PS4 Pro Speculation (PS4K NEO Kaio-Ken-Kutaragi-Kaz Neo-san)

Ha! I paid good money for that mofo, around $700 maybe. It was freakishly expensive.

 

Well, unless something has really changed, I haven't seen any circumstantial evidence of clock increases since the developer leak for Neo. From all understandings that I have so far, the wishful thinking seems to be around the fact that Neo dimensions are larger and heavier than expected; compared to what I'm unsure. Somehow this leaked information is driving the idea of higher clocks relating to more cooling. Just want to point out something who feels this way: 853Mhz is not a rounded number. Just like how 911Mhz is not either; on the contrary they're quite specific. XBO has a overly massive cooler, and they haven't moved clock speeds since launch. Yes it's true Slim moved it up, but it was for the inclusion of HDR. I think it's justified in that way.

Which I believe myself, and I don't think you'd get a lot of disagreement; that the comment you've written is really: Scorpio isn't a threat to Sony, but a higher clock speed is a nice to have. And I think we've discussed this a bit here and there, but if you are Sony loyal with a huge PS4 library, you aren't going to dump everything and go to Xbox because it's got more horsepower. And the idea of moving your library along is so strong of a locking mechanism it's hard to believe that Scorpio would have that big of an impact to Sony when you consider their substantial lead with PS4. So why juice up the Neo just because Scorpio is around? Likewise on this thought process I can get into why MS announced Scorpio so far in advance further below.

And that's all that's really for debate here, it's just a nice to have. A well priced Neo, with good characteristics (which includes low thermal footprint, low TDP, 4K HDR output etc, and high performance for a good price) is probably the ideal piece of hardware for everyone. Once you start bringing the concept of tuning it higher and higher, it's going to start losing a lot of these characteristics, price point as well.

I'm not going to pretend i understand the strategy of Neo and Scorpio, they are both new devices in their respective launches, but this is my thought process behind them.

a) tap into the customer mentality that people always like the freshest and best hardware
b) by doing this you keep your customers locked into the hardware ecosystem, and continue to lock customers into services and software (where the profit is)
c) by releasing these mid generation devices, we have yet another opportunity of capturing loyalists of competing platforms. Xbox Owners that always wanted to try PS4 can now get a Neo and play with their PS4 friends and vice versa for PS4 and Scorpio.

if these are the main goals for Sony, it would make sense why MS would announce a 6 TF Scorpio well before they are even ready to lock down hardware spec; the last thing MS wants are for Xbox Owners to pick up a Neo and continue their library there and playing with their PS4 friends. That's a major threat to MS. So what better way to stop that behaviour than to announce a carry on library and accessories on a even more powerful Xbox Console on the largest stage of gaming news. Seems to me like a fear reaction on MS, it also put Sony in a weird position they didn't expect to be in, at least from an announcement perspective. But I don't see that as a need for Sony to react.

They are indeed ahead on delivering the hardware, and they should be on price. Never discount what a good piece of hardware can do. People need to get around the whole horsepower mentality. It's not everything consoles are about.

And if for some reason Neo does turn out to be 5.5 TF. Well then I guess we need to stop saying that power isn't everything Mantra. haha because perhaps it is.

 

One guy on IGN who is a developer with MS (for sure) (spitfiresix) is pretty insistent that when Scorpio launches it will be the same price or very nearly the same price as Neo's launch price when it launches earlier than Scorpio. He is expecting the price drop on wafers from fabs improvements on yields on the 14nm process.

And since this generation is so longtooth with forwards and backwards compatiblity policy, once one platform (Xbox for instance) captures a customer they may become customers for a decade on, on these forward compatible consoles (X1 & Scorpio & someday Scorpio2). Perhaps MS is intelligently eating some of the costs to compete with Neo and in the long run gain back some marketshare by having a peformance advantage to PS4Neo at nearly the same price . And its potentially worth it with possibly +10yrs of up to ~50% attachrate for Xbox Gold Subscriptions. Plus 3rd party royalties, plus 3rd party digital distribution cut (30%), plus 1st party sales, plus 3rd party accessory royalties.

MS may also need to do this from a defensive standpoint. With Sony having the money to fund a very strong lineup of 1st party titles and be at the cusp where the majority of 3rd party devs have a financial incentive to PS4 as their lead platform, and with far more people (and their social network of friend on PS4/PS-PLUS its coming to the point where Sony is gaining so much momentum and gravity that all these advantages gravitate to PS4, putting Playstation platform at an advantage in many ways compared to Xbox platform. The gravity may become so strong it starts to stunt Xbox future customer growth, and you may start even seeing even Xbox1 customers eventually gravitate away towards Playstation platform.

 

The best thing Sony could do is announce a delay in the launch of the NEO so they can use a VEGA chip.

The second best thing they can do is overclock the heck out of the GPU and CPU.

A 4.2TFlop GPU and a barely overclocked CPU with no RAM upgrade is a joke.

Although I hate it, the whole purpose of the NEO is to make 4K and VR viable. To do so and allow for any significant graphical improvement, a bigger jump is needed. Microsoft seems to understand this.

 

Fully agree.It seems a waste of resources, in addition loss of consumers who believed proposed in "five years lifetime" and with "ps4k/Neo Hype" provided ammunition for Microsoft gain market with sufficient timing to catch die powerful enough to offer any graphics level 4k (not upscaled,checkboard etc).

 

They must be expecting a lot from VR to push this out for VR support.

 

Completely disagree, Sony just need to release it.
They are winning this gen quite comfortably, the Scorpio being faster isn't going to suddenly sway people to start picking up Xbox consoles en masse.
The Neo and even the Scorpio are just a stop-gap solutions, the real 4KVR console will be the PS5, of which Sony need to release in 2019; Now THAT needs to be a beast.

 

exactly, ppl still don't get system power don't win console wars, timing, marketing, exclusive price do. Ps1 & 2 were they perfect example. Xbox 1 was miles ahead of ps2 . Sony only goal is to release the box asap and price it right.

 

over 2x the gfx power is not a joke - many PC gamers will upgrade their cards for less.

What loss of 5 year lifetime? PS4 will still be 100% supported - Neo will have no exclusives...this is just an option for those who want it

This, even if (for some reason) Scorpio 'kills it' and people start flocking to that machine - Sony can just announce a 10-12TF "true 4K console" PS5 early in 2018 'due next year'.

 

A man throwing quotes around will be able to link to where Sony promised this.

 

Thanks, that is reasonable and indeed pretty much excludes Neo using "wider" Jaguar config.

Agree. My take on Sony's strategy is that they aim on having *always* an up-to-date console at price-conscious level, i.e. something mid-level in terms of performance (at the moment of release) so that it plays current games with adequate performance and without many compromises, so we can for example expect in 2017-18 Neo playing games at 1080p/30fps (+better AA, AF, FX), but regular PS4 would likely go down to 900p/30fps. Then in 3-4 years they'll release PS5 and Neo will take place or current regular PS4 in terms of delivering "inferior", but still acceptable performance. And so on. Actually, Microsoft's strategy seems to be similar as well, but to their benefit - because of Win10 - they can include PC-s in Xbox family of devices, so their idea is for people to join Xbox ecosystem - if they want & can afford it through the PCs, if they don't care about cutting edge performance then through Xbox console(s). Considering expected release time-frame of both Neo and Scorpio, they both represent the mid-level performance systems of late 2016 / late 2017 respectively, but I guess Sony's approach is "better" because a) it's sooner, so it can build larger user-base, b) the gulf in performance between OG PS4 and Neo will be much smaller than between Scorpio and XboxOne.

My only concern is really how will Sony cope with facilitating software development for such ecosystem - it has always been said that MS is a "software company" so there's no denying their skills in abstracting API-s, virtualisation, etc. In the end it will be the same Xbox game, whether it's played on high-end PC, on Scorpio or on XboxOne and the only differentiating factor will be resolution + other settings. For Sony though, this is uncharted (no pun intended) territory.

BTW, I'm of the opinion that Sony should consider naming their consoles not PS4 Neo or PS4k, but:
PS4
PS4+
PS5
PS5+
...

or better yet:

Playstation
Playstation+
...

 

Sony need to release the Neo this year even if it's the originally noted 4.2tf version. By doing this, Sony are in a win-win situation with Playstation. The PS4 Slim will no doubt come in between $249-$299 so will continue to sell very well compared to the Xbox One S. The Neo, assuming it comes in between $399-$449 will provide a premium console gaming experience which is significantly higher than anything we currently have; that is until the Scorpio comes out. The Neo will have had a solif 12 months on the market and will no doubt have seen a decent number in sales. The PS4 now in Slim format will continue to rack up big sales while the Xbox One sales will gradually decrease the closer we get to the release of the Scorpio. Expect to see huge trade-in number from Xbox One to Scorpio when it's released.

Now the Scorpio is expected to come out anywhere between $399-$599 and if the specs are top drawer like they are claiming, then it will more than likely be closer to $499 than $399, which means it will be the most expensive console on the market at that point (unless the NX is expensive LOL). Sony can and probably will give the PS4 & Neo pricecuts right before the Scorpio releases as well, so don't be surprised if we see a $199-$249 PS4 and $349-$399 Neo in October 2017. Coupled with a huge market-share and no doubt exclusives (timed or not), we could see it being a hard start for MS with the Scorpio.

All in all, I agree with the power issues. The Neo doesn't need to be 5.5-5.8Tf, there is not a problem leaving it at the 4.2Tf level, maybe upping the CPU speed would help, but don't forget that the Neo is essentially a souped up PS4, a PS4 with extra grunt and not an entirely new console. What it will do if prolong the lifespan of the PS4 if nothing else.

Remember the PS4 released in November 2013. I fully expect the PS4 (inclusive) to be fully suported right up to 2019 and beyond, this is when I expect the PS4 to be released...in late 2019. By that point it will have been on the market for 6 years and will no doubt get another 1-2 years of support.

Also as an end note, the new PS4 Slim will just be the PS4 and the Neo will very possibly be called the PS4 Ultra.

 

PS Ultra 64

 

I'll be really happy if Sony releases the Neo sooner rather than later and doesn't jump to the next generation so quickly like MS is doing. I'm typically an early adopter but expect my console to last longer than this and I'm happy enough with games improving via better programming throughout the console's life.

 

Both ps4 and one will continue to get games, scorpio will launch a year later, and is microsoft to jump to next generatio quickly?

 

Neo 400 dollars? Whaaaaaat https://m.reddit.com/r/PS4/comments/50fqyv/wsj_jefferies_atul_goyal_says_ps4_neo_at_399_and/

 

Why's that surprising?

 

I think it makes perfect sense. The slim at $299 is more of a shock. I suppose Sony feels like they have a free pass to sell until Scorpio is released. Pad the price now, make lots of money and drop the price to complete with the next generation.

 

I was expecting £199 for the slim.