Sony PS5 detailed, includes SSD, 8K and PSVR support
Hardware details of Sony's PlayStation 5 have been revealed in an interview with Mark Cerny on Wired.
We all knew it was likely happening, but it has now been confirmed: Sony is developing the next PlayStation console. While it doesn’t have an official name, we can all probably skip the theatrics and start calling it the PS5.
In an interview with Peter Rubin of Wired, Mark Cerny, Sony systems architect, detailed a lot of the architecture of Sony’s next console. Some of the big ticket features include a, presumably, proprietary SSD harddrive, 8K and PSVR support, and a cutting-edge CPU and GPU.
Rubin reports that during the meeting the devkit of the PlayStation 5 sat “concealed in a big silver tower.” No doubt Sony is still hard at work figuring out how to differentiate the PS5 from the other big, black boxes in your living room. However, Cerny was able to reveal the details of the CPU and GPU.
Of the CPU, Rubin said that it’s, “based on the third generation of AMD’s Ryzen line and contains eight cores of the company’s new 7nm Zen 2 microarchitecture.” Furthermore, the GPU is “a custom variant of Radeon’s Navi family, will support ray tracing.” A console supporting ray tracing is a big claim to be making, especially considering the technology is fairly new and only just finding its feet in PC gaming. If Sony has actually managed to create a devkit of the PS5 that allows developers to take advantage of ray tracing, that is huge in and of itself, and that’s before Cerny touched on the harddrive technology.
Consoles gamers have long been stuck in loading screens, and even those gamers who upgrade their consoles to solid state drives can still suffer long wait times. According the Cerny, the PlayStation 5 will be able to vastly improve upon load times and it’s all thanks to the SSD that is being used in the console.
Zero information was offered on the exact nature of the SSD, but what Cerny did have to offer was a demonstration using Insomniac’s Marvel’s Spider-Man. Using the aforementioned silver tower, Cerny compares load times on the PS5 devkit to a PS4 Pro and the results are certainly impressive. A 15 second load time on the Pro shrinks to a sub-1 second load time on the devkit.
Cerny also discussed 8K support and PSVR support. That’s right, the PS5 is supposedly going to support 8K visuals, so it’s a good thing they have that fancy SSD to speed up the load times. Interestingly, the PS5 will also be compatible with the current PSVR headset.
PSVR support isn’t the only story of old stuff being compatible with new stuff. Collectors of “old” games rejoice, because Rubin did make a point of mentioning that the PS5 is based on the architecture of the PlayStation 4, meaning all your games should play on it. This is certainly a different tune to what Jim Ryan said to Time back in 2017 about backwards compatibility, granted he was talking about PS1 and PS2 games. Whatever the case, you can rest assured knowing your collection isn’t going to be rendered obsolete.
There are still plenty of questions to be asked and hopefully answered. For instance, what kind of price point will consumers be expected to pay for this high-end gaming system? Microsoft was nearly laughed out of house and home with the Xbox One X price, but will buyers be more willing to part with $500 or more for the next PlayStation console?
This reveal is rather exciting, though without any visuals or images, it certainly lacks some punch. What’s interesting is that this announcement comes off the back of Microsoft’s Phil Spencer having already stated the company is hard at work developing their next Xbox console. Perhaps the time of big, on-stage reveals is over and now it’s all about announcing upcoming announcements and getting information out before leaks.
Though Sony won’t be at E3 2019, it’s probably a safe bet that we’ll be hearing and seeing more about the PlayStation 5 sometime soon. You can read Peter Rubin’s full interview over on Wired.
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