Ouya beaten by phones in benchmark tests
Futuremark ranks it at 73 in a list of Android devices
Recent tests on the upcoming Ouya console suggest that it's already lagging behind Android smartphones when it comes to technical capabilities.
Futuremark rated 258 Android devices according to its 3DMark benchmark tests, and the Ouya appeared at 73 in terms of performance, trailing behind both mobile phones like the HTC One and the LG Nexus 4, and tablets like the Sony Xperia Tablet Z.
James Cootes, lead developer of the Nottingham Android games studio Crystalline Green recently used 3DMark's benchmark tests on the Ouya, and posted the results as a YouTube video, one that you can see below. The tests were run on a dev kit rather than a retail machine, but show that the Tegra 3 T33 is already behind other Android devices when it comes to sheer technical capability.
Recent previews of the console by a number of websites were less than complimentary about its current readiness for the retail market, citing controller issues, a lack of games and accessibility for the average gamer.
The Ouya will retail at $99 and is due for general retail release in June. The device is already available to developers and those that backed it on Kickstarter, where it raised 8,596,474 from 63,416.
I don't see it as a big problem but phones (and tablets) were always going to outperform it thanks to technological progression. Especially given the fact that the Tegra 3, even in its best version was never the fastest mobile graphics/processing architecture available - and Boxer8 would have known that...
Its definitely cheap though hence one of the reasons why an OUYA equated to just £75 including international shipping at the kickstarter phase. The costs will only continue to tumble. In future, it would probably be good to see them lock down the latest Tegra (should they choose it again) with their latest console closer to its introduction.
Anandtech's Benchmark
Edited 1 times. Last edit by Tom Keresztes on 16th April 2013 4:09pm
Anyway, the expectations were raised given that it was a plug-in console and that they were using a faster, higher clocked version of the Tegra 3 (1.7GHz here AFAIK and a faster GPU) than in most Tegra 3 devices. Hence, some of the reaction I've seen previously on these suggestions.
OUYA would have been significantly more powerful if it used the PowerVR SGX MP4 or anything similar from the potential configurations but I'm sure there's a reason we have the Tegra 3 instead i.e. an especially good, accessible deal from NVIDIA.
Edited 1 times. Last edit by Adam Campbell on 16th April 2013 4:23pm
If you were at the sharp end of the state of device drivers, you wouldn't be so shocked. Newer devices are random without even benefiting from any fixes made to previous iterations. It's ludicrous.
Edited 1 times. Last edit by Kevin Danaher on 16th April 2013 6:53pm
It's also worth noting that Samsung offers multiple versions of popular models that carry the same name but have completely different hardware inside. Scroll through our Best Mobile Devices list and you'll see all the variations:
#58 Samsung Galaxy S III with Snapdragon MSM8960
#166 Samsung Galaxy S III with Exynos 4 Quad
#88 Samsung Galaxy S II with Snapdragon APQ8060
#116 Samsung Galaxy S II with Snapdragon MSM8660
#191 Samsung Galaxy S II with OMAP 4430
#216 Samsung Galaxy S II (4.3" display) with Exynos 4 Dual
#228 Samsung Galaxy S II (4.5" display) with Exynos 4 Dual
All scores: http://community.futuremark.com/hardware/mobile/
Sure, it's possible to use a phone/tablet like an Ouya by connecting a bluetooth controller to a phone/tablet, hook it up to a TV and then go hunting for games designed for that setup. But the proportion of gamers who actually do that is tiny - certainly we aren't seeing many successful phone/tablet games made with this in mind. And even those phone games that do support controllers are typically made for touch controls first, just as PC games with controller support are made for KB + mouse first.
Edited 2 times. Last edit by Adrian Herber on 18th April 2013 5:52am