Hacker News Reader

Comment by Hokusai | Hacker News Reader

> there's untold little quirks you have to deal with when using a general-purpose operating system

"Though initial iterations of the software for the original Xbox and Xbox 360 were based on heavily modified versions of Windows, the newer consoles feature operating systems that are highly compatible with Microsoft's desktop operating systems, allowing for shared applications and ease-of-development between personal computers and the Xbox line." Wikipedia

> and modular hardware

This is true. There are, e.g., fake GPUs that will make your experience quite bad. I always buy pre-build PCs from my favorite tech store, and I have personally avoided the problem. But Steam forums show that some people is not so fortunate. Also there is people trying to run modern games in very old PCs, consoles solve that problem by not running new games in previous generation consoles.

View on HN

It's not about the OS technology in use, it's about all the practicalities of how it is deployed on consoles vs. on desktops. Things like immutable OS volumes, fixed configuration tested on the hardware, the extent to which they build higher level automation to do what the user expects, etc. "The Xbox One runs Windows" ignores all these details which make it a much more seamless experience than on a PC. The PS4 runs FreeBSD, but try gaming on FreeBSD and let me know how it goes in comparison...

Honestly, it's plainly obvious that gaming on consoles is much more seamless than on PCs. If you don't think so, you're not recognizing all the little quirks you're dealing with on a PC. When was the last time a driver update broke a game on a console? Ever had to install support software to make a game work well with a particular controller? Issues with overlays and system feature integration? Unexpected performance loss due to a weird configuration? Mysterious DRM malfunction issues? Windows Update gone wrong? Those things (mostly) just don't happen on consoles because it's a much more controlled ecosystem.

> When was the last time a driver update broke game on a console? Ever had to install support software to make a game work well with a particular controller? Issues with overlays and system feature integration? Unexpected performance loss due to weird configuration? Mysterious DRM malfunction issues? Windows Update gone wrong?

I agree (I don't get why people downvotes). My argument is that a quality PC does not have that problems. The fact that you can get a very cheap PC creates many of this situations. But I get into "No true Scotsman" territory with that logic. And that is why I agree with your arguments.

But those things I mentioned happen regardless of the hardware build quality. Hardware quality will avoid hardware issues, things like overheating or stability problems. The things I mentioned are software integration problems that are a natural consequence of the PC ecosystem being much more heterogeneous. It doesn't matter how good your hardware is.

There's just no way around the fact that when your ecosystem gives people much more choice and flexibility, it's going to be jankier than one which doesn't. It's just math. As you add dimensions to the problem space you reduce the fraction of the problem space you can test to ensure the user experience is good, and you rely on users to figure out how to reach a good point in that space, since you can't do it for them. If your dimensions are at least separable you might have a better chance (linear scaling instead of exponential), but modern systems are too complex to keep one issue from influencing others. It's a massive engineering problem.

The cost or "quality" of the PC is not a factor.

Just the simple fact that you have to manually install graphics drivers is a basic issue that you don't have to deal with on console. Just visit any of the PCgaming subreddits and you'll find plenty of examples to do with troubleshooting graphics issues, with people suggesting using Graphics Driver Uninstaller to try and completely remove conflicting driver versions etc.etc.

I remember when there were annoying stutters after the initial BF1 launch and one of the workarounds was to use task manager to change the CPU priority for the task. Here's an example thread for ModernWarfare https://www.reddit.com/r/modernwarfare/comments/j26zli/stutt...

Literally none of those issues affect console gaming. It's sit down and start gaming without any hassles within 15 sec of turning the machine on.

I've been a PC gamer for 30 years and it's a pain in the ass compared to console. With the new generation of consoles targeting 60fps, my final annoyance with console gaming has disappeared.

>My argument is that a quality PC does not have that problems.

Part of nvidia's drivers often contain workarounds and hacks specific to games. Sometimes they have gone wrong and bricked a game until the developer or nvidia can fix it. Buying a "quality" PC doesn't alleviate you from having to use nvidia drivers.

There's also a lot of little things. Like, you launch a game and there's no audio. Well, Windows at some point decided to switch audio outputs on you. You may have a lot of them. Line out, headphones, a bluetooth headset, a virtual out for streaming software, a monitor with built-in speakers - and now you've got to click the little speaker icon and try to figure out what should be selected, which may be named after the driver or hardware vendor and not totally obvious.

That's the sort of thing that for the most part just doesn't happen with the consoles, because they're limited and tuned for the intended experience.

On my PC each legitimate output device has a duplicate with the same name that does nothing. Every once in a while when I launch a game it will switch to the duplicate entry and I will have to switch it back. It's a quirk where the fix has become a reflex.

I've never had to deal with this on any console I've owned.

Disabling all the duplicate entries might help.

Or not. Shrug. Sound configuration is one of worst aspects of Windows.

I remember it being pretty good on Windows XP. I’d run programs like reaper with full control of my soundcard and it’s IO. It wasn’t until win10 that everything sound related became a chore. I can still find snippets of XP UI in win10 hidden under many layers of new age UX. Stuff like the “listen to this device” checkbox

> Well, Windows at some point decided to switch audio outputs on you. You may have a lot of them. Line out, headphones, a bluetooth headset, a virtual out for streaming software, a monitor with built-in speakers

I agree that I have found that problems. I just get the same problems with my TV (Samsung) when I have several audio devices. Maybe one can argue that is a TV problem, not a console problem. But non-portable consoles need a TV to work. So, the problem exists but it's moved somewhere else.

After your comment I realize that portable consoles are that ideal all-in-one, at least older ones without HDMI or Bluetooth.

You can rename audio devices to be something just friendly.

Right. You can. A workaround. This is something you don't have to do on an XBox or PS5.

And that's a workaround to make it easier to perform another workaround, the "why can't I hear my game" problem. So we're in workaround Inception now, nested workarounds.

Yeah, there's something to be said for playing an online game in which everyone has the same exact hardware (mostly). This is coming from a person who occasionally plays competitive games on a 2012 Thinkpad and comforts himself when he loses by saying, "it's ok, their computer cost as much as a used car. Don't feel bad about losing".

Happy 10th birthday T-530, 1 decade and still trucking!

> newer consoles feature operating systems that are highly compatible with Microsoft's desktop operating systems, allowing for shared applications and ease-of-development between personal computers and the Xbox line

Microsoft created its Universal Windows Platform (UWP) to enable software to run across multiple Windows devices from desktops to tablets to consoles. It has not really been a resounding success, though it has some inconvenient limitations as well as business restrictions such as being tied to the Windows Store.

Even the Windows Store has moved away from UWP by supporting Win32 apps.

Reply on news.ycombinator.com