[bonzobanana]

I'm banned from the nintendo section so can't post it there so will have to post in this very low traffic area. Also the nintendo section mods don't like people mentioning how underpowered the wii is, which is why I was banned in the first place.

I believe the original xbox is a fair bit more powerful but wondered what others think.

[Chett]

I voted Wii, its a better, more powerful console overall.

I hate my Wii compared to my old xbox though.

[bonzobanana]

Just curious to know why you feel the wii is more powerful? Any particular feature.

I mean the original xbox has games like mx unleashed running at 1080i with full 5.1 sound. Can you think of a single wii type game that doesn't have a equivilant xbox game with superior graphics?

This is an image of mtv vs atv which was 1080i on xbox.

Forza was quite impressive too.

[Cerberus30000]

the processing power of the Wii is only slightly less the the Xbox by just a couple of Mhz however its using the same GPU and RAM from the Gamecube, so its also got less power there too

so no, the Wii isn't more powerfull then then the Xbox (I wish it was though)

[bonzobanana]

I think the main advantage of the wii is memory bandwidth, its huge compared to the original xbox I think. If I remember rightly the xbox unified memory is something like 6.4GB/sec but that is shared between gpu, cpu and any other processors and was high latency. I think there is a sound and i/o processor as well. The gamecube was 10.4gb/sec for its video memory and 2.6gb/sec for its main memory but the main memory had a very low latency. The wii upgrades everything by 50% over gamecube so video memory is upto 15.6gb/sec and main bandwidth is upto 3.9gb/sec all with very low latency and a few other features that increase bandwidth beyond that. The point is the wii is easily superior in memory bandwidth overall.

I know the wii loses the 16meg of slow memory the gamecube has which was used to buffer data coming from the optical drive. The gamecube only had a small disc with a single layer so 16meg of slow memory was sufficient to massively reduce load times. They had to replace this with the wii as it has a much larger disc with 2 layers so it was upgraded to 64meg of ddr memory. This isn't normal memory used by the main program but buffering/cache type memory to make access times from the optical drive much faster and also buffer sound data.

So the wii has 24meg of main memory, 3meg of video and a fully buffered optical drive.

The xbox has 64meg of main memory of which I think it can dedicate upto 12meg to video and has two streams storage data, one stream is from its optical drive with a small amount of buffering, the other stream is from its hard drive where each game can cache about 750meg of data from the hard drive.

The xbox has true 5.1 sound, a much more powerful gpu but probably a slightly inferior cpu to wii (marginal) and inferior memory bandwidth.

By looking at the wii specification you would expect the wii to offer more simplistic games to xbox with inferior graphics but be less prone to frame rate issues and I think that is actually the reality when you compare the games. This is also validated by the fact that xbox games are much larger than wii games. Most wii games are on single layer dvds, all xbox games are on dual layer dvds. I'm not saying all xbox games require dual layer though its just the way they are mastered. However xbox games are generally larger than wii games. Many wii games are no more than a few hundred meg compared to xbox games probably in the area of 2-4gig.

The conduit which is probably one of the most impressive wii games at times has quite a simplistic engine compared to Halo for example. Much smaller play area, reduced textures and a complete lack of ambition compared to to the xbox game. Halo was a early xbox game where as the conduit is a much later wii game. Shenmue on the dreamcast is a more impressive engine than the wii's conduit for textures but the dreamcast is limited by only have 16meg of main memory and a slower cdrom drive which means frequent loading pauses. However the dreamcast has 8meg of dedicated video memory compared to only 3meg on the wii. The dreamcast can't match the conduits excellent lighting effects though.

Here is an image from the conduit. The distant skyline is a obvious bitmap image which is pretty dated. There is obvious aliasing issues with the monument in the distance and on the ground.

This is the dreamcast image from shenmue

It looks much more natural. Diagonal lines like the fishing rod and metal framework are anti-aliased.

Here's a reminder of some of the incredible graphics of Halo;

A highly impressive scene which admittedly the open areas in halo can have a few frame rate issues but it doesn't effect gameplay at all. Its never too bad.

[bonzobanana]

One last comparision. Wreckless on xbox and gamecube. Both broadly similar but when you actually look closer you see the xbox is doing a lot more work visually, with a lot more fine detail;

Xbox

Gamecube

The gamecube version is still the better version though. It has missiles which added to the gameplay and the frame rate was superior with more responsive handling.

[Chett]

Originally Posted by Cerberus30000

the processing power of the Wii is only slightly less the the Xbox by just a couple of Mhz however its using the same GPU and RAM from the Gamecube, so its also got less power there too

so no, the Wii isn't more powerfull then then the Xbox (I wish it was though)

They may share the same GPU and RAM but the clock speed is almost double (GC @ 162MHz vs Wii @ 243MHz ...... xbox @ 133MHz), im by no means a Nintendo fanboy i just think its a better console than the xbox (in standard form).

Bonzo, you make some very interesting points, i cant think of any games that are superior to some of the xbox offerings, saying that, i only had Nintendo sports which my dog ate, and that brought about the end of my Wii playing.

[bonzobanana]

Yes the gamecube had a faster main bus speed than xbox for the main cpu. Gamecube was 162mhz, wii is 243mhz and the celeron processor of the xbox is only 133mhz. That is the main bottleneck on the xbox I suppose but really its the gpu that makes use of the maximum bandwidth so the 133mhz bus limitation of the main processor isn't so important. The actual processor in the xbox is 733mhz compared to about 485mhz in the gamecube. the wii is about 729mhz and definitely a bit more powerful than the xbox especially when you take in the faster bus speed. The wii is crippled by limited main memory and video memory though and extra bandwidth and a small bit of extra cpu processing power doesn't help.

[bonzobanana]

In the interest of fairness I thought I'd show a couple of images of the most impressive wii/gamecube game I could think of and its by those amazing factor 5 people who really pushed the gamecube to the maximum.

[Shonk]

your all mad

the xbox 1 blows away the wii in every department

xbox gpu is geforce 4 class (not not mx class)
Wii gpu is a lower class than an ati rage 128

The cpu on the xbox is a coppermine pentium 3 128 at 733mhz
The cpu on the wii is a power pc g3

the gpu is barley a gpu
and the cpu even if it was 2ghz would still be toasted by a 733mhz coppermine

[bonzobanana]

The xbox definitely doesn't blow away the wii in all departments because the wii has better memory bandwidth for sure. Its got that 1t-ram that has a very low latency and the wii has its gpu, video ram, system ram, sound processor, sound cache memory, secondary arm processor all on the same chip for a high bandwidth and ultra low cost design. Sadly to do this these components are relatively low spec. Also the main cpu in the original xbox was a mobile celeron type not a full pentium so had a reduced cache. I admit I don't have the specs to back this up but I would of thought the main cpu in the wii is more powerful than xbox slightly but it doesn't really matter because the wii is crippled by a limited gpu, video memory and main memory.

Half the people voting including me think the xbox is more powerful so we're not all mad.

[Shonk]

Thats what the Coppermine 128 stands for 128k l2

It doesnt matter what memory type it has the gpu is barley a gpu
and go read up about power pc g3's and how pants they are against x86 cpu's

im no hater here i have a wii 360 ps3 and xbox 1
but people need to face upto facts that the wii is a mildly overclocked
gamecube with minimal addons to for io and such

and the gamecube was a bottom book setup when it came out
where as the xbox was top end for a games console and midrange for a pc

Originally Posted by bonzobanana

The xbox definitely doesn't blow away the wii in all departments because the wii has better memory bandwidth for sure. Its got that 1t-ram that has a very low latency and the wii has its gpu, video ram, system ram, sound processor, sound cache memory, secondary arm processor all on the same chip for a high bandwidth and ultra low cost design. Sadly to do this these components are relatively low spec. Also the main cpu in the original xbox was a mobile celeron type not a full pentium so had a reduced cache. I admit I don't have the specs to back this up but I would of thought the main cpu in the wii is more powerful than xbox slightly but it doesn't really matter because the wii is crippled by a limited gpu, video memory and main memory.

Half the people voting including me think the xbox is more powerful so we're not all mad.

[bonzobanana]

Well theres certainly no getting around the fact that the xbox is more powerful you only have to look at the games especially games that are on both formats. There is also a level of ambition to xbox games that you rarely get with wii probably due to lack of memory and lack of supporting hard drive.

[bonzobanana]

Another few xbox game images to show the incredible power of the original xbox.

[quarry2006]

Originally Posted by bonzobanana

In the interest of fairness I thought I'd show a couple of images of the most impressive wii/gamecube game I could think of and its by those amazing factor 5 people who really pushed the gamecube to the maximum.

Ahh, whatever happened to Factor 5? To date theirs has been the only game to have come close to capturing the feel of the Star Wars films (Knights Of The Old Republic never came close). Pity they didn't do the follow up to Rogue Squadron, which was very much hit and miss.

For what it's worth, I voted Xbox. I don't know a darned thing about cpu, gpu or anything else of that nature, though.

[bonzobanana]

I thought I'd resurrect this thread as the poor old xbox section has no posts. I thought I'd add an image from the wii version of Call of Duty 4. I think it shows some progress for wii and definitely better than the conduit with regard textures and looking realistic. A pretty good effort I think.

Another old xbox pic for comparision.

[semiskimmed]

i'd have guessed Wii tbh, im staggered to find out the xbox is faster in some departments. although you can deffinately tell in that cod4 pic things are looking better

[bonzobanana]

Call of Duty Black Ops should be interesting as Treyarch are claiming it takes the wii to a new level in fps experiences.

[TheBlueFalcon]

The actual hardware specs aren't that much different really, but the Wii appears to pip the xbox by a small margin in most areas, as well as having newer technology. The Wii isn't a console where you'd expect the visuals to be pushed to the limit like on the xbox, so it's easy to say that most xbox games probably do look much better.

[bonzobanana]

Originally Posted by TheBlueFalcon

The actual hardware specs aren't that much different really, but the Wii appears to pip the xbox by a small margin in most areas, as well as having newer technology. The Wii isn't a console where you'd expect the visuals to be pushed to the limit like on the xbox, so it's easy to say that most xbox games probably do look much better.

What newer technology its a gamecube running slightly faster with 64meg of memory added and 16meg of slower memory taken away. The xbox has upto six times the resolution, 3x the sound channels, a 8gb hard drive, 32bit colour instead of 24bit, a gpu probably two generations more advanced. The wii's only real advantage is memory bandwidth and latency and frankly thats not needed because of the rest of the system.

I think its a fair conclusion to say the xbox is considerably more powerful than wii generally.

Here's some Call of Duty 3 Screenshots.

Xbox 360

Xbox

PS2

Wii

Looking at those images you can see how much more powerful the 360 is especially when you factor in its a higher resolution console too. Clearly a generation apart from the other images. You can also see the wii image is brighter with less contrast. This may be simply by design or user settings in the game. However 360, original xbox and ps2 all have 32bit colour. The ability to render images in full 32bit colour. The wii like the gamecube and dreamcast is limited to 24bit colour maximum depth in games. The wii, gamecube and dreamcast all share a certain look for games, slightly pastelly colour range and inability to render a realistic colour tone for human skin for example. Look above at the wii call of duty screen to see the same effect again. The colour range is far less realistic than the original xbox for example. Again it seems to be what happens when you convert 32bit textures to 24bit. I think this is one of the big issues for multiformat games converted to wii. You don't seem to get it on exclusive wii games developed from the ground up.

[TheBlueFalcon]

I posted after finding a brief list of specs of the 2 consoles and on the face of things it seemed the Wii should be slightly better. Also it has been said that the Wii does look as good when the visuals are pushed closer to it's limits. Clearly no one should say anything that disagrees with your opinion, which is probably why you were banned from the Nintendo section to begin with.

[bonzobanana]

Originally Posted by TheBlueFalcon

I posted after finding a brief list of specs of the 2 consoles and on the face of things it seemed the Wii should be slightly better. Also it has been said that the Wii does look as good when the visuals are pushed closer to it's limits. Clearly no one should say anything that disagrees with your opinion, which is probably why you were banned from the Nintendo section to begin with.

Lets not get defensive here. Just trying to debate the issue. You haven't mentioned which specs are better or which site has this information. I was banned because some nintendo fanboy moderators didn't like me mentioning the wii was underpowered and based on the gamecube. They got annoyed, defensive and abusive and ganged up on me and they had the power to ban me when I got equally abusive back. Not much I could do about it. Some people agreed with their decision other people thought it was wrong. The fact is now people realise how powerful the wii is and there wouldn't be such a debate now as there aren't many people left who think the wii is in the same power territory as ps3 or Xbox 360 anyway.

[TheBlueFalcon]

I'm not getting defensive as I have nothing at all to defend. Like I said in my first post, the Wii isn't a console where you expect the hardware to be pushed to the limit for jaw dropping visuals. Comparing a Wii to an xbox is pretty pointless to begin with in my opinion. Yes, they are both games machines, but the Wii wasn't released to be a cutting edge games machine where the developers are competing to release the best looking game.

Moving on to say that the Wii doesn’t have the same power as the PS3 or xbox 360 is even more pointless. No one with any sense is going to debate that, as it’s very obvious the Wii is not a patch on the other two. But as I’ve said, it’s not meant to be. The Wii was released to offer a slightly different gaming experience, which is why it has outsold both the xbox 360 and PS3 by a huge margin.

As far as you being banned from the Nintendo area, well they probably didn’t take to kindly to an xbox fanboy disagreeing with them, just as you don’t like anyone disagreeing with your view on the xbox vs Wii. Your mind is clearly made up, so if you don’t want to hear other people disagree with you, then there is really no point in asking to begin with, unless you enjoy bickering about insignificant things.

I should also add that I am not a fanboy of any console. I own all 3 (as well as older generation consoles) and can see the good and bad points of each of them.

A better poll would be to ask what console offers the better gaming experience between the original xbox and the Wii. I think you'll find that you would be in the minority then.

Enjoy the rest of your thread, I'm done.

[bonzobanana]

What was the point of even writing that?

[TheBlueFalcon]

Originally Posted by bonzobanana

What was the point of even writing that?

What was the point in the thread to begin with!!

[bonzobanana]

Originally Posted by TheBlueFalcon

What was the point in the thread to begin with!!

There's been over 1,800 views to this thread!

[TheBlueFalcon]

I don't see what thread views has to do with anything, but if that's the way you want to justify your negative attitude towards the Wii, then feel free.

[bonzobanana]

Originally Posted by TheBlueFalcon

I don't see what thread views has to do with anything, but if that's the way you want to justify your negative attitude towards the Wii, then feel free.

It means just because your not interested doesn't mean other people aren't as well. This world and this forum isn't run just for your benefit. Other people have opinions and issues that they might want to discuss which you have no interest in. Anyway its a mute point anyway because you were obviously interested in the thread to come to it and write in it in the first place you simply don't like the opinions of the thread. You will notice that earlier in this thread I was trying to be more impartial and I was criticised for being too generous about the wii's specification. When I started the thread I was of the opinion there were certain features of the wii that outclassed the xbox but since reading the comments and doing some other research I've gone more strongly in favour of the xbox. I've seen various screenshots after searching for them and it seems to me the xbox is a fair bit more powerful.

In some ways the ps2 and even dreamcast are performing better than wii on occasion.

One of the most striking comparisions I can think of is Half Life 2 on xbox and the conduit on wii. Both meant to be cutting edge for the hardware they are running on even though the conduit isn't a great game I don't think. If you get the chance try both games and see which you think is running on the more powerful hardware. I think the conduit's most impressive scene is the bridge where the ash is blowing in the wind.

Remember the original xbox has games upto 1920x1080i in resolution thats about six times the resolution of 720x480 which is the wii's maximum resolution. It also has 32bit colour and full 5.1 sound.

[TheBlueFalcon]

I'm not even going to fully read your drivel anymore, as this post proves that you just don't know when to stop.

[Dave]

bonzobanana, for the record you were banned from the Nintendo section for repeatedly trolling about how underpowered the Wii is despite being asked many times to stop, simple as that. You can snipe all you want at the Nintendo mods but that's a fact.

Most of us are too busy enjoying our gaming on whatever machine to give a toss about it's power, blah blah.

I'm closing the thread as clearly it's pretty much just you that's interested in discussing it with yourself as out of 28 posts, 16 of them are yours.