The Power of the PC

Now I dont mean to, or want for this to turn into a systems war thread, but me and a mate were discussing whether the PC or the PS3 had more power. By this I mean in terms of generating the greatest amount of processing power, highest quality graphics, all that jazz. Now I have always believed that the PC has, and has always had, much more power than any console in its generation. But then my mate showed me this article: http://www.smh.com.au/news/articles/the-future-of-gaming/2008/05/16/1210765152982.html , and it has me doubting. It doesnt really bother me that much, consoles have never really interested me, but Im just wondering what the fact is, just for the sake of it.

So, what platform has the greatest power PC or PS3?

Thanks

A top of the line PC is definitely more powerful than a PS3, the part in that article that says a ps3 is more powerful than any home computer is complete bull. Unless they are talking about an average pc that most people have in their homes.

mmmmmmm a powerful, top of the line pc would destory a ps3.

Its not even close, the ps3 isnt even that powerful... most multiplat games end up looking better on the 360 anyways.

So imo all the consoles are way behind a top of the line PC.

Id like to see the ps3 try to run Crysis with everyone on High or Very High settings... nope not gonna happen

The PS3 is more powerful in raw computational power, as in number crunching tons of data. This ability is never used in gaming, and never will either. The Cell processor is just wasted in the PS3, it's real home is in a data center server farm, or even a render farm. I've never really understood why Sony put one in the PS3 to be honest, it will never get utilised to it's full ability.

The main bottle neck in both PS3 and xBox 360 is memory, the graphics processor in both are quite powerful, the main limitation for developers is the amount of memory each console has, forcing the developers to tone the graphics down. If Sony had put 1Gb of memory in the PS3, you would get Crysis running on Very High settings on the PS3, not totally smooth but it would run.

For general performance, your average PC is more powerful because system builders tend to balance the tech better so that they compliment each other.

Have fun

Now I dont mean to, or want for this to turn into a systems war thread, but me and a mate were discussing whether the PC or the PS3 had more power. By this I mean in terms of generating the greatest amount of processing power, highest quality graphics, all that jazz. Now I have always believed that the PC has, and has always had, much more power than any console in its generation. But then my mate showed me this article: http://www.smh.com.au/news/articles/the-future-of-gaming/2008/05/16/1210765152982.html , and it has me doubting. It doesnt really bother me that much, consoles have never really interested me, but Im just wondering what the fact is, just for the sake of it.

So, what platform has the greatest power PC or PS3?

Thanks

nick1689

If you compare the PS3 specifications to a high end PC you'll notice that the PC is better. And with every second that passes, the PS3 falls more and more behind because new hardware for the PC is being developed and created as we speak. That article really doesn't say anything new, by the way. Consoles have always been better then an average house hold PC because a regular house hold PC is a piece of crap. But these crap PCs aren't used for gaming, anyway.

PC without even thinking, only real benefit consoles have is that there arent a thousand varieties of hardware so everyone is on the same level of hardware.potentv

I wouldn't necessarily say that. PC's at this point do have the edge on say the PS3 because our GPU's have surpassed that which was out when the PS3 was built. However I would say the vast majority of those who own pc's do not have a pC with a cpu as powerful as the cell processor. Too bad for PS3 owners their super computer doesn't mean crap when their gpu is garbage.

[QUOTE="potentv"]PC without even thinking, only real benefit consoles have is that there arent a thousand varieties of hardware so everyone is on the same level of hardware.whitey_rolls

I wouldn't necessarily say that. PC's at this point do have the edge on say the PS3 because our GPU's have surpassed that which was out when the PS3 was built. However I would say the vast majority of those who own pc's do not have a pC with a cpu as powerful as the cell processor. Too bad for PS3 owners their super computer doesn't mean crap when their gpu is garbage.

And don't forget the crappy memory.

Now I dont mean to, or want for this to turn into a systems war thread, but me and a mate were discussing whether the PC or the PS3 had more power. By this I mean in terms of generating the greatest amount of processing power, highest quality graphics, all that jazz. Now I have always believed that the PC has, and has always had, much more power than any console in its generation. But then my mate showed me this article: http://www.smh.com.au/news/articles/the-future-of-gaming/2008/05/16/1210765152982.html , and it has me doubting. It doesnt really bother me that much, consoles have never really interested me, but Im just wondering what the fact is, just for the sake of it.

So, what platform has the greatest power PC or PS3?

Thanks

nick1689

Since I first began learning about PC hardware I came to the conclusion that PCs have a lot more to offer with regards to gaming compared to consoles. The main reason is that virtually any PC component, by design, is meant to be upgraded, with the thinking that the user can choose what components they want to upgrade versus their needs/budget. The same can't be said of consoles because, by design, they aren't modular.

As for the processing power thing: Keep in mind that for every next-gen console that's released, PC hardware developers are reasearching the next greatest thing to overcome the newest technological bottleneck. This will contine ad infinitum. It's really due to the PC's industry standard design which allows it to always remain at the PC gaming hardware forefront. Consoles can't do this in the same way. It could be said that consoles have designed obselecence built in. I am, however impressed with the sheer processing power of today's consoles. Comparing consoles and PCs is more like comparing apples and oranges.

First off he is talking about the cell processor been faster than a pc processor and that is wrong since you cant compare them since they are different platforms(in cell you can run only 1 program and offload tasks to the extra 7 spe'3 while a quad core intel can either run 4 programs at the same time each on their indepented core or you can use the 4 cores for a single program for different tasks i n the program ) . In some specialised software cell is indeed faster but if you put cell in a pc and try to use for video processing audio encoding or whatever pc's are used for it will be slower than aquad or even a dual core processor.

And apparently game graphics are apparently way more dependet from the vga than the processor. Ps3 has a 7800gtx gpu installed which is at least twice as weaker than a today mainstream vga like 8800gt

Consoles are often more powerful than any PC at realease. Once the next generation of video cards come out, though, consoles are surpassed. I think 2 generations have already gone since PS3.

The G80 release came before PS3... a 8800GTX was much much more powerful than any console's gpu.

Thanks for the answers guys.

So its pretty much data processing, number crunching etc, PS3>PC; but graphics, memory, pretty much gaming performance, PC>PS3.

Am I right?

Pretty much, memory is a total joke (even with the OS overhead because of microsoft bloating Vista for NO good reason) most people have 2 to 4 gigs which makes the xbox/ps3 look ridiculously bad.

Graphics cards in consoles are dated but not too bad yet.

You don't need a high end PC to beat a PS3 anymore. 600-700 dollars will do. Memory for PC is super cheap right now!