News and Rumours: PS4

[kagemaru]

Not bothered by the used games activation process or no BC. I buy the vast majority of my games new and after the massacre of closed studios this gen, I don't blame developers/publishers for trying to grab a piece of the used game pie.

Would really love to read more details on the specs though.

 

[patsu]

If it's x64, the cheapest option is to just disable 64-bit mode on an otherwise capable chip.
Why pay extra money to physically remove that capability?

Perhaps that's what the rumor meant: A crippled 64-bit CPU. Does a crippled version use less power ? The new GPU can perform some heavy lifting, SPU-like tasks right ?

 

[patsu]

Another depth sensing patent...

USER-DRIVEN THREE-DIMENSIONAL INTERACTIVE GAMING ENVIRONMENT
http://appft.uspto.gov/netacgi/nph-...37".PGNR.&OS=DN/20120038637&RS=DN/20120038637

jeff_rigby found it.

 

[Richard]

WRT 2gb vs 4gb, is the manufacturing cost difference that big nowadays (let alone in a year and change when it starts to ramp up)? I know it all adds up and lowering the initial loss is a priority but let's get serious. 512 mb today is only possible because it's the _only_ option. If either XBOX360 or PS3 had 1gb versus 512mb the market would be far different. Devs make do with what they have. They'll also make it work with 2gb if both consoles have that. If one has double the ram, the other will start getting left behind near mid gen (nevermind the aforementioned "aha your pitiful console has half the memory of mine!" forum posts that would ensue in the first two years!)

I don't have a clue if they'll go with 2 or 4 but I'm almost certain they'll have the same amount of it.

 

[DJ12]

Hope it isn't true that Sony are hoping down the PC in a box route, especially if it's AMD based. As we would be looking at quad core Phenom II variant at best and we certainly won't be looking at anything at the upper end of the Southern Island family either.

Guess we will gain something from it being a closed box, but I must admit I'm underwhelmed.

 

[androvsky]

Why would they need an x64 CPU?

Cutting-edge game developers still need to write assembly from time to time, from what I've heard. Have you ever written 32-bit x86 assembly? If they could disable integral parts of a modern AMD CPU, it'd be the 32-bit x86 legacy section.

Also, although 32-bits give you 4 GB of memory access in theory, in practice it's tough to use more than 3 GB for applications. The OS kernel needs to reserve address space for hardware (especially the GPU) and paging, and it's really not worth the trouble to fiddle with those parts of the BSD kernel Sony's using to squeeze more usable memory out of it. It's not like it's hard to find 64-bit CPUs these days, even the PS3's Cell has 64-bit memory addressing.

 

[menmau]

Who here really believes in 2 GBs RAM?

2GBs of RAM would certainly condemn it to a shorter life, I do not believe it.
Next gen are know for being astonishing for a short period of time, that small amount would not be enough to fullfill this condition.

 

[3dilettante]

Perhaps that's what the rumor meant: A crippled 64-bit CPU. Does a crippled version use less power ? The new GPU can perform some heavy lifting, SPU-like tasks right ?

There's no significant difference in power consumption. Most of the chip is unaware of the bit mode, and for the sake of latency a lot of hardware just runs with 64-bit paths with half of it ignored.

The hardware would have to be physically different to save power, but the units that would shrink would save little since so much of the chip would not be affected.

 

[Shifty Geezer]

WRT 2gb vs 4gb, is the manufacturing cost difference that big nowadays (let alone in a year and change when it starts to ramp up)?

That's a very good point. If you aim too low, eventually the RAM you want isn't made any more and becomes MORE expensive. 2 GBs PC3200 DDR2 for your old PC = £40. You can get 8GBs DDR3 for less than that. Unless they're going with something cutting edge and insanely fast, low-balling the RAM doesn't make a great deal of sense.

 

[Silent_Buddha]

I'm not sure there'd be a benefit on console of 4 GB over 2 GB. Even PC only games rarely go over 2 GB of system memory used.

Hmm, than again. If memory is still being shared between GPU and CPU, 3 or 4 GB would probably be better.

Also for assets that would actually use that amount of memory, we're going to have to have mandatory full HDD installs with nothing streamed from disc except for Movies. Otherwise level loads will be intolerably long and if the game streams world data, pop in is going to be huge and/or art assets will be lowered. Even on PC with fast 7,200 or 10,000 RPM drives, there's still noticeable texture pop in with texture streaming engines as well as relatively long load times for games that actually include high resolution/high fidelity assets. I'd hate to imagine high resolution gameplay with high quality assets and being constrained to the speed of an optical drive. /shudder.

This also means no 2.5 inch mechanical HDDs. They'll have to use 3.5" drives or SSDs. Otherwise the drive is going to become a very serious bottleneck in the system.

This is, of course, assuming optical media is still being used for distribution.

Regards,
SB

 

[-tkf-]

This also means no 2.5 inch mechanical HDDs. They'll have to use 3.5" drives or SSDs. Otherwise the drive is going to become a very serious bottleneck in the system.

This is, of course, assuming optical media is still being used for distribution.

Regards,
SB

100MB pr sec:

http://www.storagereview.com/2tb_western_digital_my_passport_portable_hard_drive_review

 

[patsu]

If they go that route, then they expect you to buy another PS3 for that library... until at some point they add B/C over at the new machine, if at all. The new PS3 should be cheaper and smaller. I wouldn't mind if Orbis can interface with the new PS3 to use its Blu-ray and HDD.

Me no like that solution

Yeah.. I the stuff on PS3 despite all the usability flaws. Hope Sony find some way to transit us nicely into Orbis. We still have PS Suite exploration, and other SEN services coming; not to mention The Last Guardian.

Would love to see Orbis as a PS3 extender. Then we get to see the SPUs put to more jobs (No need to help the GPU anymore ! Thermal + IR + color camera work ?). ^_^

 

[androvsky]

100MB pr sec:

http://www.storagereview.com/2tb_western_digital_my_passport_portable_hard_drive_review

So about 42 seconds to fill up memory, assuming the data isn't fragmented at all.

 

[Rangers]

That's a very good point. If you aim too low, eventually the RAM you want isn't made any more and becomes MORE expensive. 2 GBs PC3200 DDR2 for your old PC = £40. You can get 8GBs DDR3 for less than that. Unless they're going with something cutting edge and insanely fast, low-balling the RAM doesn't make a great deal of sense.

Have I entered bizzaro world? All along we've been lowballing next gen specs to the extreme, and now suddenly the opposite? Alstrong for one has been vehemently denying more than 2GB RAM only in next gen...(too expensive, too many chips etc etc). Where are you Alstrong?

Why would they need an x64 CPU?

I thought everybodies theory was it pointed at a Fusion APU? Those would come X86 by default.

 

[manux]

So about 42 seconds to fill up memory, assuming the data isn't fragmented at all.

That would assume every byte in memory is used in the first frame game renders and whole memory is filled from disc and no memory is dynamically allocated and no data is uncompressed. Ofcourse some memory is allocated dynamically(all the buffers used for rendering for example), some stuff is uncompressed and some stuff is streamed frame by frame(it doesn't make sense to load stuff to memory for the first frame which user sees after 10 minutes of gaming). And in top of that OS is going to eat some memory which we could assume be around 256-512MB for kernel, drivers, background tasks+multitasking apps+browser.

Yeah, pc's do full level load in beginning but that is just waste of resources that could be better used in a console box which is price constrained. Smart streaming+compression is the way to go... I much rather would see solution which can push well unique content per frame rather than load it all once to memory and recycle.

There is a lot to optimize in regards to streaming, caching and installation that can be done right next gen and which was done with variable results this gen.

 

[Rangers]

WRT 2gb vs 4gb, is the manufacturing cost difference that big nowadays (let alone in a year and change when it starts to ramp up)? I know it all adds up and lowering the initial loss is a priority but let's get serious. 512 mb today is only possible because it's the _only_ option. If either XBOX360 or PS3 had 1gb versus 512mb the market would be far different. Devs make do with what they have. They'll also make it work with 2gb if both consoles have that. If one has double the ram, the other will start getting left behind near mid gen (nevermind the aforementioned "aha your pitiful console has half the memory of mine!" forum posts that would ensue in the first two years!)

I don't have a clue if they'll go with 2 or 4 but I'm almost certain they'll have the same amount of it.

Finally people get it, what I've always said. Guess it took weak PS4 rumors for people to come to their senses in this thread, heh. Well, not even weak. Just, weaker than Durango is all.

 

[babybumb]

The one with higher memory specs will only benefit if it has the GPU power and marketshare to back it up. If these consoles have midrange GPU 4GB makes very little sense..

Pastebin specs only make sense if Sony's plan is to disrupt the situation by launching a very cheap PS4 even before MS does potentially more expensive unit. Then they can dictate game development to their specs PS2 style because they have the installed base

One pool of 4GB GDDR5 seems not confirmed at all anyway to be usable for these consoles

 

[Colourless]

x64 has the big advantage of extra registers and larger registers. You don't need to use 64bit pointers when running in x64 'long mode'. You can just use sign extended 32 bit pointers if you only need to access 4GB address space

 

[Silent_Buddha]

100MB pr sec:

http://www.storagereview.com/2tb_western_digital_my_passport_portable_hard_drive_review

Sure if you want over 1/3 of the price of the console to be the HDD. Then again that's probably better than an SSD. But...

The best choice for speed + cost would be a 3.5" hybrid drive. Next best would probably be a 2.5" hybrid drive, and that's probably slightly more likely. Initial game load would be slower than an SSD, but once the game is loaded it could start to intelligently fill the flash buffer (say 10-20 GB) with the game data of the game you are playing. Hence once that data needs to be accessed it'll be like accessing it from an SSD.

Yeah, pc's do full level load in beginning but that is just waste of resources that could be better used in a console box which is price constrained. Smart streaming+compression is the way to go... I much rather would see solution which can push well unique content per frame rather than load it all once to memory and recycle.

There is a lot to optimize in regards to streaming, caching and installation that can be done right next gen and which was done with variable results this gen.

I have yet to see an asset streaming solution (other than ones that stream in data that is outside of the players view range) that doesn't feature significant texture pop-in with quick movements or changes to view. And most especially when you first enter the game.

Hence I still prefer either full level load at the start, or all visible assets + all assets that might become visible in the next 2+ minutes of gameplay loaded at start with streaming data only being applicable to things that might be coming up in the next 2+ minutes.

It's absolutely ridiculous that we have more texture and object pop-in now than we did 10 years ago (at least on PC which is like a sneak peak of what consoles will be like for the next generation).

Regards,
SB

 

[manux]

I have yet to see an asset streaming solution (other than ones that stream in data that is outside of the players view range) that doesn't feature significant texture pop-in with quick movements or changes to view. And most especially when you first enter the game.

AFAIK. consoles never have had proper good streaming HW support to begin with... Current gen was largely dominated by non hd sku xbox which demanded optical to be baseline. Sony and MS both had horrible performance on their 2.5" hard drives which was way below what one would expect.

Nintendo is on right track with optical+8GB flash. optical+reasonably fast flash + smart caching both to flash and memory should give results which are way beyond anything currently available as long as devs can trust that to be baseline and optimize accordingly(no optical/slow media only sku that Must Be Supported). With flash you loose the seek times which probably are major cause for popup if the things populated to view happen to require seeking.

On closed box I would much rather see devs having to manage the flash separately from hdd. If there is hybrid drive trying to guess what could be needed next the results are going to be unoptimal both on performance and space used.