Next Gen Console vs PC in AC4 & BF4 - Image Quality Showdown - Xbox One vs PS4 vs Xbox 360 vs PC
Next Gen Console vs PC in AC4 & BF4 - Image Quality Showdown - Xbox One vs PS4 vs Xbox 360 vs PC
2013-11-23
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learn more welcome to a first for us
this is our comprehensive image quality
comparison between five I don't have any
hands for you but five different
platforms in both assassin's creed 4
black flag and battlefield 4 so we are
going to be testing xbox 360 to
represent a last gen console PlayStation
4 Xbox one as well as an entry level
gaming PC so priced at around five
hundred and fifty dollars worth of parts
including a Windows operating system and
a high end PC representing around
probably about a 1,500 to 1,600 dollar
expenditure I want to take a moment to
walk you guys through our setup and how
we're going to be doing this so come on
in first of all down here we have our
high end PC running on a test bench it
features a GTX 780 and we've actually
down clocked in jury-rigged our 39 60 X
to get equivalent to 4770k performance
we've got 32 gigs of ram in there an SSD
and it is just generally pretty beastly
then following up over here I've got an
Xbox 360 I have a PlayStation 4 I'll try
not to direct that I have an Xbox one
hiding over here in the corner and you
can see the Kinect is actually living on
our entry-level machine so this one
features an AMD a8 5600 k quad core it's
got only four gigs of ram a Radeon 7770
graphics card and then in a generic
power supply in a very entry-level case
because we wanted to really reach a
price point that's more in line with the
consoles than what the typical
perception of the gaming PC is which is
that it's much much more expensive so
next up let's show you guys the setup
that we use that will allow you guys to
download the full quality files at 30
megabit per second so you can actually
compare for yourselves so each one of
these platforms runs off of HDMI to an
HD
CP compliant splitter right here so
we've actually we have to swap them as
we go what this does is it strips out
the HDCP protection that's on the
PlayStation 4 which allows us to capture
it with the same degree of quality as
all the other ones so that then comes on
over here
alright so it's able to output to our
monitor there where we're actually
playing the games and then to an
AVerMedia live gamer portable which is
actually on the floor down there and you
can see slick is actually recording
battlefield 4 gameplay right now so then
what we're doing is we are archiving all
of the footage all the test runs here
and we are going to make those available
for you guys to download while you guys
are enjoying some gameplay footage I'm
going to walk through what I feel are
the pros and cons of each of the
platforms so we'll start with Xbox 360
they're cheap they're about a hundred
and fifty bucks on eBay and they come
with a great controller still the
favorite of both me and slick the
problem with it is that while the games
run it's a miracle that they do it all
because this is an eight year old
platform I mean they're full of jaggies
and they look awful but I mean okay
they're running so if you're on a budget
or you've already got the console and
visuals aren't important to you I guess
it's a great option the only problem
that I have with it is that it doesn't
feel like a good value I'm still
investing $60 a game into something that
I'll get to play in a way the developer
never really intended it to be enjoyed
and that's not even going to be
backwards compatible with my or met that
my next console my new platform that I'm
going to need anyway for upcoming games
isn't even going to be able to run I
would have to rebuy the game if I really
wanted to have the experience that the
developer meant for me to have so that's
that's the only issue I have here just
feels like money that I continue to
invest in this platform is a bit of a
waste next up we've got our low-end PC
the pros for this is that it's four
hundred and fifty bucks without an OS or
five hundred and fifty bucks with an OS
that is smack dab in the price range of
the next-gen consoles not only that but
the functionality goes beyond gaming you
can stream you can edit you can upgrade
it in the future if you do have
additional funds available to you and it
gives you a lot of flexibility so you
can adjust your graphical settings to
for desired performance so if you decide
that detail settings are more important
okay turn down your Reds if you decide
that resolutions more important you have
that ability to make decisions for
yourself you can also get cheap
peripherals I mean when you compare the
price of a PC webcam to something like
the PlayStation I it looks like a joke
especially given that that PC webcam for
the sake of doing something like
streaming on Twitch TV has exactly the
same functionality in terms of cons well
there's no exclusive titles for it
that's that's for sure it doesn't
include a controller unless you count
the $20 that we budgeted for a keyboard
and mouse and this particular one
doesn't have very high-end components so
I'm not sure if it'll last 8 years of
heavy use the way that people would
expect from something like a gaming
console it's also a PC but it doesn't
really have the horses force around
monitor gaming or some of the exciting
PC stuff that's coming like oculus so I
have to list that as a con for it as
well now in conclusion image quality was
comparable to the next-gen consoles with
a comparable price and this is the first
time this has happened in a long time
we're used to new consoles launching
with amazing hardware for the price and
the manufacturers taking big losses on
selling them but in 2013 you can
basically just build your own console
killer PC for about the same price I
mean this is a great option if you don't
care about the slightly better image
quality that you might get on the
consoles or the exclusive titles next up
is our high-end PC and the pros of this
are pretty easy it's very very fast with
great image quality the best available
there's fantastic anti-aliasing
technology and better detail levels
available with the horsepower to really
take advantage of them there's great
functionality outside of gaming you can
do high-end video editing or other
content creation and they're amazingly
upgradable and flexible throw triple
monitors at it racing seats with
surround monitors flexible game
streaming is available to devices like
steam box in the future other pcs or
even Android devices like Nvidia shield
the sky is pretty much the limit here in
terms of flexibility on the negative
side it's expensive as all balls I mean
high-end hardware it just plain costs a
lot of money and also just tend to have
more issues than mainstream stuff that
is the the drawback of living on the
bleeding edge I mean a lot of the time
it gets patched but you do have to live
with it in the meantime yes the summary
here is that none of that really matters
because you get to join the glorious PC
gaming master race initiation into which
includes procedures that make your penis
larger if you're a man your breasts
larger if you're a woman and you're Beek
stronger if you're a bird no but
seriously it is the best gaming
experience so it's a great option
if that's what you're after it's just
really expensive compared to everything
else here next up we've got the Xbox one
the pros here are pretty complicated I
mean there's the additional
functionality with the IR blaster and
cable box integration as well as
Microsoft services there's the wife and
kids appeal with silly kinect dancing
games and i mean really to me kinect
being included really as a selling point
if you expect something like this to end
up under the tree and when you factor in
the fact that Sony wants $60 for their
inferior camera it starts to look like
not a bad value the fact that
potentially Microsoft can leverage their
cloud servers to deliver better gaming
experiences in the future is a really
cool thing that I'm excited about and
finally voice control is a definite plus
for this console in terms of the
downsides the first one I've got here is
voice control you'll notice this was
listed twice because while it's really
cool and it works we haven't really even
gamed on the thing yet we've only
benchmarked it and it's already annoyed
us a couple times by accidentally
picking up our voices and interrupting
our gameplay I'm also not impressed with
the controller the joysticks feel a
little loose and the rumble motor is
loud and pathetically weak and I mean
there's also no support for things like
live streaming on Twitch this is the
kind of thing that even Sony managed to
figure out and obviously if you're on a
PC is extremely easy to do so there's a
few things that Microsoft's gotta fix
but at least a couple of those can be
done in software in summary
unfortunately for gaming it's just plain
technologically inferior to the ps4 it's
already running at 720p and new games
I'll be it with similar detail settings
to the PlayStation 4 so from a distance
the image quality might look quite
similar but we could really see the
PlayStation 4 pull ahead in Assassin's
Creed 4 where it's running at 1080p the
flexibility of the Xbox one as an
entertainment device could be a great
value in the long run however so it's
going to be up to you whether or not
this one's a great option and I think
it'll depend on whether you're going to
use those features or not which leads us
to the PlayStation 4 the pros well first
up more games run at 1080p or at least
higher resolutions with satisfyingly
beautiful graphics it's small and
relatively sexy compared to Xbox one in
our estimation with just playing better
gaming hardware inside and no gigantic
power brick outside it's got higher
power consumption while gaming and
idling but in standby it's actually much
better so we've got to give the nod to
Sony here because
face it a lot of the time game consoles
are sitting in standby now I'm not a
huge DualShock fan but it's definitely
better than the Xbox one controller for
me so I'm again gonna give points to
Sony here in terms of cons well it just
doesn't really do much else yet so
there's no IR blaster no included Kinect
and I mean there's Sony just being Sony
like the HDCP protection on this console
almost prevented bus from making this
video for you in a timely fashion they
do weird stuff like building twitch TV
streaming then limit the quality and
prevent you from archiving it so people
can only watch you live I mean it's it's
better in terms of hardware but
sometimes again Sony does weird stuff
like in battlefield 4 there better 'no
snow to scible because up sampling from
900p adds visual anomalies that make it
look kind of soft and weird so wewe
couldn't decide really whether it was
better to have 720p with jaggies or 900
900 p with visual softness and weirdness
so I mean the summary I guess here is
that the ps4 looks like a great device
it's still not for me personally because
I really can't live without a keyboard
and mouse but it's great bang for the
buck gaming hardware and from what we've
seen here Sony's done a good job of
delivering the hardware that gamers and
developers want and hitting a very
appealing price point with it so overall
conclusions now I think many of you
might have expected me to go rah-rah-rah
PC is the greatest in this entire video
but that's really not what we're trying
to achieve we want you to make up your
own mind we're more than happy to give
you our thoughts and if you made it this
far that's awesome but before you spend
your money take a step further and check
the links in the video description we've
uploaded sample footage from each
console to YouTube and provided links so
you can download the sample footage and
watch it for yourself locally at your
leisure I encourage you to spend some
time doing that if you like to buy any
of the stuff and we've helped you make
your decision please also follow the
pricing and availability link that is
also in the video description and buy
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lot guys we also always want to hear
from you so let us know based on well I
don't know this evaluation or anything
else that you've read or watch what
platform do you feel has really won the
round up here post it in the comments
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