- 833
- Scotland
- mcgillc_10
My 250GB slim PS3 works perfectly. There is some frame drones when in the interior though.
GT6 Framerate depends on which console you have.
- Thread starter xSNAKEx
- 263 comments
- 54,167 views
- 11,660
- GTP_Orido
- 1,723
- Sydney
- snakebacon97
320GB Slim here, quite a fair bit of tearing in certain spots on Riffelsee and Eiger Nordwand Short, everything else is nice and smooth.
And if you want your PS3 to run cooler, sit it on a cake rack!
And if you want your PS3 to run cooler, sit it on a cake rack!
- 1,210
- Sydney
I'm not really interested in "proving" to you guys this is the case with a side by side slow motion capture card analysis.
Its difficult to organise and I really don't care to. Just thought id report on my observations. What I can say is there are people who say my "game runs fine" and when I see it their game is running at 20fps and has non stop tearing. Some people are simply blind to it. Personally, I can easily tell the difference between 85 and 100 fps. Well I could back in the CRT days and counter strike.
Well you cant say this is "perfect". The 3000 series ps3 slim I played on had no noticable frame drops in cockpit view in comparison to the 2001a for example.
Its difficult to organise and I really don't care to. Just thought id report on my observations. What I can say is there are people who say my "game runs fine" and when I see it their game is running at 20fps and has non stop tearing. Some people are simply blind to it. Personally, I can easily tell the difference between 85 and 100 fps. Well I could back in the CRT days and counter strike.
Well you cant say this is "perfect". The 3000 series ps3 slim I played on had no noticable frame drops in cockpit view in comparison to the 2001a for example.
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- 11,660
- GTP_Orido
I did so many arcade races in the rain recently at Bathurst and Stowe, in cockpit, when there are more than 4 premium cars close in front, there are some frame slow down, but not annoying - 50+fps. Switch to hood cam, smooth even when there are many cars - this was with Cizeta V16T, Bathurst rain at 100% with water trails on all cars, barely any drop of fps except in crowded last half of Bathurst narrow roads, some frame drop - again 50+fps. I was able to drive the beastly V16T on comfort medium in the rain, without any accident 
- CECH250xx Slim 160GB.
- CECH250xx Slim 160GB.
- 8,723
Actually, the different process sizes have a large bearing on heat generation (which is exactly why the smaller process sizes need less power). Heat build up is a sure fire way to slow a processor down, unless it doesn't have protection mechanisms, in which case it'll likely fault badly and reset the system, or just melt. Practically no processor is built like that today (although you can bypass the protection), except some discrete GPUs for PCs. Those can reset themselves without issue, usually - don't know about the PS3, though.
The GPU in my PC, for instance, runs worse when it's hot than it does warm-ish (it can scale the clocks as necessary, although it does exhibit thermal runaway, hence "warm-ish" being optimal). The manufacturer put a stupid fan control profile on its BIOS which meant it ran red hot for the sake of being a dB or two quieter. So I decided to make my own profile, and it's much better - probably extending the life of the silicon, if not the fan...
What this means, though, is that the performance of the PS3 (if it's heat dependent) is as much a function of the environment, the history of the silicon, the current level of dust caking inside, the power supply condition / efficiency, console orientation and manufacturing tolerances (!) as it is process type / scale.
That said, it should suffice to say that the larger processes are going to need more cooling - that is, they're more likely to be cooling-critical in terms of performance. If your PS3 is well looked after, there shouldn't be much of an issue - but manufacturing tolerances can still get you. Indeed, that's what the "redundancy" in the cell's SPUs is about - they turn off those that didn't come out so well. In some cases, it's possible they all come out a bit shaky, but they only turn off the worst, and if the chip as a whole passes the load test within tolerance, it's saleable.
My CECH20 runs "fine" for most things; I get a bit of slow-down (e.g. tearing in GT5) with high-poly scenes, implying the SPUs are limiting things - GT6 slows down far less often, and does so for full-screen effects, implicating the GPU instead (I think that means GT5 had a problem with load balance on the SPUs, and now my 65 nm GPU is being tested with GT6).
It's probably had a moderate dust intake (might be due a clean out soon) and sits vertically on a hard surface, its "bottom" against some hard furniture, but probably gets a steady current of air (which would be useless against a dust carpet anyway).
- 2,746
- Limbo
- TurboV16
- TurboV16
I too can confirm this. I have played GT6 on both my PS3 (45nm CPU, 40nm GPU with 1TB HDD) and my friends PS3 (40GB Fat model). My PS3 had some tearing at times, but no where near as bad as what I saw on my friends one. My PS3 also seemed to maintain a constant 60FPS, whereas my friends slowed down a lot. Not unplayable, but definitely noticeable. Hope this adds some more proof to your theory. 👍
- 607
- Poland
- Emet_PL
But of course..
edit: To be clear.. I don't want to offend you or something..
I appreciate the idea etc... but.. I don't agree with your theory about the corelation between performance and the console version.
I'm also sure that you can't tell the difference between 85 and 100 fps.
Human eye can hardly see difference in range of 50-70 fps.. anything above is just for eye's and brain's comfort.. but human in fact is not aware of the the difference.
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- 7,765
- Yorkshire
- ScapeGoat4U
- WhippingBoy
- 8,723
Patently untrue. The fact that you admit there is a "comfort" aspect means you don't believe it yourself!
The retina can do some very impressive things through clever phasing across the receptor cells, that means the "traditional" idea of "framerates" is useless. It should be obvious that the closer to reality you can get in terms of response (round-trip of player input and display output), the better.
I can tell between 60 and 120, and between 100 and 120 Hz in many situations - some people have noticed differences up to much higher framerates than that, and most people would notice the difference in latency (interactivity, responsiveness) beyond that level also.
Higher framerates are especially noticeable in the peripheral vision, e.g. large or multi-screen setups - or HMDs
- 856
- Chesterfield, MI
I have a 120gb slim and I don't notice any of those problems...
- 170
- OutspokenFlunky
- OutspokenFlunky
I have a 2501 and 4001B both of which have the same specs except the power supply on the 4001b is less. The 4TH gen machine(2501) has more frame rate drops than the 5TH gen machine(4001B). I did put in a 120G SSD on the 4001B but as we all know that does not affect the FR. I believe that this is more based on production QC, time used and heat on the MB. I do hope at some point GT6 has 3 screen support. If and when that happens I will end up getting another PS3 which should be another gen5 system. Then it would interesting to see how that will/would affect the FR.
For now I will same your theory has a little weight to it but there are to many variables to factor to make it a sound argument. Still a good base theory.
For now I will same your theory has a little weight to it but there are to many variables to factor to make it a sound argument. Still a good base theory.
- 931
I think it's a given that the processor with the thicker silicon, and thus larger die, are going to run hotter.
What I am seriously doubting here is that the heat is having any impact whatsoever between the hotter fat CPU, and the cooler slim CPU to the point where frame rates are different between the 2 machines. Certainly the Eurogamer technical review disapproves the anecdotal posts we have seen here.
What is the process involved? Either the system is dynamically clocking the system down when a over heat condition is detected (doubtful) or there is some other side effect in operation here (I have yet to see proof).
I think some people are confusing what is going on here with what is possible with over-clocking on PC CPU's when you get the CPU cooled down, with water cooling etc. With this sort of over-clocking you can buy an expensive cooling setup that allows you to manually set the clock speed of a CPU higher than the recommended levels without the CPU crashing. This is a different thing completely to suggesting that a CPU slows down when it gets hotter. Which I am currently not buying...crashing, maybe, slower, hmmm....
- 111
From what I've read, it's very common nowadays to have a CPU that dynamically clocks down when a certain thermal threshold is reached. This also applies to the Cell Broadband Engine in the Playstation 3:
From the paper 'Introduction to the Cell Multiprocessor', page 9 of the PDF under 'Extensive pervasive functionality'.
http://scholar.google.nl/scholar_ur...r&ei=Vla_Up23OqeQ0AXLjoHgDg&ved=0CDEQgAMoAjAA
Note that this mentions both thermal and power management together, which shows that it is possible to program power limitations whenever the Cell processor gets too hot. Since the PS3 runs some sort of Unix-based operating system (supposedly based on FreeBSD), it can be well assumed that the Cell therefore does clock back under a certain thermal load.
- 40,906
A cool processor is going to work more efficiently than a hot one; and a CPU under load is going to run hotter and use more power than one that is not. That has always been the case, and whether or not the PS3 actually supports dynamic frequency scaling (the technology was still quite limited when the PS3 was being developed, so if it was there it wouldn't be anywhere near as comprehensive as that in any laptop made in the past 5 years and certainly not as good as that in the next gen consoles) or not; dynamic frequency scaling is also very different from dynamic temperature control, which is tasked with controlling the fans. The PS3 can definitely do the latter (and PC's have been able to do that since... CPUs stopped being cartridges you plug into the motherboard) but I'm doubtful that it can do the former; not the least of which because the PS3 (and 360) simply shuts down if it gets to a certain temperature like PC's used to do back in the early Pentium 4 days. The 360 also did not support anything of the sort, and the two systems were not totally removed on an architecture level (the 360 CPU was built off of what could arguably be called a fork of the ideas of CELL).
As it is, there are several things at play here; too many to determine what is causing the issues shown in the OP. Most importantly, efficiency of the cooling system combined with the thermal efficiency of the processor. The original PS3's had a notable failure rate because they ran really hot and used a lot of power, even with the massive cooling system they used. The second generation PS3's had an even higher failure rate (speculative, based on what I've read over the years) because they still used a lot of power, but didn't have nearly as robust of a cooling system (both of which are far more fact than the former statement). The first slims had power usage that was "half" that of the original PS3, but not that much lower than the second generation models and with even lower cooling overhead. That's two of the systems that have been noted in the OP.
Simply lowering the manufacturing process of the various chips doesn't guarantee a lower temperature if the cooling system is pared back as well; and if the system is running hotter it will not run as well. For a game that pushes the system to the razor's edge as much as GT6 does, that loss of efficiency that comes from the system running really hot could easily be enough to cause performance problems (though words like "unplayable" and the like are rather silly).
As it is, there are several things at play here; too many to determine what is causing the issues shown in the OP. Most importantly, efficiency of the cooling system combined with the thermal efficiency of the processor. The original PS3's had a notable failure rate because they ran really hot and used a lot of power, even with the massive cooling system they used. The second generation PS3's had an even higher failure rate (speculative, based on what I've read over the years) because they still used a lot of power, but didn't have nearly as robust of a cooling system (both of which are far more fact than the former statement). The first slims had power usage that was "half" that of the original PS3, but not that much lower than the second generation models and with even lower cooling overhead. That's two of the systems that have been noted in the OP.
Simply lowering the manufacturing process of the various chips doesn't guarantee a lower temperature if the cooling system is pared back as well; and if the system is running hotter it will not run as well. For a game that pushes the system to the razor's edge as much as GT6 does, that loss of efficiency that comes from the system running really hot could easily be enough to cause performance problems (though words like "unplayable" and the like are rather silly).
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- 7,844
- Leiria
- jpfctf
- jpfctf
I don't know if this is representative or not, but I do know my Slim PS3 (with the little lights) simply can't handle GT6. It breaks apart everywhere: dealerships, in-game, replays, etc.
It's hard to evaluate in-game fps, but in the case of the dealerships and buy car animations it's easy to make conclusions. For example, on my PS3, the Peugeot RCZ will stutter constantly when going round the turntable.
It's hard to evaluate in-game fps, but in the case of the dealerships and buy car animations it's easy to make conclusions. For example, on my PS3, the Peugeot RCZ will stutter constantly when going round the turntable.
- 8,723
"65 nm" is effectively the "size" of the transistors (etc.). The smaller they are, the less power they waste as heat (I don't actually know why that is, to be honest). That means the older PS3s have more heat to "reject" to the environment than the newer ones - they are potentially more "cooling-critical", as I said.
What matters is how effective that cooling is. If the heat sinks are covered in dust, for example, operating temperatures need to be higher to reject that same heat quantity through the dust, and that means it's more likely to be throttling itself (in turn reducing the heat generated). Keep it clean, kids.
Manufacturing tolerances, i.e. straight-up imperfections in the processes that are allowed to pass through to sale, could potentially lead to greater heat generation also, depending on the imperfection.
My PC's processor (65 nm CMOS, as it happens) is a good example of "manufacturing tolerances" - it runs much cooler (or faster for the same temperature) than many others of the same "class" because I got lucky with the "binning" (it's a much higher quality part, in terms of the bare silicon, "down-graded" to meet unexpected demand in the cheap-enthusiast-chip market a few years back.)
There is a large statistical element to the issue of performance just from the manufacturing process, let alone the state some people let their electronics get into, so you probably couldn't say a certain model will definitely give you problems, or another will definitely not - it depends, but some could be more "susceptible" than others.
- 657
- Texas
- XizangM1
Sharpen mode for me is not making the framerate any better--it actually seems to perform a bit worse.
120GB Slim, testing the R8 LMS at Bathurst, which is really hard on the console framerate-wise.
120GB Slim, testing the R8 LMS at Bathurst, which is really hard on the console framerate-wise.
- 931
"65 nm" is effectively the "size" of the transistors (etc.). The smaller they are, the less power they waste as heat (I don't actually know why that is, to be honest). That means the older PS3s have more heat to "reject" to the environment than the newer ones - they are potentially more "cooling-critical", as I said.
What matters is how effective that cooling is. If the heat sinks are covered in dust, for example, operating temperatures need to be higher to reject that same heat quantity through the dust, and that means it's more likely to be throttling itself (in turn reducing the heat generated). Keep it clean, kids.
Manufacturing tolerances, i.e. straight-up imperfections in the processes that are allowed to pass through to sale, could potentially lead to greater heat generation also, depending on the imperfection.
My PC's processor (65 nm CMOS, as it happens) is a good example of "manufacturing tolerances" - it runs much cooler (or faster for the same temperature) than many others of the same "class" because I got lucky with the "binning" (it's a much higher quality part, in terms of the bare silicon, "down-graded" to meet unexpected demand in the cheap-enthusiast-chip market a few years back.)
There is a large statistical element to the issue of performance just from the manufacturing process, let alone the state some people let their electronics get into, so you probably couldn't say a certain model will definitely give you problems, or another will definitely not - it depends, but some could be more "susceptible" than others.
I am aware of the technical details (have a degree in Computing Science) and nothing you have said here says anything about performance degrading at higher temps. (The 65nm refers to the thickness of the silicon wafer by the way).
In fact what you are saying, is goes along with my over clocking comments, whereby CPUs that run cooler can typically be clocked higher without *crashes*.
What I am not buying here is these tales of slow downs on identically *clocked* CPUs between fat and slim, regardless of their manufacturing details or operating temps.
The info that fire dragon gave is interesting, and suggests that it is possible that it does happen, but I would be surprised if it is that aggressive as the game would always run slower as the CPU heats up. Leading to a very inconsistent experience.
I have access to both a fat and a slim and I see no difference whatsoever in the performance of the game.
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- 1,528
- Melbourne
- Conza_No1
I'm curious, and at the moment, I'm unsure what to believe.
According to PS3 Tech Specs on Wikipedia* I appear to have the 'dud' PS3 mentioned, I will say, that it is a 2002B not a 2001A, but the difference in release date between the two is a month, so surely that wouldn't effect the results? I should mention, I have upgraded my HDD to 7200rpm, but apparently that won't affect FPS, otherwise it was just the 250GB model I bought in late 2009 (which fits the bill on wikipedia as well).
So I'm personally without any of the drawbacks, especially with;
RGB Full Range (HDMI) - Full
Y Pb/Cb Pr/Cr Super-White (HDMI) - On
Deep Colour Output (HDMI) - Automatic
If I wanted to test this, I'd presumably turn these settings on/off, and perform what sort of tests?
HDMI is going at 1080p directly to my computer monitor, no tearing or anything like that to report thus far, but at the same time, maybe I'm not looking for it.
* http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/PlayStation_3_technical_specifications#Configurations
- 1,210
- Sydney
Don't be so sure about there being no changes just because the model numbers are close. Yes there can be vast differences. For example someone on the first page said he also has a 40gb PS3 like the first one mentioned and went on to compare the two, his one being just one model newer CECHH vs CECHG literally could be a day apart or even half day in production, but in fact the CECHH model he has is vastly different to the CECHG I tested with.
Here are the motherboards from a CECHG and the CECHG. Keep in mind BOTH are 40GB fat ps3. Thats why i keep saying its not enough just to say what playstation and hdd size you have. You need to know the model number
I dont know what your specific model is like, I only reported what I observed on the models I tested.
I tried various configurations of settings, I guess mostly I ran with the game with deep color on but dynamic range to limted. I always kept sharpen image to off as that seemed to highlight differences most. I only mentioned it as I noticed it seemed to increase FPS in the slower systems.
However regardless of the settings, some consoles were always ahead of others. The CECH3002B for example had no trouble running the game even with both dynamic range to full and deep color options set to on, and it even outperformed the 2001a even with all this off and sharpen on enable.
Having all the options enabled and no sharpen on the 2001a dropped the fps down to as low as what felt like 25fps in some case. I say this based on my perception only. I am not making any factual claims. As a PC gamer very in tune with FPS since about 1996 I can tell the differences pretty easily as I played counter strike competitively on a 100hz monitor and 100fps and the slightest drop would alter the game for me.
On top of this, there can also be manufacturing differences, even between the same models. Keep in mind the cell processor has one core as a "backup". I am not sure what this means but its possible they have it there just in case one of the cores tuns out to be a dud during manufacture and they can still use the chip instead of throwing it away. They can possibly utilze this backup core on the ps3s that have it available, and ofcourse the ones with the dud core will perform slower. This is pure speculation of course. Maybe someone can shed some more light on what this "backup core" is all about, but its just a theory.
There can also be differences in how the ps3 has been kept temperature can affect how the ps3 runs etc. I am not sure if the ps3 downclocks due to temperature, but its easily possible.
Lastly, as I've already stated, some people simply do not notice tearing or drops in FPS. I have seen this first hand. It is quite possible your ps3 is exhibiting this, but you do not notice it.
- 528
- oohhh8yeah
WOOOHOOOO I have the 4th gen CECH 2501A the last model GPU and CPU 
GT6 is as smooth as it gets...not as smooth as GT5 though.
GT6 is as smooth as it gets...not as smooth as GT5 though.
- 1,210
- Sydney
WOOOHOOOO I have the 4th gen CECH 2501A the last model GPU and CPU
GT6 is as smooth as it gets...not as smooth as GT5 though.
Good stuff
What firmware are you guys running? Have you updated to 4.53 yet?
- 11,660
- GTP_Orido
Don't be so sure about there being no changes just because the model numbers are close. Yes there can be vast differences. For example someone on the first page said he also has a 40gb PS3 like the first one mentioned and went on to compare the two, his one being just one model newer CECHH vs CECHG literally could be a day apart or even half day in production, but in fact the CECHH model he has is vastly different to the CECHG I tested with.
Here are the motherboards from a CECHG and the CECHG. Keep in mind BOTH are 40GB fat ps3. Thats why i keep saying its not enough just to say what playstation and hdd size you have. You need to know the model number
I dont know what your specific model is like, I only reported what I observed on the models I tested.
I tried various configurations of settings, I guess mostly I ran with the game with deep color on but dynamic range to limted. I always kept sharpen image to off as that seemed to highlight differences most. I only mentioned it as I noticed it seemed to increase FPS in the slower systems.
However regardless of the settings, some consoles were always ahead of others. The CECH3002B for example had no trouble running the game even with both dynamic range to full and deep color options set to on, and it even outperformed the 2001a even with all this off and sharpen on enable.
Having all the options enabled and no sharpen on the 2001a dropped the fps down to as low as what felt like 25fps in some case. I say this based on my perception only. I am not making any factual claims. As a PC gamer very in tune with FPS since about 1996 I can tell the differences pretty easily as I played counter strike competitively on a 100hz monitor and 100fps and the slightest drop would alter the game for me.
On top of this, there can also be manufacturing differences, even between the same models. Keep in mind the cell processor has one core as a "backup". I am not sure what this means but its possible they have it there just in case one of the cores tuns out to be a dud during manufacture and they can still use the chip instead of throwing it away. They can possibly utilze this backup core on the ps3s that have it available, and ofcourse the ones with the dud core will perform slower. This is pure speculation of course. Maybe someone can shed some more light on what this "backup core" is all about, but its just a theory.
There can also be differences in how the ps3 has been kept temperature can affect how the ps3 runs etc. I am not sure if the ps3 downclocks due to temperature, but its easily possible.
Lastly, as I've already stated, some people simply do not notice tearing or drops in FPS. I have seen this first hand. It is quite possible your ps3 is exhibiting this, but you do not notice it.
So, performance wise, what's best display setting in GT6 ? flicker reduction, normal or sharpen ?
Have you tried racing in the rain at 100% weather, 100% water on track, arcade pro - 10 AI, say at Bathurst, save the replay and play the replay at 1080p ? I am sure even the best Slim will have lots of dropped frame when there are more than 3 premium cars in view.
- 4,559
- Minnesota
- TJ136
I still say it all depends on settings and how much you work the PS3 before/after playing.
I have a fat one and I have microfreeze mostly at the beginning of race/replay (Mostly from what I heard was personal bgm being the issue), other than that I have no issues, Framerate is decent.
I have a fat one and I have microfreeze mostly at the beginning of race/replay (Mostly from what I heard was personal bgm being the issue), other than that I have no issues, Framerate is decent.
- 528
- oohhh8yeah
