Feasibility of an upgradeable or forwards compatible console *spawn*

[Shortbread]

If the 4K gaming that Sony speaks of, is simply up-res scaling (not native buffer rendering), is this really a big deal? Most, if not all 4K TVs scale lower resolution material (gaming as well) to its native resolution. I'm more opt to keep the PS4K at 1080p (gaming wise), and allowing my TV to do the up conversion. Unless, Sony will be redoing it's OS/App UI in true native 4K fashion... other than that, this 4K gaming speak is nonsense at the moment.

 

[Love_In_Rio]

Well, that would seem to indicate it being Jaguar (or Puma) based. No Zen, then. Might be able to rule out GDDRX5 too.

Zen will be out for end of the year. If PS4.5 is also end of the year. Why not Zen?. There are pre production Zen cores out there for sure.It has not sense to launch a system seeking for 4K and keep the weakest component in. In fact devs for sure in a poll asking what to improve in current PS4 would vote for a new CPU before a new GPU. It´s the main bottleneck.Besides, if it´s still an APU Jaguar won´t make it, as it hasn´t been shrunk to 16nm.
The main enemy nowadays of not reaching 60fps in games is Jaguar, not Liverpool GPU. Don´t forget that for PSVR frame rates are key.

 

[DieH@rd]

- no longer clamshell memory, so can run memory clocks higher - 6 ~ 7 gHz

PS4 CUH1200 already moved away from clamshell memory. They now use eight 1GB chips.

 

[function]

When MS released Kinect they had the 360S with built in Kinect support ready to go. I think Sony will want to do the same thing, given the cable mess involved with PSVR and given that if Sony want to get behind 4K BR there is no better time than now.

To make the most of the excitement for PSVR they ideally need to launch PS4K beforehand. A big reveal at E3, with launch as soon as possible after (same day would be best) and immediate mass availability so no-one that wants one is left waiting would be best. Given how long PSVR has been in gestation this should be doable, I reckon.

Zen will be out for end of the year. If PS4.5 is also end of the year. Why not Zen?. There are pre production Zen cores out there for sure.It has not sense to launch a system seeking for 4K and keep the weakest component in. In fact devs for sure in a poll asking what to improve in current PS4 would vote for a new CPU before a new GPU. It´s the main bottleneck.Besides, if it´s still an APU Jaguar won´t make it, as it hasn´t been shrunk to 16nm.
The main enemy nowadays of not reaching 60fps in games is Jaguar, not Liverpool GPU. Don´t forget that for PSVR frame rates are key.

I think Sony will want mass availability before the end of the year, perhaps by summer or at least around October. Also, AMD are looking at limited availability for Zen (on GF 14 nm) in it's initial outing at the end of the year, with integration into an APU sometime mid 2017. I don't think the timing works for Zen, and if it did the design work would be huge.

Jaguar/Puma means either doing all the design work for 14/16 nm or staying on the cheap, high yield 28 nm. Which is a distinct possibility IMO. Should be able to clock above 1.6 gHz if they wanted to: 2+ gHz is attainable on commercially available cores now.

PS4 CUH1200 already moved away from clamshell memory. They now use eight 1GB chips.

Yeah, but PS4 is still tied to the original clamshell friendly clocks. A new, faster PS4 would be starting from a point where this was no longer necessary. Combined with improvements in GDDR5 this should mean they can target higher clocks "for free".

 

[function]

If the 4K gaming that Sony speaks of, is simply up-res scaling (not native buffer rendering), is this really a big deal? Most, if not all 4K TVs scale lower resolution material (gaming as well) to its native resolution. I'm more opt to keep the PS4K at 1080p (gaming wise), and allowing my TV to do the up conversion. Unless, Sony will be redoing it's OS/App UI in true native 4K fashion... other than that, this 4K gaming speak is nonsense at the moment.

From my (admittedly limited) understanding of some of the techniques involved, you can build a better 4K image if you have access to the depth buffer, particularly if you generate a higher res depth buffer.

Your 4K TV is stuck with upscaling a final image - effectively just a colour buffer. But if you had, say, 20 % more GPU time (?) you could use that to generate a higher res depth buffer than for normal 1080p, and use that in combination with your 1080p colour buffer to construct a higher res image that would be more accurate and less blurry than if you simply upscaled the colour buffer. You could also use multiple frames (temporal re projection I think the kids are calling it) to increase the samples used to generate the 4K image.

Top and bottom of it is there are ways of making a 4K image that are cheaper than native rendering and superior to plain ol' upscaling. A bit more power might be enough to enable some of them.

If Sony wanted to be strict about the way in which the "extra power" were used, who knows, they might only enable said "extra power" when 4K output or PSVR was detected.

 

[upnorthsox]

Patrick Klepek [who broke the PS4.5 news on Kotaku] in Q&A twitch stream, talking about his article
https://www.twitch.tv/patrickklepek/v/55620319?t=18m46s

"There is hardware being built. There are test kits being built. There is documentation that exists talking about these machines."

So the question then is, who jumped first MS or Sony? I'm beginning to think now that it was Sony, but we did hear rumors of MS first.

 

[Egmon83]

Now with the October PSVR release I do see a PS4k coming out yes; with the new BD drive. Newer die-shrinks should allow this PS4k to be able to decode the required H265 codec on the GPU, while not making too much noise. A newer HDMI standard would be incorporated as well, unless the programmable HDMI in current PS4 is up to that task.
Also included could be a more elegant PSVR cable solution: for example an extra USB port in the back (at least). Maybe even incorporate the MINI PS4 inside?

That makes sense to me!

Same game hardware though

 

[iroboto]

So the question then is, who jumped first MS or Sony? I'm beginning to think now that it was Sony, but we did hear rumors of MS first.

Seems irrelevant to me; novelty has little value, execution is everything. Often competitors who compete in the same industry will see the same trends and often reach the same conclusions.

It's likely they started without knowledge of each other pursuing the same goals.

 

[Deleted member 11852]

So the question then is, who jumped first MS or Sony? I'm beginning to think now that it was Sony, but we did hear rumors of MS first.

You can't judge any actual projects gestation period based on the timing of the leaks outting them.

 

[Love_In_Rio]

Seems irrelevant to me; novelty has little value, execution is everything. Often competitors who compete in the same industry will see the same trends and often reach the same conclusions.

It's likely they started without knowledge of each other pursuing the same goals.

Well, they both have daily contacts with AMD for sure, planning whatever is next.Not too difficult to know for them what is planning each other.

 

[Deleted member 11852]

Well, they both have daily contacts with AMD for sure, planning whatever is next.Not too difficult to know what they both are planning.

It's kind of compelling to believe. Microsoft and Sony both face the same commercial realities in terms of technology available and it's no coincidence that both current gen consoles ended up being based on Jaguar and in the same ballpark performance-wise and launching in the same month in the same year. It's therefore no surprise that any possible "rev.2" upgraded console edition is being made viable possibilities by whatever AMD is doing with the tech that is common to both consoles.

The real fun is, if these things are real, will Sony maintain their edge. I think Microsoft would try to grab the technical high ground.

 

[iroboto]

Well, they both have daily contacts with AMD for sure, planning whatever is next.Not too difficult to know for them what is planning each other.

Agreed, but on paper this is likely a breach of contract somewhere on AMD behalf if AMD is passing requirements around between the their two customers.

 

[Deleted member 11852]

I seriously doubt there is any impropriety within AMD. Neither Microsoft or Sony will be aware of the other company's choices. This just isn't how business works. If these projects are real AMD will simply present a new chipset to each company with the possible configuration options and costs.

If there is any industrial espionage happening, it's within Microsoft and Sony themselves, or developers. Those leaky, lazy bastards!

 

[Michellstar]

Well, AMD stated late in 2014 two new semi-custom design wins, expected late 2016

http://www.kitguru.net/desktop-pc/a...nother-gaming-device-chief-financial-officer/

"AMD announced two new semi-custom design wins back in October. The design wins are expected to bring the company combined total lifetime revenue of approximately $1 billion over approximately three years starting 2016"

"“I will say that one [design win] is x86 and [another] is ARM, and at least one will [be] beyond gaming, right,” said Devinder Kumar, chief financial officer of AMD, at the Raymond James Financial technology conference. “But that is about as much as you going to get out me today. From the standpoint [of being] fair to [customers], it is their product, and they launch it. They are going to announce it and then […] you will find out that it is AMD’s APU that is being used in those products.”

One of those, it´s believed to be NX

Last year they announced another design win, but dismissed that was about gaming.

 

[Love_In_Rio]

Well, AMD stated late in 2014 two new semi-custom design wins, expected late 2016

http://www.kitguru.net/desktop-pc/a...nother-gaming-device-chief-financial-officer/

"AMD announced two new semi-custom design wins back in October. The design wins are expected to bring the company combined total lifetime revenue of approximately $1 billion over approximately three years starting 2016"

"“I will say that one [design win] is x86 and [another] is ARM, and at least one will [be] beyond gaming, right,” said Devinder Kumar, chief financial officer of AMD, at the Raymond James Financial technology conference. “But that is about as much as you going to get out me today. From the standpoint [of being] fair to [customers], it is their product, and they launch it. They are going to announce it and then […] you will find out that it is AMD’s APU that is being used in those products.”

One of those, it´s believed to be NX

Last year they announced another design win, but dismissed that was about gaming.

Interesting.Google tells me one could be for Nintendo(the ARM one),one for Apple(the one beyond gaming) for 2017/8 but the 2015 win is undisclosed and stated to start generating revenue in the end of 2016.
If it was Sony one has to wonder where is Microsoft...and what was the business reason that took Sony to buy a design in mid 2015 for a fast launch.Maybe they know MS ditching consoles and targeting PCs only with its win store?.That could make the iterative evolution a way to counter the PC continous tech improvement and always holder of WAY better multi versions.
Too many speculations,but this has the fun smell of new gen launchs and rumors!.

 

[Shifty Geezer]

The real fun is, if these things are real, will Sony maintain their edge. I think Microsoft would try to grab the technical high ground.

Wouldn't that be fun! How would the fanboys deal with a PS4.4 versus an XB1.7? "Xbox is more powerful than PS4 now." "No, PS4 is more powerful. The new versions' don't count because no devs are targeting them." That'd confuse the warring no end!

 

[Love_In_Rio]

Wouldn't that be fun! How would the fanboys deal with a PS4.4 versus an XB1.7? "Xbox is more powerful than PS4 now." "No, PS4 is more powerful. The new versions' don't count because no devs are targeting them." That'd confuse the warring no end!

Easy for me:Xbox 1.7 for the win!.But the important question is, will it have a blitter?.

 

[bunge]

Easy for me:Xbox 1.7 for the win!

4.4 > 1.7

Dummy.

 

[turkey]

4.4 > 1.7

Dummy.

Ahh but 1.7 is 70% increase and 4.4 is just 10%

70 > 10

Meaningless comparison ftw

 

[DieH@rd]

DF has no info about hardware in it [Klepek clearly mentioned more powerful GPU several times in his Kotaku article], but at least we have another confirmation about existence of PS4K test kits.