http://gear.ign.com/articles/112/1122613p1.html
two 266MHz ARM11 CPUs
133MHz GPU
4MBs of dedicated VRAM
64MBs of RAM
1.5GBs of flash storage
they really don't mean much to me but anyway
comparison
http://gear.ign.com/articles/112/1122861p1.html
3DS specs Updated
This topic is locked from further discussion.
If true, I told you guys so
Everyone was saying it may have 800Mhz CPU, 200Mhz GPU, 256MB RAM, 8GB or more storage
And of course this isn't confirmed and no clock speeds and such don't mean everything
But nintendo, if this is correct, is going the cheaper route.
I think if these are true it all but confirms a price point lower than $200, there is no way they should charge more for that
Sure two CPUs @266Mhz is a good thing, but considering the PSPs CPU is of a higher speed, and won't the CPUs both be simply making the image twice, therefore it can't really combine the CPUs to rock out to 520Mhz? I don't understand all this stuff so don't take it like I know what I'm saying, coz I don't
But the specs are a tad bit underwhelming (though the VRAM is as much as a PS2 i believe and i'm not sure how much VRAM other handhelds have)
Notice though
DS- 67Mhz CPU, 4MB RAM
DSi- 133Mhz CPU, 16MB RAM
3DS - 266Mhz CPU (two), 64MB RAM
notice, the entire DS family tree roughly doubles CPU clock speed, and quadruples the RAM every time
Eh, just something I noticed, i believe there are some similarites to GB/GBC in this regard
I think GB had 4Mhz CPU, then GBC had 8Mhz, then GBA 16Mhz CPU, coincidence that they all double the CPU clock speed I guess (my numbers could be wrong tho)
If these are the specs, i Wouldn't rule out $169 or $179 now (yea i know it will more than likely be $199)
Darth, do you think Nintendo was justified pricing the DSi XL at $190 earlier this year, considering the incredibly ancient tech inside it? Nintendo doesn't base their prices off of technical specs, they base it off of the price they think consumers are willing to pay for it.
Some nice specs there. Two ARM11 cores means that switching between tasks shouldn't be very long (much like a proper dual core CPU). Having two cores makes sense for a machine made to perform multiple tasks, especially a media centric machine that could be running music + a browser. While I think the clock is a bit low, even for an ARM processor, it does increase the battery life, and the system probably has provision to shut one of the CPUs down if it's not needed. I hope to hell that the clock is not final at it's much higher though.
As for the GPU, there are tech demos of it doing it's thing on Youtube. It's an impressive piece of work, especially as it's been around for quite a while, just unused in anything. While reported polygon fillrates are much lower than the Xbox's maximums (but not far off from real world estimates), 3DS games should look as good as anything on the PS2 geometry wise, and better on the texture, shader, and effects side of things judging from the MGS-3D demo. The PICA200 also is made to use a special graphics API called MAESTRO summed up by Thinkdigit.com:
The key factor towards attaining this performance level as well as being energy efficient is theMaestrographics API, which is able to juice out every single drop ofOpenGL ES 1.1. It provides the developers with a library of massively used and nice looking elements/functions (for example - shaders, light elements, even shape primitives) for them to use directly to create rich graphics, thereby reducing the need of writing/scripting these elements. Check out the images to understand the features of Lighting, Shadow, Figure, Mapping and Particle Maestro.
This really is what a Nintendo system needed. A real API with real support for multilayer texture effects and is ready to do it. The GC and Wii would struggle to do that demo, and this PICA200 is ready to pretty much steal the limelight graphically from Nintendo's last two home consoles. Good shadowing capabilities have seemed to be a boon for Nintendo too, and it really seems that the PICA200 will provide those 360-like graphics (in terms of techniques used, not quality) in an SD resolution.
As for memory, the 4 MB of "VRAM" is probably a pure display buffer eDRAM type system a la PS2 or Gamecube/Wii, which would help maintaining a nice high framerate for resolutions on the 3DS. The 64 MB seems a bit low to me but I'm sure the system will have a texture compression scheme that will make the most of the space a la Gamecube and the Wii when the texture compression is actually utilized. 128 MB still would've been nice for media use though, but for games 64 MB should be large enough if TC is available.
It's good to see the specs and finally see an Xbox-in-your-hands like system when it comes to raw processing power.
That is true, but going with lighter specs, it gives them room to work with. They always want to sell at a profit, I doubt this will demand they go high to do that. I wouldn't really compare the XL to this, because I doubt they really expected the XL to fly off shelves. It was a last hooray kind of thing, so they maximized the price point. And when it comes to the CPU, yeah their for the double image, but I assume this is what developers were talking about when they said, they could do more by skipping 3D. They could use both for a single image.Darth, do you think Nintendo was justified pricing the DSi XL at $190 earlier this year, considering the incredibly ancient tech inside it? Nintendo doesn't base their prices off of technical specs, they base it off of the price they think consumers are willing to pay for it.
SakusEnvoy
Well, those specs seem underwhelming. I figured it would be higher than that. Especially if it costs $200+ dollars...tocool340Nintendo likes money. It's the same with Apple, tech specs are decent but they charge a high price. If Nintendo can get away with charging $250 for the 3DS and still sell a million within the first 3 months, they would. Nintendo is the only gaming company that makes a profit at all the hardware they have ever sold. None of their consoles (handheld or home) have ever been sold at a loss.
Is there a slot for a SD card or any other method of adding extra storage?
Is there a slot for a SD card or any other method of adding extra storage?
misiufraggle
yes, sd (micro, mini, or normal i dont remember).
[QUOTE="misiufraggle"]
Is there a slot for a SD card or any other method of adding extra storage?
NaveedLife
yes, sd (micro, mini, or normal i dont remember).
That is cool. I'd like it if it were possible to download games / demos using a Wii, save them to SD card, and then play them on 3DS. 8)
Your estimates are wrong. The clock speed isn't being doubled each iteration and the original Gameboys did not have 4mhz clock speeds. It doesn't work that way, its not even the same CPU die being used. What your doing is comparing say a 300mhz Pentium II to a 600mhz pentium 3 to a 1.2ghz pentium 4. The differences between each architecture are more than just clock speeds. Heck a downclocked 300mhz pentium 4 would easily beat the tar our of a pentium 3 at double the speed and likewise with a P2 or P CPU...If true, I told you guys so
Everyone was saying it may have 800Mhz CPU, 200Mhz GPU, 256MB RAM, 8GB or more storage
And of course this isn't confirmed and no clock speeds and such don't mean everything
But nintendo, if this is correct, is going the cheaper route.
I think if these are true it all but confirms a price point lower than $200, there is no way they should charge more for that
Sure two CPUs @266Mhz is a good thing, but considering the PSPs CPU is of a higher speed, and won't the CPUs both be simply making the image twice, therefore it can't really combine the CPUs to rock out to 520Mhz? I don't understand all this stuff so don't take it like I know what I'm saying, coz I don't
But the specs are a tad bit underwhelming (though the VRAM is as much as a PS2 i believe and i'm not sure how much VRAM other handhelds have)
Notice though
DS- 67Mhz CPU, 4MB RAM
DSi- 133Mhz CPU, 16MB RAM
3DS - 266Mhz CPU (two), 64MB RAM
notice, the entire DS family tree roughly doubles CPU clock speed, and quadruples the RAM every time
Eh, just something I noticed, i believe there are some similarites to GB/GBC in this regard
I think GB had 4Mhz CPU, then GBC had 8Mhz, then GBA 16Mhz CPU, coincidence that they all double the CPU clock speed I guess (my numbers could be wrong tho)
If these are the specs, i Wouldn't rule out $169 or $179 now (yea i know it will more than likely be $199)
darth-pyschosis
[QUOTE="darth-pyschosis"]Your estimates are wrong. The clock speed isn't being doubled each iteration and the original Gameboys did not have 4mhz clock speeds. It doesn't work that way, its not even the same CPU die being used. What your doing is comparing say a 300mhz Pentium II to a 600mhz pentium 3 to a 1.2ghz pentium 4. The differences between each architecture are more than just clock speeds. Heck a downclocked 300mhz pentium 4 would easily beat the tar our of a pentium 3 at double the speed and likewise with a P2 or P CPU...If true, I told you guys so
Everyone was saying it may have 800Mhz CPU, 200Mhz GPU, 256MB RAM, 8GB or more storage
And of course this isn't confirmed and no clock speeds and such don't mean everything
But nintendo, if this is correct, is going the cheaper route.
I think if these are true it all but confirms a price point lower than $200, there is no way they should charge more for that
Sure two CPUs @266Mhz is a good thing, but considering the PSPs CPU is of a higher speed, and won't the CPUs both be simply making the image twice, therefore it can't really combine the CPUs to rock out to 520Mhz? I don't understand all this stuff so don't take it like I know what I'm saying, coz I don't
But the specs are a tad bit underwhelming (though the VRAM is as much as a PS2 i believe and i'm not sure how much VRAM other handhelds have)
Notice though
DS- 67Mhz CPU, 4MB RAM
DSi- 133Mhz CPU, 16MB RAM
3DS - 266Mhz CPU (two), 64MB RAM
notice, the entire DS family tree roughly doubles CPU clock speed, and quadruples the RAM every time
Eh, just something I noticed, i believe there are some similarites to GB/GBC in this regard
I think GB had 4Mhz CPU, then GBC had 8Mhz, then GBA 16Mhz CPU, coincidence that they all double the CPU clock speed I guess (my numbers could be wrong tho)
If these are the specs, i Wouldn't rule out $169 or $179 now (yea i know it will more than likely be $199)
ColdfireTrilogy
I said that clock speed doesn't mean everything, obviously. Different CPUs perform differently
But to my knowledge (and on Wikipedia) the GB had a 4.19Mhz CPU, the GBC had a 8Mhz CPU, the GBA had a 16Mhz CPU, then DS got 67/33Mhz CPUs, and DSi got 133Mhz CPU, now 3DS has two 266Mhz CPU
All i'm saying is the number of the clock speed for the CPU has roughly double each gen, except DS where one CPU did the 2x jump and there was another more powerful one.
I know the clock speed doesn't indicate what it can actually do per say, I believe I said so in my original post. But the numbers, all double each gen, and thats what i was pointing out
Darth, do you think Nintendo was justified pricing the DSi XL at $190 earlier this year, considering the incredibly ancient tech inside it? Nintendo doesn't base their prices off of technical specs, they base it off of the price they think consumers are willing to pay for it.
SakusEnvoy
Like i said in SW, the XL had an established market price to go off of. This does not. They charged the same price for N64 and GCN at launch so its possible.
They had to increase price of XL based off DSi and Lite, but 3DS can be price anywhere since its a huge risk (3D) and the economy, in addition to not having a market yet.
I think it will be $199, but $169 or $179 wouldn't shock me. Infact, if Nintendo really wants to guarantee sales, price it at the old $169 DSi price point (yes the same price as XL now) and it will for sure sell a lot (while killing DSi sales)
I think $179-$199 is the likely target.
Sounds about right, I don't understand why anyone would be surprised or disappointed. It's a handheldistuffedsunnyi think alot of people were expecing iphone 4 type specs (i think its roughly 512MB of ram, a DX10.1 compliant GPU and a dual core 1GHz CPU). thats where the dissapointment is coming from i think.
[QUOTE="istuffedsunny"]Sounds about right, I don't understand why anyone would be surprised or disappointed. It's a handheldosan0i think alot of people were expecing iphone 4 type specs (i think its roughly 512MB of ram, a DX10.1 compliant GPU and a dual core 1GHz CPU). thats where the dissapointment is coming from i think. I was expecting that amount of Ram, but at half CPU speed @ 512MHz dual processor and at least 64MB of VRAM. If the system did cost $200+, I think those specs would definitely be more fair for the price it would cost...
[QUOTE="osan0"][QUOTE="istuffedsunny"]Sounds about right, I don't understand why anyone would be surprised or disappointed. It's a handheldtocool340i think alot of people were expecing iphone 4 type specs (i think its roughly 512MB of ram, a DX10.1 compliant GPU and a dual core 1GHz CPU). thats where the dissapointment is coming from i think. I was expecting that amount of Ram, but at half CPU speed @ 512MHz dual processor and at least 64MB of VRAM. If the system did cost $200+, I think those specs would definitely be more fair for the price it would cost... i think its going to come in at 200. an iphone 4 is not cheap if nintendo did go with your proposed specs though then it would cost alot more....and eat the battery silly. also your proposed spec would be very out of balance....the GPu would be way to weeny to compliment the rest of it. its a spec more suited to a multimedia device running a heavy OS rather than a dedicated gaming system with a more specialised OS. i mean it would have more ram than a PS3 or 360.....thats a bit much. as i mentioned in another thread....i think people were getting way ahead of themselves. many seemed to be thinking that this would be an iphone killer in performance (and some possibly in features....really not going to happen people)...the standard by which all mobile hardware would be judged. a little unrealistic for a handheld that will at its highest be 250 quid at launch. assuming its going to be 200 (imho 250 would be a bit pricey) i think your getting a solid deal. new glasseless 3D screen, touch screen, 2 core CPU, 64Mb of ram, battery, g wireless at least (possibly N, have ninty specified the wireless?), 1.5GB of internal storage and a GPU with more poke than a GC. not the deal of the century perhaps but solid. if you want a multimedia device, a cutting edge device and/or a device full of features then get something else.....the 3DS is not for you. an iphone, an android phone or something like an open pandora may be more to your liking. you will be dissapointed with the 3DS. if your buying it just for the 3D then stay your hand...there will be other devices out there with better implementations....including future revisions of the 3DS. also the wow effect of that will ware off. if there are games on the 3DS that you are looking forward to then get a 3DS.
[QUOTE="tocool340"][QUOTE="osan0"] i think alot of people were expecing iphone 4 type specs (i think its roughly 512MB of ram, a DX10.1 compliant GPU and a dual core 1GHz CPU). thats where the dissapointment is coming from i think.osan0I was expecting that amount of Ram, but at half CPU speed @ 512MHz dual processor and at least 64MB of VRAM. If the system did cost $200+, I think those specs would definitely be more fair for the price it would cost... i think its going to come in at 200. an iphone 4 is not cheap if nintendo did go with your proposed specs though then it would cost alot more....and eat the battery silly. also your proposed spec would be very out of balance....the GPu would be way to weeny to compliment the rest of it. its a spec more suited to a multimedia device running a heavy OS rather than a dedicated gaming system with a more specialised OS. i mean it would have more ram than a PS3 or 360.....thats a bit much. as i mentioned in another thread....i think people were getting way ahead of themselves. many seemed to be thinking that this would be an iphone killer in performance (and some possibly in features....really not going to happen people)...the standard by which all mobile hardware would be judged. a little unrealistic for a handheld that will at its highest be 250 quid at launch. assuming its going to be 200 (imho 250 would be a bit pricey) i think your getting a solid deal. new glasseless 3D screen, touch screen, 2 core CPU, 64Mb of ram, battery, g wireless at least (possibly N, have ninty specified the wireless?), 1.5GB of internal storage and a GPU with more poke than a GC. not the deal of the century perhaps but solid. if you want a multimedia device, a cutting edge device and/or a device full of features then get something else.....the 3DS is not for you. an iphone, an android phone or something like an open pandora may be more to your liking. you will be dissapointed with the 3DS. if your buying it just for the 3D then stay your hand...there will be other devices out there with better implementations....including future revisions of the 3DS. also the wow effect of that will ware off. if there are games on the 3DS that you are looking forward to then get a 3DS. Don't forget that the fourth-generation iPod Touch, with 8 gigabytes of storage and the same specs as the iPhone 4, is actually only $229. I don't think specs are the be-all-end-all of everything, but realistically if this device comes in at the $200-250 price range, there's no reason why they couldn't have equalled or surpassed Apple's hardware. Although I think 512MB of RAM would have been overkill since the 3DS probably isn't designed for multitasking.
Personally I just wish they hadn't downclocked the GPU -- I was expecting PICA200 to run @ 400Mhz. The slight increase in power consumption would have been worth it for the greatly enhanced performance. Oh well.
i think its going to come in at 200. an iphone 4 is not cheap if nintendo did go with your proposed specs though then it would cost alot more....and eat the battery silly. also your proposed spec would be very out of balance....the GPu would be way to weeny to compliment the rest of it. its a spec more suited to a multimedia device running a heavy OS rather than a dedicated gaming system with a more specialised OS. i mean it would have more ram than a PS3 or 360.....thats a bit much. as i mentioned in another thread....i think people were getting way ahead of themselves. many seemed to be thinking that this would be an iphone killer in performance (and some possibly in features....really not going to happen people)...the standard by which all mobile hardware would be judged. a little unrealistic for a handheld that will at its highest be 250 quid at launch. assuming its going to be 200 (imho 250 would be a bit pricey) i think your getting a solid deal. new glasseless 3D screen, touch screen, 2 core CPU, 64Mb of ram, battery, g wireless at least (possibly N, have ninty specified the wireless?), 1.5GB of internal storage and a GPU with more poke than a GC. not the deal of the century perhaps but solid. if you want a multimedia device, a cutting edge device and/or a device full of features then get something else.....the 3DS is not for you. an iphone, an android phone or something like an open pandora may be more to your liking. you will be dissapointed with the 3DS. if your buying it just for the 3D then stay your hand...there will be other devices out there with better implementations....including future revisions of the 3DS. also the wow effect of that will ware off. if there are games on the 3DS that you are looking forward to then get a 3DS. Don't forget that the fourth-generation iPod Touch, with 8 gigabytes of storage and the same specs as the iPhone 4, is actually only $229. I don't think specs are the be-all-end-all of everything, but realistically if this device comes in at the $200-250 price range, there's no reason why they couldn't have equalled or surpassed Apple's hardware. Although I think 512MB of RAM would have been overkill since the 3DS probably isn't designed for multitasking.[QUOTE="osan0"][QUOTE="tocool340"] I was expecting that amount of Ram, but at half CPU speed @ 512MHz dual processor and at least 64MB of VRAM. If the system did cost $200+, I think those specs would definitely be more fair for the price it would cost...SakusEnvoy
Personally I just wish they hadn't downclocked the GPU -- I was expecting PICA200 to run @ 400Mhz. The slight increase in power consumption would have been worth it for the greatly enhanced performance. Oh well.
but the new ipod touch does not have 2 screens nor does it have a 3d screen which is probably costing ninty a few quid in its own right. i also wouldnt be surprised if that 3d screen is draining more power than all of the other components combined..or at least taking the lions share. unless there LED screens...which i doubt. yea if ninty were making an ipod type product then these specs at 200 would be dissapointing. but there not directly comparable in terms of their hardware setup. a 400Mhz GPU would also be bottlenecked by everthing else... 200Mhz would have been more realistic imho. 133 is perhaps a bit too much of a cut i agree. wishful thinking on my part....but hopefully a future firmware update may open 166MHz to devs or something....assuming the cooling is up to scratch and the decision wasnt one based on yield.Your estimates are wrong. The clock speed isn't being doubled each iteration and the original Gameboys did not have 4mhz clock speeds. It doesn't work that way, its not even the same CPU die being used. What your doing is comparing say a 300mhz Pentium II to a 600mhz pentium 3 to a 1.2ghz pentium 4. The differences between each architecture are more than just clock speeds. Heck a downclocked 300mhz pentium 4 would easily beat the tar our of a pentium 3 at double the speed and likewise with a P2 or P CPU...ColdfireTrilogy
In reality, you're wrong about the Pentium 4 vs Pentium 3 comparison. In almost all cases the P3 was significantly faster than the P4 per clock cycle. One of the big points of Netburst was boosting clock speeds, which it certainly did, but out of it of course came faster FSBs, etc as compared to what was available with P3 technology. That was not the end of the story of the P3 though. It's design was taken and formed into the highly powerful per clock and efficient Pentium M series. Pentium M was further developed into the Core Architecture (it pretty much was two Pentium M cores on one die to say the least). Core Architecture was further refined into the extremely successful Core 2 series. The P3 architecture was the basis of the cores in the Larrabee GPU project as well. While it wasn't successful for Intel in terms of making money, it does go to show how good that CPU series was and it's ability to be pushed further with improvements.
Now to go back to your logic, yes new architectures tend to involve better per clock performance. I would assume there would be some improvements going from older ARM iterations to the ones in the 3DS, but the clocks are still much lower than I think they need to be. 10 Hours of battery life is a good balance and whatever clock speed achieves that should be the one to rest on. My gut feeling tells me 300 or perhaps 400 MHz could be pushed.
this still not a official word from nintendo it is just leaked info from some source i take it with a grain of salt
First off. I see alot of people saying how the iphone has DX10 GPU's, and 512mb of RAM and what not. What u guys need to realize is that just because the iphone's GPU supports it doesn't mean it has the actual power to use it effecctivly. For example a ATi 4550 is capable of DX10, but ur most likely gonna get 15 fps on crysis in DX10 mode. Also in terms of RAM the iphone has 512mb. This is shard by both the GPU, and the rest of the system. The 3DS has 4MB of Vram which is actually very good for a handheld. Very good. I also see alot of people complaining about OpenGL ES 1.1, but the PS3 also uses OpenGL ES 1.1. This doesnt mean much because both the PS3, and 3DS have extensions that allow it to do much more. On top of that the 3DS devs have a software available to them that allows them to program OpenGl 2.0+ shaders, and convert them to something the 3DS can use so dont worry about the 3DS interms of shaders. I see alot of people dissapointed about clock speeds, but what most people dont know is that devs can make their game overclock the hardware when needed. This was teh case with the PSP, and im sure this will be the case with the 3DS. so that 133mhz GPU or those two 266mhz CPU's can go much higher if they devs dictate the game to do so.
on your last point about the devs being able to clock the hardware higher....absolutely not. the PSP was origonally clocked at 266Mhz or something but sony released a firmware update that clocked the CPu up for future games after that update at the expense of battery life. the CPu in the PSP was designed to work at 333Mhz. but it was sony that allowed that not devs who forced it. the only way the 3DS will get faster is if nintendo sanction it and update the firmware to allow it. devs are absolutely not allowed to change the spec of any platform. now nintendo might do that depending on cooling and hardware (if theres a chance that a few 3DSs wont be up to the overclock then they cant do it) with a future update but thats nintendos call. devs can not make the hardware go faster...if they could then it could lead to a disaster.First off. I see alot of people saying how the iphone has DX10 GPU's, and 512mb of RAM and what not. What u guys need to realize is that just because the iphone's GPU supports it doesn't mean it has the actual power to use it effecctivly. For example a ATi 4550 is capable of DX10, but ur most likely gonna get 15 fps on crysis in DX10 mode. Also in terms of RAM the iphone has 512mb. This is shard by both the GPU, and the rest of the system. The 3DS has 4MB of Vram which is actually very good for a handheld. Very good. I also see alot of people complaining about OpenGL ES 1.1, but the PS3 also uses OpenGL ES 1.1. This doesnt mean much because both the PS3, and 3DS have extensions that allow it to do much more. On top of that the 3DS devs have a software available to them that allows them to program OpenGl 2.0+ shaders, and convert them to something the 3DS can use so dont worry about the 3DS interms of shaders. I see alot of people dissapointed about clock speeds, but what most people dont know is that devs can make their game overclock the hardware when needed. This was teh case with the PSP, and im sure this will be the case with the 3DS. so that 133mhz GPU or those two 266mhz CPU's can go much higher if they devs dictate the game to do so.
painguy1
[QUOTE="painguy1"]on your last point about the devs being able to clock the hardware higher....absolutely not. the PSP was origonally clocked at 266Mhz or something but sony released a firmware update that clocked the CPu up for future games after that update at the expense of battery life. the CPu in the PSP was designed to work at 333Mhz. but it was sony that allowed that not devs who forced it. the only way the 3DS will get faster is if nintendo sanction it and update the firmware to allow it. devs are absolutely not allowed to change the spec of any platform. now nintendo might do that depending on cooling and hardware (if theres a chance that a few 3DSs wont be up to the overclock then they cant do it) with a future update but thats nintendos call. devs can not make the hardware go faster...if they could then it could lead to a disaster.First off. I see alot of people saying how the iphone has DX10 GPU's, and 512mb of RAM and what not. What u guys need to realize is that just because the iphone's GPU supports it doesn't mean it has the actual power to use it effecctivly. For example a ATi 4550 is capable of DX10, but ur most likely gonna get 15 fps on crysis in DX10 mode. Also in terms of RAM the iphone has 512mb. This is shard by both the GPU, and the rest of the system. The 3DS has 4MB of Vram which is actually very good for a handheld. Very good. I also see alot of people complaining about OpenGL ES 1.1, but the PS3 also uses OpenGL ES 1.1. This doesnt mean much because both the PS3, and 3DS have extensions that allow it to do much more. On top of that the 3DS devs have a software available to them that allows them to program OpenGl 2.0+ shaders, and convert them to something the 3DS can use so dont worry about the 3DS interms of shaders. I see alot of people dissapointed about clock speeds, but what most people dont know is that devs can make their game overclock the hardware when needed. This was teh case with the PSP, and im sure this will be the case with the 3DS. so that 133mhz GPU or those two 266mhz CPU's can go much higher if they devs dictate the game to do so.
osan0
you think firmware is going to stop something like that? not even dude. if devs want to do it directly from their game they can. In terms of heat the 3DS is fine. Nintendo just did this because of battery life.
God you guys, quit comparing apple to orange clock speeds. Chances are the ARM11 trounces the PSP's processing engines clock per clock by quite a bit. Also the 3DS has full 3D GPU that's close to the Xbox in terms of sheer capability. It's not like the PS2 or PSP that split the graphics load, where geometry is calculated on one processor and the texturing/everything else on another chip.
on your last point about the devs being able to clock the hardware higher....absolutely not. the PSP was origonally clocked at 266Mhz or something but sony released a firmware update that clocked the CPu up for future games after that update at the expense of battery life. the CPu in the PSP was designed to work at 333Mhz. but it was sony that allowed that not devs who forced it. the only way the 3DS will get faster is if nintendo sanction it and update the firmware to allow it. devs are absolutely not allowed to change the spec of any platform. now nintendo might do that depending on cooling and hardware (if theres a chance that a few 3DSs wont be up to the overclock then they cant do it) with a future update but thats nintendos call. devs can not make the hardware go faster...if they could then it could lead to a disaster.[QUOTE="osan0"][QUOTE="painguy1"]
First off. I see alot of people saying how the iphone has DX10 GPU's, and 512mb of RAM and what not. What u guys need to realize is that just because the iphone's GPU supports it doesn't mean it has the actual power to use it effecctivly. For example a ATi 4550 is capable of DX10, but ur most likely gonna get 15 fps on crysis in DX10 mode. Also in terms of RAM the iphone has 512mb. This is shard by both the GPU, and the rest of the system. The 3DS has 4MB of Vram which is actually very good for a handheld. Very good. I also see alot of people complaining about OpenGL ES 1.1, but the PS3 also uses OpenGL ES 1.1. This doesnt mean much because both the PS3, and 3DS have extensions that allow it to do much more. On top of that the 3DS devs have a software available to them that allows them to program OpenGl 2.0+ shaders, and convert them to something the 3DS can use so dont worry about the 3DS interms of shaders. I see alot of people dissapointed about clock speeds, but what most people dont know is that devs can make their game overclock the hardware when needed. This was teh case with the PSP, and im sure this will be the case with the 3DS. so that 133mhz GPU or those two 266mhz CPU's can go much higher if they devs dictate the game to do so.
painguy1
you think firmware is going to stop something like that? not even dude. if devs want to do it directly from their game they can. In terms of heat the 3DS is fine. Nintendo just did this because of battery life.
no...they cant. if a developer ever tried to overclock someone elses hardware without their permission...whether its on a console or a PC.....there would be absolute hell to pay. in the case of a console the hardware belongs to nintendo and no developer has the right to change the spec without nintendo permission. lets look at a possibility if a dev did do that. lets say EA release a new need for speed for the 3DS and the game clocks the GPU to 200MHz and the 2 cores to 300MHz so it can run all nice and smooth. sounds great? now what happens if that overclock ends up borking a whole load of 3DSs in the process because the hardware cant take it. its entirely possible....ninty will have only tested the hardware up to their own spec before shipping it off. what would happen? well nintendo would basically take EA to court and beat the living crap out of them. not all hardware is equal..any overclocker will tell you that. some CPUs will happily overclock like crazy while others of the exact same model will have very little capacity for overclocking. this is as true in console land as in PC land. even if this hypothetical NFS only borked 1% of 3DSs that would still be a complete disaster. on consoles/handhelds...unless the manufacturer specifically says its ok to clock the hardware higher and they give the devs that kind of access...they can not do it. a developer can also not go near a PCs clock for the same reasons....if a game overclocks your PC and borks it in the process then thats a catastrophe. and yes firmware controls this stuff..its the OS of course it controls the hardware speed. thats how sony upped the clock speed in the PSP....they updated the firmware so devs could use it.[QUOTE="painguy1"][QUOTE="osan0"] on your last point about the devs being able to clock the hardware higher....absolutely not. the PSP was origonally clocked at 266Mhz or something but sony released a firmware update that clocked the CPu up for future games after that update at the expense of battery life. the CPu in the PSP was designed to work at 333Mhz. but it was sony that allowed that not devs who forced it. the only way the 3DS will get faster is if nintendo sanction it and update the firmware to allow it. devs are absolutely not allowed to change the spec of any platform. now nintendo might do that depending on cooling and hardware (if theres a chance that a few 3DSs wont be up to the overclock then they cant do it) with a future update but thats nintendos call. devs can not make the hardware go faster...if they could then it could lead to a disaster.osan0
you think firmware is going to stop something like that? not even dude. if devs want to do it directly from their game they can. In terms of heat the 3DS is fine. Nintendo just did this because of battery life.
no...they cant. if a developer ever tried to overclock someone elses hardware without their permission...whether its on a console or a PC.....there would be absolute hell to pay. in the case of a console the hardware belongs to nintendo and no developer has the right to change the spec without nintendo permission. lets look at a possibility if a dev did do that. lets say EA release a new need for speed for the 3DS and the game clocks the GPU to 200MHz and the 2 cores to 300MHz so it can run all nice and smooth. sounds great? now what happens if that overclock ends up borking a whole load of 3DSs in the process because the hardware cant take it. its entirely possible....ninty will have only tested the hardware up to their own spec before shipping it off. what would happen? well nintendo would basically take EA to court and beat the living crap out of them. not all hardware is equal..any overclocker will tell you that. some CPUs will happily overclock like crazy while others of the exact same model will have very little capacity for overclocking. this is as true in console land as in PC land. even if this hypothetical NFS only borked 1% of 3DSs that would still be a complete disaster. on consoles/handhelds...unless the manufacturer specifically says its ok to clock the hardware higher and they give the devs that kind of access...they can not do it. a developer can also not go near a PCs clock for the same reasons....if a game overclocks your PC and borks it in the process then thats a catastrophe. and yes firmware controls this stuff..its the OS of course it controls the hardware speed. thats how sony upped the clock speed in the PSP....they updated the firmware so devs could use it.I not saying that they would do it without Nintendo's permission. Im just saying that it has nothing to do with firmware. Nice wall of text though. :P Its not like Nintendo would say would never say yes. IDK about the ARM, but i do know the PICA is very power friendly so Nintendo wont be to strict about it if devs ask. Heck Nintendo might do it themselvs. This is ofcourse just on special ocasions. hopefully that clears anything i left out in my original post.
Until there's an official release I think it's better to list this woefully low power set of specs as a "worst case scenario"
Jaysonguy
Nintendo never officially released the Wii's specs ....
[QUOTE="Jaysonguy"]
Until there's an official release I think it's better to list this woefully low power set of specs as a "worst case scenario"
darth-pyschosis
Nintendo never officially released the Wii's specs ....
We're talking about the handheld, not the console
Nintendo has been screaming "NEW ADVANCED TECH" with this handheld, for them to hype it this much and not give it any horsepower to actually deliver that promise would be a hard pill to swallow
[QUOTE="darth-pyschosis"]
[QUOTE="Jaysonguy"]
Until there's an official release I think it's better to list this woefully low power set of specs as a "worst case scenario"
Jaysonguy
Nintendo never officially released the Wii's specs ....
We're talking about the handheld, not the console
Nintendo has been screaming "NEW ADVANCED TECH" with this handheld, for them to hype it this much and not give it any horsepower to actually deliver that promise would be a hard pill to swallow
all Nintendo has been screaming is 3D!!!! 3D!!!! NO GLASSES!!!!!!!!!!. It's 3rd party devs that have been saying stuff like that. And this is advance for a handheld. Although its CPU may not compare its GPU is certainly something comparable to various other mobile devices. Its architecture is just very different from that of traditional GPU's in smartphones which gives people the impression that it is lackluster. The only major thing something like the iphone has over the 3DS is CPU, and RAM, and even that is minimal considering that iOS uses a significant amount of it. So maybe you will be seeing better looking textures on the iPhone, but thats it. In terms of visuals the gap isnt that big much like that of the PS3, and 360.
[QUOTE="Jaysonguy"]
[QUOTE="darth-pyschosis"]
Nintendo never officially released the Wii's specs ....
painguy1
We're talking about the handheld, not the console
Nintendo has been screaming "NEW ADVANCED TECH" with this handheld, for them to hype it this much and not give it any horsepower to actually deliver that promise would be a hard pill to swallow
all Nintendo has been screaming is 3D!!!! 3D!!!! NO GLASSES!!!!!!!!!!. It's 3rd party devs that have been saying stuff like that. And this is advance for a handheld. Although its CPU may not compare its GPU is certainly something comparable to various other mobile devices. Its architecture is just very different from that of traditional GPU's in smartphones which gives people the impression that it is lackluster. The only major thing something like the iphone has over the 3DS is CPU, and RAM, and even that is minimal considering that iOS uses a significant amount of it. So maybe you will be seeing better looking textures on the iPhone, but thats it. In terms of visuals the gap isnt that big much like that of the PS3, and 360.
Graphics wise, the 3DS should have the iPhone 4G and iPad beat or equaled. In the CPU department, they will beat the 3DS if the specs are true. As long as the 3DS has texture compression, texture quality shouldn't be an issue in comparison. 128 MB would realistically still be better, because this isn't just VRAM, it's the system's entire memory pool. The original Xbox would've been much better off with 128 MB, and with similar graphics capabilities (if not a bit less overall), the 3DS should have 128 too. The 4 MB of dedicated VRAM suspected is probably a framebuffer only, as in this application - storing two frames for 3D - it would be extremely useful and important to performance, more so than just doing one frame at a time a la PS2, GC, Wii or Xbox 360, which all have eDRAM type setups with dedicated frame buffer storage.[QUOTE="painguy1"]
[QUOTE="Jaysonguy"]
We're talking about the handheld, not the console
Nintendo has been screaming "NEW ADVANCED TECH" with this handheld, for them to hype it this much and not give it any horsepower to actually deliver that promise would be a hard pill to swallow
mouthforbathory
all Nintendo has been screaming is 3D!!!! 3D!!!! NO GLASSES!!!!!!!!!!. It's 3rd party devs that have been saying stuff like that. And this is advance for a handheld. Although its CPU may not compare its GPU is certainly something comparable to various other mobile devices. Its architecture is just very different from that of traditional GPU's in smartphones which gives people the impression that it is lackluster. The only major thing something like the iphone has over the 3DS is CPU, and RAM, and even that is minimal considering that iOS uses a significant amount of it. So maybe you will be seeing better looking textures on the iPhone, but thats it. In terms of visuals the gap isnt that big much like that of the PS3, and 360.
Graphics wise, the 3DS should have the iPhone 4G and iPad beat or equaled. In the CPU department, they will beat the 3DS if the specs are true. As long as the 3DS has texture compression, texture quality shouldn't be an issue in comparison. 128 MB would realistically still be better, because this isn't just VRAM, it's the system's entire memory pool. The original Xbox would've been much better off with 128 MB, and with similar graphics capabilities (if not a bit less overall), the 3DS should have 128 too. The 4 MB of dedicated VRAM suspected is probably a framebuffer only, as in this application - storing two frames for 3D - it would be extremely useful and important to performance, more so than just doing one frame at a time a la PS2, GC, Wii or Xbox 360, which all have eDRAM type setups with dedicated frame buffer storage.yeah i pretty much agree with you. Im pretty sure 3DS will useS3CT texture compression. Im 100% sure that 4mb VRAM is framebuffer. i highly doubt we would have those kind of graphics on 4Mb RAM alone :P[QUOTE="darth-pyschosis"]
[QUOTE="Jaysonguy"]
Until there's an official release I think it's better to list this woefully low power set of specs as a "worst case scenario"
Jaysonguy
Nintendo never officially released the Wii's specs ....
We're talking about the handheld, not the console
Nintendo has been screaming "NEW ADVANCED TECH" with this handheld, for them to hype it this much and not give it any horsepower to actually deliver that promise would be a hard pill to swallow
You really couldn't understand what I was saying?
Nintendo will not release official specs. This, or any other leak, is as close as we may get
The Wii was an example that I was using.
No, they haven't been screaming "advanced tech" all they've said is glasses free 3D, and that developers love it. They haven't hyped it more than what they already are delivering on (3D and games) so you're doing all the hyping by your lonesome.
Yeah you simply cannot. 32 MB bare minimum VRAM would be lowest I'd ever recommend from what I've seen so far, though 64 is what would make sense cost/performance wise. 128 would be optimum though. Even still you can do alot with 64 MB of dedicated VRAM, but this is the full RAM pool we're talking here, hence why I would want 128 MB. An eDRAM set up with the 4 MB will do wonders though. I'd love to see the system with a video output, perhaps up to 720p (doable on 4 MB FB, just like with the PS2), though for z-buffering performance, 480p should be the highest.
Basically I expect the 3DS to be an amalgam between the PS2 and Xbox. PS2 like geometry, with the Xbox's multi-texturing + various rendering capabilities, with the GC/Wii's pure system efficiency. Interestingly enough, technically the PS2 could do anything the Xbox could in terms of rendering techniques such as self shadowing, normal/bumpmapping. It's lack of multi-texturing, older hardware rendering model, and low amount of RAM, combined with lower processing speeds held it back in comparison, though a couple games really do the PS2 justice (namely Hitman Blood Money). What made me very excited about the 3DS was MGS 3D. Finally we could see a more advanced vision of MGS3, as it could've been with a much more powerful system, a la Xbox. Much like the PS3, the PS2 was alot of horsepower that required developers to create their own software to really get the most out of. The Xbox had the benefit of the Direct X API and hardware ready to do what the DX API specified it could do. It didn't hurt the Xbox that respectably it had more raw usable power than the PS2, dedicated hardware purely to graphics along with the DX specification.
Yeah you simply cannot. 32 MB bare minimum VRAM would be lowest I'd ever recommend from what I've seen so far, though 64 is what would make sense cost/performance wise. 128 would be optimum though. Even still you can do alot with 64 MB of dedicated VRAM, but this is the full RAM pool we're talking here, hence why I would want 128 MB. An eDRAM set up with the 4 MB will do wonders though. I'd love to see the system with a video output, perhaps up to 720p (doable on 4 MB FB, just like with the PS2), though for z-buffering performance, 480p should be the highest.
Basically I expect the 3DS to be an amalgam between the PS2 and Xbox. PS2 like geometry, with the Xbox's multi-texturing + various rendering capabilities, with the GC/Wii's pure system efficiency. Interestingly enough, technically the PS2 could do anything the Xbox could in terms of rendering techniques such as self shadowing, normal/bumpmapping. It's lack of multi-texturing, older hardware rendering model, and low amount of RAM, combined with lower processing speeds held it back in comparison, though a couple games really do the PS2 justice (namely Hitman Blood Money). What made me very excited about the 3DS was MGS 3D. Finally we could see a more advanced vision of MGS3, as it could've been with a much more powerful system, a la Xbox. Much like the PS3, the PS2 was alot of horsepower that required developers to create their own software to really get the most out of. The Xbox had the benefit of the Direct X API and hardware ready to do what the DX API specified it could do. It didn't hurt the Xbox that respectably it had more raw usable power than the PS2, dedicated hardware purely to graphics along with the DX specification.mouthforbathory
We should be able to connect 3DSs to TVs, none of the screens have anything going on with the touch screen, so this may not be a problem
Yeah but the iphone is essentially a mini-computer. The DS is designed to play one game at a time, not run a bunch of apps and what-have-you
Of course I assume an iphone can run many apps at once. I'm more of an android guy :P
(Then there's the price)
Not disappointing at all, I'll just copy and paste what I said in my blog.
I will take these with a grain of salt, but as digital foundry pointed out, IGN have been accurate in the past with their specs leaks:
266MHz ARM11 CPU(two of them)
133MHz PICA 2000 GPU
4MBs VRAM 64MBs of RAM
1.5GB of flash mem. (rumoured to be 2GB's, 512MB's used for the OS 
)
And we know the full resolution in 3D (i.e. both eyes) will be 800x240 or 190,000+ pixels.
I am not a graphics expert, but I admit at first I was disappointed by those numbers, they just seemed a little low.But then I thought about it, and they are great. Definitely enough for what Nintendo entended. First we shouldn't be disappointed because it matched their handheld timeline. I'm not comparing direct specs, but what the handhelds were comparable to:
GB/GBC = NES
GBA = SNES
NDS = N64
3DS = GCN?
Gamecube specs:
485MHz IBM Gekko PowerPC CPU
162MHz ATI Flipper GPU
40MBs of RAM
640x480 resolution 300,000+ pixels.
It seems to fit the time line (and surpass it), just going by these basic numbers. Keeping in mind the 3DS hardware is newer and better (from what I know the GPU has some great capabilities GCN's did not), and the 3DS displays fewer pixels so it only has to work less for better results than the GCN.
So why should people be disappointed? Nintendo has to balance price, performance, and battery life. I have seen iPhone mentioned, and sure it has great graphics (well the UE3 tech demo does, as does ID Software's engine), but it's not cheap and iPhone is limited by controls.
Was it because PSP broke Nintendo's handheld trend? Or because IGN previews apparently said 3DS was close to 360/PS3 power? Or both? Looking at that, I don't think people should be disappointed. Let's not forget displays full 3D with no glasses, something other systems can't replicate. This is what's really important anyway:
AWESOMENESS.
3ds will be ps2 with better effects
I'd just like to say that anyone comparing the iPad's or smartphones's CPU to the 3DS's is insane. You're comparing a $200 device with 10-hour battery life to a $400-600 w/o contract device that could maybe chug along for three hours while playing graphically intense games, if that.
3ds will be ps2 with better effects
dontshackzmii
men after reading this topic, i'm surprised somebody didn't mention that it was just as powerfull as the dreamcast or even a bit lesser.
Common people.
the 4mb of vram is ALOT ( the psp/ps2/gc/wii had all lesser the xbox was first in the line to get 4vram ) the 64MB is far enought, the 2x cpu's are basicly there to emulate 2 different cpu's from the old ds's, and reduce the energie drain out of 1 higher cpu. The undercloaking is just something to be done because of a battery life time. Nintendo doesn't wanna bring the awfull uptime of a psp.
The 133 mhz pica + 4vram + 64mb ram + 266@ dual cpu, will be enought to place down atleast xbox speeds + 360/ps3 shaders.
While these specs are nothing more then a rumor, i'm happy to see atleast that the 4vram the 64mb ram ( which i tought would be about 44-48mb ) etc.
I'm just suprised that people can actually come up with crap like its a ps2 or a ps1, or a dreamcast, or a gamecube. no it isn't.
Besides that part, the screen is 3inch, needs to calculated 3D effects ( which aren't a 2x drain on the hardware, because some stuff doesn't need to be rendered twice ). or even compare it towards a PSP.
comparing the 3DS with a iphone/ipad/desktop pc is just wrong, you cant compare those with it. go run the catedral demo for 2 hours with your iphone, its game over for your battery. it doesn't even show 3D effects throught no 3D screen. Still the grahpics etc will be superior, bt it needs to be. the iphone is a multitasking device.
Ever noticed the specs of a xbox 360, and compare that towards a pc. you will see that your PC outweights the xbox360 graphics BIG time. but at the same time, you need to do multiple stuff with it. while even a while ago, the pc hardly could keep up with a xbox360 game ( even while the gpu and cpu + memory where far superior ).
The 3DS doesn't need all the fancy 512 ram, because its a way low level design for games, which makes the games USE every SINGLE hardware piece to the max.
Consider this:
Nintendo needed to make a system, which didn't drained its own battery down to zero in 2 hours. It will probably keep itself alife for atleast 8 hours.
They needed a device which is compact
They needed to deliver stereoscopic 3D effect
They needed to deliver a gpu which could generate this gen 3d games
They needed to fire 2 different screens + touchscreen
They needed a cpu that could place a good fundamental basis
And all this at the cost of around the 200 euro? ( iphone , ipad etc are way beyond this price )
its not just picking up the best in place hardware parts, and ducktape them together, like the psp did years ago.
They actually still need to make it useable for a longer time then 3 hours of playing.
Lets not even talk about the ridicilous comparison on the ipad deparment, have you seen the accu packs? thats like 2x a compleet 3ds.
3DS comparing with the PS2 is just so wrong. You guys seem to forget that the architecture is something that needs to be looked at at the same time.
Besides that the earlyer post about the dude with the mhz, common. stop posting.
i rest my case
im surprised with 64MB of ram..i thought it would be the same as a GC...44MB or so. a nice surprise there.
osan0
GameCube actually had 43MB of RAM in total. Of which only 24MB is system memory. 2MB of RAM is for the framebuffer. 1MB for the texture buffer. The remaining 16MB of RAM acts as a buffer for the optical drive.
One other thing to note is that when it comes to RAM, game consoles tend to opt for quality (eg. low latency) over quantity.
[QUOTE="osan0"]im surprised with 64MB of ram..i thought it would be the same as a GC...44MB or so. a nice surprise there.
ThePlothole
GameCube actually had 43MB of RAM in total. Of which only 24MB is system memory. 2MB of RAM is for the framebuffer. 1MB for the texture buffer. The remaining 16MB of RAM acts as a buffer for the optical drive.
One other thing to note is that when it comes to RAM, game consoles tend to opt for quality (eg. low latency) over quantity.
and i have learnt something today. i knew the GCs memory was divided but i always thought the 16MB memory bank was for work that didnt need as much bandwidth or storage. it seems to be just there as a buffer for the DVD drive and audio. no wonder the GC could load like lightening...thats quite a buffer (at the time anyway). that makes the 64MB even better i suppose. since the 3DS will use carts devs wont need to set much aside for buffering. i wonder what type of ram it is and is it unified?[QUOTE="ThePlothole"][QUOTE="osan0"]im surprised with 64MB of ram..i thought it would be the same as a GC...44MB or so. a nice surprise there.
osan0
GameCube actually had 43MB of RAM in total. Of which only 24MB is system memory. 2MB of RAM is for the framebuffer. 1MB for the texture buffer. The remaining 16MB of RAM acts as a buffer for the optical drive.
One other thing to note is that when it comes to RAM, game consoles tend to opt for quality (eg. low latency) over quantity.
and i have learnt something today. i knew the GCs memory was divided but i always thought the 16MB memory bank was for work that didnt need as much bandwidth or storage. it seems to be just there as a buffer for the DVD drive and audio. no wonder the GC could load like lightening...thats quite a buffer (at the time anyway). that makes the 64MB even better i suppose. since the 3DS will use carts devs wont need to set much aside for buffering. i wonder what type of ram it is and is it unified?the 64mb is the total system memory pool meaning it will be shared by both mot of the system, and the GPU.
People stop crying over the RAM quantity. It's about quality and not quantity. PC, Laptops and eve Smartphones have way more because they need it to run the Operative system. Windows 7 needs 3GB or it won't work so most PC games will require to 4 and more for some games. The same goes for smartphones. soulreaper-4Win7 can technically run on 512 MB. For games, 2 GB tends to be the minimum for most games when running on Win7 or Vista specifically (in comparison to WinXP). RAM size is still important for consoles. While yes, latency and speed are of importance (this makes eDRAM especially advantageous), giving developers alot of room to work with is also essential. Luckily with carts, loading times can be very quick, almost unnoticeable, which will help to ease up RAM needs. Even still, the 3DS will probably use most of the 64 MB for storing visual data (with texture compression in use too!). You have to remember that it's also sound storage, OS storage, etc. The more the merrier (though it can cost you power usage wise). 64 is fine though. It shouldn't be a bane for creative visions in reference to what the GPU and CPU can handle. The processors in use, especially the GPU and it's target output resolution, truly dicate the amount of RAM needed.
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