Ever since Nintendo unveiled the Wii U earlier this year the question on many gamer’s minds has been “okay, cool touch screen controller, but is Nintendo going to wimp out when it comes to processing power again?” Those following the rumors have heard the Wii U will be anywhere from slightly less powerful than current HD consoles, to significantly more powerful. Where does the truth lie?
Well, developers with access to the console are starting to speak out and apparently the system will have a 3 GHz, Quad Core PowerPC processor and either 768 MB or possibly a full 1 GB of RAM. For comparison’s sake the Xbox 360 has a 3.2 GHz Tri Core processor and 512 MB of RAM, and the Playstation 3 has a 3.2 GHz Cell processor and 512 of RAM. So to sum up for everyone who’s glazed over at all this talk of Cores, RAM and processors, the Wii U’s main processor will be roughly equivalent of the ones in current generation HD consoles, but Nintendo is going to load on more RAM (an extra 250 – 500 MB of RAM doesn’t sound like much, but it can make a big difference on a console).
So, is Nintendo wimping out or not? Yes and no. This is going to be a real HD console, capable of graphics as good or better than anything we’re currently seeing on consoles, but on the other hand it doesn’t look like they’re doing much in the way of future proofing — the Playstation 4 and Xbox 720 will likely top the Wii U’s specs pretty easily. But hey, how detailed do you really need Mario or Kirby to be? As long as the next Nintendo console outputs graphics that actually look decent on an HD TV I’m sure it’ll do fine.
via Wii U Daily