Now that Microsoft and Sony have revealed their next-generation game consoles, we can thoroughly evaluate the hardware and service difference between the two consoles and start formulating an opinion. Ultimately, console wars are not won by hardware differences, but by the exclusive titles warranting a specific purchase. Nevertheless, it’s the hardware differences that attract the game developers who make these games.
Price
Playstation 4 is priced at $399, while the Xbox One is $499. For the $499 price, Xbox One ships with Kinect. The PS4 counterpart of the Kinect called the PS4 Eye must be purchased separately.
CPU
Both companies have contracted AMD to build a custom CPU for their consoles, and unsurprisingly, their CPUs are very similar. Xbox One uses an 8-core 64-bit x86 Jaguar CPU at 1.6 GHz. Playstation 4 also uses an 8-core 64-bit X86 Jaguar CPU, but Sony has not revealed its console’s actual clock speed.
An important observation is that the x86 architecture of both consoles implies that it’s going to be very easy to port console-developed games to a PC, as it uses the same architecture.
Ported games from the last generation of consoles were often very clunky and felt like an afterthought; it was very obvious they were first developed on a console and then ported to the PC, even if simultaneously released. And let’s be honest: Developers tend to favor developing for consoles as there’s less piracy than on the PC. Using x86 architecture across the board makes game development much more flexible.
GPU
Playstation 4 features a video card based on AMD’s Radeon 7870. Alternatively, the Xbox One’s video card is derived from the Radeon 7790. This would suggest that Playstation 4′s GPU is somewhere around 50% more powerful than that of Xbox one, given the power variation in the PC equivalent. However, such an assertion is simply untrue because these are not the same GPU’s as their PC equivalent.
Claiming such a thing is marketing jargon − AMD has developed custom GPUs for both consoles; while some of the components are similar PC version, it is a modified card. Indeed the Radeon 7870 for the PC uses a 256-bit bus, twice the 128-bit bus of the Radeon 7790, but it is worth mentioning that they are integrated into a far-less-restricted architecture. The difference in clock speed and stream processors will be not equal 50% more power.
Image courtesy of Cnet
RAM and bandwidth
Both consoles pack 8 Gbytes of RAM but differ on the basis of type. Xbox One uses the industry standard DDR3, compared to the Playstation 4′s GDDR5, a form of memory specifically optimized for GPUs but also used as system memory in this case. The primary difference between the two forms of memories is bandwidth. GDDR5 allows the Playstation 4 to provide a bandwidth rate between GPU and CPU of 176 Gbytes/s while DDR3 of Xbox One uses 68 Gbytes/s between GPU and CPU.
What this essentially means is that the GDDR5 is better suited for transferring larger amounts of data such as higher polygon counts, more complex post processing, etc. Xbox One compensates for the decreased bandwidth through 32 Mbytes of high-speed SRAM on its GPU. Other than the expensive price, the principle drawback to GDDR5 is that is latency is slower than that of DDR3. Therefore, DDR3 is preferential for transferring smaller amounts of data. The average PC still uses DDR3 for its system memory.
Hard drive
Sony confirmed on June 11 that the Playstation 4′s 500-Gbyte hard drive is removable and swappable; it can be replaced with a hard drive of any size. The hard drive of Xbox One is also 500 Gbytes in size; although it is not removable.
Backward compatibility
Xbox One’s divergence from PowerPC to x86 architecture means it’s not backwards compatible with Xbox 360 games. Microsoft has no plans to restore backward compatibility with previously owned 360 titles via digital cloud.
Playstation 4 uses the same x86 architecture as Xbox One; therefore it too is not natively backwards compatible with Playstation 3 titles. Nonetheless, it is worth mentioning that Sony promised during its February press conference that backwards compatibility will be digitally available at a later date, courtesy of the GAIKAI cloud service acquisition.
DRM and connectivity
By far the largest difference between the two consoles is their take on Digital Rights Management. Microsoft is so serious about stopping piracy that the Xbox One requires a steady Internet connection at all times to play its games. If an internet connection drops for more than one hour, games are rendered inaccessible until the connection is restored.
This is bad news to anyone living within a remote rural area or naval base that does not have the luxury of guaranteed Internet any given point. The Playstation 4 permits gaming regardless of an Internet connection.
Purchasing or borrowing pre-owned games
Lending an Xbox One game to a buddy is the same as grabbing your left foot with your right hand, and jumping through the formed loop. Yes, it’s a massive inconvenience. Rules for lending and reselling games vary by third-party publisher; Microsoft sanctions companies to enforce their own rules.
It is within the right of a third-party publisher such as Electronic Arts to potentially ban the reselling of their titles, so no more purchasing preowned games. Or on a different note, third-party publishers also have authority to charge an additional fee to unlock preowned games.
Microsoft itself has established an explicit rule set for the games publisher under its own studio.
• Physical games cannot be rented or loaned at launch.
• Xbox One games can only be given to people who’ve been on your friends list for a minimum of 30 days.
• Games can only be given once.
Microsoft’s redeeming quality in this debacle is that it allows 10 “family members” access to “log in and play from your shared games library on any Xbox One.” This feature is limited to one family member at a time.
Multimedia
Both consoles include the ability to use of a second screen. PS4 requires a Playstation Vita handheld console to perform this feature, while the Xbox One is far more flexible – the single Smart Glass app is that’s needed to extend the functionality to tablets and other mobile devices.
Rear view of the Playstation 4
Xbox One includes many more connectivity sockets than PS4: USB 3.0 and multiple HDMI in/Out to name a few. Using Xbox One as a multimedia device will be extremely easy when coupling this many sockets and the Smart Glass app. PS4 has significantly fewer sockets, in particular, suffering from the lack of an HDMI in.
It appears Playstation 4 emphasizes gaming for its own sake, and Xbox One aims to conqueror the living as the central multimedia hub. Both are strong contenders in their own right, yet success ultimately boils down to where the developers flock. Do they flock to a console more apt to protect their products with its strict DRM policies, or to the slightly more future-proof game-centric platform?
Story based on Gamezeit
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