With the current consoles being basically a PC it seems Sony went one step further and delivered us one of the first true console upgrades we have seen in many years. It claims backwards compatibility will be a thing but it remains to be seen whether we will see "we highly suggest the PS4k" in the future. No release date but game developers are seemingly required to support it by October and have patches for games released before then.

There have been all sorts of rumours and speculation happening for months now but it is being widely reported now as more concrete information has come to light via Giantbomb.
It is claimed so called 4k output is supported, though games themselves will not be required to do so. Unknown framerate/frequency but it would be surprising to not see some flavour of 60Hz, especially as Sony is requiring game performance to match or beat the present PS4 model. Alas the VR/headset gaming stuff Sony is working on seems to be a bit absent from the documents obtained, give or take mention of a breakout box, so possibly not 120Hz out of the box. The specs the furryteeth care about see rather more modest increases (still 8 cores but with a jump from 1.6Ghz to 2.1Ghz, slightly faster memory and more "compute units/CUs" which is somewhat analogous to the older concept of shader cores in the graphics cards) and other than a bigger memory allocation/"budget" for games it does not represent a change in the core underlying architecture. Unlike upgrading your PC though you will apparently not see improvements beyond any firmware driven upscaling and such unless the devs release a patch.
Whether we will see the return of 4 player split screen co-op now everybody can have their own 1080p space is also unknown, we can but hope. Apparently online games of a competitive nature are being considered in this with a kind of online mode being required so we hopefully will not see the FOV and increased clarity set appear in consoles.

Official word from Sony is not a lot right now but there are many conferences coming up so we might hear more from one of those. No price has been mentioned but apparently the previous leaks reckon $400 USD (£280, 350 Euros, 43000 yen, $520 Australian, 3250 Sek or 267 Guineas, though users of any of those currencies are probably wary of directly converting like that).

We have not really seen true console upgrades since the days of the Amiga, give or take things like the N64 expansion pack which is hardly in the same league as this. What do you think about all this and what do you hope this leads to?

Thanks to Foxi4 for the sources.

 

[kumikochan]

i love the picture you posted LOL , it is sad to see Sony taking the direction of Microsoft.

i own the ps4, and it feels almost as a PC to me, needing to extract the content of every game is kind of a hassle.
the console itself is fantastic, but i do not like to think they are already making a new console after roughly 3 years of the ps4's release..? or is it more than 3.

even if 4, it would be too early, but i think maybe it is a ps4k player , if it gets exclusive games like (with the n3ds which has only 1-2 exclusives) well.. then there might be some people going mad over it.

but overall i am not really mad over it or anything, but i do think it is way too early for a next gen Sony console, so i do hope that the extra features of the so called ps4.5 are minimal compared to the current ps4.

How so is Sony taking the same decision as Microsoft. I don't see Microsoft releasing an upgrade, phil spencer just spoke out a month ago it would be a stupid mistake for them to do so. So what you're saying doesn't make sense at all.

 

[MetroidOtherS]

The rumors state it wont be able to render games in 4k but only upscale them as it is impossible for a system with the form factor of a ps4 to render a game in 4k, (pretty obvious) but its said to have features akin to the new 3ds where games will have a boost in fidelity on the ps4.5 but still be able to run on the original ps4. So yeah no 1080p four player split screen.
That said if i ever get a 4k tv in the future ill prob pick up a ps4.5

 

[chartube12]

I wouldn't be surprised if the 4.5 has a SoC of the ps1/2 and psp/vita inside. Making it able to play the entire Playstation library minus the ps3's.

Hell maybe the 4.5 will be similar to a micro PC tower and have a slot for a ps3 card. The card sold separately for like 100 would have the ps3's cell processor.

 

[gamesquest1]

i will just wait another year for the ps4c becuase i like cheap colourful plastic shells, i wonder how long before they start saying "oh well regular PS4 users only get multiplayer mode, you need the PS4+ to get the full game" RIP console generations i think from this points its going to be more of a smear of gradual updates like the iphones

 

[RaMon90]

What about the old ps4? I bought it some months ago, 399 euro wasted? If its true about this new ps4 then i will only buy if they get the old one for 299 euro

 

[Tom Bombadildo]

As long as I can trade in my current PS4 to take a significant chunk out of the price, I'm game. And it has to keep supporting faceplates so I can keep my Bloodborne bae one

 

[p1ngpong]

I have been deliberately avoiding adopting anything in 4k just because it seems that it is a temporary standard that could easily be defunct at any time. There doesn't seem to be a consensus regarding what ultra HD standard people will stick with, we have been hearing about 5k, 6, and 8k stuff already. Maybe this will nail down 4k as a standard for the foreseeable future if enough people adopt but this is a seriously risky move considering the PS4 has a solid and huge userbase already. We will get the promises that this will not replace the original PS4 but you just know at some point we will have "PS Neo" only titles and I am betting it will be sooner than later considering the consoles are already having a hard time even doing full 1080p 60fps on a lot of games. It would be ironic but I can really see a point where Sonys "4K" PS4 might actually have a best use as just a true 1080p machine rather than a 4K one.

 

[mightymuffy]

How so is Sony taking the same decision as Microsoft. I don't see Microsoft releasing an upgrade, phil spencer just spoke out a month ago it would be a stupid mistake for them to do so. So what you're saying doesn't make sense at all.

He was the first to talk about console upgrading actually, with his 'in thing' being he wants 'forward compatibility.' Sony then first talked about 'PS4.5/4K' about a week later, reception was mixed, and Phil Spencer made that comment, as if to say we'd taken his earlier comments out of context. In other words he did a Sony, on Sony! Probably gonna smack him in the face now the rumours have more weight (and reception isn't quite as pessimistic). Either way I'd put a tenner on MS planning exactly the same thing..

 

[dubbz82]

I wouldn't be surprised if the 4.5 has a SoC of the ps1/2 and psp/vita inside. Making it able to play the entire Playstation library minus the ps3's

Why though? Software based emulation is certainly possible for PSP and ps1...ps2 as well, if they sank a little bit of time into optimizing

 

[Deleted member 370671]

Why though? Software based emulation is certainly possible for PSP and ps1...ps2 as well, if they sank a little bit of time into optimizing

Well, nothing is better than some 100% accurate emulation
And tbh I doubt the PS2 can be emulated accurately enough. Emulators require a lot of pure power (having plenty of cores doesn't help much) and 2.1 GHz (admitting the specs are true) is not that much.

 

[Yil]

I would buy one if it can out put two or three seperate 1080p screen, vr capable and ps3 compatible.

 

[GuyInDogSuit]

Comparing the PS4/4K to a PC is silly. For less than that price tag, I got a PC that can run PS4 ports like Fallout 4 and The Witcher 3 with no issues.

 

[Joe88]

already got one

Spoiler

 

[FAST6191]

Glad the old computer I had sitting in the pile could provide a smile before it gets stripped for wire and a cover for something. That said it is tiny so I might consider doing something real with it if I is a sensible motherboard form factor inside it. Bets on I forget how nasty old computers are and slice myself to ribbons.

Whats up with sony and their fascination with the matrix?

Edit: Dammit someone beat me to it

Someone? Basically everybody had made that joke and was sorry for it in the sources, let alone by the time I got around to posting something. It was half the reason I busted out the table and marble spinning thing.

As for upgraded consoles, wouldn't the DSi or the New 3DS qualify, Fast? Both are significant upgrades of the original that don't break compatibility.

Just to provide some symmetry from last time this came up I will call the dsi a handheld and not a console, again despite probably arguing the opposite the last time around. Also just because they failed (ish) unlike say the GB to GBC then I am going less with upgrade and more with new console, otherwise you might have to count the PS2 by virtue of it having hardware BC.

 

[Foxi4]

The rumors state it wont be able to render games in 4k but only upscale them as it is impossible for a system with the form factor of a ps4 to render a game in 4k, (pretty obvious) but its said to have features akin to the new 3ds where games will have a boost in fidelity on the ps4.5 but still be able to run on the original ps4. So yeah no 1080p four player split screen.
That said if i ever get a 4k tv in the future ill prob pick up a ps4.5

The sources I read today say that it can render 4K native, it just doesn't have the juice to do so with AAA titles, which is understandable as even most reasonably priced gaming PC's are huffing, puffing and sweating when attempting to render 4K at a playable framerate. That said, I don't think native 4K is even the point here, Sony probably just wants their console to nail 1080p already and, if possible, be 4K-ready, so to speak. 4K is not adopted in the living room, it's more a buzzword than an actual feature.

EDIT: As for BC, I really couldn't give a rat's ass at this point - you can grab a PS3 for the price of one game these days, or even cheaper if you know where to look, adding that functionality would only serve to bump the price tag.

Considering the second revision came out several months ago? At least 2 more years. Like I said this isn't like a typical revision and we're not talking about a smaller CPU here. Not only that but this isn't a PC, and it's not a handheld. It's a console and what worries me is that Sony's decided the current hardware isn't good enough and instead of working around current hardware limitations they'll just release newer hardware.

Not that this really concerns me I mean I could sell my Destiny PS4 and buy the newer revision but... it just leaves me with this sour taste in my mouth. I just bought the PS4, now the entire system's inferior? I'd rather see them improve the OS instead of focusing on 4k.

With all that being said I'm calling it... they'll start advertising games with smoother frame rates that current models can't achieve. I kind of have this feeling it'll launch around FF15's release and we'll see videos of the game running at 30-60FPS (no telling). It's dastardly, it's evil, it's Sony.

What second revision? Do you mean the 1TB system or the fact that Sony switched from touch-sensitive pads to physical buttons on the console? I wouldn't consider either a revision, they're different SKU's of the same system.

Just to provide some symmetry from last time this came up I will call the dsi a handheld and not a console, again despite probably arguing the opposite the last time around. Also just because they failed (ish) unlike say the GB to GBC then I am going less with upgrade and more with new console, otherwise you might have to count the PS2 by virtue of it having hardware BC.

It's not about whether the console contains the old hardware or not, it's about whether it's used as the primary processing units. The GBC, DSi and N3DS use the same hardware as their predecessors, just overclocked and with some minor additions. The PS2, PS3 or the GBA do not - they use a whole new "main" processing setup with the old processors used as co-processing units. Of course the GBC/DSi/N3DS cases could be debated since they all have exclusive software, everything depends on the criteria you choose.

 

[CathyRina]

I don't care about all that 4K nonsense
I don't even have a 4K TV
Just make all the Games run at 1080p60 in Neo Mode and I'm sold.
Framerate -> Resolution
If devs just gonna up the resolution or graphical fidelity then this model is redundant for me.

 

[Foxi4]

I don't care about all that 4K nonsense
I don't even have a 4K TV
Just make all the Games run at 1080p60 in Neo Mode and I'm sold.
Framerate -> Resolution
If devs just gonna up the resolution or graphical fidelity then this model is redundant for me.

According to the documents NEO mode is supposed to provide better framerate over base mode first and foremost, so you might get your wish if any of this will turns out to be true.

 

[hollowtip]

Whether we will see the return of 4 player split screen co-op now everybody can have their
own 1080p space is also unknown, we can but hope.​

4-player split screen gameplay has become obsolete due to the advent of online gaming, and you wont be seeing it return for anything other than indie titles. That's not to say I'm sad to see it retired either, as playing on a squared section of the TV felt claustrophobic and watered down in comparison to experiencing the single player campaigns or modes.

We have not really seen true console upgrades since the days of the Amiga, give or take things like the N64 expansion pack which is hardly in the same league as this. What do you think about all this and what do you hope this leads to?

This is pretty incorrect. Off the top of my head, The 32X, Sega CD, and 64DD all offered an upgrade to the base console, and were considered failures. As someone mentioned earlier, 4K hasn't become standardized and the format could easily become defunct in the next few years. Unless sony is able to launch the console at an affordable price point and they are able to offer significant trade-in value towards the new model, I don't see the 4K PS4 gaining enough mainstream attention unless they can eventually match the pricing of the current PS4.

 

[Foxi4]

4-player split screen gameplay has become obsolete due to the advent of online gaming, and you wont be seeing it return for anything other than indie titles. That's not to say I'm sad to see it retired either, as playing on a squared section of the TV felt claustrophobic and watered down in comparison to experiencing the single player campaigns or modes.

This is pretty incorrect. Off the top of my head, The 32X, Sega CD, and 64DD all offered an upgrade to the base console, and were considered failures. As someone mentioned earlier, 4K hasn't become standardized and the format could easily become defunct in the next few years. Unless sony is able to launch the console at an affordable price point and they are able to offer significant trade-in value towards the new model, I don't see the 4K PS4 gaining mainstream attention.

4-player co-op won't be obsolete for as long as people have families, friends and couches. Online is great and all, but you're not going to play online multi on a party - you'll play couch co-op. As for the price point, it's supposed to be $399 and chances are that later down the line the new revision will simply replace the base model, as it was the case countless times before. Regarding the add-ons you mentioned, only the 32X was an add-on focused on horsepower - the other two were merely new storage readers with some additional hardware to allow for steady read-out (like extra memory), they weren't exactly re-inventing the base system, merely adding functionality.

 

[Qtis]

So I have to buy another Netflix Machine?

Kidding, kidding. The PS4 is working quite nicely now and the titles that have been made for it are fantastic. Still, I'm a bit vary on the Neo aspect mainly due to the feeling that Uncharted 4 & co will suffer the Uncharted 3 PS3 effect: Nice visuals, but abysmal frame rates at times on the PS4 vs PS4 Neo. Things will start getting interesting if the XB1 will also be refreshed as rumours have it (though everyone from MS seems to counter this). Time will tell