu is LOW mid range. The only high techie thing on new consoles are ram and memory speed. NOTHING ELSE.