Going through the generations of gaming consoles and choosing the best is somewhat hard but with 2023 technology and my extensive knowledge combined with others, I have chosen the best gaming consoles between the years 1998 and 2023. Enjoy!
Starting at the beginning in 1998, the best gaming consoles to own were the Dreamcast, Nintendo 64 and the PlayStation.
According to multiple websites found on a search for the specs on Bing the dreamcast has a 128-bt Hitachi SH-4 RISC processor (200MHz 360 MIPS), a NEC CLX2 graphics processor, 16MB RAM, 8MB video RAM, a 2MB sound RAM, and 16.7 million colours. It can display 640 X 480 resolution. The game media is 1.2GB GD-ROM and has 12x access speed.
According to multiple websites found on a search for the specs on Bing the Nintendo 64 has a CPU that has a 64-bit NEC VR4300 clocked at 93.75 MHz with a 24 KB L1. It has a cache memory of 4 MB Rambus RDRAM that is expandable to 8 MB with the Expansion Pack. Moreover,
the storage is a 4–64 MB Game Pak and can be expanded to 32 KB. Additionally, the graphics are a SGI RCP clocked at 62.5 MHz with 100 MFLOPS. To finish the sound is a RSP, 16-bit stereo audio with up to 100 channels.
According to the Game Console Index:
CPU: 32-bit R3000A RISC clocked at 33.8688 MHZ, 30 MIPS, and 132 Mb/s bus
RAM: 2 MB (16 Mbit)
Sound: 16-bit Sony SPU, ADPCM, 44.1KHz
Sound Channels: 24 channels.
Video/GPU: 32-bit Sony/Toshiba, RAM 1 MB VRAM(SGRAM on later models) 2 KB texture caches(132 MB/s memory bus, 32-bit wide), 64 bytes FIFO buffer
3D Geometry Transform Engine(GTE) Coprocessor, 66 MIPS, Polygons: 360,000/flat shading, 180,000/texture mapping.
Colours: Color palette: 16,777,216, 57,344 to 153,600 colours on screen at a time.
Media: Compact Disc-ROM(CD-ROM)
Jumping to the year 2008, the best gaming consoles to own were the PlayStation 3, the Wii and the Xbox 360.
According to Blog Spot:
CPU: Intel i5 Processor
Motherboard: MSI P67A-GD65
Video Card: GeForce GTX 640
Video Drivers: Nvidia GTX 640
Hard Drive: 1TB Seagate
RAM: 8GB RAM
PSU: 100OW
Case: Standard case.
CPU cooling: Water cooling
Sound: On board.
Operating system: Windows 2003 Server
CPU: Broadway IBM PowerPC clocked at 729 MHz
Memory: 64 MB GDDR3 SDRAM, 24 MB 1T-SRAM(accessible for graphical textures and video data usage)
Storage: 512 MB (flash memory), SD/SDHC(Removable), gamecube memory card(removable, first version only)
Sound: Audio DSP – Stereo, Dolby Pro Logic II compatible. Wii Remote – 1 speaker
Video/GPU: 3 MB ATI Hollywood GPU clocked at 243 MHz
Resolutions: 480i, 480p, 576i(PAL)
Media: Wii Optical Disc, Gamecube Game Disc(first version only), Digital
Processor: 729 MHz PowerPC-based Broadway processor.
Memory: 88MB of RAM
Graphics: ATI Hollywood GPU
Resolution: Supports up to 480p
Storage: 512MB of internal flash memory
Connectivity: built-in Wifi for online gaming and internet
Next in the year 2013 the best gaming consoles to own were the PlayStation 4, the Wii U and the Xbox One.
CPU: 8-core AMD Jaguar
RAM: 8GB GDDR5
GPU: 1.8 teraflop
Supports 1080p gaming
Hard Drive: Choice of 500GB or 1TB
CPU: IBM power-based multi-core processor.
GPU: AMD Radeon-based High definition.
RAM: 2GB DDR3
Internal Storage: 8GB or 32GB.
Display: Up to 1080p resolution.
CPU: Custom 8-core AMD.
GPU: 1.31 teraflops AMD Radeon
RAM: 8GB DDR3
Internal Storage: 500GB or 1TB
Display: Up to 1080p resolution.
Moving into more recent territories, three of the best video game consoles to own in 2018 were the PlayStation 4 Pro, the Nintendo Switch Oled and the Xbox One X .
CPU: 8-core AMD Jaguar
GPU: 4.2 teraflops AMD Radeon.
RAM: 8GB GDDR5.
Internal Storage: 1TB.
Display: supports up to 4k resolution.
Display: 7-inch Oled Screen.
Internal Storage: 64GB.
Battery Life: Approx 4.5 to 9 hours.
CPU, GPU: NVIDIA Tegra x1.
CPU: custom 8-core AMD.
GPU: 6 teraflop.
RAM: 12GB GDDR5.
Internal Storage: 1TB.
Display: Supports up to 4k resolution and HDR.
Finally, the best gaming consoles so far in 2023 are the PlayStation 5 and the Xbox Series S and X.
CPU: Custom 8-core AMD Zen 2
GPU: 10.28 teraflops AMD RDNA 2
RAM: 16GB GDDR6
Internal storage: Custom 825GB SSD.
Display: Supports up to 8K resolution.
Xbox Series X:
CPU: 8-core AMD Zen 2.
GPU: 12 teraflops AMD RDNA 2.
RAM: 16GB GDDR6.
Internal Storage: 1TB custom NVMe SD.
Display: Supports up to 4K at 120fps and 8K resolution.
Xbox Series S:
CPU: 8-core AMD Zen 2
GPU: 4 teraflops AMD RDNA 2
RAM: 10GB GDDR6
Display: Supports up to 1440p resolution at 60fps.