It's no surprise that the next generation of consoles is upon us. But when exactly, we can't say for sure. For Sony, its PlayStation 5 is not going to be retailed this year. Speaking to Wired, Sony's Mark Cerny, the lead system architect for the PS4, provided some juicy details regarding the company's much awaited console, but also noted that their "next-gen console won’t be landing in stores anytime in 2019".

Release date aside, Cerny provided more details regarding the specs of the device. As expected, the latter will boast a better CPU and GPU. More specifically, the home console will pack a CPU based on the third generation of AMD’s Ryzen line with eight cores of the company’s new 7nm Zen 2 microarchitecture, and for its GPU, a custom variant of Radeon’s Navi family, with ray tracing support will be embedded.

Cerny notes that the ray tracing technology will have more use than just improving on the visual aspect on this 8K-compatible device. “If you wanted to run tests to see if the player can hear certain audio sources or if the enemies can hear the players’ footsteps, ray tracing is useful for that,” he says. “It's all the same thing as taking a ray through the environment.”

More than just focusing on the visuals, Sony is also laying emphasis on the audio, stating that the AMD chip also packs a custom unit for 3D audio. “As a gamer,” Cerny says, “it's been a little bit of a frustration that audio did not change too much between PlayStation 3 and PlayStation 4. With the next console the dream is to show how dramatically different the audio experience can be when we apply significant amounts of hardware horsepower to it.”

Of note, the PlayStation 5 will also come with a solid state drive (SSD) which will drastically improve in-game load times. During the interview, Wired had a glimpse of this when Cerny compared fast travel in 2018's Spider-Man between a PS4 Pro and a PS5 dev-kit: it took 15 seconds on the PS4 Pro while it a mere 0.8 seconds on the PS5.

Wait, that's all cool but Spider-Man is getting a re-release on the PS5?! Not quite. According to the interview, this next-gen PlayStation will be partly based on the PS4’s architecture, and will also be backward-compatible with PS4 games. Also compatible with the PS5 will be the current PSVR headset. Moreover, the next generation of PlayStation-branded console will still support physical media instead of being a download-only device.

So what do you think of the next PlayStation so far? Which features do you wish it to support and do you think Sony will implement them?

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[Vorde]

I dont think sony will use a SSHDD hybrid drive, there are reports about reliability, my guess is a M.2 sized SSD and a usual HDD, and even going to a stretch, games be designed with critical data on one drive and everything else on the HDD, but then companies may exploit that feature... (Black ops 4 is a nighmare with HDD usage)

It would be nice if they embedded an NVMe drive with the console. With those load times they are quoting, it sounds like it.
PS5 sounds like it's going to be a decent console based on this, but hopefully this time it will have more exclusives that make me want the console. I bought a PS4 to play FF15 and that came out on PC, and the only other thing I can think of is Horizon Zero Dawn and probably some shooter games I could care less about =\

 

[tech3475]

SSDs have gotten significantly cheaper the last couple years, even a 1TB SATA SSD can be had for anywhere from $100-$150 for consumers nowadays vs the hundreds it would've cost during the PS4's release. It's not that far fetched that Sony could secure high capacity SSDs for cheap in 2019.

For 1TB though it's still 2-3 times price for an equivalent HDD. 500GB may be an option as that is around that price but it's not an ideal size.

I find it hard to believe they'll be that cheap, unless they're 'faulty' in some way (e.g. 'bad' for too many writes (compared to usual) but good for reading).

I dont think sony will use a SSHDD hybrid drive, there are reports about reliability, my guess is a M.2 sized SSD and a usual HDD, and even going to a stretch, games be designed with critical data on one drive and everything else on the HDD, but then companies may exploit that feature... (Black ops 4 is a nighmare with HDD usage)

The latter I suspect will happen in that configuration, basically treating the SSD as a cache drive and system drive similar to the Xbox/360. The downside to this will be initially slower loading time (HL2 and Halo 2 felt like they took forever from disc).

The other advantage to this configuration is that it could also work with USB drives.

Another possibility is similar to my laptop, where the user decides how to use the data between the SSD and HDD, although unlikely.

 

[Teletron1]

I read they said the unit would be priced at $499 and sold at a $100 loss suppose to be fully backwards compatible (chip is supposed to mimic older systems ps1-ps4) will also support 8k 120fps upscaling hdr vrr ray tracing 2tbhd (ssd) ds5 controller will have a built-in camera and a 2020 launch date, rumors also state this will be the last console produced by Sony .. sounds pretty nuts at 499 also pushing the 8k which according to both amd and nvidia will be the cap for resolution for the foreseeable future because its the maximum level the eye can see

hopefully it also has the bells and whistles with network capabilities can't wait to see how the psvr2 will look

 

[MiiJack]

inb4, the PS5 will probably have the same Launch price as the PS3.

 

[Zense]

"8K compatible device" hahaha fuck off, definately not intending to mislead people into thinking it's gonna run games at 8K.

Just like how PS3 and X360 were Full HD capable when most of the games ran at 720p or less.

Geez, NOW this one is going to be BWC with PS4 games? I should have held off just a bit longer and bought the PS5 instead.

For someone who has been on the fence on buying a PS4 pro, this is good news. The only deciding factor now is price. I can see them trying to pull a PS3 over again, even if BWC should make it cost slightly less (not that it did for PS3).

The only gripe I might have is that it probably will lack the screen sharing stuff the PS4 had with all its games with the PSVita, still if you wanted that then the PS4 would be a better choice.

Talking about the specs, I somewhat feel they are a bit underwhelming. Sure ray-tracing is the new thing everyone's talking about but to me it isn't much of a game changer. 4K gaming is nice and better audio is nice. I think if they wanna show that they have some new experience they can provide then maybe it will be connected to PSVR. Or maybe it truly is a PS Switch...

 

[Exaltys]

not to mention censorship still going to impact games under a certain degree

I hope to see things improve on this front but I doubt it. I only got a PS4 a while down the line. I think PS5 will be the same or not at all. Most games come out on PC too anyhow and even more Japanese devs are bringing titles to PC nowadays that probably would have been console exclusive years ago (ex. FF15, DQ11, Sekiro, DMC5, Monster Hunter World, etc.)

 

[leon315]

NO THANKS, i'm pc gamer now. PC mustard race is year ahead of any consoles on the markets.

 

[smf]

If they share information about it right now, this could only mean that the development kit has been released to other companies and developers,

That doesn't particularly tell you much, they could put dev kits out and then make a decision in a year that they should wait another six months for faster cpu & gpu chips to become available if the games aren't panning out as well as they hoped.

It's much easier to do now they are using commodity hardware.

 

[the_randomizer]

Don't SSD's have a smaller/finite number of times it can be written and read compared to mechanical HDDs? Good luck with that.

 

[Sonic Angel Knight]

I hope to see things improve on this front but I doubt it. I only got a PS4 a while down the line. I think PS5 will be the same or not at all. Most games come out on PC too anyhow and even more Japanese devs are bringing titles to PC nowadays that probably would have been console exclusive years ago (ex. FF15, DQ11, Sekiro, DMC5, Monster Hunter World, etc.)

As much as I see pc as a asset for "Console gaming" it still has problems that I don't like honestly. DRM for starters, needing multiple sources of digital store clients to play "store exclusive" games like Destiny 2, Titanfall, or recent borderlands 3. (which isn't even on steam) The biggest one for me is the fact that some pc games require different hardware to play and huge file size of data to install, and then on top of that, if some kind of DRM causes problems that devs don't try to fix, or basically that most people report problems because of "This game was tested only on this system, get these specs, optimizations, etc."

Plenty of times where people complained about some games not working on their system. I figure it's hard to make a game compatible for everyone's pc, or even troubleshoot problems with it. Consoles are a one and done deal. You buy them and more often than pc games, will have less problems that developers can fix because they don't need to accommodate for different system hardware. It's the same system everyone has, so it makes sense. Not to mention the retail games also means that you can trade or sell games unlike digital which can also die sometime in the future. (R.I.P Nintendo wii shop channel)

 

[Techjunky90]

Everyone talking about backwards compatibility. PS5 will be backwards compatible with PS4 games because a PS5 is just an upgraded PS4. PS5 should be able to emulate PS1 & PS2. PS5 will not be powerful enough to emulate PS3 which means really the only way to make it work would be for PS5 to have the PS3 chipset on board

 

[Stwert]

8K with Ray Tracing? Really?

Considering how computationally difficult and expensive getting just 4K and Ray Tracing is right now, colour me skeptical.

I’ve a feeling 8K checker-boarding is going to the order of the day. Unless of course the PS5 is going to be ridiculously expensive.

I’m adopting a cautious, wait and see approach with this. But hell, I’ll be happy if they manage true 4K @ 60fps with, or without, Ray Tracing.

 

[Tom Bombadildo]

For 1TB though it's still 2-3 times price for an equivalent HDD. 500GB may be an option as that is around that price but it's not an ideal size.

I find it hard to believe they'll be that cheap, unless they're 'faulty' in some way (e.g. 'bad' for too many writes (compared to usual) but good for reading).

That's just consumer pricing. Sony's obviously not actually going to spend $100-$150 per SSD, they'll partner with some flash chip manufacturer and buy in bulk and get them for peanuts. Sure it'll still be more expensive than HDDs, but it's not going to be a major price concern for Sony.

 

[the_randomizer]

That's just consumer pricing. Sony's obviously not actually going to spend $100-$150 per SSD, they'll partner with some flash chip manufacturer and buy in bulk and get them for peanuts. Sure it'll still be more expensive than HDDs, but it's not going to be a major price concern for Sony.

Shouldn't they be more worried about the finite read/writes of SSD vs HDD? Especially considering games will write a lot?

 

[Tom Bombadildo]

Shouldn't they be more worried about the finite read/writes of SSD vs HDD? Especially considering games will write a lot?

Modern SSDs max write cycles are incredibly high, you'll never hit the maximum life of an SSD unless all you're doing is writing to it 24/7 for a couple years.

The average write cycle for a 1TB SSD is something like 800+TB, which will never be hit in a console's life span. And that's just the manufacturer's estimate, most will probably last well above that no problem.

 

[Deleted_413010]

Still can't get backwards compatibility for ps3-ps2-ps1?

I hope it can least play audio cd and install music to the system.

All that sounds nice and all but still, if the games aren't fun, then it's worthless by itself, not to mention censorship still going to impact games under a certain degree.

There's no confirmation on backwards compatibility for the PS5. However if it doesn't have compatibility with PS4 games and maybe even PS3 games then the PS5 will be a disaster just waiting to be killed off.

 

[chrisrlink]

I can only imagine the security on the ps5

 

[Tom Bombadildo]

There's no confirmation on backwards compatibility for the PS5. However if it doesn't have compatibility with PS4 games and maybe even PS3 games then the PS5 will be a disaster just waiting to be killed off.

Wait, that's all cool but Spider-Man is getting a re-release on the PS5?! Not quite. According to the interview, this next-gen PlayStation will be partly based on the PS4’s architecture, and will also be backward-compatible with PS4 games. Also compatible with the PS5 will be the current PSVR headset. Moreover, the next generation of PlayStation-branded console will still support physical media instead of being a download-only device.

It will, at the very least, be BC with PS4 games according to the interview.

 

[huma_dawii]

Awesome, good thing I didn't buy a PS4 this gen, I will buy PS5 and have all the PS4 games for cheap!

 

[Techjunky90]

There's no confirmation on backwards compatibility for the PS5. However if it doesn't have compatibility with PS4 games and maybe even PS3 games then the PS5 will be a disaster just waiting to be killed off.

Ps5 has to have backwards compatibility with ps4 games, there is no way around it. Ps5 is basically just an upgraded ps4. Same architecture. There has been no technology advancement in storage medium since the ps4, which means ps5 will use bluray just like the ps4. Ps5 will not have the power to emulate ps3, which means the only way the ps5 will play ps3 games is if Sony puts the ps3 chipset on board, which I suspect is the real reason the ps5 will launch at a higher price than ps4.