Sega says: iPhone as Powerful as the Dreamcast

[Elven6]

Speaking with SEGA of America president Simon Jeffery earlier today he noted that the iPhone is about as powerful as the publisher's console the Dreamcast. Jeffery said the company is delighted with how their iPhone version of Super Monkey Ball has been received by the phones many owners and detailed how the developer plans to take advantage of what he calls an upcoming and potentially major new platform for gaming.

Source (http://kotaku.com/5026060/sega-the-iphone-is-as-powerful-as-the-dreamcast)

For some reason I am highly doubting this is true, its probably Sega trying to get the handful of hard core Dreamcast fans to jump ship by making them think this is the closest they will get to a console from Sega.

Maybe if benchmarks were done I might believe it, but until then I won't.

[ICE]

That would be pretty crazy if its true..

[BlueCrab]

I wouldn't doubt that the iPhone is more powerful than the Dreamcast myself. Just basing the argument on the CPU (which, yes is the exact wrong way to run the argument, but follow me for a minute), the iPhone has an ARM11-derived processor that from what I can find on Google is running at least at 400MHz, possibly up to 600MHz or so. The Dreamcast ran on a 200MHz SH4 processor.

Also, its interesting to note that embedded in the iPhone's processor is a PowerVR Series 4 video "chip" (which should draw a parallel in your mind to the video core of the Dreamcast: A PowerVR Series 2 (CLX2, specifically)).

Remember, the Dreamcast came out almost 10 years ago. The technology is there to make a piece of hardware that is more powerful than the Dreamcast that fits in the palm of your hand.

Times change, and technology advances.

[Elven6]

Consoles are optimized differently then other products, handhelds are usually not as optimized as consoles which is why I think Sega is "talking out their asses".