Predict: The Next Generation Console Tech

[Squilliam]

The same reasoning could be used the other way around. If they're not liking what they're hearing about the PS4, then there is all the more reason to vocally complain about it. I think they main reason we've heard so little about the nextBox and the PS4 is simply much better secrecy policies. It's just a matter of time before we'll hear more, as they say, patience is a virtue. In the mean time, we can all bicker about what we'd like to see .

There must be thousands of people working on the development kits right now and we're still not really getting leaks. It seems there has been a huge crackdown of leakers perhaps because we used to get Sony's entire E3 presentation announcements before E3 for instance. I guess those whom once couldn't help leaking the info have been found out and their example to the rest of the team probably encourages silence.

 

[McHuj]

this is an article abouT how advanced intel is with CPU performance :
http://www.tomshardware.com/reviews/atom-z2760-power-consumption-arm,3387.html

:

Why are they comparing a 40nm processor vs a 32nm one? My guess is that Intel wouldn't,t look so good against a 32nm A6. Sounds like intel paid for one marketing.

 

[BRiT]

Possibly because they don't make the one processor on the smaller fab process yet?

 

[JardeL]

There must be thousands of people working on the development kits right now and we're still not really getting leaks. It seems there has been a huge crackdown of leakers perhaps because we used to get Sony's entire E3 presentation announcements before E3 for instance. I guess those whom once couldn't help leaking the info have been found out and their example to the rest of the team probably encourages silence.

Actually you/we heard a lot of truth about PS4 and next Xbox, thanks to sweetvar26.

 

[BRiT]

Actually you/we heard a lot of truth about PS4 and next Xbox, thanks to sweetvar26.

Have we? Nothing has been confirmed anywhere, so until it is it's still in the realm of rumors and speculation.

 

[V3]

I'm sure it would still be significantly faster that the PS3 if it also has a beefed up GPU. If they're only say targeting $299 a beefed up APU is probably all they can afford isn't it?

Perhaps the reason why we're not hearing about the PS4 is that people along the chain aren't liking what they're hearing and therefore dismissing them?

PS3 chips is not bad. We know Cell can run at much higher clock. There is one extra SPE that can be used. The FlexIO has some unused lanes. RSX was also run at lower clock, had some pixel pipelines disable and memory bus and ROP cut to half. If they unlock all that and put it in more and faster RAM for a casual PS4, it would still be a decent system for $299.

The A10 retails at around $120+ ? It's pretty big at 246mm2 at 32nm. Even if they managed to beef it up with more compute units, it would still be pretty big at 28nm. And I don't know what they're going to do with memory bandwidth. AFAIK A10 has like around half the memory bandwidth of PS3. Without that discrete GPU in PS4, they will have memory bandwidth problem.

And like ERP mentioned most of the interesting algo are bandwidth limited.

They talk about stacked memory and interposer but that will push the price way up, forget $299 break even point at launch, if you're using that sort of cutting edge tech. And that's before shortage problem.

 

[arijoytunir]

At which manufacturing process should a Cape Verde needs to be produced to run at 2 ghz speed as it runs at 1 ghz on 28nm process ? Or can it be clocked to 1.6 ghz which gives about 2 TF of performance !

 

[Proelite]

Have we? Nothing has been confirmed anywhere, so until it is it's still in the realm of rumors and speculation.

Sweetvar26 stuff is not rumor / speculation. Unless you think AMD / Sony would go through the trouble of deleting rumors / speculation from Neogaf and Google Cache.

The only other source that's completely grounded in truth is the pastebin article back from 2011, the first to mention Durango and Orbis as code names.

 

[MrFox]

They talk about stacked memory and interposer but that will push the price way up, forget $299 break even point at launch, if you're using that sort of cutting edge tech. And that's before shortage problem.

I haven't found much info about it, I imagine pricing could be an issue for the interposer (in the short term), but not the memory itself. Stacked memory is produced on the same process and using the same memory cells as mainstream dram. There's no reason to expect a shortage. After all, the Vita had a 1Gb of stacked memory from Samsung, and the price of the entire SoC was estimated at $16.

 

[Squilliam]

PS3 chips is not bad. We know Cell can run at much higher clock. There is one extra SPE that can be used. The FlexIO has some unused lanes. RSX was also run at lower clock, had some pixel pipelines disable and memory bus and ROP cut to half. If they unlock all that and put it in more and faster RAM for a casual PS4, it would still be a decent system for $299.

That would be crazy. Absolutely noone would buy a $299 PS4 which is just a respun PS3 unless they pulled a Wii out of their hats.

The A10 retails at around $120+ ? It's pretty big at 246mm2 at 32nm. Even if they managed to beef it up with more compute units, it would still be pretty big at 28nm. And I don't know what they're going to do with memory bandwidth. AFAIK A10 has like around half the memory bandwidth of PS3. Without that discrete GPU in PS4, they will have memory bandwidth problem.

And like ERP mentioned most of the interesting algo are bandwidth limited.

They talk about stacked memory and interposer but that will push the price way up, forget $299 break even point at launch, if you're using that sort of cutting edge tech. And that's before shortage problem.

I don't think they'll get a quote from Newegg for their PC components. When you make an order for 50M+ chips you do get the opportunity to cut a deal. Given the fact it would be a custom part they would also have the opportunity to make the necessary adjustments to the memory bus for the console. It wouldn't be too bad having a single chip + interposer and memory and it would certainly be doable at $299 with a small loss to start with as the technology grows to maturity.

 

[Albofighter]

I think Sony should just release in 2014 in order to provide a high end console that's cost effective, thus competing with microsoft. In 2014, nividia Maxwell GPUs will release which is supposed to be a great improvement I believe, and AMD will release the volcanic islands to compete. If Sony could get that GPu in plus a better CPU and stacked memory, I'm sure they could compete with MS' strong console without investing the same amount of money. It would probably delay them 6+ months but I think the benefits outweigh the small loss in market share.

The current rumours worry me. If I want a casual console then the wii U is the perfect choice. Maybe things have been quiet on Sony's end because they are re-evaluating a few things.

 

[V3]

I haven't found much info about it, I imagine pricing could be an issue for the interposer (in the short term), but not the memory itself. Stacked memory is produced on the same process and using the same memory cells as mainstream dram. There's no reason to expect a shortage. After all, the Vita had a 1Gb of stacked memory from Samsung, and the price of the entire SoC was estimated at $16.

I don't think Vita uses the Wide I/O variety. I think Vita's bus width is only 64 bit or 128 bit? The one that can give 200GB/s bandwidth in PS4 will be wider and most likely more expensive due to availability alone.

That would be crazy. Absolutely noone would buy a $299 PS4 which is just a respun PS3 unless they pulled a Wii out of their hats.

But that's exactly what they need to do, even with just beef up A10 in the PS4. They need to pull something like Wii. Even Nintendo doesn't seem to be able to pull it off with Wii U, you and me will agree that Sony has almost no chance what so ever doing that.

I don't think they'll get a quote from Newegg for their PC components. When you make an order for 50M+ chips you do get the opportunity to cut a deal. Given the fact it would be a custom part they would also have the opportunity to make the necessary adjustments to the memory bus for the console. It wouldn't be too bad having a single chip + interposer and memory and it would certainly be doable at $299 with a small loss to start with as the technology grows to maturity.

That price is from AMD, $122 for 1000 unit. Even at 50 mil, it should be around that price, not much cheaper. Newegg sell A10 at $130 it seems. An $8.00 markup.

I reckon the modified A10 or Fusion processor in PS4 is most likely going to be on an interposer, CPU, GPU and RAM are going to be on their seperate die and connected together on the interposer acting like a single chip like A10 or other AMD Fusion processor. It won't be on a single die like the A10 on PC.

The rumoured number of compute units to be in PS4 is just too big for a CPU+GPU on a single die. But if they really switch to Jaguar cores, that might still be a possibility. The original rumour also put the memory at 2 GB, which is the sort of amount that this sort of tech allows while keeping price reasonable.

Increasing memory bandwidth is not a trivial task. I still think Sony should just use off the shelf components like an FX-4300 and HD7970 in PS4 as main component and sells PS4 at $699 at launch. Like how Sega do this with their arcade cabinet now days. This way they can make PS4 at anytime, instead of waiting for Wide I/O stacked memory and high integration Fusion processor. There is just very little money to be made in exotic hardware. The money is all in the software.

 

[MrFox]

I don't think Vita uses the Wide I/O variety.

It does. Vita is probably the first consumer product to have a wide-IO memory (earlier I thought it was 512bit wide, but according the the article it's more likely 1024bit).
http://www.i-micronews.com/news/Sony-wide-IO-memory-Playstation-Vita,9334.html

EDIT: No it's 512bit after all, wideIO specs are 44x6 per 128bit.

 

[Squilliam]

But that's exactly what they need to do, even with just beef up A10 in the PS4. They need to pull something like Wii. Even Nintendo doesn't seem to be able to pull it off with Wii U, you and me will agree that Sony has almost no chance what so ever doing that.

That price is from AMD, $122 for 1000 unit. Even at 50 mil, it should be around that price, not much cheaper. Newegg sell A10 at $130 it seems. An $8.00 markup.

I really doubt that they would pay retail for their chips. AMD probably cut something like a cost + royalty deal with Sony given the fact that any chips sold on top of their existing business are effectively bonus revenue.

In the history of consoles only the Wii and the NES have 'done a Wii'. You can't just pull a Wii out of a hat when you need to boost sales because it takes a lot of good innovative ideas AND a lot of luck by being in the right place at the right time.

Increasing memory bandwidth is not a trivial task. I still think Sony should just use off the shelf components like an FX-4300 and HD7970 in PS4 as main component and sells PS4 at $699 at launch. Like how Sega do this with their arcade cabinet now days. This way they can make PS4 at anytime, instead of waiting for Wide I/O stacked memory and high integration Fusion processor. There is just very little money to be made in exotic hardware. The money is all in the software.

Memory is the most important subsystem in the consoles because it is the weakest link in your typical computer. It isn't your number or type of ALUs which are important it is how much and how fast you can feed them which dictates what you can do with them. So whilst it would be nice to use a ridiculous 300W console with off the shelf parts it probably wouldn't be justifiable for the majority of people so that leaves us to do the best we can with what we have and doing something exotic with the memory architecture is how we can do it, in true console fashion.

 

[Shifty Geezer]

Sony business talk moved here.

 

[JardeL]

Have we? Nothing has been confirmed anywhere, so until it is it's still in the realm of rumors and speculation.

Yep, we have. I bet you won't be surprised when MS/Sony announce the official specs.

 

[Nesh]

Sony business talk moved here.

One of my posts got disappeared in the process

 

[DoctorFouad]

what are the odds now for a little SSD (64 Gb) inside nextgen consoles working as a cache to help streaming and also install firmware updates and maybe some games, allowing also to sell consoles without HDD ?
if a 64 Gb ssd costs 40$, isnt it better for sony/microsoft to include instead a 500 Gb HDD for the same cost ? or maybe a less expensive 32 Mb flash memory at 15$ is a better solution a la wiiu ? but couldd this 32 Gb be as fast and efficient for streaming games assets as a classical SSD ?

are developers asking for SSDs for nextgen consoles ? does anyone here knows if deelopers would prefer small SSDs for nextgen consoles without HDD instead of a standard big HDD without SSD ?

some numbers : an SSD could read/write data at 300-500 Mb/s, a fast HDD would do that at 60-100 Mb/s, is 100Mb/s sufficient for streaming gaming assets from blu ray to HDD to RAM, or do developers need a higher bandwidth ?

 

[almighty]

what are the odds now for a little SSD (64 Gb) inside nextgen consoles working as a cache to help streaming and also install firmware updates and maybe some games, allowing also to sell consoles without HDD ?
if a 64 Gb ssd costs 40$, isnt it better for sony/microsoft to include instead a 500 Gb HDD for the same cost ? or maybe a less expensive 32 Mb flash memory at 15$ is a better solution a la wiiu ? but couldd this 32 Gb be as fast and efficient for streaming games assets as a classical SSD ?

are developers asking for SSDs for nextgen consoles ? does anyone here knows if deelopers would prefer small SSDs for nextgen consoles without HDD instead of a standard big HDD without SSD ?

some numbers : an SSD could read/write data at 300-500 Mb/s, a fast HDD would do that at 60-100 Mb/s, is 100Mb/s sufficient for streaming gaming assets from blu ray to HDD to RAM, or do developers need a higher bandwidth ?

A 500Gb mechanical drive would be better, more storage to rip the whole game to the HDD if needed which would be much better for streaming.

SSD's are overrated.

 

[anexanhume]

It does. Vita is probably the first consumer product to have a wide-IO memory (earlier I thought it was 512bit wide, but according the the article it's more likely 1024bit).
http://www.i-micronews.com/news/Sony-wide-IO-memory-Playstation-Vita,9334.html

It has 1080 pads so I'd hope it's 1024 bits. Makes me think Sony will do the same if they can handle the heat on the RAM. Then they can use cheap RAM.