stanzaspeed said:
pfftt i dont even use/have a virus scan program.
My Anti-Virus program is Linux. woot!
As far as the console wars go, don’t believe all the hype the corporations throw at you. Cutting-edge PC's are already more powerful than next gen consoles, and expect this gap to continually grow over the next ten years(Sony's expected life cycle of the PS3), since you can't upgrade the hardware in a console. It's sad really, that current PC hardware has already exceeded the performance capability's of the PS3, that isn't even out yet. At this point the main thing that the PS3 has on PC's is blu-ray tech, it's also what is causing the delay. And PC's will get blu-ray soon enough anyways. The hardware specs are absolutely gorgeous on the 360 and PS3, there potential is incredible. But Sony and Microsoft really dropped the ball where it counts in current games, memory bandwidth. Both systems are choked and unable to realize their full ability. Both systems have tremendous horsepower, but it gets bottle necked in the memory. It's like building an 800hp 7M and then putting a little 20mm throttle body on it. The motor is capable but the power is never fully realized. The 360 and the PS3 are the same, and will always be because the hardware specs are already set.
Now lets look at CPU's,
The 360 has 3 individual CPU's running at 3.2 GHz that can be used for anything. And it has only 1 MB of cache for all 3 CPU's to use.
The PS3 has essentially 8 CPU's but only one of them can be used for physics calculations and everything else the PS3 needs. The other 7 are basically used for math calculations and on top of that they still have to wait for the first CPU to issue them instructions. And it only has 512KB of L2 cache for all 8. It's a sever bottle neck. This really depressed me, the CELL processor had the potential to become something truly revolutionary, but Sony failed and the CELL fell far far short. It is still a very powerful processor, but not what it could have been. It wasn't designed with PC or consoles in mind it was designed for appliances. Things that didn't need a whole hell of a lot of processing power, but needed to to a lot of things at once, hence the eight cores. The idea to use it in a console for processing power was an after though, and brought in at the end of the development cycle, to late to make necessary adjustment to fully utilize them.
So in a console the 360 has the advantage it terms of power, even though the PS3 can do more things at once.
Then there's PC's The current offerings (lets say the AMD FX-55) even at 2.6 GHz still owns the PS3's CELL(3.2GHz) processor, because of it's 1.5 MB cache, Sad. The 360 is a little harder because of it's three independent cores, but it's still limited because of it's 1MB of cache. It's is still faster than the AMD, but not by much. So whats the PC to do? Well both AMD and Intel well on there way to bringing multi-core processors to the consumer market(knock knock)oh, i guess their here. Intel is slated to introduce a 4 core processor beginning of 2007. And these processors are not plagued by the bandwidth issues of there console counter parts.
Now for system memory.
The 360 has 512 MB of system memory
The PS3 has 256 MB of system memory
The PC has... well how much do you want? 512 MB, 1GB, 2GB, 4GB? Take what you want and upgrade later. Not possible with your consoles. you're stuck with what you get for the next ten years.
Then you still have to deal with the memory bandwidth bottle necks on the system bus on the PS3 and the 360. PC's are only going to get faster.
Now lets talk graphics cards.
This is where the consoles(360) have the PC's by the balls right now.
The 360 has an ATI chip that has been designed from the ground up to preform perfectly in it's environment. It is a truly beautiful piece architecture, and in my opinion the ATI chip and Blu-Ray are the only true next gen things in the console wars. Even two graphics card's set up in SLI or cross fire are going to have trouble keeping up with the ATI XENOS chip in the 360. And it may be a few years before we get see some of the designs from the XENOS make it to PC cards because Microsoft owns the Intellectual Property, and won't release it until it feels it's safe for the console. PC graphics cards will surpass the 360’s shortly but not because of the designs in the XENOS. That is still a few years down the road, but when it is released expect a impressive jump in the PC graphics market.
The PS3 is a sadder story. Originally Sony intended to use three CELL processors to take care every thing, But then decided hit Nvidia up for one of their cards and then put it on steroids. This is the reason the PS3 has dual monitor capability, it's a hold over from the PC where that feature makes more since, The 360 lacks this ability because it was designed from the ground up for use in a console. Resent news has Nvidia claiming the performance of the PS3's graphics card(RSX) as similar to the GeForce 7800 in terms of performance. This is a little concerning because it's been shown that two GeForce 6800's running in SLI mode are marginally faster than the GeForce 7800. So if Nvidia is being honest and not just trying to puff up sales of the 7800, then PC graphics have already surpassed the PS3.
The biggest difference between PC and Console comes from the fact that Consoles are designed so that the game can communicate directly with the hardware with minimal translation from software. This is known as mode 0(zero). With PC's, on the other hand, the game has to communicate with the operating system, the operating system has to communicate with the drivers, which then have to communicate with the BIOS which then communicates with the hardware. This slows things down. So the same game on a console, and on a PC with similar hardware configurations, the console will preform better. However as PC get faster and better, and consoles are forced to stay the same for the duration of their product cycle In the end the PC will become the better gaming platform.
* Disclaimer: Information in the post is correct to the best of my knowledge, I am a gamer as well as a techie, and as such I try to keep up on such things. However in this world, technology changes day to day. I'm disappointed in Sony right now, but things may change, and Sony may fix some of the short comings of the PS3 before it's launched. Maybe it's the cause of the delay. Time will tell. As such if you want more current information on the next-gen consoles and PC's use google, it's your friend 
For those wondering my stance in PC vs. Console. I’m quite comfortable with a controller and a sniper rifle, however I will always feel more at home with a mouse and keyboard.
