Posted on 03/13/2013 11:10:48 AM PDT by Ernest_at_the_Beach
Being based on low-power/low-cost microprocessor technology and current-generation graphics processing technology from Advanced Micro Devices, Sony PlayStation 4 will unlikely offer horsepower comparable to even today’s gaming PCs. However, the PS4 has a secret weapon that even high-end PCs will not sport for a couple of years: 8GB of GDDR5 memory. As it appears, game developers believe in this feature.
“[PlayStation 4] is a perfect fit for the types of games we do, and we are confident that we will bring open-world gaming to a whole new level because of it. I am glad Sony decided to go with 8GB GDDR5 RAM because it means that the PS4 will out-power most PCs for years to come,” said Linus Blomberg, chief technology officer and co-founder of Avalanche Studios, in an interview with Gamingbolt web-site.
Sony PlayStation 4 is based on a semi-custom AMD Fusion system-on-chip that integrates eight AMD x86 Jaguar cores, custom AMD Radeon HD core with unified array of 18 AMD GCN-like compute units (1152 stream processors which collectively generate 1.84TFLOPS of computer power that can freely be applied to graphics, simulation tasks, or some mixture of the two), various special-purpose hardware blocks as well as multi-channel GDDR5 memory controller. The PS4 will come with 8GB of unified GDDR5 memory sub-system (with 176GB/s bandwidth) for both CPU and GPU as well as large-capacity hard disk drive.
Even by today’s standards Sony PlayStation 4 can be considered as an entry-level gaming system and is significantly behind mainstream and high-end machines. Still, when compared to average PCs, which feature dual-core microprocessors, integrated or entry-level graphics as well as around 4GB of DDR3 memory, then Sony’s PS4 is a powerhouse.
Still, PS4 is not only about pure performance, but also about other features and capabilities.
“The PS4 will not only be a very powerful gaming machine from a hardware perspective, but it will also be a social tool and integrated marketplace more akin to the successful mobile devices. It’s the best of all worlds in a way; great performance for demanding high-end gaming, good social ecosystem and connectivity, and integrated business marketplace,” added Mr. Blomberg.
Sony PS4 will be equipped with Blu-ray disc drive capable of reading BDs at 6x and DVDs at 8x speeds, USB 3.0 connectivity in addition to a proprietary aux port, Gigabit Ethernet port, 802.11b/g/n Wi-Fi, Bluetooth 2.1 EDR wireless technology as well as HDMI, optical and analog outputs. The new system will also utilize new DualShock 4 game controller with integrated touchpad as well as better motion sensing thanks to new PS4 Eye tracking cameras.
How can they do that on a low powered chip.?
I’ve heard some rumors that the PS4 will not be backward compatible to PS3 and earlier games. Anyone got more concrete information?
“I’ve heard some rumors that the PS4 will not be backward compatible to PS3 and earlier games. Anyone got more concrete information?”
It’s not a rumor ... it’s a fact and was discussed by Sony. Sony moved away from the Cell architecture and went the x86 route. It’s not going to be possible to emulate the Cell via software for a long, long time.
They are supposed to “eventually” support PS3 titles on the PS4 using some kind of streaming technology Sony purchased. The idea here is to run the game remotely on PS3 hardware and stream the video, etc to the console. That’s probably going to be a while as well though ... unless they allow you to install this program on a local PS3. They haven’t released much in the way of details about this though.
With all that computing power, you’d think the PS4 would be able to play PS3 and PS2 games natively.
But nooooo...
So with buying all new games in add., seems like quite an outlay of cash required
“So with buying all new games in add., seems like quite an outlay of cash required”
Yeah. The rumor about the new Xbox is that its also going to be x86 based as well (should say x86-64) ... I doubt it will be backwards compatible too.
I’m probably going to go back to PC gaming myself. The only PS3 games I’m addicted to are Warhawk and Rock Band 3. It looks like Wing Commander is making something of a return in 2014, so I’ll be using that as my gaming distraction once its released :-).
The last console I bought new prior to the PS3 was the Nintendo 64 ... I mainly bought the PS3 for media streaming and those damn music games that were a big hit about 5 years ago (I found those to be a *lot* of fun).
I just got a new comp, and the Nvidea GeForce card has 2gb of GDDR on it.
That would be DDR3,...on the CPU....Graphics card nught have DDR5 on it,...much faster as I understand it.
First this is Sony...never believe the hype. They said same thing about a PS3. In reality its about the same as the xbox360 which released 1year earlier. Sony will probably have a horrible bottleneck in it knowing them.
I watched the Sony conference and so far the only game that interested me was the Killzone game..heard a rumor that the games will cost 70 bucks a piece, which I dont know if most people would be willing to spend so much for 1 game(Considering PS3 games can range from 49.99 to 59.99) will wait and see how much they charge for the system and what other games become available before I consider buying it..they didnt even show the system itself at the conference which was pretty disappointing
Bet it isn’t capable of playing older games. It is nothing but a racket.
Yes, that’s what I’m talking about, the NVidea GeForce graphics card has GDDR5 on it.
The Raspberry Pi streams 1080p video and the whole thing costs $35. $70 with a power supply, enclosure, cables, and SD card, and that is splurging on some of the above. You can do a lot for very little money in computer hardware these days.
Love the Raspberry PI, but its probably safe to say that the computing power contained in the next gen consoles is going to be at LEAST 10x what the PI has in it.
Oh yeah, I’m not trying to compare the two directly, just pointing out that you get a lot for your money these days. And the PS4 will be ~5-10X the price, depending on how you look at it.
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