Hardware Real specs new 3ds

[Chrisssj2]

Question to processor gpu ram and asorts. what will the differences be?

 

[The Real Jdbye]

I don't think it's known exactly what CPU is in the 3DS, but we know that it's quad core, so it's theoretically at least twice as fast.

 

[Chrisssj2]

HMm ok and gpu the same I heard and more ram?

 

[MyJoyConRunsHot]

Specs were reported via a teardown/hacking by 3dbrew:
CPU: Quad-core ARM11 @268Mhz
GPU: Pica200 (Clockspeed not documented)
RAM: 256MB FCRAM, 10MB vRAM

http://3dbrew.org/wiki/Hardware#New_3DS_Specifications

 

[MyJoyConRunsHot]

One thing I don't understand about the reported clockspeed of the CPU is how the OS is running more than 2x the speed of the original. Assuming the OS is still using 1 core, the CPUs in the N3DS are identical to the ones in the previous models, clockspeed included. How is the OS even running faster if there were no upgrades to the CPUs themselves such as clockspeed?

 

[TheDreamLord]

Assuming the OS is still using 1 core

Why would you even make that assumption?

 

[the_randomizer]

I don't think it's known exactly what CPU is in the 3DS, but we know that it's quad core, so it's theoretically at least twice as fast.

More cores doesn't mean higher clock speed though. If the games don't use more than two cores, it's not faster than the regular 3DS.

 

[The Real Jdbye]

More cores doesn't mean higher clock speed though. If the games don't use more than two cores, it's not faster than the regular 3DS.

On a hardware level, it should be twice as fast. Whether software takes advantage of that or not wasn't really part of my point. Although they will in time.

 

[Nemix77]

Actually doubling up CPU cores does not mean double the performance of the CPU.

In real world performance gains by the extra cores on the New 3DS are somewhere around 50% faster than the old 3DS's CPU.

My guess is 25% of that extra CPU power goes into the new face tracking camera, built in NFC and new adaptive brightness functions while the other 25% is reserve used to speed up the OS (menus and game loading) and for future exclusive New 3DS titles that can use the extra juice.

The real gaming performance gains on the New 3DS is comes from the 67% more vRAM than old models and my guess a small bump up in the GPU speed which cannot be confirmed, this will be again used on future exclusive New 3DS titles that are developed to take advantage on the extra vRAM and GPU speed.

 

[minexew]

On a hardware level, it should be twice as fast. Whether software takes advantage of that or not wasn't really part of my point. Although they will in time.

On a hardware level, it's "twice as big", not twice as fast.

 

[The Real Jdbye]

On a hardware level, it's "twice as big", not twice as fast.

Twice as many cores on the same/similar CPU is theoretically 2x speed, as in the CPU can perform twice as many instructions in the same amount of time (under optimal conditions)

 

[sarkwalvein]

Twice as many cores on the same/similar CPU is theoretically 2x speed, as in the CPU can perform twice as many instructions in the same amount of time (under optimal conditions)

Linear parallel speed up belongs to some fantasy land.

 

[minexew]

Twice as many cores on the same/similar CPU is theoretically 2x speed, as in the CPU can perform twice as many instructions in the same amount of time (under optimal conditions)

Yeah, theoretically. So, whether the software takes advantage of it, is exactly the point.

The CPU is as slow as ever, now there's just more of it.

 

[MyJoyConRunsHot]

Yeah, yeah its an old thread. But I wanted to report that neogaf kinda answered my question:

About the CPU, 3DBrew still lists 4 cores at the same clockspeed as the OG 3DS, but we have had hints from devs on GAF about other changes that improve single-threaded performance (that video of Retro City Rampage running way faster when compiled for N3DS), so that's not definite. Which is quite strange, since we have been able to run homebrew on the N3DS for a while so a higher clockspeed would be very easy to detect. One possibility is faster/bigger CPU cache, that would definitely impact single-threaded performance and is harder to determine without spec sheets.

http://www.neogaf.com/forum/showthread.php?t=1028062&page=3

Ignoring the obviously ignorant comment about the number of cores in the N3DS(typical of neogaf users anyway), apparently, developers there have hinted at other improvements such as improved cache/single-threading which might contribute to why the OS runs faster. Good news if true.