Editor's blog: Digital Foundry channel

By Tom Bramwell Published 21 May, 2009

Featuring the new EGTV HD player.

For more than two years now, friend-of-Eurogamer Richard Leadbetter has been diligently playing through the PS3, Xbox 360 and often PC versions of big-hitting games to bring you technical analysis of their relative strengths and weaknesses.

Eurogamer's Face-Off features always provoke widespread discussion, and over 19 rounds and several bonus editions have explored the differences between more than 100 current generation games - partly to help people who own more than one format decide on which to buy, and partly because we're massive geeks and can't resist.

But it's mostly for the latter reason that I couldn't resist the opportunity, when it arose, to bring the Digital Foundry blog within the bounds of Eurogamer, and give Rich and his team of technical experts the chance to expand on their work in the Face-Offs, with more extensive technical analysis that reveals the tricks of the trade and helps to put those big, showy high-definition trailers we see nowadays into perspective.

The result is the Digital Foundry channel, which launches today. Staffed directly by Rich, it's already stocked with interesting features, like a forensic technical investigation into how Final Fantasy XIII might work on Xbox 360, and analysis of the latest raw Uncharted 2 footage.

The Digital Foundry channel also hosts an entire archive of previous work, which you might not have encountered at its previous home. If you like to know how your games and consoles work, head over there and you stand a very good chance of finding out.

Tom.

P.S. Another thing you might notice is that the Digital Foundry video content is showcasing our new Eurogamer TV HD player, which is coming soon to the rest of the site's video content. Let us know what you think of it.

Picture of Tom.

About Tom Bramwell

Tom is Operations director of Eurogamer Network and Editor-at-Large of Eurogamer.net. He joined the company in February 2000.

Read more articles from Tom by visiting the Tom Bramwell archive page.

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Comments (34) Latest comment 3 years ago

Comments threads automatically close after 30 days, but please feel free to continue chatting on the forum!

  • McBradders #1 3 years ago

    Bring back Jaz Rignall too. And Gary Harrod. And Oz. And Rad Automatic, scrap this Digital Foundry gubbins and bring back Mean Machines >:(

  • ChthonicEcho #2 3 years ago

    Err, both the DF channel and the 'head over there' links simply lead to EG.

  • miiiguel #3 3 years ago

    Put it on Live. Please?

  • Widge #4 3 years ago

    check your menu to the left

  • Wastelander #5 3 years ago

    Groovy.

    The bitter tear cup will be full to overflowing and my arcane fanboy energy engine will be complete.

  • ChthonicEcho #6 3 years ago

    I found it, obviously, just odd that the links would lead to the main page.

    Looks all good, although the seeker bar thingamabob becomes too wide for what's beneath the video.

  • Widge #7 3 years ago

    I dunno, I've been over to DF the odd time and quite liked the articles just focussing on the engine behind one game. In fact I've been waiting for the Uncharted 2 one that has appeared on the main screen.

    Would like to see what Rich made of the patch that improved the PS3 Bioshock and the torn frame impact of turning Vlock off (to the naked eye, nothing but he's got 'da tech' you know?)

  • AphoticCosmos #8 3 years ago

    Nice :)

  • des #9 3 years ago

    Good work EG,best game tech analysis on the web...

  • seasidebaz #10 3 years ago

    Not very technically-minded is he, this Richard Leadbetter?

    Running 4Gb of RAM on Vista32? Madness.

  • Vroom #11 3 years ago

    Coin-op, you're a star!

  • Cadence #12 3 years ago

    Coin-Op are you for real?!

  • Wastelander #13 3 years ago

    Man the valves!

    The cogs are a turnin'

  • Garulon #14 3 years ago

    Coin-op, do you own a PS3 by any chance? And you told your friends at school how much more powerful it was than the "XFlop full circle?"

  • rhubarbandcustard #15 3 years ago

    "The result is the Digital Foundry channel, which launches today. Staffed directly by Rich, it's already stocked with interesting features, like a forensic technical investigation into how Final Fantasy XIII might work on Xbox 360, and analysis of the latest raw Uncharted 2 footage."

    CSI games?

    What a waste of bandwidth.

  • seasidebaz #16 3 years ago

    who cares about a few MB vs. Vista 64 headaches?

    But it isn't just a "few" MB, it's 4Gb - VRAM - whatever else wants some RAM. And as the card is a GTX295 with about 1.5Gb VRAM, that leaves... About 2Gb system RAM.

    Around 2,048Mb difference just from running 32bit software.

  • seasidebaz #17 3 years ago

    MAXIMUM. ADDRESSABLE. RAM. IS. 4GB.

    Learn to read. That maximum addressable is RAM + VRAM.

  • rhubarbandcustard #18 3 years ago

    And God said 'Let there be geeks'.

    And lo, there were geeks.

  • seasidebaz #19 3 years ago

    Nothing but nothing needs to worry about this kind of stuff yet, so why cry about it.

    I wasn't crying about it. I was laughing at the fact that Mr Leadbetter has put 4Gb of RAM in a PC running 32 bit software despite only needing to put 2 in there with one of those GPUs. 3 at most. In fact, putting 4 in can be detrimental to performance. And then he wonders why Crysis doesn't run very quickly :p

  • rotmm #20 3 years ago

    I'm guessing Coin-Op deleted yet another post. Or has he deleted his entire account?

  • Garulon #21 3 years ago

    "In fact, putting 4 in can be detrimental to performance. "

    Really? I don't have any dog in the fight (I only game on the 360, and I have a yummy 64-bit Vista box for non-gaming tasks) but I am curious. How's that then? Bank switching?

  • Wastelander #22 3 years ago

    Who the fuck runs 3 gigs of ram? that would totally mess up most dual channel mobos when you could just run a 4gig pair in two slots.

    I really don't get your problem with this at all.

  • seasidebaz #23 3 years ago

    @Garulon:

    No idea, I was looking at some figures and it seems like something to do with the way the memory controller works.
    Because Vista32 limits the maximum system ram to 3012Mb (or thereabouts) the memory has a wobbler or something when the VRAM gets mapped over any memory not within that 3012Mb range. So, doubled-up memory locations.
    I'm not fussed either, I've got 2Gb on Vista32. If I go any higher I'm going 64bit.

  • Wastelander #24 3 years ago

    There's no problem running 4gig on a 32 bit system at all, I'm running 4gig dual channel Corsair on XP Pro with a 512 graphics card and it works nicely. Windows detects just under 3 and half gig of usable ram and my mobo can still use dual channel mode as I'm using a matched pair.

  • Gaol #25 3 years ago

    @Wastelander

    Yeah but put a 1.5 gig Vram card in there and you're down to 2.5gig in a best case scenario. And I really don't think many games have a big enough memory footprint to need more than 2 gig under XP.

  • Chufty #26 3 years ago

    Well I'll chip in to this tangental discussion. I bought Vista 64 two weeks after its release. I have had not one single problem with it.

    All drivers work, all software works, everything works.

    So the argument shouldn't be about whether the extra few hundred Mb of RAM is worthwhile, or what performance benefits do or do not exist, but about the fact that your initial assumption that Vista64 is problematic is horribly broken.

    Stop reading fanboy forums and actually try 64 bit for yourself. You'll be pleasantly suprised.

  • DFawkes #27 3 years ago

    As long as it's not Richard Leadbetter. Literally anyone but him I'd believe, even the head of SCEA. I don't trust him at all, that Leadbetter, and I never will.

    Oh... damn.

  • Wastelander #28 3 years ago

    That's true Gaol. I don't think anything will use over 2gig at the moment, (not on XP32 anyway) but if you go over that's still allowing two full free gigs for an application to use, that's not having to share with your OS and whatever other processes you've got running.

    Ram is so cheap now, £45 or so for reasonable branded and heatsinked (heatsunked?) 800mhz 4gig kits. It's not even worth mixing and matching.

    What's really ridiculous is 1.5gig VRAM on a bloody videocard!

  • Royal Fool #29 3 years ago

    This is a great move by Eurogamer.

  • AphoticCosmos #30 3 years ago

    To echo Chufty's comment, I've been using Vista x64 since it came out and it's worked like a dream. Not one single BSOD, no driver problems except where they weren't provided [I'm looking at you, Creative!] and extremely fast. I can't even begin to imagine using x84 architecture OSes again when I've got a x64 CPU sitting in my case.

    My new rig, parts arriving tomorrow, will have 6GB of 1600MHz DDR3 Triple-Channel. If I had an x84-bit architecture I wouldn't be able to kit it out with that.

    Please try out x64 systems before you knock them. They really don't have anything wrong with 'em at all.

  • Tonka #31 3 years ago

    partly because we're massive geeks and can't resist.

    But it's mostly for the latter reason that I couldn't resist the opportunity, when it arose, to bring the Digital Foundry blog within the bounds of Eurogamer

    Reading this put a huge grin on my face.

  • Chufty #32 3 years ago

    You are allowed to suffer the odd typo.

  • RaptorM60 #33 3 years ago

    HD player = the last thing that Eurogamer was missing to reach the point of perfection ;)

  • craigy Verified Senior Developer, Eurogamer Network #34 3 years ago

    Alright, alright! I'll sort out an RSS feed.