Playstation 5 [PS5] [Release November 12 2020]

So weird, our PS5 is essentially silent.

I would understand if people complained about the PS4, but not the PS5. As someone that is a general consumer I find this the quietest console I've had since the Megadrive / SNES era.

These types of posts are so far removed from actual experience with the machine that I question why they're being brought up in the first place.

 

My PS5 is fairly quiet as well. But it's definitely louder than my XSX. And certain things cause it to ramp up to certain speeds, definitely not noticeable with headphones on, but with them off, I suppose people could hear my ps5 in a quiet enough environment.

 

Some people (on this forum?) also said they use the dan ramp up on PS5 to know beforehand that a jump scare or boss battle will be coming soon.

About XS,

iirc I read somewhere that Xsx is basically dead silent. due to its noise profile is below or on par with the common ambient noise level.

I got xss and it is also ridiculously silent. I can't hear anything until I stick my ear on it.

 

Yup, i am sure you can find something to complain about when it comes to XSX but it is not noise. Its DEAD SILENT regardless of what you do. In november it will be one year that i own XSX and i am still impressed every time on turn this thing on ... incredible

 

I find the only noise I hear from my PS5 is the disc drive - that whirrs for a bit when loading a game, but other than that it is absolutely silent. Even when it's been on for 6 days just sitting on the valhalla menu screen because someone's partner accidently switched it on and then couldn't be bothered to switch it off and just swapped input to the TV....

 

One thing that has to be said for people that are dismissing complaints about coil whine is that coil whine is far more subject to variance from person to person because some people are far more sensitive to it than others. While this is also true for fan noise, it's is true to a far lesser degree than coil whine or electrical noise in general.

For example, I've had multiple GPUs and PSUs that had a coil whine that, for me, was far more noticeable than the fans in my PC (case, CPU and GPU fans). However, when I asked friends and family if they could hear it over the fans all but three of them couldn't hear it from where I'd normally sit while using the machine. Some of the ones that couldn't hear it from there could hear it when they got closer to the component in question, while others couldn't hear it regardless of how close they got to the component.

It's been so bad at times that I basically just got rid of that GPU or PSU even though for the most part I was the only one that noticed it. There have also been the extremely rare cases where everyone asked could hear the coil whine. Those components obviously immediately went away without me even attempting to see if I could deal with it in normal day to day useage.

I'm going to guess the PS5 PSU isn't so bad that everyone notices it, much less is even distracted by it. But that isn't to say that it doesn't exist and isn't a distraction for some. Looking at the comparison above, MS obviously went out of their way to attempt to minimize or remove the potential for distracting coil whine (something that rarely happens with electronics) while Sony didn't (something far more common WRT consumer electronics).

So, I wouldn't exactly ding Sony for this since a relative minority of people will be affected by it and the majority of electronics companies don't bother directly addressing coil whine either. Rather, I'd applaud MS for going out of their way to attempt to remove the possibility that it would potentially distract from the experience of a relative minority of consumers.

Regards,
SB

 

Remote Play via mobile internet connection is working fine. But since I'm limited to 2mbit home upload, I'll most likely only use it to access OS and mess with the console remotely when I really need to.

 

What alternate path are you considering for heat to leave the console? The case itself can get warm, but it's not a particularly effective path.
The cooler-exhaust path is the dominant way to get heat out of the system, and if so then that path in both designs needs to transfer heat at the same rate. Failing to remove 200W of power means heat builds up in the console until something breaks.
What can differ is the temperature of the parts being cooled, since heat flow is proportional to the temperature of the hot side. A good cooler and a bad cooler in isolation are going to remove the same amount of heat at some point, it's a question of how hot the hot part of the system gets until the rates equalize.

Coil whine can also be affected by variation between components, the parts they are mounted to, and physical matters like adhesives and the electrical behavior of the load.
Some people report coil whine in specific titles, while others report hearing little coil whine in those games, but in others. It's also not apparently a phenomenon of just the most demanding titles. As an acoustical phenomenon, it could mean it's not just the people's sensitivity or hearing that varies, but resonance points in the hardware coupled with whether the games they run hit those points.
A console whose parts happen to have variances that don't line up in a way that resonates in an audible frequency or one that is more readily baffled by the case would be mostly silent. A fraction of the millions of units getting an unlucky combination seems plausible, particularly since Sony has a history of more variable construction--since not everyone complained about a jet-engine PS4 Pro. There's also at least three fan models in play across the production pool as well.
The Series X PSU's heavier use of coatings would help interfere with resonance in audible range, and help absorb vibrations in general.

 

After looking at the videos I can conclude both the ps5 and xbox series X are near silent. If they are complaining about power supply coil noise and not the fans etc

https://answers.microsoft.com/en-us...-playing/e2245c2c-ba8d-4704-a069-4abf6cf5ab11
https://answers.microsoft.com/en-us...rd-noise/589d0763-bdd4-4c79-be4b-14a501359d76

Btw I don't advise the sticking 'gweneth paltrow' goop anywhere to fix anything, engineer the tech so no goop is required

 

Like @3dilettante mentioned it could just be down to source components. The goop could have been used on initial launch systems to mitigate issues on just those first built machines. As manufacturing matures you'll see it less on newer machines. If I were comparing quality of manufacturing I would be looking at machines released later this year. You'd expect machines built a year later to be more refined.

Tommy McClain

 

Yeah the noise on the PS5 video seems not a coil whine but a fan noise. It does sound really annoying tho. My Sony Vaio tap 11 tablet used to make that sound before I add a goop of lubricant to the shaft.

Btw iirc years ago people recommended applying nail polisher to make coil whine goes away instead of using goopof stuff

 

That's very considerate of you.

 

The flip logic is that launch machines may be over-engineered because there is limited wear/usage in which to make better decisions. Latter machines may indeed be refined, but may be less robust.

 

It's common for the "best" consumer level engineering companies to use "goop" in order to ensure that there's no coil whine in their products. When you get to components for industrial or data center useage, of course coil whine is less of an issue since those are generally much noisier environments than your typical consumer living room.

Seasonic Connect 750W Power Supply Review - Tom's Hardware | Tom's Hardware (tomshardware.com)

There's some shots of the opened PSU with "goop" there.

For example, Seasonic, widely regarded as one of the best consumer PSU makers regularly uses "goop" in their PSUs just for that purpose. Even if only 1% of PSUs would exhibit coil whine due to variances in manufacturing, it's worth it to them.

Or
be quiet! Dark Power Pro 12 1500W Power Supply Review | Tom's Hardware (tomshardware.com)
Corsair RM850x (2021) Power Supply Review | Tom's Hardware (tomshardware.com)

Generally only cheap PSU makers with a spotty reputation will skimp on the "goop".

If you look at the best PSU makers, they'll have less goop on their more expensive PSUs and more goop on their cheaper PSUs. You can afford to spend more money to attempt to source better quality components with less manufacturing variance on expensive PSUs. However, even then you'll see strategic useage of goop on some components or wires.

On their cheaper PSUs, in order to combat coil whine from cheaper components, they'll use more goop.

So, should we be expecting the same quality of components in a console's PSU as we find in PSU's costing 200+ USD? Or is it more likely that Sony and MS spent much less than 50 USD on their PSUs and thus are more likely to have components more in common with PSUs costing less than 100 USD? And even then, quality PSU maker's will be using goop if they want to ensure that there is as little possibility for coil whine as possible.

Regards,
SB

 

Yep. That could be the case too.

But even over engineered ones like ps3 still got blindsided by the lead free solder.

PS5 launch maybe overengineered in the heatsink département, but maybe Sony was blindsided by the components that were whining

 

Also, if you're a skeptical consumer, then the initial batch of product will be the best engineered with the best sourced components because those are the units that are the most likely to get reviewed. Then after 6-12 months, you start sourcing cheaper components that aren't as high quality. This appears to be fairly common with OEM PC makers (cheaper slower memory, SSD, etc.) and I've even heard of Apple doing this when people take apart their device to see why it doesn't match up to reviews they'd read about it.

The vast majority of consumers will never notice since the devices are generally much more powerful than they actually need. So if it's a little slower or even significantly slower than reviews in everyday useage, they'll never know.

You see this far less often in gaming/professional laptops and PCs, however, since much like consoles, variances in performance will be much more noticable.

Regards,
SB

 

Sometime but not always. Witness PS3 YLoD and 360 RRoD. My March 2007 fat launch PS3 still works fine. I think the last two generations of consoles were engineered for longevity more than anything. The loud PS4 and the massive OG Xbox One.

 

I'm not sure those are great counterexamples, although I get what you mean. The PS3 and X360 were unlucky in that they launched right when the industry was forced to switch away from leaded solder to lead free solder. So, best practices for lead free solder still weren't well known or at the very least well known across all industries.

Lucky or unlucky me, I was working in the recycling industry when all of this went down and there was a massive influx of electronics as manufacturers across a spectrum of devices (an Onkyo amplifier that I had failed due to this after a few years) struggled to come to grips with the lower tolerances of lead free versus leaded solder over an extended period of useage.

Regards,
SB

 

PS3 YLoD is due NEC/TOKIN capacitors most of the time, not solder.
Earlier models could be overengineered to be more robust, but also have a known problems corrected in later revisions.

 

Reflowing the solder which was a common fix for most defective launch PS3's isn't related to the capacitors.

Regards,
SB