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[Foe-hammer]

I still believe that having an hdd as standard would add a performance boost that otherwise will not without one; particularily towards the end of the 360's life, when all other resources (ram) is being maxed.

Even if the above is not  the case, being able to use the hdd as standard, and not having to take the time and resources to make a game run good/acceptable without an hdd, cuts down on development time and resources.

The point that devs say they would have loved to have both a standard hdd and the added ram, says that a standard hdd would have been an improvement.  Whether the improvement was performance, or to make developing games easier, who knows.  But, i think it applies to both cases.

[Bogus8]

QUOTE(LowProfileWurm @ Sep 6 2005, 03:34 PM)

Are you trying to compare the complex data loading of PS2 to the loading time of PSX games' considerably less complex data?  Because I'm not.  I'm simply saying that the RAM in Xbox360 is more valuable to loading times than the HDD caching. 

[LowProfileWurm]

QUOTE(Bogus8 @ Sep 6 2005, 10:49 PM)

That is EXACTLY his point... games increase in complexity so yes the 12X drive will be faster but the games will be more complex making load times equal to what they were.  Load times weren't too bad on the xbox but you also had cache'ing on the fly which you can't have with out an HD.

[LightningStruckMyXbox]

I am just hoping that after a year or so after launch, M$ will add the HDD standard. Prices will have dropped enough so that this could be possible. This would give the xbox360's more demanding games to use it with an HDD.

I also think that devs could go the extra mile to support those who have an HDD by adding the option to cache when an HDD is present.

Game on the 360 will NEVER fully support caching though, because too many people will still (If thes 1st gen don't poop out like the last 1st gens) be using the original.

But with the added processor speed and RAM speed they might be ale to get information in and out quicker so that they don't have to cache.

But we will never know how fast that the 360 REALLY goes. M$ really dropped the ball on this one.

But I think that some bit of cacheing has to be done. The dash on the old xbox took up around 170 mb. The new dash is a little biger with more features and sounds to add. Could M$ have a private drive to store the dash? More importantly, could they use it to cache games?

BTW: How much does it cost for a 8mb drive? $30-40?

[Bogus8]

QUOTE(LowProfileWurm @ Sep 6 2005, 09:04 PM)

Then we were talking about 2 different things.  But I'll address this too.

[LowProfileWurm]

QUOTE(Bogus8 @ Sep 6 2005, 11:20 PM)

History has proven that if you give them faster hardware they will utilize it and abuse it... as they speed the hard ware up the software will get bloated and so I think it will stay the same.  psx > ps2 is one example and just plain and simple PC's is the other example.  Load times on Word on windows 3.11 was just about as long as Word 2003 on XP.

[deftonesmx17]

QUOTE

Games get more complex with more data each generation. Correct. But compression techniques and computation cycles get more efficient each generation. So, if they cancel each other out, and we have a faster DVD drive, then logically, load times will be approximately the same

This did not hold anywhere as true with the game at hand. The PS2 had a 24x CD speed while the PSX had a 2X cd Speed. According to you logically the PS2 game should have loaded much faster or even with about the 5 sec load time. This was FAR from the case. The PS2 Crash Game took almost 1-2 mins to load a level, which is not even close to being equal with the 5 sec loading of the PSX Crash gamnes. Odd, is how the 2x DVD version of Crash TWC loaded much faster than the CD version. This also shows to me that the Blu-Ray drive in the PS3, logically, might be faster than the DVD drive in the xbox 360.   I am sure I will get plenty of crap about saying that, but before anyone argues, stop and ask yourself if you know for sure what the Blu-Ray drive speed in the PS3 will be.

I will also repeat something that Deftech pointed out, maybe only 20% of all the xbox games use the HDD for caching, but its odd how almost every game I own uses it. To me that means the "good" games did use it and that might be part of the reason those were "good" games since they didnt have to tone the game down to work without the HDD.

[twistedsymphony]

QUOTE(deftonesmx17 @ Sep 7 2005, 10:36 AM)

I will also repeat something that Deftech pointed out, maybe only 20% of all the xbox games use the HDD for caching, but its odd how almost every game I own uses it. To me that means the "good" games did use it and that might be part of the reason those were "good" games since they didn't have to tone the game down to work without the HDD.

[deftonesmx17]

QUOTE(twistedsymphony @ Sep 7 2005, 12:03 PM)

In the end, I think it's funny how SOOO many people claim that the 133ATA cable upgrade in the current gen Xbox doesn't make a difference to loading times and that it makes no difference if the game loads from the DVD or the HDD... and now a lot of those same people are complain about not having HDD caching because it's so much faster 

An 80 pin (ata133) cable makes no difference as the IDE controller on the motherboard is what is limiting it. Anyone with computer knowledge knows this. And yes all games load faster from the HDD unless it has a horrid seek time. I have tested that part and games from the HDD do indeed load faster, with a HDD that has a faster seek time than the DVD drive. Other than that they are both transfer rate limited due to the IDE controller.

[LowProfileWurm]

I'm not arguing that point deftones.  What I'm saying is the difference won't be as appreciable since they chose 512Mb RAM as standard instead of the HDD.  I'm curious, how can you tell what games you own now are caching on Xbox1?  Most of cross-platform games don't use it.  As Twisted said, 20% of games even use it at all.  And if a game does demand it, like an RPG, then users will buy the HDD.  Since 80%+ will already have the HDD, devs don't have to worry whether their profits will take a substantial hit.  And about your Crash example... fuck if I know, maybe it was an anomally.  I don't like Crash Bandaidcooch.

I just don't think the HDD will matter that much.  It's an expenditure that offers no immediate return.

[deftonesmx17]

QUOTE(LowProfileWurm @ Sep 7 2005, 01:08 PM)

I'm not arguing that point deftones.  What I'm saying is the difference won't be as appreciable since they chose 512Mb RAM as standard instead of the HDD.

Come on, they did that so $ony wouldnt have twice the RAM. Yes the 360 has 512MB it can use for anything, but lets be real, with the GFX people want out of that thing it will use every bit of 256MB  for GFX. Thus keeping it right on par with the PS3, otherwise the xbox 360 would have had to share 256MB, which would have killed it and everyone knows that, even devs.

I am aware the HDD is not that important, but it would have made a difference

[LowProfileWurm]

QUOTE(deftonesmx17 @ Sep 7 2005, 02:15 PM)

Come on, they did that so $ony wouldnt have twice the RAM. Yes the 360 has 512MB it can use for anything, but lets be real, with the GFX people want out of that thing it will use every bit of 256MB  for GFX. Thus keeping it right on par with the PS3, otherwise the xbox 360 would have had to share 256MB, which would have killed it and everyone knows that, even devs.

Actually, MS asked the devs which they would prefer:  HDD or 512Mb of RAM.  And they said "more RAM".  Sure, the descision to persue this questioning was driven by PS3's specs, but it was a smart move.  And as far as being "on par" with PS3, they are two different beasts.  The 360 could use 400Mb of RAM for GFX work and leave 112Mb leftover for other things.  How does that put it on par?  The PS3 gets 256Mb of VRAM, that's all.  

[scooby_dooby]

Also the argument about 20% of games using the HDD is ridiculous IMO,

#1 - since PS2 has majority market share, outselling xbox over 4 to 1, all cross platform games had very little motiviation to make any use of the HDD, this is not proof that the HDD is useless, it's simply a result of the current marketplace.

#2 - the BEST games for xbox, the EXCLUSIVE games that set it apart from PS2 all used the HDD extensively, Halo1, Halo 2, KOTOR, Jade Empire, Forza

The AAA titles did use the HDD, so who cares what the final percentages are? The BEST games used it to make the games better and extract the most performance they could out of the hardware. These are the games that we bought XBOX's for, not the 80% of shit, cross platform ports.

At the very least it provides an unlimited swap file for developers to use, so they are not simply limited to 512MB of writeable memory. Hell, Halo 2 which is 2 years old uses 2 cache directories and stores WELL OVER A GIGABYTE of swap files, that's on a system with only 64MB of ram.

It offers flexibility more than anything, as well it opens the doors to many more PC ports and PC-based games, and also is essential for an entire super-genre of games(MMO's) from MMO-FPS to MMO-RPG here's an entire genre that needs a HDD.

[jaskerzada006]

Yep, Doom 3 uses 2 gigs.  

That won't be possible now.

[LowProfileWurm]

),

I'm not doubting that the extra RAM was thrown in to save their asses.  MS realized that 256Mb wouldn't be enough.  Aren't you glad they figured that out BEFORE launch?  Thankfully for MS, RAM is cheap, so they can play up to the PS3 specs.  But you have smoked yourself retarded if you think that MS didn't explicitly ask developers what they wanted more... extra RAM or HDD.  

And obviously you've swallowed more Sony PR bullshit than I've swallowed MS's because you're CONVINCED that 360 will be "CRUSHED" by PS3.  360 has much more to offer than just specs...  Too bad 360 will lose because it can't grill, right?