News Putin's 'sovereign' gaming console projects detailed; one with a homegrown Elbrus CPU, the other a Chinese knockoff — Russian gov't admits the cons...

[Admin]

Russian politicians call for 'unconventional' approaches to overcome lack of performance of homegrown console hardware for gamers.

Putin's 'sovereign' gaming console projects detailed; one with a homegrown Elbrus CPU, the other a Chinese knockoff — Russian gov't admits the cons... : Read more

 

[Pierce2623]

Man I feel bad for the Russian citizens that want nothing to do with the Ukraine. They’re being forced into 3rd world lifestyles because a power grabbing dictator holds false elections and drags one of the largest countries in the world through the mud over his personal whims.

 

[ivan_vy]

using android-like phones installed base and ARM consoles to play in the cloud is the best way to go, centralized and scalable computing and having control and data of the games being played, I don't think they care about monopolistic practices at all.

 

[newtechldtech]

Government gaming console ? no thank you, this is a Spying device.

Since when a gaming console is a priority to governments ? besides , world wide, Only USA and Japan make consoles ... it is not important .. unless you want to spy on your people .

 

[derekullo]

Government gaming console ? no thank you, this is a Spying device.

Since when a gaming console is a priority to governments ? besides , world wide, Only USA and Japan make consoles ... it is not important .. unless you want to spy on your people .

Being able to grow your own food, create your own processing chips and create your own gaming console projects self sufficiency.

"The latest set of national goals are similar to the previous set announced in July 2020, but nationalist policies, patriotism and economic self-sufficiency receive even greater emphasis"

Russia’s national goals increasingly focus on nationalist themes and self-sufficiency

The Bank of Finland Institute for Emerging Economies (BOFIT) is an internationally renowned research institute specialising in emerging economies and global economic developments.

www.bofit.fi

With Russia already controlling the Russian internet
https://www.voanews.com/a/voa-russian-kremlin-targets-full-internet-control-in-russia-/7915222.html
Having a console dedicated to spying on its citizens feels a bit redundant ... assuming said consoles would be connecting to said Russian internet.

 

[Geef]

Think of it this way. A PS4 runs on an 8-core 1.6GHz CPU/GPU same die. PS4 Pro is same but OC'd to 2.1GHz.

They can get a basic setup like that and they will be set for hardware. Only trouble would be getting games from companies.

As long as they don't try to play Cyberpunk 2077 on it they should be fine. 🤣

 

[jlake3]

Think of it this way. A PS4 runs on an 8-core 1.6GHz CPU/GPU same die. PS4 Pro is same but OC'd to 2.1GHz.

They can get a basic setup like that and they will be set for hardware. Only trouble would be getting games from companies.

As long as they don't try to play Cyberpunk 2077 on it they should be fine. 🤣

The issue is that a GHz is not a GHz between architectures and especially not between instruction sets. Good and comparable benchmarks on Elbrus are hard to come by, but just based on FP32 GFLOPS it looks like it may underperform compared to Zen2 clock-for-clock while also not clocking as high on a given power budget.

Good software optimization might help... but the Elbrus chips we have some info on are TSMC 28nm and it looks like a "sovereign console" would need to be built on Mikron's 65nm process, sending the CPU performance back further.

Then there's the issue of needing a decent GPU to go with it...

 

[Sluggotg]

Who are they going to convince to make games for this? With Low end proprietary hardware, the programmers will be starting from scratch. Will Putin provide a decent SDK for the system? How many software developers outside of Russia will be interested in making games for this? The only way I can see them selling it, is if Putin makes All other video game systems illegal. (Might not be a very popular Policy).

 

[newtechldtech]

Being able to grow your own food, create your own processing chips and create your own gaming console projects self sufficiency.

Since when Gaming consoles are that important for self sufficiency ?

 

[usertests]

Good software optimization might help... but the Elbrus chips we have some info on are TSMC 28nm and it looks like a "sovereign console" would need to be built on Mikron's 65nm process, sending the CPU performance back further.

I guess that explains why they're using a "dual-core homegrown Elbrus processor" and not an 8-core like the Elbrus-8S(V) on TSMC 28nm. That processor should be capable of playing some fun late 2000s/early 2010s games, at least (tested with an RX 580 graphics card).

It's not like new low-end systems can't exist, just look at "Playdate". But you would need an impeccable software-side strategy to get any traction. If the hardware can't even reach the level of a Haswell/Skylake quad-core w/ iGPU, you are going to be locked out of a lot of modern PC games. Low-end emulation is already well conquered by $50-150 Chinese ARM devices, and anything Russians can get their hands on above that (N100 box, Steam Deck, etc.) will deliver a better experience than a 65nm Elbrus-based system.

 

[Ralston18]

Thread going political.

Closing thread to further comments.