New PS4 Specs Leak Based on January's Development Kit

[exfileme]

The PlayStation 4 spec list has been refreshed thanks to Orbis documentation and the development kit.

New PS4 Specs Leak Based on January's Development Kit : Read more

 

[cptnjarhead]

interesting, sony's previous consoles had custom (exotic ) hardware.
Seems rather off the shelf for sony.
we will see.
: on the plus side, hope we will see more natively multi-threaded (console ported) games for PC.

 

[antilycus]

If those are truly the specs that gamers and developers have to look forward to, this isn't very next gen at all. I would expect OUYA and PC Gaming to take off. I think it's becoming apparent that 500 USD consoles w/ games that are clones of other games just isn't worth it. 100 bucks for OUYA and about 500 for an AMD A10 or ~600 for AMD FX 8150 w/ 16 GB of ram. I dont see the developers really changing anything and I think the Next iterations of Open GL and DX are going to more important than the specs. The current system is about to change massively, thanks to tablet gaming, cheap hardware (OUYA) and dedicated PC Gamers.

 

[Guest]

AMD 8 core! sorry intel...

 

[LukeCWM]

I'm glad AMD got the bid. They need the boost! But it's unfortunate that it's Bulldozer they landed with. Well, unfortunate for console gamers. Maybe it will shift more people towards PC gaming, but but I doubt it will affect many. Most console gamers I know don't care about visual detail or smoothness or high frame rate; they just want to shoot stuff.

 

[neon neophyte]

this is a real boon for octo loving amd fans. this next generation of games should be designed to play quite nicely with their cpus (and gpus.)

 

[aicom]

[citation][nom]LukeCWM[/nom]I'm glad AMD got the bid. They need the boost! But it's unfortunate that it's Bulldozer they landed with. Well, unfortunate for console gamers. Maybe it will shift more people towards PC gaming, but but I doubt it will affect many. Most console gamers I know don't care about visual detail or smoothness or high frame rate; they just want to shoot stuff.[/citation]
Actually, choosing Bulldozer is a godsend for PC gaming. This means that in order to perform well on low-clocked, poor-IPC CPUs, they will have to multithread extensively. This means that games built for the new console may finally see some benefit from HT on the Core i7s, not to mention perform quite will on Piledriver and its successors.

 

[Evolution2001]

(hoping this doesn't double-post...if so, "sorry" in advance)

I'm not really a fan of PC-like hardware making up the consoles. What this leads to for cross-platform gaming is that the game gets developed on the console hardware first because it's a quicker dev/release cycle and more profitable since console gamers aren't likely to pirate their games, and then we PC gamers get the craptastic ported version with lower res graphics & lousy controls.

 

[CaedenV]

The CPU is listed as 4x dual-core AMD64 "Bulldozer": Don't believe it, 4-6 cores in total (2-3 bulldozer units)
GPU is listed as an AMD R10xx: probably right as the GPU is the single most important part to get right in a dev kit
160 GB HDD: Absolutely, and I would not be suprised to see much larger drives, as well as an SSD option down the road
Blu-ray drive: maybe, maybe not. I know there was talk of 'download only' for games, but if they want it to be a multimedia center then it needs a blu-ray player.
four USB 3.0 ports: possible, more likely to see some cost cutting with 4 USB2 for controllers, and 2 USB3 for external HDD option (my origonal thought was they would have a small SSD for the OS and user files, and then force users to get an external USB3 drive to store games)
two Ethernet ports: Why would they do this on the final build? One gigabit port is already 1 more than what will be used by most users. Give it an ethernet and wireless N, and call it a day.
HDMI and optical output: Absolutely will happen, likely firmware upgradeable HDMI to support future 4K and Ethernet over HDMI technologies.
2.0, 5.1 and 7.1 audio channels: Absolutely will happen. Audio is cheap and easy tech to integrate, and the PS3 already has this, so why would they take a step backwards?

"The PlayStation 4 will also supposedly offer multi-user simultaneous logins, meaning the console will allow more than one person to be logged into the same system at the same time. This is done by linking controllers to user accounts, thus when a second player activates a controller, he/she will be asked to log into their account."
The problem with this is that I would then be expected to carry my controller to my friend's house, or expect people to be able to tell each of their identical black playstation controllers apart... I like the general idea behind it as it allows for trophy tracking when you are away, but it also may allow developers to say "you cannot play as the 2nd player on this game until you pay a $5 log-in fee, or purchase rights to the full game" kind of thing. That would be terrible.

 

[beppomarx]

I am not a gamer by any means, I have never in my life bought a gaming console but do play very very occasionally on my pc. But by following the market this seems like a decent setup. You're simply not going to find i7 processing power in a console to be sold in the 300 or so dollar range. Assuming they can keep thermals under control, the power draw isn't much of a concern for console gamers and depending on the actual video setup (cores, speed, architecture) it makes sense. I mean just looking at what's posted here I would assume $300 worth of hardware is being used and the fact that large mainstream developers are going to be pushed onto an 8 core CPU that means that pc ports will be easier and better handled by your 4, 6, and 8 core processors. And bringing more experience to the dev world for multi core setups seems like a great thing to me.

Just look at consoles today (ps3 Xbox360 even Wii u), they still sell and are more than adequate for their market even with 7 year old specs. The market isn't going to accept $500 base model consoles and with good programming that setup shouldn't have any problem running games at 1080p at 60fps, and mainstream televisions don't need anything more than that for a while now. Looks good to me.

 

[calmstateofmind]

Funny how these get "leaked" right after the new Xbox specs are "leaked" as well.

 

[Guest]

AMD! Game! here's to hoping it can support eyefinity and bring decent frames/second and quality.

 

[friskiest]

[citation][nom]antilycus[/nom]If those are truly the specs that gamers and developers have to look forward to, this isn't very next gen at all. I would expect OUYA and PC Gaming to take off. I think it's becoming apparent that 500 USD consoles w/ games that are clones of other games just isn't worth it. 100 bucks for OUYA and about 500 for an AMD A10 or ~600 for AMD FX 8150 w/ 16 GB of ram. I dont see the developers really changing anything and I think the Next iterations of Open GL and DX are going to more important than the specs. The current system is about to change massively, thanks to tablet gaming, cheap hardware (OUYA) and dedicated PC Gamers.[/citation]

You get what you paid for,..
$100 Ouya console:
+ Cheap price
+ Cheap games
- casual games only
- poor graphics/slider/rail shooter
- quickly becomes obsolete at the rate of development in mobile performance

$500 PS4/Xbox 720 console:
+ performance adequate for at least 5 years
+ AAA quality games with real plot and all the nice stuffs
+ games should get you occupied for weeks/months
+ physical copy of games
- price
- price of games

There's still ALOT of people who wants to play console games- not cheap $1-$5 mobile games

 

[RyQril]

well, at least PC gonna have good ports

 

[jn77]

I use my PS3 for Blu-Ray and leave the games to my PC with a real graphics card....... I will buy a PS4 for USB 3, faster CPU, GPU, I hope they leave dual ethernet on it (I would use it as a media server) and the first upgrade it will get is a 1TB HD or a 512gb SSD.

 

[gggplaya]

Good move on sony's part. Using off the shelf PC components means easier to program games, developers will especially like this because they can program for xbox and PS4 at the same time, with minimal tweaking and sell on both platforms. The downfall of PS3 sales were complaints from developers that it was too hard to program for.

Ultimately games sell the console, so having a limited choice will also limit console sales and minimize profits. It's better to sell your console at or slightly below cost and make money from the sales of games. That's continued revenue as opposed to a small one time profit.

 

[BestJinjo]

LukeCWM,

The most CPU limited titles on the PC are MMOs, RTS games and shoddy console ported 2-core mess that Bethesda games are. MMOs and RTS are not found on consoles. The most popular console games are generally very GPU limited titles.

Consider that current titles that run on PS360 do not even run at 1920x1080. Actually recent games run well below 1280x720 (Black Ops 2 880x720, Uncharted 3 well below 1024x768, Dark Souls 1024x720). Now next gen cosoles will have DX11 graphics (w/ very demanding graphical effects like tessellation, bokeh depth of field, POM, dynamic area lights, higher resolution textures, etc.) and will supposedly target 1920x1080 resolution with some AA. The minute you are talking about gaming at 1920x1080 2-4xAA in DX11 and next generation DX11 games, you are going to be GPU limited in 90% of games, if not more. People keep ripping Bulldozer/Vishera apart but consoles aren't going to have HD7970 Ghz CFX or GTX680 SLI. Most likely consoles won't even have a GPU as powerful as a GTX670.

When FX8120-8350 are paired with a GTX670 at 1920x1080 AA in non-MMO/non-RTS titles, the gaming system is almost entirely GPU limited, regardless if an AMD FX8000 series or a Core i5/i7 CPU is used:

http://pctuning.tyden.cz/hardware/graficke-karty/25994-vliv-procesoru-na-vykon-ve-hrach-od-phenomu-po-core-i7?start=16

Having an AMD FX8000 series processor is actually the 2nd best option long-term assuming MS/Sony cannot afford to fork out more $ for Intel's Core i5/i7 CPUs. Think about this, would you rather have a Bulldozer/Vishera or some underpowered crappy IBM PowerPC architecture or a tablet 8-core Jaguar CPU?

 

[ibjeepr]

[citation][nom]jn77[/nom]I use my PS3 for Blu-Ray and leave the games to my PC with a real graphics card....... I will buy a PS4 for USB 3, faster CPU, GPU, I hope they leave dual ethernet on it (I would use it as a media server) and the first upgrade it will get is a 1TB HD or a 512gb SSD.[/citation]

Ya that's pretty much where I'm at. When I bought the PS3 it was the best blu-ray player available and the same price as a dedicated blu-ray player. I game a little on it but it's really all bout the PC for me. I'll probably pick up the new PS4 just for the occational sports or fighting game and to have a new blu-ray player.

 

[dark_knight33]

[citation][nom]friskiest[/nom]You get what you paid for,..$100 Ouya console:+ Cheap price+ Cheap games- casual games only- poor graphics/slider/rail shooter- quickly becomes obsolete at the rate of development in mobile performance$500 PS4/Xbox 720 console:+ performance adequate for at least 5 years+ AAA quality games with real plot and all the nice stuffs+ games should get you occupied for weeks/months+ physical copy of games- price- price of gamesThere's still ALOT of people who wants to play console games- not cheap $1-$5 mobile games[/citation]

Ouya will do for consoles what farmville did for facebook. Social/Casual gaming just dwarfs the console market. The biggest issue cited about the PS3 is it's excessive price. When the current set of consoles came out, which one sold the best: Wii. Why is that? Cheapest. Still great games, no HD. You can get really great games on an ARM/Tegra platform, and you, like MSFT & Sony are highly underestimating it's impact on the market.

Performance is only considered "adequate" for 5 years, because developers (save Crytek) don't bother pushing the envelope any more. The mediocrity of the development community is the reason why the current consoles are lasting a decade. If developers were putting out versions of their games that actually took advantage of the larger resource pool a PC offers, it would quickly push consoles aside. PC have moved evolutions beyond consoles, and sadly because games are no longer pushing those limits, hardware development is slowing, and becoming more expensive to buy. $900 GPUs?? I remember when $300 would buy the flagship product, and that was stupid expensive. OTH, if the latest AAA titles required that kind of performance, the GPU would be cheaper and more powerful. Xbox & PS# consoles are bad for gaming progress IMO.

 

[Evolution2001]

[citation][nom]friskiest[/nom]You get what you paid for,..$100 Ouya console:+ Cheap price+ Cheap games- casual games only- poor graphics/slider/rail shooter- quickly becomes obsolete at the rate of development in mobile performance$500 PS4/Xbox 720 console:+ performance adequate for at least 5 years+ AAA quality games with real plot and all the nice stuffs+ games should get you occupied for weeks/months+ physical copy of games- price- price of gamesThere's still ALOT of people who wants to play console games- not cheap $1-$5 mobile games[/citation]
First, I overall agree with your assessment. That being said...
I don't have a dog in either fight, but... mobile apps don't have to be flashy & high tech to have replay value. I'd say the actual number of games that you'd want to replay over a span of years is about the same. A couple on each platform. Graphics-wise, I'm still impressed what tablets/phones are capable of today. Granted, their graphics are what consoles were doing 7 years ago, but looking at the platform 'as is', it's respectable. Games like Infinity Blade, some of the EA sports and racing games, Angry Birds, Minecraft...all very re-playable on mobile devices.
So now you take a platform like Ouya that is open source and add to it other open projects like WebGL, and you have very capable games like . Again, this is just proof of concept. And I certainly expect next gen consoles to play games like Samaritan without much issue. Will Ouya do that? Not likely. But with constant open source contributions, that is the appeal of the lower priced OUYA unit. Lots of development interest on a platform that can continue to be revised, unlike the more closed environment of a Sony/MS/Nintendo console. I would certainly be more likely to give a $100 console a shot over a $500 console, unless I was tied to a particular platform's title, like Halo or something that's only available on Xbox.

 

[ddpruitt]

8 Core CPU for PS4 and Xbox 720? These specs have to be wrong. This is overkill for a console, even on a dedicated Gaming PC your much better off with a 4 core. Something is off here

 

[juanc]

FINALLY! We'll be able to emulate the PS4 and XBOX 720!

THANKS Sony for putting AMD on it. It gives an extra punch to the Intel users when emulating.

 

[HenrikG]

But will it have Spotify...

 

[anxiousinfusion]

Kotaku added that there's also a headphone jack but it's unclear whether this will end up on the final product.

I imagine that users planning on using headphones would pull the audio direct from the screen or from their sound system.

 

[gggplaya]

[citation][nom]anxiousinfusion[/nom]I imagine that users planning on using headphones would pull the audio direct from the screen or from their sound system.[/citation]

I pull it from the back of the TV now, but not all tv's have analog audio output. It would be nice if it were directly on the console for late night gaming where i don't want to wake anyone up.