PlayStation 3 vs. Xbox 360

It’s All In Your Mind

There’s always a bit of guff thrown into CPU comparisons, and these consoles are no exception. When the Xbox 360 team announced its specifications, Sony immediately claimed dominance on dot-product operations - but they weren’t comparing apples to apples. Instead, they were including the processing power of both the CPU and the graphics processing unit (GPU). It’s fair to say that the consoles will be comparable in processing power. Still, Sony’s GFLOPs figures are impressive, and if no one’s lying to us - or if both parties are lying to us by about the same percentage, which is the more likely situation - the PlayStation 3 is your leader. It makes sense, because they had four or five months more to play their hand, work on the processor, and one-up the competition.

ADVANTAGE: Slight edge to Sony.

Pictures Of The Fewtcha

The GPU comparison is murky... terribly murky. It doesn’t help that both Microsoft and Sony are doing their best to spin all the numbers to their advantage.

Microsoft’s using an ATI chip with a brand-new Unified Shader Architecture that uses the same graphics pipelines for both vertex and pixel operations. It will have 48 multipurpose graphics pipelines running at unknown capacity.

Sony has picked the Nvidia RSX, a hot new graphics architecture, and will run it at 550 MHz, which Sony claims is more potent than a pair of GeForce 6800s working in unison. Gamespot pegs this at around six vertex pipelines and 24 pixel pipelines. Our conclusion: the consoles will be comparable in graphical power.

Sony does hold a slight edge at the high end. The PS3 will support 1080p high-definition output and the Xbox 360 tops out at 1080i. That letter means a lot; both are the same incredible resolution, but a progressive picture is basically flicker-free, and technically an interlaced picture is half the resolution of a progressive one. On the other hand, not many HDTVs support 1080p.

The question is, will there be rumors about Sadaam Hussein buying dozens of PlayStation 3s to network together for Scud missile guidance systems, as there were with the PlayStation 2? If you’ve been keeping up with current events, probably not. In fact, the whole story was patentedly ridiculous. But Sadaam’s probably pretty damned bored and wouldn’t mind getting his hands on one, just like you.

ADVANTAGE: Tie.

Storage Concerns

The full Xbox 360 package includes a hard drive. The PlayStation 3 only has a slot for a 2.5” hard drive; by all indications, Sony will leave this expensive hardware goodie out of their base system as well.

It’s a step backward for gaming, but we’re sure Microsoft’s accountants are happy about the change. Even with the Xbox 360, experts are guessing that the moneybags software monopoly is losing over $100 per unit.

Does the full Xbox package take the sting out of the disk-less base package? Not really. Microsoft’s software certainly will detect the presence of the drive and respond accordingly, customizing the owner’s experience and options, but Sony’s will doubtlessly do the same. And it won’t be long before gamers figure out ways to use off-the-shelf hard drives in place of the manufacturers’ more expensive upgrades.

ADVANTAGE: This used to be a big advantage for the Xbox; now it’s gone. Tie.

Controlling Behavior

The Xbox 360 is the only next-generation controller to look anything like last generation’s. What happens onscreen is important, but what happens in your hand is just as important. You may be hoping for home networking, multimedia features, or 1080p, but if playing your games is excruciatingly painful, you ain’t gonna be happy.

The PS3 controller, a curved, crescent-shaped aberration, looks to be more useful as an eye-gouger than as an ergonomic device.

ADVANTAGE: Xbox 360.

Extras

Both consoles are boasting about their online play, media integration, wireless capabilities, and movie playback.

ADVANTAGE: Tie.

It’s All Timing

Microsoft took the lead and announced its console first. If they can lay a strong claim to gamers’ hearts this Christmas, they’ll have the pole position when Sony hits back.

Note that the most important word in the previous sentence is ‘‘Christmas.’’ This is the big game-buying season; the time when parents’ pursestrings magically loosen and good boys and girls get big expensive electronic toys for the winter. Sony will be trying to create Christmas in springtime. With the dominance of the PlayStation 2, they have a shot at it - but it’ll be an uphill battle.

A lot depends on whether parents and adult gamers believe the new consoles deliver something appreciably better than their existing console. They certainly look pretty, but are they worlds better than the previous generation, like the Xbox and PS2 were? And economically, do families have the disposable income? Natural disasters and an extended Iraq war have taken their toll on both national and family budgets.

ADVANTAGE: Xbox. Launching in time for Christmas was a masterstroke.

Launch Titles

Both consoles look strong; both have their cash cow exclusives (Halo on the Xbox and Final Fantasy on the PS3).

ADVANTAGE: Tie.

Repeat Business

Did we mention dominance in the last section? That’s what the PlayStation brings to the table in terms of incumbency. The PlayStation 2 sold over 100 million units. Based on figures at the end of 2004, we can deduce that the Xbox reached around twenty million. This, friends, is what you call a severe butt whoopin’.

If they will only buy one new console, as is often the case, how likely are those 100 million PlayStation 2 owners to buy an Xbox 360 instead of a PlayStation 3?

Visitor comment: True but didn't the PS2 come out like a year before the xbox, I mean of course everyone's gonna have a PS2 instead of an xbox. Hmmmmm, sounds like something really familiar.

Did we mention that both consoles are backwardly-compatible, allowing you to play older games on the same brand of console?

Yeah. Whoopin’.

And how does this affect you? Simple. The strongest console will have the allegiance of more publishers. It’ll get more exclusives on the top games, and it’ll often get the best version of non-exclusive games. The royal treatment.

ADVANTAGE: PS3.

The Winner Is...

So the battle is joined. Microsoft and Sony have come out sluggin’, and it’s going to be a knock-down, drag-out brawl. Hopefully gamers will be the winners in this conflict, because from all the indications, competition is good for the game-buying public.

Unless Sony really stumbles out of the gate, this one’s a draw. Except that the PlayStation has a huge installed base advantage by a factor of five-to-one. A tie is a win for the PS3.