PC Specs equivalent to a Console?

jaykhunter

Hey guys, do you know what the specs of the Xbox 360/PS3 would be comparable to a CPU/GPU on a PC would be? Like, what PC would have the same specs as a modern console?

I'm not looking to start an argument or anything, i have all 3 consoles and just bought a pc and would like to know where it stands. (i5 2500k, z67, Sapphire HD6870, 8GB ram)

360 specs
PS3 specs

thanks for reading

AlmightyCushion

That PC absolutely murders the consoles.

cml387

It's equivalent to PC and graphic cards available in 2005.

deconduo

Put it this way, the brand new Xbox being developed is rumored to have a CPU equivalent to an i3 and GPU equivalent to a 5670. Its due for release in 2 years time. Consoles are way way behind in hardware tech.

Tea_Bag

deconduo wrote: »

Put it this way, the brand new Xbox being developed is rumored to have a CPU equivalent to an i3 and GPU equivalent to a 5670. Its due for release in 2 years time. Consoles are way way behind in hardware tech.

unfortunately for us PC gamers.

jaykhunter

0.5GB of ram, tri-core @ 3MHz... Is that right? Like could u make a pc of the same specs for much less than an Xbox?

Serephucus

If I remember right, it's got some sort of weird seven-core processor at about 1.6GHz or something, and the equivalent to a 7900GT - or in current standards, a 9600GT / 5670. Oh, and a gig of RAM.

The only reason it keeps up is because of hardware optimization - which says a lot for the hardware, but is a PITA for everyone here.

jaykhunter

Had to google "PITA" there...got a lot of new terminology since coming to this forum Cheers man. Is there a benchmark page you use for reference so i can gauge where that lies?

demanufactured

Even an off the shelf dell pc.brand new is more powerful than any console

Serephucus

I find TechPowerUp handy. They do a Performance Summary section, where they average cards performance over given resolutions, and you can compare a lot of them there. I had to go back a few years to find a 7900GT though. :P

ShadowHearth

1900xt was in Xbox if I remember right. ( moded gpu ).

Keep in mind that xbox play on 720p most games and very rare to non 1080.
720p is Only 1280x720 resolution, which is a joke compared to pc standards.
All games that come multiplatform will be low/med on console detail wise too.

Now we have built few budget pcs for 400eu: i3 2100, 4gb ram, 500gb and 6770. These pcs will run anything on 720p resolution with way higher settings then any console, yes, even bf3!

So let's see: 400eu pc will be your multimedia centre in the first place, proper Internet browser, music centre, movie player and storage. Oh yeah, gaming machine too. Best thing is, you will be able to upgrade that system later on and wipe the floors with any new console. If rumoured price point of 600eu for new Xbox is true, then pc gaming will be just a superior thing in any given situation!

Unregistered.

This is classic oversight by everyone who has commented so far. Bar Serephucus, (s)he hit the nail on the head, post #7.

Edit: Not sure if oversight is even the word I am looking for.

jaykhunter

Unregistered. wrote: »

Edit: Not sure if oversight is even the word I am looking for.

Dismissive, maybe? This is one of the reasons I just bought a gaming PC. A lot of people on boards really sing the praises of PC gaming, and they're (we're) a smart bunch so there must be something to it

ShadowHearth

It's hard to answer that question, because console is just a console where pc is a very versatile equipment. You can't just built pc for gaming. You build a pc, which has option to play games.
It will be cheaper to build more powerfull machine, then building same spec pc as Xbox, because parts will be rare and more expencive.

Unregistered.

jaykhunter wrote: »

Dismissive, maybe? This is one of the reasons I just bought a gaming PC. A lot of people on boards really sing the praises of PC gaming, and they're (we're) a smart bunch so there must be something to it

Nope. You can build a high-spec gaming PC and get a greater game-play experience, no doubt about that. Do you know what happens when you build a PC with the equivalent hardware of a console?

ShadowHearth

Unregistered. wrote: »

Nope. You can build a high-spec gaming PC and get a greater game-play experience, no doubt about that. Do you know what happens when you build a PC with the equivalent hardware of a console?

That is quite a stupid statement, sorry. I won't go in to pc vs console war again as its imposible to prove anything to console gamers. I will just stick with one thing I am not bad at: helping people to build gaming pcs and let them enjoy all the colors of the rainbow, not just one.

Tea_Bag

Unregistered. wrote: »

This is classic oversight by everyone who has commented so far. Bar Serephucus, (s)he hit the nail on the head, post #7.

Edit: Not sure if oversight is even the word I am looking for.

if you're talking about hardware optimization, you're bang on. the console OS is extremely optimized, developers have low level access to hardware (not yet seen in PC gaming)

the GPU in the XBox is a bastardised yoke, then there is eDRAM, which was ground breaking at the time. its the reason the XBox is still able to keep up with the PS3, which was far better speced (but a cu** to code for)

its a shame the PC hasn't had some of the optimizations, but we do so much more anyway.

I also wouldn't write off the next XBox just yet. it might only be a 6670, but I can guarantee it'll do 1080@30fps, or 720 3D @ 60.

still got nothing on my 6990 though

Unregistered.

ShadowHearth wrote: »

That is quite a stupid statement, sorry. I won't go in to pc vs console war again as its imposible to prove anything to console gamers. I will just stick with one thing I am not bad at: helping people to build gaming pcs and let them enjoy all the colors of the rainbow, not just one.

What on earth are you talking about?

Tea_Bag wrote: »

if you're talking about hardware optimization, you're bang on. the console OS is extremely optimized, developers have low level access to hardware (not yet seen in PC gaming)

This is it. Consoles are standardized platform, making them very easy and favourable to develop for! They also have to use economical hardware which is why you'd never see a high-end discrete graphics chip in them. PC's can offer a better experience because they can offer a lot of power to make up for the low level hardware programming afforded by consoles.

Tea_Bag wrote: »

its a shame the PC hasn't had some of the optimizations, but we do so much more anyway.

Aye, but can you imagine the uproar if games were developed for say i5 quad + 6850 only? The only way to get around the headache of the mish mash of hardware is to use API's like DirectX which offer a general interface for developers - which is the complete opposite of optimizations!

PogMoThoin

Consoles could be even better on the hardware they have if they weren't so restrictive, as they are they fail at everything other than playing games, although the PS3 has a slight edge as it is more versatile. I had a 360 and it's a very poor media player. Lack of a browser is just pathetic

Trevor451

I actually think MS was wise not to include a web bowser on the 360. Have you ever tried to use the wii/ps3 browsers before?

Unregistered.

Trevor451 wrote: »

I actually think MS was wise not to include a web bowser on the 360. Have you ever tried to use the wii/ps3 browsers before?

I always wondered if that was down to the software or having to navigate with the controller.

ShadowHearth

Trevor451 wrote: »

I actually think MS was wise not to include a web bowser on the 360. Have you ever tried to use the wii/ps3 browsers before?

I used psp and ps3 browser alot. Ofc proper browser is waaaaaaay better, but ps3 solution was not that bad.

You which really blows? The on on 3ds!

Monotype

jaykhunter wrote: »

0.5GB of ram, tri-core @ 3MHz... Is that right?

3.2GHz.

But the frequency doesn't count for much and I remember reading that even early dual cores at the time could beat it - the Pentium Ds and Athlons X2s.
Even a €40 Celeron G530 2.4GHz would most likely be a few times as powerful.
For a very rough estimate, there's been about 15% increase in performance for a given frequency across each new CPU generation but being conservative and assuming 10% each stage to Sandy Bridge -> Westmere -> Nehalem -> Penryn -> Core 2 and 100% increase to the pentium Ds would put it at an equivalent of 7GHz.

As others have said, the consoles are damn well optimised for the old hardware in them. Game makers want their games to look good so they'll use any trick that they have to achieve this. They have they exact hardware that everyone else has right in front of them - it's not going to change apart from slight revisions.
There's no overheads of handling a full OS with a virus scanner and two dozen processes running in the background. The only problem is that the developers don't always think about the future (Skyrim slows down a lot on the PS3 after a number of hours).

Here's a list resolutions used in console games:
http://forum.beyond3d.com/showthread.php?p=1113342

It's interesting to see how some of them make use of anamorphic widescreen to render at lower resolution while squashed and stretch to higher resolution.

Anyway, you can see that most of them run at 720p.
That's 1280x720 = 921,600 and most PC gamers would be looking at 1080p as the standard now, 1920x1080p = 2,073,600. Over double the number of pixels and not as tightly optimised.

Tea_Bag wrote: »

unfortunately for us PC gamers.

Well on the bright side, if the xbox really is only getting a 6670, it will be lagging so far behind regardless of how much optimisation takes place that people might start flocking towards the PC - and more people means more games built from the ground up for PCs.

ShadowHearth

I think tea_bag is talking about other part of te problem for pc gamers. ( I think, I am not sure ):

This low end hardware will make even bigger gap between pc gamers and consoles. We might see even more very bad console ports to pc as developers not arsed to optimise it or do better and use real potential on pc. If hardware would be on the level with pc it would benefit both parties as we all would get proper and good quality products.

Consoles do use hardware more efficient as they learned it to use more efficient, plus you need to wok only on 1 set of hardware, where's for pc version there are really huge amount of configurations, which changes very rapidly!
The only reason they butcher pc components and make it more efficient - costs. It's cheaper to buy low end stuff and upgrade it, then buying a new gen gpu and slam it inside with no upgrade. Even of you introduce that butchered 6670 to pc, it will still be quite sad gpu compared to anything high end, even from same gen.
The strength is not the hardware in console, but time and efficiency of use of it. I am prety sure if developers would have more time with pc Gpus, they could make them way more efficient too, but it's easyer to make faster hardware, because it's very easy to replace.

Perfect example would be nvidia vs ati. Ati make faster cards, but drivers not making it efficient, where's nvidia makes slower cards in paper, but theyr software makes better use of it.