Revolution to be small and use DVD's

[easy_g]

http://cube.ign.com/articles/613/613340p1.html

As long as it's size doesn't inhibit it's performance, I'm happy. And it is definitely good to see Nintendo use a disc that is the same as the other systems, one less excuse for third parties not to join on.

[danny90044]

nice

[MorPhiend]

Dang it! I was just about to post this too! Stupid laundry...


I like it. That causes some pretty cool images in my mind. I think I am going to like this idea of actually hearing Revolution information!:D

[greyzieoriental]

said to be backwards compatible with the cube also(p46 of EGM june #192)

[MorPhiend]

said to be backwards compatible with the cube also(p46 of EGM)

Iwata announced that at the GDC a couple months ago. But it is aldo stated in this article.

[evilmax17]

This is shaping up to be a good console. DVD playback on the Revolution!

[epobirs]

This is shaping up to be a good console. DVD playback on the Revolution!

Yep, a major feature now that DVD players go for $30.

[guyver2077]

Upon hearing this news, puppies everywhere let out a collective cry.

[evilmax17]

Question for those in the know:

How positive would the Revolution's use of standard DVD's be to 3rd party developers? Does Nintendo's proprietary GCN disks cost the developers more? Do you think this will generally encourage 3rd party support (of course, time will tell, but in theory)?

[Dr Mario Kart]

Upon hearing this news, puppies everywhere let out a collective cry.

yea...whats that phrase all about? do puppies hate wireless controllers? or will the Revolution systematically feed puppies to hungry mutated babies?

[Ledhed]

Why do people get so excited when they hear a system is going to be small? Does it really make that much difference in your home theatre set-up?

When I hear "small," I think "less room for cooling." Mebbe that's just me though.

[David85]

Yep, a major feature now that DVD players go for $30.

HAHAHA

Thank you.

I never understood why someone would spend an extra $100 for a system just to have the DVD player. I got mine for $35 and it works great.

[Grave_Addiction]

Can we get some C&P love?

[Ledhed]

Can we get some C&P love?

Pre-E3 2005: Breaking: Revolution Details
Sleek system to play standard DVDs, says Nintendo. More inside.
by Matt Casamassina

May 12, 2005 - The Electronics Entertainment Expo 2005 is still days away, but that hasn't stopped Microsoft from debuting its Xbox 360 console on MTV. And now Nintendo has followed suit, revealing some new, meaty details about its next-generation console, codenamed Revolution.

In a recent New York Times article, Nintendo of America's vice president of corporate affairs Perrin Kaplan describes the console as "very, very sleek." The system, which is reportedly tiny, will stand horizontally. Its width will reportedly be no more than three DVD cases stacked flatly on each other, or slightly more than an inch. That makes the console theoretically smaller than Apple's recently released Mac Mini computer.

Although Nintendo has historically selected proprietary media formats, such as the GameCube Optical Disc, for its platforms, the publisher is with Revolution opting for a more standardized medium. The new console will play standard DVD media, according to the company. Nintendo has not yet revealed if Revolution will as a result be able to play Hollywood movies on DVD, but that seems very likely at this point.

At the Game Developers' Conference in March, Nintendo president Satoru Iwata said that Revolution would offer Wi-Fi online connections out of the box and would be backward compatible with GameCube, or able to play GCN software.

According to recent information, Revolution will also be able to play high-definition games and regularly go online.

Finally -- something of a no-brainer given the popularity of the Wave Bird pads -- Revolution's still-secret controller will be completely wireless. Controllers for Microsoft's Xbox 360 are also wireless. Upon hearing this news, puppies everywhere let out a collective cry.

More details to come at E3 2005. Stay tuned.

[doodle777_98]

Small means you can carry it around and travel with it. There has been tiems where me and my friends want to get druk and play at his house and carry a GC with a little handle is alot easier than carring a huge ass xbox.

[Ledhed]

Small means you can carry it around and travel with it. There has been tiems where me and my friends want to get druk and play at his house and carry a GC with a little handle is alot easier than carring a huge ass xbox.

Then tell his cheap-ass to get his own system. Problem solved. ;)

[Dr Mario Kart]

size is a valid point. The processors in the mini-macs arent all that powerful correct? And we're going to have next gen capability in something EVEN smaller? It doesnt add up if you ask me, unless Nintendo is cutting short on the processing power, maybe at a mini-mac equivalent of 1-1.5 ghz?

[Wlogan31]

yea...whats that phrase all about? do puppies hate wireless controllers? or will the Revolution systematically feed puppies to hungry mutated babies?

This is in reference to the fact that puppies will no longer have chords to chew on and tear up...

[doodle777_98]

Then tell his cheap-ass to get his own system. Problem solved. ;)

not everyone is into gaming. But when you bring over beer and mario party everyone wants to play.

[vherub]

plus, puppies, small children, drunk, angry friends or anything hyper/uncoordinated are the arch nemesi of wires, tripping over them and such.
Which is good for the system being small because it can easily be stored just about anywhere- instead of on the floor and in harm's way. The cube is already tiny and that has a better heat distribution/ cooling system than the ps2 or xbox from my experience.

[crystalklear64]

Yep, a major feature now that DVD players go for $30.
But thats $30 and convinence saved when included in a console.
I think its sweet that Nintendo is releasing stuff about the Revo.

[crystalklear64]

This is in reference to the fact that puppies will no longer have chords to chew on and tear up...
Oh, I thought it was a statement meaning that puppies will be unhappy because instead of them being adopted/bought for a gift, parents will buy consoles for their kids. Maybe I just like lil' dogs more than I should...

[epobirs]

But thats $30 and convinence saved when included in a console.
I think its sweet that Nintendo is releasing stuff about the Revo.

Please. When the PS2 launched decent DVD players were $300 and higher plus fairly bulky. Talk about a day late and a dollar short.

[epobirs]

plus, puppies, small children, drunk, angry friends or anything hyper/uncoordinated are the arch nemesi of wires, tripping over them and such.
Which is good for the system being small because it can easily be stored just about anywhere- instead of on the floor and in harm's way. The cube is already tiny and that has a better heat distribution/ cooling system than the ps2 or xbox from my experience.

Perhaps you've heard of this marvelous invention called furniture. Only idiots and small children leave their consoles on the floor.

[guessed]

yea...whats that phrase all about? do puppies hate wireless controllers? or will the Revolution systematically feed puppies to hungry mutated babies?

Dogs, as you know, can hear frequencies that we can not. Puppies actually have more sensitive hearing than older dogs -- as their hearing degrades over time they are able to hear fewer frequencies. Wireless controllers often use a radio frequency that crosses over into one that can be heard by puppies, and it sounds to them much like fingernails on a chalkboard sound to us, causing them to cry. I just made all that up, except the first sentence.

[epobirs]

Small means you can carry it around and travel with it. There has been tiems where me and my friends want to get druk and play at his house and carry a GC with a little handle is alot easier than carring a huge ass xbox.

Sorry, the last thing I want to do when invited over to hang around with drunken fools is bring along a piece of equipment that cost me $100+, unless it's a TASER.

[Sleepkyng]

for some of us who don't live in big houses, or live in a small country with alot of people (like, i dunno, Japan) space is a big issue.

if you live in a 700 sq ft apartment with someone else, you know what i'm talking about.

if the revolution is around the size of the GC then i'm sold. It'll be class anywhich way.

I hate the construction of the xbox and ps2, they look and feel cheap to me.

[jkam]

Size isn't that big of a deal although if its small I could probably put it on the shelf along with another console which is good. The DVD playback feature is good but I'd have to say it doesn't make much of a difference at this point. Nintendo usually makes really solid hardware.

[flybrione]

Question for those in the know:

How positive would the Revolution's use of standard DVD's be to 3rd party developers? Does Nintendo's proprietary GCN disks cost the developers more? Do you think this will generally encourage 3rd party support (of course, time will tell, but in theory)?

It is not the cost but, to my knowledge GC discs have less storage than a standard DVD that the PS2 and Xbox use, basically due to the size of the disc.

[miniarnold]

The article also pointed out: "Nintendo president Satoru Iwata said that Revolution would offer Wi-Fi online connections out of the box"

Looks like Nintendo has reversed it's online stance with first the DS and now Revolution. Maybe they just had a good poker face going?

At any rate, I'd have to say that this system is the next-gen system that I am most excited about right now. It looks like they've addressed many of the complaints with the old system, and hopefully they'll get the 3rd party support they need.

[lionheart4life]

If the controllers are wireless, will they still be capable of force feedback/vibration? I'm not too experienced with the Wavebird or other wireless controllers, but I don't think they are currently, and this is a pretty useful feature in some games.

[Dr Mario Kart]

Here's an idea. If the thing is so small, slap an LCD screen on there, and BAM!

The Revolutionary part of it is that it IS the next GBA. ::splosion::

Edit: I dont think Nintendo has been entirely contradictory about the online play thing. They've messed around with it in the past, and they've just been unsatisfied with the way it is currently. Now their going to try again but they're not going to settle for what has existed previously.

[azel]

Hrm... So Nintendo has made itself the only vulnerable victim (at least at the inception of the console) of likely piracy. The fact that PS3 and Xbox 360 will both likely use a non-standard DVD format (HD-DVD, BluRay, etc.) will make piracy difficult if not impossible at least for a while. I can forsee mod chips or some stupid swap trick allowing burned games on revolution very soon after launch. It killed the dreamcast and sega's hardware futures (my favorite console of all time), I hope it doesn't kill nintendo's.

[willardhaven]

Wireless is a nice feature, but part of me wishes the wires would stay.

[maddfrog]

If the controllers are wireless, will they still be capable of force feedback/vibration? I'm not too experienced with the Wavebird or other wireless controllers, but I don't think they are currently, and this is a pretty useful feature in some games.

The Logitech wireless controllers for the PS2 do have vibration to them (and I think the Xbox controllers from them also), and even with it batteries lasts around I think 30 something hours, if not more. I've been using the same batteries that I got out the box on my PS2 controller and I've already put 60+ hours on it, and it still works.

And battery life shouldn't be an issue if Nintendo and Sony go the same route as Microsoft and make the controllers rechargeable.

[Dr Mario Kart]

I dont know how likely Sony and MS are to use non-conventional format though.
Also, I personally think that piracy HELPED the Xbox launch. with the hard drive, it really appealed to modders, which may have helped move a few more thousand units during the critical launch time. It also hasnt done too much apparent damage to the PS2.

[MorPhiend]

It is not the cost but, to my knowledge GC discs have less storage than a standard DVD that the PS2 and Xbox use, basically due to the size of the disc.

GCN discs hold 1.5 GB of data each. The small size (contrary to popular belief) is not to counter piracy, but to allow for faster seek times.




Why can't people get it through their head that Nintendo has not changed their mind about online gaming? They were never against it! They were only down on the same old PC gaming model. Nintendo does not make PCs. They don't want clunky interfaces. They don't want online gaming that only a few have access to. They don't want subscription fees. They don't want it to be hard to use (hard consists of anything that everyone wouldn't be able to do - if you can't open the box, plug it in and be online, it is hard). Iwata didn't say that people don't want to play online. His words meant that people have never encountered gaming such as Nintendo is trying to create, thus they don't know that that is what they really want.

Read this:
http://www.n-sider.com/articleview.php?articleid=258&page=1

Does that sound like Nintendo ever thought online was dumb, that it was a fad? Then why have they spent 22 years researching it and wasting money on "failed" ventures? It was all leading up to what they will soon be bringing us. Nintendo didn't wake up the day before GDC and pull the idea out of their butt that they would provide online. They have been working on it since before either M$ or Sony had ever even imagined they would be a part of this industry. Nintendo does not hate online gaming. Get it through your thick skulls. Everything that M$ does is borrowed PC culture. And that is not what Nintendo is bringing to the table. Sheesh...:roll:




On another note: It is now official that Blu-Ray vs. HD-DVD is done. On 9 May it was announced that the .1mm hardware technology of Sony's will be used (abandoning Toshiba's .6mm) and that Toshiba's software technology for reading discs will be used. I am too lazy to find the article. I'm sure someone else will (epobirs?).


And on the worry of rumble wireless controllers, they will almost definitely be rechargeable. We know that the controllers will be gyroscopic. Why not rumble? Afterall, Nintendo is the one who brought rumble technology to home consoles. And with backwards compatability, it needs rumble. And while I'm on the topic of controllers, before anyone freaks out, I'm sure there will be a way to connect the bongos, MP6 mikc, DDR mat, etc. to the Revolution. But hopefully we'll find out on Tuesday.



And back to the topic of the thread, now it is official, not just hearsay from a random website:

http://www.nintendo.com/newsarticle?articleid=9594f668-5342-4b38-8eb1-d6bf479c4139&page=home

Nintendo has now confirmed what has already been reported.


I'm going to bed...

[easy_g]

Wireless is a nice feature, but part of me wishes the wires would stay.

I doubt that you could ONLY use wireless. Because most people don't use wireless internet now, so you'd have to have wires.

[gokou36]

On another note: It is now official that Blu-Ray vs. HD-DVD is done. On 9 May it was announced that the .1mm hardware technology of Sony's will be used (abandoning Toshiba's .6mm) and that Toshiba's software technology for reading discs will be used. I am too lazy to find the article. I'm sure someone else will (epobirs?).

Wrong info there buddy. It was never official, just that IGN made it out to be official.


IMO, Nintendo will hurt themselves down the road by going with DVD, a technology thats like 5 years old now. And yeah i'm aware that we won't be using HD/blu ray discs for movies anytime soon, but 2-3 years from now most likely. The only good thing I can see that comes out of DVD is faster load times(maybe 16X?) and piracy.

[epobirs]

GCN discs hold 1.5 GB of data each. The small size (contrary to popular belief) is not to counter piracy, but to allow for faster seek times.




Why can't people get it through their head that Nintendo has not changed their mind about online gaming? They were never against it! They were only down on the same old PC gaming model. Nintendo does not make PCs. They don't want clunky interfaces. They don't want online gaming that only a few have access to. They don't want subscription fees. They don't want it to be hard to use (hard consists of anything that everyone wouldn't be able to do - if you can't open the box, plug it in and be online, it is hard). Iwata didn't say that people don't want to play online. His words meant that people have never encountered gaming such as Nintendo is trying to create, thus they don't know that that is what they really want.

Read this:
http://www.n-sider.com/articleview.php?articleid=258&page=1

Does that sound like Nintendo ever thought online was dumb, that it was a fad? Then why have they spent 22 years researching it and wasting money on "failed" ventures? It was all leading up to what they will soon be bringing us. Nintendo didn't wake up the day before GDC and pull the idea out of their butt that they would provide online. They have been working on it since before either M$ or Sony had ever even imagined they would be a part of this industry. Nintendo does not hate online gaming. Get it through your thick skulls. Everything that M$ does is borrowed PC culture. And that is not what Nintendo is bringing to the table. Sheesh...:roll:




On another note: It is now official that Blu-Ray vs. HD-DVD is done. On 9 May it was announced that the .1mm hardware technology of Sony's will be used (abandoning Toshiba's .6mm) and that Toshiba's software technology for reading discs will be used. I am too lazy to find the article. I'm sure someone else will (epobirs?).


And on the worry of rumble wireless controllers, they will almost definitely be rechargeable. We know that the controllers will be gyroscopic. Why not rumble? Afterall, Nintendo is the one who brought rumble technology to home consoles. And with backwards compatability, it needs rumble. And while I'm on the topic of controllers, before anyone freaks out, I'm sure there will be a way to connect the bongos, MP6 mikc, DDR mat, etc. to the Revolution. But hopefully we'll find out on Tuesday.



And back to the topic of the thread, now it is official, not just hearsay from a random website:

http://www.nintendo.com/newsarticle?articleid=9594f668-5342-4b38-8eb1-d6bf479c4139&page=home

Nintendo has now confirmed what has already been reported.


I'm going to bed...

Nintendo's complaint with online was that they didn't see a large enough audience in it. They deemed the floppy drive add-on for the Famicom a failure because it only sold 4 million units. (Plus however many Twin Fami units Sharp sold.) A numer of prominent titles were only available on floppy in Japa in an attempt to drive the market to a more cost effective medium but the installed base of cartridge driven Famicoms was too high to convince people to change over to a floppy with serious load time issue for the same price as ROM games.

Almost any other company would have been thrilled to get 4 million units out in a single region but Nintnedo had an all or nothing attitude. Their approach to online is the same. If it isn't going to be a huge part of the business they don't want to bother. It's their conservative nature. It has often made them late to the party on new standards but it also avoids expensive failed ventures. The choices a business must make are rarely obvious.

OTOH, telling people, "You don't want this, you just think you want it." is a really bad policy when market acceptance and not technical feasibility is the main obstacle. Microsoft made that mistake in the early 90's. Internet use was very high within the company but the general assumption was there wouldn't be a serious consumer market until broadband became widely available. Consumers just wouldn't find the limitations of dial-up service enticing. This turned out to be completely wrong. Once enough of the early World Wide Web was in place and ISP pricing stopped being by the minute consumers got very interested. Microsoft did a massive turnaround and invested deeply in making Windows 95 natively Internet capable, also changing MSN from a proprietary platform like AOL to a service based on web standards.

Sony and Microsoft has proven that online is a real and vital part of growing the console business. Nintendo's choice is no longer if but instead how.

[epobirs]

And no, the next generation DVD wars are not over. Toshiba adamantly denies the claims made by a Japanese newspaper and has instead demonstrated a new version of their disc that brings the capacity within 10% of Blu-ray but is still much simpler to manufacture with less new equipment investment required.

They've also demoed a double side hybrid disc that offers DVD compatibility on one side and HD-DVD on the other, allowing for content playable in existing and next generation players.

http://eetimes.com/news/latest/technology/showArticle.jhtml?articleID=163100700

http://eetimes.com/news/latest/business/showArticle.jhtml?articleID=163100509

[Sartori]

Hrm... So Nintendo has made itself the only vulnerable victim (at least at the inception of the console) of likely piracy. The fact that PS3 and Xbox 360 will both likely use a non-standard DVD format (HD-DVD, BluRay, etc.) will make piracy difficult if not impossible at least for a while. I can forsee mod chips or some stupid swap trick allowing burned games on revolution very soon after launch. It killed the dreamcast and sega's hardware futures (my favorite console of all time), I hope it doesn't kill nintendo's.


Microsoft will use DVD this generation as well.

[epobirs]

If the Revolution is indeed as small as claimed it may mean nintendo is truly taking a different approach to the next generation and completely giving up any attempt to maintain computational parity with Sony and Microsoft. Instead they would have a very inexpensive platform that would focuse on input devices and new gameplay enabled by those. Having a low cost of entry will help mitigate the cost of those controllers. Possibly the sort of machine the Xavix product line would be if that company had Nintendo's deep pockets to drive their R&D.

Backward compatibility to GameCube and its controllers would allow for continuing development of more conventional games. There would be some improvements in the hardware such as increased, dedicated shaders but nowhere near what the competition are offering. Abandoning that battle to focus on unique gameplay could be a winner, especially if third party support continues to be lacking.

[SevereTireDamage]

Two things concern me:

1) If they're going with standard DVD now, wouldn't that still put them a generation behind the other two for media capacity? Damn it, Nintendo, not 3 systems in a row.

2) I didn't mind the GC having mini-DVDs because I actually care about loading times, and the GC almost always had the best load times of multiplatform games (the ones that didn't optimize for the Xbox's HD, anyway). So now that progress is erased. Blah.

[Moxio]

Why do people get so excited when they hear a system is going to be small? Does it really make that much difference in your home theatre set-up?

When I hear "small," I think "less room for cooling." Mebbe that's just me though.

Less room for cooling? Wouldn't a small system theoretically give enough space for more cooling? Also remember, it will be able to stand vertically.

[David85]

Frankly I don't see what the big deal is.

No one is gonig to rush out and by really expensive HD TVs now, and they will be expensive for years and years. I wish Nintendo would do it through anyways, just to piss Sony off. Nintendo NEEDS to pick sides against Sony, and should team up with MS to do it. I see no point in having both Nintendo and MS using DVDs in their systems now. I think it was lame for MS to do it with the Xbox. What would I rather do, spend huge ammounts of money for a video game system because it plays DVDs too, or spend less, much less and just buy a cheap DVD player? Hard choice.

[epobirs]

Two things concern me:

1) If they're going with standard DVD now, wouldn't that still put them a generation behind the other two for media capacity? Damn it, Nintendo, not 3 systems in a row.

2) I didn't mind the GC having mini-DVDs because I actually care about loading times, and the GC almost always had the best load times of multiplatform games (the ones that didn't optimize for the Xbox's HD, anyway). So now that progress is erased. Blah.

The difference between different optical medias is pretty minor compared to the difference between optical discs and mask ROM chips. The lesser capacity of the GameCube's mini-DVDs was a minor issue for third party developers. The cost of putting anothing disc in a game package is nickels and dimes compared to how they once sweated over ROM usage. If a game threatened to overrun the original planned ROM size there would be a lot of wrangling over whether to move up to the next increment or lose parts of the game.

DVD is still offering plenty of capacity for most projets. I am not aware of a single game in this generation that used more one DVD by pure necessity. Several games that come on two DVDs only use about 4 GB on each one and that includes a lot of duplicated material. The separate discs were used to emphasize the differing paths f the two character the player could to to play as, which further demonstrates how cheap the discs are.

More capacity is always appreciated but so is low cost. The difference between shipping a game on two discs or onehigher capacity disc plaes if the platform's cost of entry is driven too high by the inclusion of an expensive new drive technology or other features are sacrificed to make up the cost. The cost of the hardware can be subsidized but that is a treacherous game, as Microsoft learned in this generation.

It helps if the manufacturer has an ulterior motives beyond gaming for pushing newer drive technology. In this generation Sony was driven to use not only DVD but also include support for movie playback because they're also in the movie studio and home video business. For Microsoft and Nintendo's product launching a yearlater it made sense because most of the cost premium for using DVD in stead of CD had vanished and buzzword compatibility has a value as well. By and large though, neither saw as much benefit from it as Sony. Sony was able to do it because the technology was well established. It added cost but much less than it would have a year earlier, when Sega launched Dreamcast, for instance. For Sega the added cost would have been prohibitive.

So now we have a new generation of consoles and a new generation of optical discs to deliver HDTV content looming as well. The problem is that the new drives are very costly, not shipping outside of engineering samples, and possibly will be obsoleted by changing standards before the primary driving application becomes a market force. Sony has the same motives as ever. They want to sell HD movies to consumers just they did with DVDs. Tha same cannot be said for Microsoft and Nintendo. They have good reason to be wary of the cost. Microsoft has an alternative. Sine their platform will allow media streaming from computers running Microsoft's operating systems, PC users will be free to install a next generation optical drive in their system when the standard is final and the price is right. With that the Xbox 360 retroactively becomes a remote display for that PC to display HDTV content.

Nintendo doesn't have that option but it isn't part of their business. They have no reason to care so long as they can make a convincing argument for their machine on the basis of the games. I strongly suspect they will avoid joining the traditional console fight again and instead try to position their machine as a unique product in its own niche.

[epobirs]

Frankly I don't see what the big deal is.

No one is gonig to rush out and by really expensive HD TVs now, and they will be expensive for years and years. I wish Nintendo would do it through anyways, just to piss Sony off. Nintendo NEEDS to pick sides against Sony, and should team up with MS to do it. I see no point in having both Nintendo and MS using DVDs in their systems now. I think it was lame for MS to do it with the Xbox. What would I rather do, spend huge ammounts of money for a video game system because it plays DVDs too, or spend less, much less and just buy a cheap DVD player? Hard choice.

The installed base of HDTV is growing steadily and those buyers have an important feature from a marketer's perspective. They represent a certain level of affluence and willingness to spend for better features.

Also, the cost isn't that high for HD screens anymore. I can now buy a very nice 32" unit for about what I spent for my 30" Toshiba a little over ten years ago. Factor in inflation and the new set is much low in cost.

There is also a chicken & egg situation at work. Price will drop a lot as volumes grow but more than just screens are needed to make that happen. Consumers need to see a good selection of content at reasonable prices and packaged as they prefer. Cable and satellite TV offerings are starting to offer a good variety of HD channels but the cost is still high for much of the market. The two missing areas are prerecorded media in stores and video games. Many consumers purchased new TVs in recent years to get feature set that supported DVD better and many also purchased screens that suited their gaming needs. Manufacturers have become conscious of this and many already offer gaming oriented features or try to make sure buyers are aware of the advantages of using the component inputs with game systems that support it. (Recall RCA's Xbox Ready line of sets.)

Some things take a long time to come together and be real products for the mass market. For this coming generation, supporting only HD display would be incredible bold and risky, so they aren't going to that extreme. But things appear poised for rapid adoption of HD by consumers as the disc formats and games become a major incentive. I'd be willing to bet that the generation of console after the next, say starting in 2009 or so, will be exclusively HDTV oriented.

[pumbaa]

Am I missing something? The website says this:

"In a recent New York Times article, Nintendo of America's vice president of corporate affairs Perrin Kaplan describes the console as "very, very sleek." The system, which is reportedly tiny, will stand horizontally. Its height will reportedly be no more than three DVD cases stacked flatly on each other, or slightly more than an inch. That makes the console theoretically smaller than Apple's recently released Mac Mini computer."

But it says nothing about a very important dimension... length. It's never made sense to me how saying that it will be less than an inch high make it "Mac Mini" like in proportions. It's seems like the line that talks about the Mac Mini is editorial in nature... Nintendo didn't say that... NY Times did. This thing could be the length and depth of a PS2.... or an Xbox for that matter.

I think everyone is jumping the gun when it comes to how this size has any bearing on power. Iwata has said before that the console will no skimp on graphics power... why even mention anything like that if it isn't true?

I'm not sure you can start saying where exactly Nintendo is going (it's own niche or otherwise...) based on the fact that its next console is going to be about an inch tall.

[yellowaznboy]

Am I missing something? The website says this:

"In a recent New York Times article, Nintendo of America's vice president of corporate affairs Perrin Kaplan describes the console as "very, very sleek." The system, which is reportedly tiny, will stand horizontally. Its height will reportedly be no more than three DVD cases stacked flatly on each other, or slightly more than an inch. That makes the console theoretically smaller than Apple's recently released Mac Mini computer."

But it says nothing about a very important dimension... length. It's never made sense to me how saying that it will be less than an inch high make it "Mac Mini" like in proportions. It's seems like the line that talks about the Mac Mini is editorial in nature... Nintendo didn't say that... NY Times did. This thing could be the length and depth of a PS2.... or an Xbox for that matter.

I think everyone is jumping the gun when it comes to how this size has any bearing on power. Iwata has said before that the console will no skimp on graphics power... why even mention anything like that if it isn't true?

I'm not sure you can start saying where exactly Nintendo is going (it's own niche or otherwise...) based on the fact that its next console is going to be about an inch tall.

From nintendo.com:

In its final form, Revolution will be about the thickness of three standard DVD cases and only slightly longer. The versatile Revolution will play either horizontally or vertically, allowing the user total flexibility in setting up a gaming session wherever they have a television.

[pumbaa]

From nintendo.com:

In its final form, Revolution will be about the thickness of three standard DVD cases and only slightly longer. The versatile Revolution will play either horizontally or vertically, allowing the user total flexibility in setting up a gaming session wherever they have a television.

I stand corrected. I understand that this is still amazingly small... but lets not count our tech specs before they are revealed is all I'm saying ;) .

[epobirs]

Am I missing something? The website says this:

"In a recent New York Times article, Nintendo of America's vice president of corporate affairs Perrin Kaplan describes the console as "very, very sleek." The system, which is reportedly tiny, will stand horizontally. Its height will reportedly be no more than three DVD cases stacked flatly on each other, or slightly more than an inch. That makes the console theoretically smaller than Apple's recently released Mac Mini computer."

But it says nothing about a very important dimension... length. It's never made sense to me how saying that it will be less than an inch high make it "Mac Mini" like in proportions. It's seems like the line that talks about the Mac Mini is editorial in nature... Nintendo didn't say that... NY Times did. This thing could be the length and depth of a PS2.... or an Xbox for that matter.

I think everyone is jumping the gun when it comes to how this size has any bearing on power. Iwata has said before that the console will no skimp on graphics power... why even mention anything like that if it isn't true?

I'm not sure you can start saying where exactly Nintendo is going (it's own niche or otherwise...) based on the fact that its next console is going to be about an inch tall.

Iwata has said a lot of things. Many of them meaningless, others nonsensical. The laws of physics remain the same and Nintendo has no special access to semiconductor technology that others are denied. The sole major variable is whether the chipset will be produced in a 90 nm process or 65 nm process. The former is realibly available now and the latter is not yet in use for any commercial products. Companies staking their schedule on delivery of 65 nm parts could run into serious problems. Sony already experience this when they were forced to make their shipments of Japanese PS2 at .25 micron rather than the intended .18 micron process that was in place by the time of the US launch. Those early chipsets had awful yields, making for very expensive product among the working chips. It set back the PS2's profitability by several months. (Cell is intended to be a 65 nm product but they could repeat history by shipping the existing 90 nm version at launch.)

There is no escaping the math. To be on par with the competition a comparable amount of transistor real estate will be involved running at an also comparable clock speed. The power and heat involved makes it extraordinarily unlikely that a computational package equivalent to xbox 360 is going to be in size suggest by the two offered dimensions. Even if the chipset is at 65 nm the difference in power and heat is not going to be so huge it would allow both that size and competitive throughput.

It is completely feasible that a die shrink of the existing GameCube chipset to 130 or 90 nm could produce such a tiny package but that only offers a cheaper GameCube, not a next generation console that competes directly on visual processing. Just the difference in complexity of the video processor between the XGPU and the as yet unnamed ATI chip in the 360 is an order of magnitude. Even with the latest process technology this is a big mother of a chip. Those unified shader pipelines carry a penalty in transistor usage but so long as there isn't a major performance penalty the gain in versatility will make developer very, very happy. (Essentially, this mean each of the 48 shader pipelines can be assigned to pixel or vertex functions as needed, giving a lot of freedeom to configure the hardware to the game rather than the usual reverse.)

the description almost makes it sound like a 1U server blade but that isn't encouraging. Such blades usually forego top of the line processors to keep the power and thermal characteristic within acceptable limits.

Perhaps the third unspecified dimension makes the system much larger than expected and includes an active cooling solution at one end but making such and oddball sized item seems unlikely. If the Revolution is going to be PStwo sized and graphically comparable to Xbox 360, then Nintendo has splainin' to do.

[Sleepkyng]

Perhaps the third unspecified dimension makes the system much larger than expected and includes an active cooling solution at one end but making such and oddball sized item seems unlikely. If the Revolution is going to be PStwo sized and graphically comparable to Xbox 360, then Nintendo has splainin' to do.

please tell me that you either A) work in the gaming industry, B)work in tech, or C)have too much time on your hands :D

don't get me wrong, your posts are great and really informative...

almost too informative...:razz:

[pumbaa]

Iwata has said a lot of things. Many of them meaningless, others nonsensical. The laws of physics remain the same and Nintendo has no special access to semiconductor technology that others are denied. The sole major variable is whether the chipset will be produced in a 90 nm process or 65 nm process. The former is realibly available now and the latter is not yet in use for any commercial products. Companies staking their schedule on delivery of 65 nm parts could run into serious problems. Sony already experience this when they were forced to make their shipments of Japanese PS2 at .25 micron rather than the intended .18 micron process that was in place by the time of the US launch. Those early chipsets had awful yields, making for very expensive product among the working chips. It set back the PS2's profitability by several months. (Cell is intended to be a 65 nm product but they could repeat history by shipping the existing 90 nm version at launch.)

There is no escaping the math. To be on par with the competition a comparable amount of transistor real estate will be involved running at an also comparable clock speed. The power and heat involved makes it extraordinarily unlikely that a computational package equivalent to xbox 360 is going to be in size suggest by the two offered dimensions. Even if the chipset is at 65 nm the difference in power and heat is not going to be so huge it would allow both that size and competitive throughput.

It is completely feasible that a die shrink of the existing GameCube chipset to 130 or 90 nm could produce such a tiny package but that only offers a cheaper GameCube, not a next generation console that competes directly on visual processing. Just the difference in complexity of the video processor between the XGPU and the as yet unnamed ATI chip in the 360 is an order of magnitude. Even with the latest process technology this is a big mother of a chip. Those unified shader pipelines carry a penalty in transistor usage but so long as there isn't a major performance penalty the gain in versatility will make developer very, very happy. (Essentially, this mean each of the 48 shader pipelines can be assigned to pixel or vertex functions as needed, giving a lot of freedeom to configure the hardware to the game rather than the usual reverse.)

the description almost makes it sound like a 1U server blade but that isn't encouraging. Such blades usually forego top of the line processors to keep the power and thermal characteristic within acceptable limits.

Perhaps the third unspecified dimension makes the system much larger than expected and includes an active cooling solution at one end but making such and oddball sized item seems unlikely. If the Revolution is going to be PStwo sized and graphically comparable to Xbox 360, then Nintendo has splainin' to do.

I completely understand that a pstwo sized NEW console is not giong to be comparable to anything a regular sized next gen system is giong to do. That is not my arguement. My argument is that we know little about the size of the damn thing... and what we DO know is being skewed into automatically making this thing underpowered.

I still fail to see how the 3 dvd's tall and slightly longer (disregarding depth entirely) = the pstwo. The PStwo is 1.1 inches tall by 23 inches wide by 6 inches deep.

The only thing Nintendo has told us is that it's 3 DVD cases tall... check out this picture...

http://media.ps2.ign.com/articles/557/557637/img_2414767.html

It sure looks like the pstwo is about two dvd's tall... does that 3rd DVD in the picture equal the Revolution? We just don't know. We shall see in a couple days.

[epobirs]

please tell me that you either A) work in the gaming industry, B)work in tech, or C)have too much time on your hands :D

don't get me wrong, your posts are great and really informative...

almost too informative...:razz:

All three at various times, though currently just the third.

[epobirs]

I completely understand that a pstwo sized NEW console is not giong to be comparable to anything a regular sized next gen system is giong to do. That is not my arguement. My argument is that we know little about the size of the damn thing... and what we DO know is being skewed into automatically making this thing underpowered.

I still fail to see how the 3 dvd's tall and slightly longer (disregarding depth entirely) = the pstwo. The PStwo is 1.1 inches tall by 23 inches wide by 6 inches deep.

The only thing Nintendo has told us is that it's 3 DVD cases tall... check out this picture...

http://media.ps2.ign.com/articles/557/557637/img_2414767.html

It sure looks like the pstwo is about two dvd's tall... does that 3rd DVD in the picture equal the Revolution? We just don't know. We shall see in a couple days.


In terms of a familiar point of reference for most readers here and on gaming sites in general, the PStwo is a useful. It not only comes close to the measurements in question, it is the same type of product as the item under discussion. Saying "about half again as high as a PStwo" helps vsualize the exact context. Add in the second known measurement "slightly longer than a DVD box" and we have something very close to the PStwo in those areas. We don't know depth but it would be reasonable to assume it's no greater than the length, else it would be odd that the most prominent dimension is the one left to the imagination. Supposing the unit's depth matches its length and the power supply is external as seen in GameCube and Pstwo, this is still a mighty tight package for a state of the art chipset and its cooling apparatus. We can probably assume a hard drive, if any, is going to be an external add-on.

A substantial upgrade to the Gamecube hardware could be made to work in that size, and since it would seem that the big features of this system are not going to be in the chipset, this makes me suspect Nintendo is excusing themselves from the hardware oneupmanship business and concentrating on those things they believe will translate into big sales of product the competiton would find inconvenient to match. This would still let them offer new entries in the big franchises without having too much of the retail price eaten up by the chipset rather than those areas that will distinguish the system as a whole. There comes a time when you realize banging your head against the wall is not leading to anything positive and instead decide to look for doors that go somewhere less painful. Or to put it another way, if you have no hope of winning the game, it may be time to find a different game. Let Sony and Microsoft bash it out while defining a separate market.

I think you got a number wrong there. The article that image is part of gives the PStwo dimensions as 1"x9"x6". 23 inches is big Xbox territory and well beyond the original PS2..

[pumbaa]

In terms of a familiar point of reference for most readers here and on gaming sites in general, the PStwo is a useful. It not only comes close to the measurements in question, it is the same type of product as the item under discussion. Saying "about half again as high as a PStwo" helps vsualize the exact context. Add in the second known measurement "slightly longer than a DVD box" and we have something very close to the PStwo in those areas. We don't know depth but it would be reasonable to assume it's no greater than the length, else it would be odd that the most prominent dimension is the one left to the imagination. Supposing the unit's depth matches its length and the power supply is external as seen in GameCube and Pstwo, this is still a mighty tight package for a state of the art chipset and its cooling apparatus. We can probably assume a hard drive, if any, is going to be an external add-on.

A substantial upgrade to the Gamecube hardware could be made to work in that size, and since it would seem that the big features of this system are not going to be in the chipset, this makes me suspect Nintendo is excusing themselves from the hardware oneupmanship business and concentrating on those things they believe will translate into big sales of product the competiton would find inconvenient to match. This would still let them offer new entries in the big franchises without having too much of the retail price eaten up by the chipset rather than those areas that will distinguish the system as a whole. There comes a time when you realize banging your head against the wall is not leading to anything positive and instead decide to look for doors that go somewhere less painful. Or to put it another way, if you have no hope of winning the game, it may be time to find a different game. Let Sony and Microsoft bash it out while defining a separate market.

I think you got a number wrong there. The article that image is part of gives the PStwo dimensions as 1"x9"x6". 23 inches is big Xbox territory and well beyond the original PS2..

I understand what you are saying completely... and I'm sure this is PARTIALLY Nintendo's strategy. But I can't see the next generation of Nintendo console being less powerful than the Xbox 360... I don't think Nintendo's "revolution" is goign to essentially "take them out of the fight" so much a distingusih them in said fight. I might be wrong about all of this... but all the info released from Nintendo seems to point to something "revolutionary" along the lines of the DS... something different... but not completely crazy different. I suppose the argument can be made that the DS is an entire generation behind the PSP in graphics... but that might be a different situation. Again... we shall see... you are more informed than me about such things epobirs... but I just cant fathom Nintendo making their next system so different that its not comparable... at least graphically to its obvious competitors. Nintendo isn't designing this system in a vacuum... and I'm pretty sure it knows that graphically its got to compete (partnering w/ ATI is one step in this direction). I realize it might not the most reliable thing... but IGN's Revolution FAQ tends to back my thinking.

http://cube.ign.com/articles/522/522559p1.html

EDIT: and about the pstwo dimension... my mistake it was a mistype. I got the dimensions you got... just typed 'em wrong.

[Samurai X]

The last thing i care about is it's size, i actually don't want it to be so small , i want it to be medium and very sexy !

[jkam]

This was on gamesindustry.biz

"Thanks to Nintendo's hardware development partners IBM and ATI, the small system will be packed with power that will enable it to wow players with its graphics. Nintendo's legions of loyal fans will be happy to learn that Revolution will be backward compatible, playing both Nintendo GameCube 8cm disks along with its own 12cm optical disks in the same self-loading media drive.

"In the next generation, the addition of the Internet will be important to all consoles and particularly important to Nintendo. Revolution will be wireless Internet ready out of the box.

"There's much more to Revolution that will be revealed over the coming months, but the combination of its compact size, wireless Internet, backward compatibility, quick start-up time and quiet, low-power operation add up to the start of a great game system. Get ready for the Nintendo Revolution in 2006!"

I know this doesn't actually give specs but there was another article that I can't seem to find... that matched up the Revolution with similar spesc to that of the XBOX 360. It would be pretty silly for Nintendo to go with a system capable of only Gamecube graphics. As for the size though it is hard to believe it would be more than that although I like the statements:

"Thanks to Nintendo's hardware development partners IBM and ATI, the small system will be packed with power that will enable it to wow players with its graphics"

and

"quick start-up time and quiet, low-power operation"

I guess Nintendo does have something up their sleeves or at least some explaining to do to epobirs.

[greyzieoriental]

sounds great from that little bit
will the revolution be backwards compatible with their component cable(now thats something i wanna hear)

[MorPhiend]

This was on gamesindustry.biz

"Thanks to Nintendo's hardware development partners IBM and ATI, the small system will be packed with power that will enable it to wow players with its graphics. Nintendo's legions of loyal fans will be happy to learn that Revolution will be backward compatible, playing both Nintendo GameCube 8cm disks along with its own 12cm optical disks in the same self-loading media drive.

"In the next generation, the addition of the Internet will be important to all consoles and particularly important to Nintendo. Revolution will be wireless Internet ready out of the box.

"There's much more to Revolution that will be revealed over the coming months, but the combination of its compact size, wireless Internet, backward compatibility, quick start-up time and quiet, low-power operation add up to the start of a great game system. Get ready for the Nintendo Revolution in 2006!"

I know this doesn't actually give specs but there was another article that I can't seem to find... that matched up the Revolution with similar spesc to that of the XBOX 360. It would be pretty silly for Nintendo to go with a system capable of only Gamecube graphics. As for the size though it is hard to believe it would be more than that although I like the statements:

"Thanks to Nintendo's hardware development partners IBM and ATI, the small system will be packed with power that will enable it to wow players with its graphics"

and

"quick start-up time and quiet, low-power operation"

I guess Nintendo does have something up their sleeves or at least some explaining to do to epobirs.

I'm banking that in twelve hours (immediately following their press conference), they will be calling epobirs up to do some explaining.

I still think that it will be at least as powerful as 360 (still a stupid name) and I would pee my pants if it were as powerful as PS3. I don't know how Sony is going to be able to hit a pricepoint that is not 3DO-ish.

I wonder if Revolution will still launch before Sony, since Sony has obviously felt M$'s pressure and pushed up their release to probably first quarter of 2006.

BTW, I know the BD-rom/HD-DVD consolidation has been denied by both camps, but I have also read multiple reports that that is just to cover up until a later revelation. But I guess it doesn't really matter either way, if what you said about the new HD-DVD format is true.

And I guess that no one is going to understand what Iwata tries to say in his secretive words, unless they want to. And I think that is the way he intends it to be...:roll:

[David85]

Why is the codename Revolution? The Gamecube one was Dolphin, which was lame. It should be the name of the real thing.

[Sleepkyng]

Dolphin? really? that is lame...

Revolution is kinda lame too, tho so is 360.

all the console names are lame. This is a 'game cube', this is an x-box, this thing is a play-station.

Genesis was a good name, and super nintendo was a good name because it was so ridiculously japanese.

[Quackzilla]

I still think that it will be at least as powerful as 360 (still a stupid name) and I would pee my pants if it were as powerful as PS3.

-_-

[jw1976]

pics finally posted via IGN

http://media.cube.ign.com/articles/615/615030/imgs_1.html

[Sleepkyng]

nice ps2 design!

[Ledhed]

For those of us who don't plan on keeping it vertical, it's going to look a little silly considering the parallelogram design.

EDIT: Nevermind, I got a clearer shot of it now and see that it's rectangular.

[dcfox]

pics finally posted via IGN

http://media.cube.ign.com/articles/615/615030/imgs_1.html
I think Nintendo wins hands down for best new console design. That thing is damn sexy!

http://media.ign.com/thumb/112/1122348/e3-2005-high-res-revolution-images-20050517072755728_thumb.jpg

[Robobandit]

yeah, on looks alone it seems that some people might be buying revolution. I'm a little concerned about the power or lack thereof, but it looks great.