I have my own view when it comes to numbers:

NAME CPU MEM GPU VIDMEM YEAR DIFF
NES 1.79MHz 2KB 5.37MHz 2KB 1983 0
SNES 3.58MHz 128KB 3.58MHz 128KB 1990 7
N64 93.75MHz 4096KB 93.75MHz 4096KB 1996 6
NGC 486.0MHz 40960KB 162.0 MHz 3072KB 2001 5
Wii 729.0MHz 90112KB 243.0MHz 3072KB 2006 5

If we find the average rate of change per year it's:
1.49685 4.22905 1.27634 3.70653
As a multiplication

It's been 6 years since the Wii came out (Which is a baby step above the GameCube)
So...

CPU 6.5GHz
RAM 2GB
GPU 1.8GHz
VRAM 64MB

These are totally unrealistic, but half the CPU and GPU speeds:
CPU 3.25GHz
RAM 2GB
GPU 900MHz
VRAM 64MB
The VRAM in this case is the RAM for rendering to frame, it is unified with the system RAM for performance reasons. 64MB is way more than enough to pump out 1080p frames at 24bit colour.

You could probably half all of those and you'll still get a system better than the 360 and PS3, so I really wouldn't be surprised if we see 1GB RAM (Although developers would be annoyed, RAM is a big issue with the PS3 and 360 it's what makes the in-game textures such a low quality).

This is a totally foolish way to look at it though, the clock speeds mean nothing these days as there are other sectors that improve performance, I wouldn't be surprised though if this is the configuration we see, developers ask for more RAM, CPU speeds these days are around 3GHz in a good PC and are creeping up to higher numbers, GPU speeds are around 900MHz, except VRAM we're seeing things at 512MB as normal, but again, with consoles if it's unified VRAM there is a rather dramatic performance increase.

Welcome to the forums, am curious as I am learning some programming languages off my own initiative (Python, C#)  is C++ easy to pick up like C# seems to be?  Also, I don't like the idea of going back into education and such (as I am old :'( ) if there was any decent resorce sites online you would recommend should I decide to also learn C++ as a hobby so to speak?

Thanks in advance for the help.

I started learning Visual Basic .NET and then self-taught myself a lot of that, transferring to C++ was very each from there, so I'm guessing if you know C# you can "step down" to C++ easy, although the world of C++ is a lot broader than C#.

You most definitely need a goal when you're learning, my goal was to output graphics, then user input, then 3D effects, by googling online and using tutorials I taught myself a lot

Nope. Steaming multiple screens is hardly different than playing a simple splitscreen game. Also, the Wii's rumored GPU (4670) actually supports the streaming of up to 4 SD images. In other words, the Wii U will be BUILT for this. They anticipated this and that is why they decided to go with a powerful GPU that was made for this

Also, look at the 3DS. Much of the power is actually locked away because some of the resources have to go to rendering 2 screens. If the 3DS had no 3D, it'd look much better, but I still looks VERY good (look at Revelations, and it's only a first-gen 3DS title.) So if the 3DS doesn't have a problem with this then I doubt the Wii U will.

I think it is unfair to say these things so definitely, splitscreen isn't that similar to playing splitscreen as a splitscreen game renders to buffers that are 25% the size of the full screen or 50% if it's 2 player, it takes the rendering onto seperate buffer like the Wii U streaming does, but those buffers are reduced in size, the Wii U aims to have a full sized buffer rendering on the TV at the same time as rendering a buffer that is the size of the new controller, so it's a lot more GPU intensive to stream it that it is to do splitscreen, especially across multiple tablets.

After writing all that though, the old issue with being unable to handle more than one tablet I once read was rumoured to be down to the CPU not being able to stream fast enough as opposed to it being a GPU hit, if that rumour is true then Nintendo is confident their graphics processor can handle rendering to a TV and more than one tablet at the same time, increasing the number of CPU cores that simultaniously run and dedicating each one to each controller would solve the multiple tablet issue IF that was the reason why they didn't show more than one tablet.

The power issue with the 3DS is all down to the GPU too, the 3DS is actually doing something similar to the Wii U, it's rendering two screen buffers, one for each eye, the way this has been described is "effectively double the resolution", which is all down to GPU pixel-filling power, the team behind Resident Evil Revelations stated in one of their videos that the depth of field effect turns off when the 3D is on and the framerate drops to 30fps (Half the speed of rendering), so the problem with the 3DS is if you go for amazing graphics, you lose the 3D ability, most amazing graphic games run at 30fps on consoles.


If you want to know about the difference between console GPU performance and PC GPU performance just ask me and I'll make an indepth thread about it.

I think that they were just lazy! Because some games look really nice and can compete with 360 graphics! (Conduit 2 specifically) The  Wii has allot of potential and I think that the developers need to start to work a little harder.

The conduit 2 runs at 30 frames per second at 480p, so it runs half the speed of most 360 games at less than half the resolution, I'm willing to say that the Wii has hit it's maximum potential and the only thing that can be done now is mix up the graphical style produced by games; mario galaxy, skyward sword, xenoblade chronicles, conduit 2, all look very impressive, but they all have different graphical styles (They're also all Wii exclusives).

I do believe many game developers were lazy, however there is some good reasoning behind it.

It's well-known that the Wii sold the most consoles, however when you take the individual person on the console, those with Xbox 360s and PS3s bought more games for their system than Wii owners, more software quantities ship on the other two consoles than the Wii so in some respects dedicating more resources to 360 and PS3 games is more profitable.

The Wii exclusives tend to push the graphical power of the Wii greatly, so we know it's possible, it's a shame when you see the PS2 graphic style shovel-ware the console has compared to mario galaxy.

The Wii's low console power also meant that realistic graphics that people were used to on other consoles could not be translated to the Wii, some of the most impressive looking titles have distinctly cartoony effects, Mario Galaxy, Brawl and Skyward Sword, when you take something like Goldeneye Wii which strived for realism, it sadly missed the mark with the low quality character faces and textures, making up for it mostly in the animation department, so in part if you're trying to make a realistic Wii game, it's somewhat not possible considering the competition it stands against with the other consoles, you could say that developers chose to create something that simply works than to attempt to match these other consoles.

One distinct feature that the 360 and PS3 have above the Wii is their software's expandability, games can be patched, updates, new levels, unlocks can be added in, so there's money to be made from those too, dedicating more resources to those consoles could prove profitable over a long period, whereas the Wii takes the old approach of releasing software into the wild to fend for itself, so one bug in the software and it's all over, meaning more resources would have to be dedicated to bug testing for Wii software, which is more time and effort, so perhaps relaxing time spent on the graphics and gameplay lets the bug testing be more thorough to produce software that is solid, even though it's not using the console's full potential.

The Conduit showed that when effort is put into it, a Wii game can look great and achieve the complex effects that the 360 can do, but so much effort was put into that game and when compared to the sales it made, was it really worth it?

Welcome.
You can explain those things until you're pink in the face, but it still won't get through in most cases.
You're better off learning to live with ignorance.

I learnt to live with ignorance, but when I have free time I enjoy teaching about small things and when I explained the theory behind 3D view-port translations to a 2D screen on a game forum I found my information being quote in various corners of the web so I do get some self-satisfaction knowing that some of my ideas and explanations educate a few people

The biggest issue Nintendo seemed to have faced recently is marketting, the 3DS performed worse than Nintendo had expected and one could say that the marketting for it was very poor. When asking the casual market why they had no interest, most people presumed the 3DS is just another DS like the DSi, I remember smiling greatly when the UK TV ads changed quite dramatically to feature the slogan "This is not DS, this is Nintendo 3DS" and the entire advert did not even mention the 3D capabilities, it mentioned graphics, motion control, game library, camera, everything BUT the 3D.

The Wii U has a similar name to the Wii, this similarity could also cause it to loose a big audience capture from the casual market, only gaming enthusiasts know what the Wii U is, I would not be surprised if a casual gamer believes it's just another iteration of the Wii and will ignore buying it "Because I already have a Wii".

Nintendo should think seriously about a name change after how the 3DS performed, even an incremental change such as "Wii 2" could make a difference to an on-looker's brief perspective of the console.

I do not have any ideas on what names would be good, it has a number of unique features such as the streaming to tablet, perhaps a pun on Tablet or Stream? But they don't sound like solid names (Imagine all the urine jokes that will come out of "Wii Stream").
You could pick a serious sounding name like "Nintendo HD", or something really daring, just the letter "U", the Nintendo U actually sounds okay to me.

Hello all I joined this forum because I found that a lot of people don't understand the terms used when describing the Wii U's console "Power" and a lot of people don't really understand how console hardware and software work in relation to the Wii U, I decided to start voicing this knowledge so I joined this place!

I'll be making a tech FAQ thread after I answered some questions from users, as there's no good place for that, anyone want to ask me something in relation to the Wii U or other console programming? I will take intelligent speculative guesses too and give reasoning behind them.

I'm a C++ video game programmer and a computer science enthusiast, this includes consoles because it facinates me how consoles are developed for.

I hope I can help a few people in understanding the console a bit more