Xbox Series X & PlayStation 5: Graphical Capabilities Compared And Simplified

You could go out and purchase either the Xbox Series X or the PlayStation 5 right now, but speaking strictly about graphical prowess, which console performs better?


What do ‘graphics’ actually mean?

‘Graphics’ is an umbrella term, and it can denote many different aspects of the images we see when playing a game. It can mean the textures, lighting and overall detail determining how realistic a game looks. It can also mean resolution, which determines the pixel count and clarity of everything you're seeing on screen. Then there’s frame rate, which is a measure of how many frames (images) per second the game draws on screen, and therefore how fluid and smooth the experience is.
There’s a symbiotic relationship between these three parameters. For example, on a mid range PC, you might be able to play a game on ultra settings while maintaining a high frame rate when at 1080p resolution, but if you went up to 1440p, keeping the same graphics settings will likely result in a large frame rate dip. Lowering the graphical settings, however, will enable you to play at these resolutions smoothly. You can play around with these settings to find a balance on PC, but on consoles these settings are locked for the most part.
On the new consoles, graphical quality settings will be set and optimised to push as much out of the consoles as they can while maintaining and stable and fluid frame rate, and all at 4k resolution - the current benchmark resolution for high end gaming. Of course, there is the ability on both consoles to lower the resolution if your display doesn't support 4k, as every display has a maximum resolution that it supports.

Considering consoles are built to optimise graphical power and efficnetly make use of the hardware,  frame rates are usually a great way to see how a console performs. Framerate comparisons enable observation of which system can maintain the highest and most fluid image while pushing the console to its maximum within a given game.
 

                

Important hardware components

RAM (Random Access Memory)

RAM exists as lightning fast memory that the system uses to load relevant data quickly, and it's crucial in order to keep the system as a whole running smoothly. RAM capacity is measured in Gigabytes, and the more the gigabytes of RAM a system has, the faster it is. ‘DDR’ (double data rate) has been the standard for RAM architecture since the year 2000, with the most up-to-date and fastest variant today being DDR6. DDR6 is the type of RAM both consoles use.
A less relevant but integral factor in the way RAM works is the speed of the memory bus, which is measured in bits. The bus speed (measured in ‘bits’) represents the speed at which the RAM communicates to the CPU. 

GPU (Graphical Processing Unit)

The main event when it comes to pushing pixels, the GPU is the most important component for playing games. This is where the system processes the vast majority of the graphics you see on screen, from calculating lighting and shaders to high resolution textures. GPU’s have their own varient of RAM called V-RAM (the 'V' standing for video), which acts as dedicated memory used to quickly load and process graphical data. Both systems house the latest GDDR6 (the ‘G’ standing for graphics) RAM modules.
The speed of a GPU or ‘Clock speed’ is measured in Gigahertz (Ghz) - the higher the number, the faster the chip is. Another metric used to measure the power of the console GPU’s are ‘Teraflops’, with one teraflop expressing a processor's ability to perform a trillion calculations in one second.
When you see 'CU' on a spec sheet, this refers to 'compute units'. Think of these as the smallest units of computational power in a GPU; the more the GPU has, the more it do and better.
Both consoles run a custom version of AMD’s RDNA 2 chip architecture - the company’s latest and fastest GPUs to date.
 

CPU (Central Processing Unit)

The brain of the system. The CPU represents the raw number crunching power of a PC or console, and for games, controls a lot of behind the scenes - such as AI behaviour and maintaining stable framerates. CPU’s are made of smaller processing units known as cores, which collectively make up the CPU chip and can be assigned separately to tasks. The speed of a CPU is measured in Hertz (Hz), and the more cores a chip has, the more it can do simultaneously at once.
The Series X and PS5 both use AMD’s Zen 2 8 core CPUs. ‘Zen’ is the umbrella name for AMD’s CPU architecture, with their series of Zen 2 CPU’s being succeeded by their new line, Zen 3, just a week and a bit ago.

 

In light of the above information, let's have a look at the Xbox Series X and PS5 specs side by side.

 

Comparing the two consoles

The PS5’s specs are very similar to the new Xbox, with a couple of key differences.
The PlayStation’s variation of the RDNA 2 chipset features a significant 10.28 teraflops of horsepower clocked at a variable speed, having the capability to run up to 2.23GHz when it needs to. This pushes it ahead of the Xbox speed wise.
However, the Xbox’s 1.825 Ghz GPU has a hefty 12 Teraflops of power and an extra 16 compute units, representing the main difference in performance between it and Sony’s latest hardware, and ultimately making the Xbox more powerful overall on paper. The higher CU count and extra couple of teraflops it has over the PS5 gives developers headroom to push a little more power out of the system, representing a potentially bigger overall graphical punch across the range of parameters we discussed. Considering the higher maximum clock speed of the PS5 custom chip, though, the true difference remains to be seen. It'll be interesting to see how developers use the features unique to each of these custom chips and how they can optimise them.

The PS5’s CPU is identical to the Xbox’s, other than it having a slightly lower clock speed. Considering how small this difference is, it isn’t likely to present any meaningful performance difference other than maybe some slight frame rate differences.
Another slight difference between the two, but also one likely equivalently insignificant in reality, is the bus speed of the RAM. The 16gb of RAM in both systems is more than enough deemed required for modern, high end gaming, though the higher bus speed of 320 bits in the Xbox to the PS5’s 256 bits of transfer speed, ultimately means the Series X can transfer data a very small amount faster than its competitor.

The verdict

It’s clear that both of these systems are very powerful for the price, and considering that they’re essentially based around the same hardware, differences are going to be minimal.
The Series X is certainly more powerful on paper, but almost exclusively because of the higher teraflop count. The teraflop metric does denote power in that it determines how many calculations the GPU can perform per second, but in the same way that horsepower doesn’t necessarily determine everything about the speed and performance of a car; how many teraflops the GPU has doesn’t wholly determin all aspects that go into displaying the graphics on screen.
The true metric is, of course, the games. There aren’t many indepth side-by-side's out at the moment, but Digital Foundry’s Devil May Cry 5 comparison showed visuals to be identical to one and other, differing only slightly in frame rate. Even then, comparisons were balanced, with the PS5 pulling higher frame rates in the high frame rate mode the game offered, but a higher frame rate being maintained on the Xbox in ratracing mode. These variations were very minor even when either console pulled out slightly ahead.

Time will tell exactly where these consoles differ over the aggregate as more games are compared, though considering the similarities on the hardware side and the glimpses of in game comparisons we’ve seen so far; both consoles are highly competitive with each other in the graphics department. As such, it would be reasonable to suggest looking to the other, non-visual based features of each console and the exclusive games they bring, as a better measure to determine which one is right for you.
The Series X ans PS5 are both incredibly powerful machines that are right in-line with some of the top PC rigs on the market, while also being a lot cheaper. If there's one thing for sure, you certainly won't be disappointed with graphical punch of either of them.

 

Linden Garcia,
Editor, NoobFeed