Playstation 4: The Story So Far

From Mike Muncatchy of www.digitalvideogamer.com, "The future of the Playstation brand is almost upon us! Here is a look at what we might see out of the new behemoth sitting in Sony’s super secret testing labs, presumably guarded by armed sentries.

In the fascinatingly quick moving world of technological breakthroughs, a vision of the next next-generation of consoles can be filled with volumetric smoke and pixel shaded mirrors. Sony, as a technology manufacturing giant, is often easier to watch, as their technology typically pops up in multiple hardware divisions and patents before jumping into a shiny new gaming box. Another way of viewing their procession into the future is to take a look back at the hardware they have released, and examine patterns that could re-appear in their future system. This method, combined with recently released information regarding patents, should give us a more accurate view of what we could be getting our sweaty palms on in the future."

[Darkstorn]

USB 3.0? Seriously?

I think the predicted specifications for the PS4 are a little high, but there's no doubt that the hard drive will have to be vast and that there will probably be some new iteration of Blu-ray for expanded disc storage.

[Cevapi88]

i would want sony to work with google to implement chrome as the official web browser of the ps3

we know that they will bring it when it comes to specs and overall raw power of the machine....i want to see how they will surprise us with features we would have never thought of

[zeeshan]

A good article. 32GHz sounds like a lot but then again, technology todays changes faster than we could have imagined 5 years ago. I think when it comes to optical device, Sony will stick with Bluray and will probably enhance it to hold massive amount of data. Probably something like BD2 but that's just me. Who knows what Sony's got cooking in ther tech kitchens :)

[AmazingBrian]

Its been reported that Sony is in the process of creating a new optical disk much better than blu-ray. I don't think it will be ready by next gen but no playstation system has had the same format. I think it will be blu-ray still but it went like this:

CD > DVD > Blu-ray > ???

[ProjectVulcan]

The GPU is the key component here for visuals and the fastest single consumer GPU in the world is already about ten times as fast as PS3's- GTX480. Transistor count isnt exactly a perfectly accurate method of measuring performance, but it gives a good idea how technology has moved on especially regards GPU. RSX has 300 million transistors, GTX480 has 3 BILLION on one die. Be at least another two generations of GPU development before 2013 starts. So think about that. On the CPU side, CELL has 234 million transistors, a current six core twelve thread intel core I7 970X has 1.2 billion- 12 core processors are scheduled on the consumer roadmaps before 2013, expect 2.5bn+ tranny central processor units to be reasonably common, again, ten times more than PS3s CELL.

As for memory then we are reaching the point where the top cards have 1.5GB video RAM per GPU, expect that to double inside a year. Some limited editions of cards are available with 2GB now already too. Even if you assume that another generation 'only' has 2GB video memory and 2GB system memory, 4Gb is still 8 times what PS3 has now.

Bluray as it stands now seems more than enough even for next gen, however support for a 100GB BD disc would make perfect sense- these already exist. This is assuming that a disc solution is still employed, i think it will, but could be the last generation to do so. Even a 8 x BD drive offers excellent read speed, 36mb/s is very fast compared to dvd, faster than any dvd drive.

You would almost certainly expect sony to go down the standard hard drive route once again, and at the current rate of hard drive progression, 1 terabyte 2.5 drives will not be too expensive in two years time (currently about 110 pounds so expect that to at least halve before 2013), assuming they stick with a small form factor drive. SSDs will likely still increase the cost too much even in a few years over conventional drives, so i wouldnt expect them to be included in consoles.

[Eddie20101]

There is no story so far, just a bunch of fanboy implied bull crap that's not even coming from the PS3 fanboys.

[bakasora]

32GHz is not economically feasible even for 5 years down the road. maybe they can add more cores.

[nickjkl]

the ps4 will have 2 cell processors
with all 8 working spus instead of 7 totaling 16 spus one for os the rest for what ever
most likely going to stay at 3.2 ghz for power efficiency
going to jump up to [email protected]
they might just drop the gpu all together depending on the power of the new cell processor

and thats from ibms blade center which can do 6.4 tflops at its peak but costs around 10 grand

[OpenGL]

The main reason the transistor count is so different between those CPUs is the massive difference in cache size. The i7 970X has 256KB of L2 cache per each of the 6 cores and 8MB of L3 cache compared to the PS3's 512KB of L2 cache on the PPU and 256KB of L2 cache per each of the 7 SPEs.

Also, Intel CPUs are CISC so their instruction sets are a lot more complex, so you'll see a gain in transistor count for that reason alone. Out of order execution with true branch prediction, as well as numerous other instructions like MMX, SSE, etc adds to the transistor count.

[Blaine]

I had to skim through your comment because it was exciting me too much! Reading it closely would probably cause my head to explode.

[callahan09]

@VulcanProject:

That's all true about the potential power out there in the PC market, but are you suggesting that components like that will be in the PS4? I'm confused about your point for talking about how much more powerful a PC can potentially be than the PS3, you never really approach the subject of what could be in the PS4 until you get to talking about HDD versus SSD and Blu-Ray versus something else...

The i7 970 Extreme costs about 1000 dollars. You need a really high-end motherboard to house the thing, and that's going to cost you a couple hundred, let's say 200. Then it's about 500 for the GTX 480. We haven't even talked about RAM, hard drive, and optical drive. We haven't even talked about the cost of an 800+ watt PSU to power all of this stuff, and a properly designed case to house it all with good air flow and a cooling system that isn't obtrusively loud. It'd have to be a very effective proprietary design from Sony to give a recognizable appearance to the PS4 while likely trying to house minimize size, keep the PSU inside the system instead of having a power brick, and still be able to keep the noise and temperature down. Considering all that, if they had already had that design completed and they were secretly ready to release it as the PS4 this year, there's no way it would cost less than 3000 dollars. They won't release another console for more than 500 dollars. And it will be many, many, many years before this could be done for 500 or less.

[ProjectVulcan]

@ OpenGL, I know. Merely demonstrating the packaging and process that is available NOW for CPU and GPU dies, indeed the GTX480 is nearly all logic transistors. CELL partly combats its cache disadvantage by having an incredibly fast memory bus bandwidth. Server processors on the cutting edge are even larger than consumer processors because they have huge amounts of cache, but i discounted then knowing that. Im unconvinced sony will still use a CELL design for their next console, due to the problems it has given many developers. Most likely RISC based architecture still, but there has been x86 in consoles before. It could easily happen again.

As for your comment callahan09 then the above comment still applies. The consoles can only take advantage of process and GPU technology available at the time- So i was saying what technology is available now and inside the next two years, tech that could be implemented into the consoles much as it all was implemented into this existing generation of consoles five years ago. PS3 after all uses an off the shelf Geforce 7, It makes sense whatever GPU PS4 uses will be in some way related to modern day GPU architecture....but then i thought you would realise that as it is very obvious.

You clearly arent very aware of the speed of process technology when you think that all the performance i highlighted will cost similar amounts to what it costs NOW. You also seemingly miss the entire point of sony's hardware business plan for every home console it has launched- the hardware is built and sold at a loss. The top PC gear now always commands a premium too at retail and is sold at wild figures simply because they can and NOT necessarily because it cost hugh amounts to produce-its the cutting edge premium. Indeed 360 launched for 280 pounds packing GPU performance that in late 2005 had you wanted an equal card on Pc, would have cost you as much as said new 360 console....

Will GTX480 performance cost 450 pounds in two years for example? Of course not! Two years ago the fastest GPU was the GTX280 which cost 400 pounds and consumed a maximum of 236w, in practice though, it was less. It was built on the 65nm node. Do you know how much equal performance costs TODAY? Less than 150 pounds at retail! (radeon 5830/GTX460 768mb are actually slightly FASTER than GTX280 but hey), dropping quickly and consuming 180w maximum- again in practice less. This is built on two generations newer, 40nm. The next node generation, 28nm, is due in 6 months. After that 20nm is betting favorite to arrive by 2013. This is indeed, common knowledge.

When it comes to costs like motherboards or power supplies for consoles, they are all custom made to only be as good as is required for the whole package. That was the reason i didnt include them- because its irrelevant to the core technology. Its only ever as good as it needs to be, when you know the exact power consumption of your console for example you can create an exact power supply and build it down to your own costs....

[hakis86]

32GHz does sound much, but in fact it isn't. IF we can compare it to the CPU on my PC, which is a i7 clocket to 3.0 GHz with 4 cores, the total is 12 GHz, and if we count the "cores" that are displayed in task manager (8) it's 3 x 8 = 24GHz. And this is a CPU from 2009 (not 2008 right??).
2-3 years from now I have no problem seeing a multicore CPU that totals somewhere arounf 32GHz.

However, the question is will the techology stagger now that we have reached the 'GHz barrier' ?
Obviously it's not a problem to upgrade from 33mhZ to 333mhz to 3.2 GHz, but very few devices are above 3.x GHz, because of heat and power consumption.
And how many cores is practical and cheap enough to put in a console - 16 cores is a lot..!

Can't wait for it to be announced though.

[ProjectVulcan]

Core i7 has four PHYSICAL cores with two threads of execution, 'virtual' cores. That still makes it 4 x 3ghz. As i have mentioned though, this is an outdated method of talking about CPU performance. The article doesnt seem to be aware of that, hence the speculation that might refer to something with say....ten cores, each running 3.2ghz = 32ghz.

Clockspeed hasnt been a good method of evaluating performance for sometime now as a standalone consideration, its only ever useful and accurate when directly comparing processors with identical architecture and cache size. SO the statement that we can expect a 32ghz processor isnt particularly useful. A dual core intel atom has two cores like an intel core 2 duo, both could run 1.83ghz even. But unless you know how different the models are in die size and architecture, you wouldnt know despite those seeming similarities the core 2 duo processor is more than ten times faster.....

What we CAN expect however is a processor with many cores maybe double figures, and with many times more transistors than what CELL currently is. CELL is very focused on a particular type of floating point performance, I suspect that a next generation processor will be more general purpose and make life a lot easier for developers. Needless to say with the ability NOW to pack 4X+ more transistors than CELL in the same space as what CELL originally occupied when it was first designed, we can expect a pretty significant performance leap from the next generation hardware, which might still be two years away

[Luzce]

Clock speed is just a bad way of comparing processing power. Like vulcanproject stated, if the processor architecture was identical, then you can use this method to compare them, but comparing a 3GHz Pentium 4 processor from 8 years ago to a modern day i7 just because they run at the same clock speed would be ridiculous. You also cannot make the math saying that 6x 3GHz cores = 1x 18GHz. Running an algorithm on a dual core 1.5GHz processor may or may not be faster than running it on a single 3GHz core, it all depends on the algorithm.

[hakis86]

So Maybe a CPU in the PS4 will have 10X the computing power of the Cell in the PS3.
To be honest I actually hope it's the same arcitecture - a new Cell, probably with more cores and SPE's.

Now that developers learn to take advantage of it you can see how insanely powerful it is. And their knowledge isn't gonna fade away =).
So hopefully SONY could invest some more time and money in teaching the "lazy" developers what Naughty Dog, Guerilla games, Santa Monica etc. already knows.
I don't want them to use Intel. But I'm excited to see what they actually end up doing =)

[Snakefist30]

Wat is Holographic Disk Format???

[The Lazy One]

it's a ludicrously large data storage medium.

[kneon]

With an equally ludicrously high price tag. They will go with high capacity bluray, it's much cheaper and easier to do as well as being backwards compatible.

[Dee_91]

yea ur gonna get the next ps4 and still bash like u do the ps3

[awesomeperson]

Umm black cat, how does a picture of you having a PS3 prove that they have Holographic Disk developed by Microsoft?

[iPlayGamez]

holographic disk is a disk that stores info in 3d space so it holds TERABYTES of memory right now it costs thousands of dollars for 1 disk so it will come down in price but my guess is not by next gen, but it will be used for gaming as Nintendo is a big investor in this storage medium so they apparently have plans to use it when it is affordable.

EDIT: to guy above im not sure if microsoft or sony are invested in holodisc but on the holodisc developers website it has nintendo as a partner but that was a year ago so they must have more investors

[kneon]

Sony has been working on holographic disks for quite a while, just like almost every other CE company. But it could be a while until they are commercially viable. It's believed that Bluray could eventually get up to about 5tb. That will likely be a cheaper alternative to holographic disks, so unless they can manage to store at least 5-10 times more data at a similar cost it could become a stillborn technology.

[Jazz4108]

It is what 360 is using in there next system. This is from the Ms rep at my store and so far everything he has told me is true. He told me about Kinect 2 months before they announced the name and also told me they would be releasing the 360 slim at e3 and I found that out 6 months before. So if he said MS has been working on this for the next 360 I believe him. He also said that for movie playback they will be using a tech similar to blueray that all the major studieo have signed on to an it will one up blueray with true 3D capabilities running much faster then blueray. Bluerays biggest downfall for gaming is that it is slow and this will be faster then dvd9.

[kneon]

@Jazz4108

Sorry but that is a load of crap. Microsoft hasn't magically found a way to do holographic disks a couple of orders of magnitude cheaper than everyone else. And the studios are not about to jump to a new format again, it's too expensive and holds no value for them. This is just dumb.

And it seems someone is confusing the capabilities of the PS3 with the capabilities of bluray. Bluray does support true 1080p 3d. Bluray is also very fast, much faster than dvd. But the PS3 only has a 2x drive while there are 16x drives out there. A 2x bluray drive reads at about the maximum data rate of an 8x DVD, but the DVD rate is not constant and depends on where on the disk the data is stored. A 16x bluray drive is about twice as fast as a 24x DVD drive, and DVD isn't getting any faster while bluray still has room to grow.

[D4RkNIKON]

This is all way over my head but it sounds impressive. hah

[gravesg]

32ghz ?? gtfoh ... that, is not happening and 5GB of ram ???

5gb of ram is crazy as well ..the guy who made the article, has never built a computer

im thiking sony will go joint intel and IBm for the next cpu, the clock speed will prolly be in the 3.2-3.7ghz range, with about 6-10 cores *depending on the yeild and what kind of cores they are. Full-architecture cores will be more expensive.

ram wise is gonna be either 4Gb or 6Gb, ram sticks are made in 2gb and 4gb sticks, they also make them in 1gb sticks but its rare,and manufactures are fading from 1gb ram sticks.

they are going blu-ray again, but maybe with their own 400gb disc,and laser setup or pioneers new disc. either way blu-ray is here to stay.

i would hope for 500gb hard drives to be the standard, chorme as the defualt browser, and maybe usb 3.0 ... but seeing as how 3.0 devices aren't broad and about, maybe 1 usb 3.0 port and 2 usb 2.0 ports.

i think this next generation is gonna be all native res 1080p games, or at the min 60fps 720p games.

[SOAD]

5 gigs is crazy for you but then you predict 6?

[a08andan]

Only thing that I have to say about your post is that USB 3.0 is backwardcompatible with USB 2.0 as far as I understand, so it will only have USB 3.0 or better USB ports. If I'm wrong about the backwardcompability, then ignore this :D

[clarkdef]

Nah the next step up is going to have to be more than that my friend, what you suggested wouldn't look much better than what the PS3 is now.

Plus this guy didn't even mention the 6SPEs all at around 3.2GHz clock rates, making the PS3 more like 60x the power of the PS2. The PS4 to truly take the next step will have to be twice the power also. It will have to throughput aroud 45teraflops.

[gravesg]

yup, your right, i wasn't sure lol.
just checked tho. nice

[TrailerParkSupervisr]

He means that 1G sticks are not gonna be around. It's either 4G or 6G.

[Mmmkay]

you can get ram in any sizes..
i've got several 256kb and 1mb you can have if you like... see what i did there?

[gravesg]

no 5 gigs is highly impratical, since for only a couple cents more at the manufacturing price you can get another gb on the same size stick.

but 4Gb's of ram is industry standard now, hell if you look in your local paper most desktop computers come with 6gb of ram.

you really think they wont add 2gb's of ram, and it'll be dirt cheap by the time the manufacturing for ps4 is in full swing.

tho, i doubt 6gb due to the fact, they'll probably want to use some nice high-speed ram.

[SOAD]

Okay, my bad. Thanks. I didn't realize that.

[jerethdagryphon]

the only thing extrodinary avbout htere pattern based spec is cpu speed the rest isnt actually to bad heck 5 gig ddr3 is only about 150 now so in 5 years or so that would be ....60 at retail prices ish

not foo far fetched

[ULTIMATE_REVENGE]

You do know that USB 3.0 has now been standardised right? even LightPeak is soon to be standardised and guess what? Sony has already shown interest in Intels LightPeak technology.

Seriously you guys need to keep up to date.

[gaffyh]

I doubt this will be the actual specs. I can see possibly 4GB of unified RAM, but I think the processor speed is too high at 32GHz. It is more likely that we will see a 4GHz multi-core chip of some sort (similar to the Cell), maybe even a unified GPU/CPU similar to the Tegra but with higher specs.

For the next gen Xbox I can almost definitely see it using Blu-Ray, and even for the PS4 I just see a higher capacity of Blu-Ray discs rather than a brand new format. The Holographic discs have far too much storage especially when you consider that Blu-Ray discs have still not been filled up after 4 years. If we start seeing multi-bluray games then maybe we'll see a new format next gen.

[ProjectVulcan]

@ gaffyh - i believe the article is using a rather outdated method of multiplying cores by clockspeed to come up with the 32ghz figure. The modern way is to simply state the number of cores and the clockspeed of each.

[Persistantthug]

Our current Electical based CPU's seem to have hit a wall.

How do we know? Because there's been no commercial CPU that's hit 4.0 ghtz. They hit 3.7 or was it 3.8 like in 2005 and then they just quit, and decided to add more lower clocked cores.

So obviously some sort of revolutionary change needed and due for CPU's. It's going to get a bit silly trying to do 8 and 16 core fabrications.

Fiber optic seems to be the next step.

[ChickeyCantor]

actually the I7 920 is clockable up to 4ghz.

[avengers1978]

I will say this once again,... we will see a new nintendo system and new xbox before we see the PS4, and even then chances are strong that the PS3 will still be selling very well.

[CimmerianDrake]

Kaz Hirai said he wants the devs in to help design the PS4, so don't be thinking all over the top in terms of tech, because the devs will want their job to be easy, but at the same time with high quality. I don't think we'll be having the kind of situation with the PS4 that happened with the PS3.

[morkendo]

this PS4 sound crazy kool!! but if the price is 800-1,000.00 sony will suffer again. no one in they’re right mind will be willing to pay that price in the economy now days. not alone with 3,000.00 3D tv as well. with 4,000.00 we all could buy a decent car.

[hikayu]

bluray is still growing and have yet to ovetake the DVD market , there's no need to move on to another format and abandon it . considering the ridiculous amount of money sony poured into the format war , abandon it now is not an option . what's more reasonable is a much faster and more layer bluray drive . say , quadruple layer and 10X read ? that's like twice as much storage in a disc : 132GB of 4layer vs 66GB of DL ( 2 layer) ; 5 times faster : 10X vs 2X. right now , the disc's prototype is out for month . the bluray drive , however , is now . making a powerful enough laser to read that disc is nothing short of a technical feat . but im sure sony will pull it off just fine .
ps4 is still 3-4 years away at least . why ? sony is launching multiple campaigns on the ps3 , introducing next-gen system would only cause disaster . people are barely getting into 3D , Move have yet to gain consumers' trust.

[SephireX]

@vulcanproject
Very well said. Just goes to show how quickly technology is advancing and that the next generation might be a much bigger leap than we first thought.

In regards to a 1 terabyte drive, it is certainly probable with even 250gb drives available this gen. Though it won't be much use unless the PS4 allows us to install most games to the HD in full. Now if most games take up over 50gbs, a bigger HD may be on offer. I would like there to be full digital distribution on the PS store next gen for every game with good deals and lower prices than retail, especially for Plus subscribers. I think the PS4 will launch in late 2013. I'm going to make a bold guess that MGS5 will be an exclusive launch title or will come out within one year of launch.

[_EvilMonkey_]

the ps4 with the raw power of an i7 core or higher and nvidia's quadro fx card or higher, add expanded bluray space and at least 1 terabyte of hard space. expand memory ram to 4 gigabytes, come to think of it this sounds more like a pc. its all good though.

[OneSneakyMofo]

Sony won't choose a i7 processor. They'll want to run with IBM again to create The Cell version 2.0. As for hard drive space, 1TB is ludicrous, lol. Anything goes with the video card, and I think they'll pop in around 2-4 GB of RAM.

[MONOLITHICIDE]

well it is a computer entertainment system

[writersblock]

and i7 wont be going into it, a quadro card? 1 TB hard drive?

You're crazy, haha

[OmarJA-N4G]

The PlayStation 4 will be more stable than a high-end PC with Windows 10.

[iamgoatman]

More Stable?

Just to clarify, why would the next Playstation console, by default, be more stable than a PC? Every device has the potential to crash, why would the PS4 somehow be different?

[OneSneakyMofo]

Blue screen of death.

[JustTheFactsMr]

Because closed hardware systems with a narrowly defined set of components provide a very stable baseline compared to a platform that has to account for hundreds or thousands of variations that are out the original designers control.

The great strength of the PC - hardware upgrades and the extra flexibility is also it's greatest weakness - a tradeoff in loss of stability.

So yes every system has the potential. But not the same probability.

[Steve_0]

@Jimmy Riddle,
Because PS4 will be shorter and have a wider base than a modern PC. Physics my friend.

[Prcko]

Polygons: 2.5 Billion Per Second. 10X increase in polygonal output
imagine that :OOOO

[Pandamobile]

We're already pretty close to that on PC :P

Radeon HD 5970 has a 1.5 billion poly/second throughput, so combine that with another 5970 and your PC will be able to push 3 billion polys/second.

(although no application would come close to needing all that.

[SOAD]

Panda, I remember hearing that the Nvidia GTX 480 would only get as far as 750 million poly/second. It was in a tech demo for the new PhysX.

[Hazmat13]

how much RAM is needed to play Crysis on high to Very High setting? im guessing PS4 will and can play Crysis on Very High setting but PC gaming will have grown bigger in that time. anyone agree?

[N2G]

dont we love it when we hear news about PS4 even though we dont want it any time soon ? LOL

[Consoldtobots]

yeah I think that's what Sony is counting on, Im certainly not ready to leave the PS3 behind. Too much life and power still left untapped. Maybe in another 5 years the PS3 will seem dated but until then happy PS3 gaming!

[N2G]

5 years is too much i think 4 years & 11 months is about right. lol

seriously though i would like to see a PS4 come out in 3 years.gotta love Sony's consoles. ;)

[Blaine]

I'll be ready for PS4 in late 2012.

PS1: 1994
PS2: 2000
PS3: 2006
PS4: 2012? I'd get it for sure.

Just get me GT5, KZ3, U3, R3, InFamous 2, Demon's Souls 2 (Please! With Move support), GTA V... And a few other games here and there (Twisted Metal, Socom, etc.) until November 2012, and by then I'll be ready to welcome the PS4 with open arms.

[theEnemy]

lol.

The PS3 is not even halfway of it's lifetime.

Keep dreaming.

[TheStorm]

You do realize that most of the time around half way through it's life they usually get ready to release another one. PSOne lasted from around 1995-2005 strong, PS2 was released in 2000. PS3 was released 6 years into the life of the PS2. It's not unreasonable to start getting ready for PS4 talk.

[kharma45]

We didn't have a massive global recession last time though.

Sony will want to eek out as much life from the PS3 as possible, hence Move and 3D.

[colonel179]

PS4 is definitely going to be a 3D console. There's no way Sony is pushing 3D so much, just to end it with the PS4.

I expect the PS4 to be a full-3D console with 720p resolution as a minimum...

[nickjkl]

developers cant even take full control of the ps3 they dont need a new system if all their going to do is be lazy

[PSFan100]

Well I would defiantly move on to the PS4 if it came with those specs! That's just me though, a gamer.

[BattleAxe]

I'll be happy with my PS3 for a few more years yet. When the PS3 launched I spent $1000.00 for a PS3, Resistance 1, and a 3 year extended warranty. Next time I'll wait for a year or 2 until the price drops. I've got a good PC to get me through the 1st year of the PS4's release.

[roguewarrior]

First i bought a PS3 for $600,and Resistance 1. Then 2 extra controllers, bluetooth headset, and the BD remote. Then i saw the Ps3 running on a HDTV at my friends house, had to have 1. $2000 later i'm enjoying HD glory. but my receiver doesn't have hdmi inputs, so i buy a new pioneer receiver. upgraded the HDD to 500GB. I'm not buying another console till 2014, it takes a year or two before you start to see what a console can really do any way.

[Blaine]

@rogue
I also got my PS3 at launch with Resistance 1! For my HD graphics, though, instead of getting an overpriced HDTV I got an ASUS computer monitor--24" for 250$ (if I sit close enough, it may as well be 40"! And the image is gorgeous).

[Pandamobile]

32 GHz CPU? Is this guy retarded? I don't think 32 GHz will ever be a viable CPU clock speed. At least not for a long, long time.

[kharma45]

Too true. It just reeks of someone who knows nothing thinking firstly that bigger numbers are better and secondly going for things that are impossible.

Chances are CPU-wise the PS4 will continue off the Cell chip in some form, Sony invested too much to ditch it.

[BrianC6234]

More likely it will have 32 cores than 32GHz. Will we ever see 10GHz?

[Pandamobile]

Eventually, but the days of just adding more and more CPU cycles into a chip are over.

As soon as the Pentium 4's hit 3.6 GHz or so, they hit a massive wall where the chips were just getting too hot to cool efficiently. So what happened was Intel and AMD started making their CPU's smarter. By adding more cores, they were able to drop the core clocks significantly, and still deliver tons of performance.

So even today, you'll rarely see a CPU ship out of the box higher than 3.2 or so GHz. There's a could of AMD quads that do, but generally, you'll see 2.5-3.4 GHz CPU's, but with 4-8 cores.

[kneon]

We'll probably see 10ghz CPU eventually, but those are going to spew out huge amounts of heat if they don't use something like reversible computing, which no one has made work as far as I know.

I expect the PS4 processors will run no more than 5Ghz, but there will likely be a lot of them.

[jerethdagryphon]

6.5ghz is about the fastest and thats a nitrogen cooled specialy made die thing is we have pushed pure silocon as far as it will go in terms of size and speed

32 nano meter pathways for those who dont know there suffixes that .000000032 meters

likly thell mix germamium into chips as ibm has been wortking with exotic chip contruction for a few years or perhaps we will see a breakthrough in optoelectonic chips but raw core speed id say 4 ghz with maybe 16 -32 cores ie 3-4 cells in tandem

[sehnsucht]

We're past the GHz race...This guy has no idea what's going on with processors. My i7 is 1.6GHz but it far out-performs a 3+GHz P4. I guess this is the kind of result you get just crunching numbers without understanding processor architectures...

[Newtype]

1.6GHZ? My i7 is 2.93 GHZ...lemme guess...laptop?

[writersblock]

Every PS3 will need to come with a liquid nitrogen cooling system

[iPlayGamez]

yeah and the guy cant do math 2 x 10 = 32 ummmm ok i guess

[Sprudling]

Of course it's possible - with multiple cores. My 2 year old computer has 4 cores with 11 GHz combined. The article uses the word 'combined' too.

GHz is a very bad measurement of computational power nowadays anyway. Infact, recent CPUs have lower clock speed than the Pentium 4 had back in 2002.

[asdr3wsfas]

"Of course it's possible - with multiple cores. My 2 year old computer has 4 cores with 11 GHz combined. The article uses the word 'combined' too."

It doesn't work like that. Parallel processing doesn't just scale up the speed linearly and for a certain problems it won't increase speed at all.

Similarly, for other classes of problems (like factoring numbers), parallel processors will rock it while a high ghz single-core will not even come close to the same performance. This is true even if the single-core is faster than all the parallel processors combined.

This is why the ps3 is used to crack encryption. It has a lot of processors. If you had a single-core cpu with the same GHZ as all those of the cell added together it wouldn't even come close to the factoring speed of the ps3 cause parallel processing works better for solving that problem.

You can't just compare the speeds like this. Each are better at different types of problems.

[Consoldtobots]

well Intel did recently introduce the photon CPU which theoretically blows away the current limitations but it's far from being a production chip yet.

[PSFan100]

It's interesting to see the CPU increase with each console 33mhz to 300mhz to 3.2ghz but lool they think the CPU will clock at 32.0Ghz for the ps4! I wish it to be true, but i think it's unlikely. Although, just imagine what games would look like with that amount CPU power alone, never mind the GPU. Maybe they will add a PPU?! hmmmmm

[jerethdagryphon]

if you look at amds numbering structure during there x2 duel cores the number given is effective clock speed

ie this chip will do as much work in a given time as a 6ghz chip

each core you add in x86 arcatecture doesnt add it full speed to the speed of existing cores

they just work more efficiantly

1 man can write a novel in 10 weeks
10 men can write that novel in 1 week given proper organization

obviously the analogy isnt perfect but it works

[writersblock]

Forget 32 GHz, we wont be seeing 5 GHz in a console anytime in the next 10 years

Right now i7's (best chips on the market) go up to around 5 Ghz, and to actually buy it direct costs high hundreds/low thousands

And the amount of heat it would generate...

After that is developed too, it would be on PC first then move to consoles in like 2-3 years

[Brewski007]

This is all well and good, but Predictions about something that probably wont be out for another 3-5 years at this rate is silly.
We could all make up these drasticaly cool specs for it but i will wait for it to come from the head honcho's themselves. Technology is moving very quickly these days so who knows what uber coolness we'll get on it.

[QuantumWake]

32GHz?! Must be mistaken for '3.2GHz'. lol

2GB split? 5GB total? That might be a hassle to work around if budgets are concerned. Next generation consoles will probably be limited to 1-2GB total... But hey, someone might surprise me. :P

[a08andan]

Naa it says that the 32 ghz is combined performance which likely suggests 10 cores with 3,2 Ghz each or something like that :P

[writersblock]

10 cores running at 3.2 would cost thousands

[EXID]

throw in solid state hdd's and next gen consoles would be that much better D: that'd be nice never having to worry about hard drive failure...

[Makidian]

I was thinking the same thing. Let's just hope that large SSD's are cheap enough by then.

[LOLconsoles]

Most likely it'll have something along the lines of a gpu equal to an HD 4670, a decent quad core cpu, 1, MAYBE 2, gigs of ram, and will most likely use blu ray.

[zero_gamer]

I'd wait for a few more years to release a new system. Get your hardware specs planned, and wait til the chipsets shrink in nm to avoid what everyone calls an expensive launch. By then you should have a couple AAA titles as well. Whatever, I paid 500 for my 20GB and am happy til this very day about my purchase.

[SOAD]

3.4 Ghz tops. The speed will remain the same and the amount of cores will increase.

[iamgoatman]

The 10x idea the writer uses to come up with the possible specs is ridiculous.

32Ghz? Come on now, if you have any knowledge of hardware at all, nows the time to use a little bit of it. A combined clock speed of 32Ghz over multiple cores isn't going to happen for a long time, if at all.

5GB of RAM? Seems like a weird number, but obviously continuing on the 10x idea.

I'm surprised he didn't say 10x Colours, or 10x the resolution, why stop at 1080p when you can hope for 10800p!

Not to mention you need to take cost into consideration, it's all well and good saying you want the best specs possible, but you've got to think about how much it will cost to implement, not to mention how you'd cool the thing.

I think specs equal in performance to say a mid to high end PC at the moment would be more realistic, anything over that and the cost to the consumer will be sky high.

[iPlayGamez]

not to be a smartass but 10800p is 100x 1080p but,,,,,, super hd which is like 4000p, or something like that, is 10x 1080p sooooo yeah think about that.

[astronautbread]

a much more realistic setup for the ps4 would be

A new version of cell, most likely supporting something along the lines of 2 3.2ghz cpu's with 16-32 spu's running along side.

the graphics chip will be fast, and probably have a small portion of dedicated memory (128-256mb)

the processor and the graphics card will work much more closely this time, and share a pool of memory (4-6gb)

sony will break their cycle, and not introduce a new disc format, as it will not be needed. multilayer BD will be the norm in 2012, so expect disc size to be between 100-200gb.

it will ship with a terabyte hard drive (atleast)

if sony is smart they will either release separate models with and without backwards compatibility. they could also ship with ps1 and ps2 support while selling an add-on for ps3 functionality. (this could all be moot as the system i described should have no trouble running ps3 games as the architecture is so similar.)

[DJMarty]

I'd say:

CPU = Upgraded Cell running at 6Ghz, 24-32 SPE's(with PS3 backwards compatibility mode)

Sys Memory = 3Gb Rambus 2 running at 6Ghz

GPU Memory = 2Gb Rambus 2 running at 6Ghz

Media = Upgraded Blu-ray 300Gb+, X6-X8 read spead.

GPU = Upgraded RSX based on Tesla 1 or Tesla 2 cores(with PS3 backwards compatibility mode)

Storage = Atleast 500Gb 2.5" hard drive, and some kind of online data locker for game saves

[Tsar4ever01]

CPU= No cell version 2, Sony want to move away from the exotic tech of cell to a more traditional cpu design to appease 1st & 3rd party developers. MOST likely IMB's new POWER7 mulitcore CPU, a scaled down cost effective version to suit sony's specific needs. It's already been announced.

Sys Memory= I predict around 6GB total, split YET sharable. CPU will support 4GB GDDR3. *I hope Sony would stretch it to 8GB total sys Memory to better to compare it's games to PC GAMES graphics and not to rivals such as the NEXbox.

GPU memory= 2GB of DDR5.

Media= Blu-ray is still valid, updated with the new purple lazer tech that'll read/write the higher storage capacity blu-ray disc while still being 100% BC with all current blu-ray formats, speed at least 8x to 12x.

GPU= There's 2 LIKELY options, either sony will stay with nVidia or go on a limb and try Imtec's POWERVR-6 graphics chip. If they stay with NVIDIA I think they would opt for the latest GeForce GTX/Fermi series, not the ultra powerful GTX-480 series mind you cuz it's already been reviewed as being a very HOT wattage chomper. And I'm sure Sony wouldn't want ANY chip on their system that might very well cause a NUCLEAR MELTDOWN during extensive useage. So they might use a later version of the GTX/480-5xx low wattage version of the GeForce GTX/Fermi GPU that supports All the latest and greatest specs, like CUDA, PhysX, Shader Model X.X, OpenGL X.X, OpenCL X.X etc, etc.......

Storage= 2.5" SATA HD is almost dead! SSD/Solid State Drive is the future, I'm sure sony will imbrace it. (*The Ps3 even could already use it!) Yeah, it's pretty expensive today but prices always DROP as newer and varied tech surfaces, it will become the mainstream standard by the release of the nextgen of consoles. Following the great idea sony use for the ps3 by allowing ANY non properity 2.5 HDD of equal size, type and speeds to WORK on the ps3, I'm confident the ps4 will support ANY non properity SDD of the same type and speeds too. I predict retail version to have 420gb to 500gb SSD.

Display= I expect ALL ps4 games will support 1080P from the start, but have a built-in SCALER chip(*ie like xbox360's "ANA" chip) on the mother board and or GPU chipset so ALL PS4/PS3 games to support All future displays QF-HDTV(3840x2160p) signals without any problems or strains off the CPU/GPU.

*All PS4 consoles SHOULD come equipped with a standardized SCEA headset. like an upgraded/dated version of the current assesory version.

*All PS4 consoles & *SOME, if not All GAMES will be 3D capable & 3D HDTV compatable. (*like DUUUH!!!)

*All ps4 will support ALL the latest HDMI 1.4A, B and C spec and future specs. All systems will have a least 2.

*All ps4 will support the latest & future USB specs. all systems will have at least 2.

[frankymv]

Wii HD: Fall 2011
Xbox 720: Fall2011
PS4: Fall 2012

[liveActionLeveler]

im gonna say
wii hd-fall 2012
xbox 720-fall 2013
ps4-fall 2013

[GodGinrai]

if i was gonna take a guess id pobably pick the time frames you posted..looking forward to them when they are released..and once again i will buy them all!

[Xof]

I don't think I'm gonna bother with any more console generations. They're getting more and more expensive, and the game libraries are taking longer and longer to fill up. It's only this year, really, that I've felt my PS3 is finally "worth it." My 360 has yet to reach that level in my opinion, and it doesn't look like it ever will.

[Xfanboy]

like every new console it will another step closer to being a PC!!

2014 the year of 1080p for consoles & every game in 3d..

It will be interesting to see how my gpu & quad core holds up against Ps4 & 720 if it plays the same then im not buying a ps4 till a price drop.. games don't even use 4 cores as of yet!!

http://www.youtube.com/watc...

[Rahim92]

is like offering a person a Mcdonalds cheese burger after having 6 slices of pizza. The PS3 hasn't yet FULLY shown of what its really capable of. I guess God of War 3 and Uncharted 2 is the beginning of it.

[HelghastGeneral]

Things they need to fix with ps4 is the blue ray drive speed needs to increase because its slowness is why we have to install most games. developers can stream but that only happens to exclusive ps3 games and multiplatform developers refuse to do that. They also need to fix the memory instead splitting it into two types they need to make it into one type thats shared like xbox360's. They also need to fix the cells design to make it easier to program for that is why less experienced programmers describe it as alien technology.

In my opinion the only games that game out this generation so far is god of war 3, metal gear 4, motorstorm, uncharted 1&2, killzone2 so far. Everything else multiplatform is based on outdated graphics. xbox360 is really just as old as xbox the ps3 however is still brand new.

[DJMarty]

Speedwise PS3's Blu-ray is just as fast as 360's DVD.

Most 360 games are now on DVD9's, 360 reads DVD9's at X8.

Blu-ray reads the whole disc at a constant speed, DVD does't.

Also Blu-ray speed will increase further by the time PS4 arrives, PS3 had a first generation Blu-ray x2 drive in it, x4, x6, x8, x10 drives exsist now.

[HelghastGeneral]

If the speed is the same then explain why we have to install every almost every game that comes out.

[air1]

I dont think sony is going to go all out on the ps4 like they did with the ps3. i think they will upgrade what they have now. not by a lot but enough to wow you, i dont see them doing a gamecube wii thing.

i think next gen sony will be a little more careful with the launch price. the ps3 is doing great now but we cant forget how bad the launch was. however, i think the ps3 held its own at launch for that 600 price tag. i dont think micro or nintendo could of pulled that off but im sure sony wanted a better launch, the ps3 started very slow but thats ok cause look at it now..

"its a marathon not a sprint" in sony's words....

i want my ps3 and 360 to keep running. its nintendo that i am interested in, will the wii have a wii-360 upgrade type of thing or will they go all out like sony did with the ps3?!

@ djmarty

im not too hardware savy but i dont think that the ps3 drive runs just as fast as the 360's. i could be wrong but i highly doubt it...

@thelastgaurdian

what do you mean by the best consoles? reliability? cause if it thats what you mean, considering i only have 2 bubbles i would gladly like to use my last bubble on that opinion.

[TheLastGuardian]

especially if you've been a playstation gamer from the start. Sony makes the best consoles I just hope the PS4 will be affordable at launch.

[Dayngls]

Playstation 4 talk already? im still VERY happy with my Playstation 3

[DarkSpawnClone]

OH Crap if the ps3 "only dose everything" The ps4 will be unbelievable O___O!!...hope the graphics will be able to keep up more with good computers to some degree,i know with the pc you can always upgrade ect ect..but it would be cool if the consoles could(or almost) match the pc's ..i cant wait for the ps4...but my wallet can.

[air1]

i always wonderd why they dont design the consoles to support upgrades like the n64 did with that cartridge that came with turok.. it would have a better chance to keep up with pc's and a cheaper alternative then a whole new launch (i know they will have to eventually). i would like to modify the consoles case too, with out having to kill the warranty over a simple case swap. we been dealing with the same damn colors since the begining. its always some kinda grey or black. i know the 360 is off white and a few limited editions came out but damn if i want a blue console i shouldnt loose my warranty over it..

[DJMarty]

Cos generally add-on's don't sell well, and it split's the user base up.

Devs would support the larger user base.

[Magna Farta]

1st, The Saturn was actually MORE powerful than the PS1, but it had it's power spread over multiple processors, and only a handful of programmers knew how to code for multi-processors. Kinda that same problem that PS3 had compared to the 360. The power was there, but getting to it was a pain in the asses of most devs.

2nd, his math is WAY off. 660MB x 10 = 6.6GB, NOT 4.7.
32MB is 16X the RAM, not 10X.

Someone needs to go back to math class

[Azianphil88]

The PS4 should have a new controller style
The DualShocker 4 and the Dualshocker 3 should be capable to use the PS4 if the consumer are use to D3 controller

[HelghastGeneral]

Sony should just let nintendo and microsoft make their move and then bring out a system similar to theirs. I think its just hurtful if they repeat the same process over again and make a really powerful expensive machine. really powerful that developers can't use until three years in and expensive that no one can afford. Also what's the point of making console really powerful and only using that potential 25% of the time. Most games which are multiplatform are limited to 360's hardware and do not use any of ps3's potential if they did every game would be as great as uncharted 2 and god of war 3. So in the end sony is losing money and were paying extra money and getting a few great exclusives each year and shitty multiplatform titles with 360's hardware.

Its better they just make something similar and stick with there studios and developers and all the fightning and bullshit stops.

[soheillVII]

and the new playstation price is = $999 =)))))))

[despair]

nah thats crazy, sony will learn their lesson, it'll be $998.00 :)

[f789790]

I could honestly see them doing $600 again. I mean, it worked.

It's been out for 4 years and I think it will be another 4 before the ps4 comes out. All we should even speculate on is the PSP2.

[ATi_Elite]

At this point in the game Sony needs to just stretch out the PS3 as long as it can.

Next gen the consoles are dead as they have arrived to the point that they are forced to compete directly with PCs because of the evolution in tech and lowering prices.

PS3 and 360 are just gimped PCs but the next gen they will have no choice but to be designed around a PC framework as they will do everything a PC does.

They can't be $600 or $500 maybe $399 and they will be DX11 but with limited tessellation.

It's still a ways off as PC gaming is preparing a huge leap in capabilities when Intel and AMD release their new processors near the end of 2010.

[ChickeyCantor]

32Ghz...
Its like a CPU/GPU hybrid...it could do anything.
Man i would love to have such CPU...if only right?

but then again:
http://www.betanews.com/art...

[big_silky]

The only thing that truly matters is the price tag on the box.

Imo they've gotta release it for $400 or under, I don't think they can afford to repeat their mistakes.

[NIRVANArazor]

yes some one make something about psp2

[Paballo]

Ps3 still has a lot of life in it and by the end of this year we will start arguably reaching the midpoint of this console generation.Developers have yet to maximize on the consoles hardware yet alone strain it with developers like GG,Naughty Dog,Insomaic Games,Sucker Punch PolyPhony Digital,Zipper Interactive,Quantic Dream,Media Molecule,Eat Sleep Play,Relentless Games,Game Republic,ThatGaneCompany,Light box Interactive,Slant Six Games,Sony Japan Studio,Sony Santo Monica and third party companys like Level5,Crytex(yet to be released Crysis2)Kojima Productions,Square Enix, only pushing the hardware to the respective 50-60%not to mention that the development community has just gotten to grips with cell, have started using the ps3 as the lead platform,advancements in blu ray that allows single layer blu rays discs to be pushed to 33.4GBs or 66.8GBs( dual layered),not to mention that later through firmware updates we will see ps3 playing blu ray discs up to 200GBs,improvements to the psn and a new premium service that will allow a service that not only equals xbox live but betters it with allowing you to play a complete game for an hour trial before you buying,downloading free ps1 games etc ,not at all forgetting PS move coming at fall not to mention 3D for the ps3 and we see with all of that,that the Ps3 easily has another 7years left in it.But let's just look at the future and fastfoward by Five years.Using Moore law,observing the technology advancements in the market, analysising of the spec difference between the ps1-ps2 and ps3 I have calculated the possible ps4 specs below.Cell broadband engine 2.0(dual)@7-10Ghz.32Spe's( for each cell).5PPE's and a local pool cache memory of 12MB.Hopefully 16nm process.16GB XDR 2.0 RAM @ 7-10Ghz.Cell based custom built GPGPU either by intel larrabee or ATI.Directx12/OpenGL 5. 5000Mhz/5Ghz core.Clock Speed 4500Mhz/4.5Ghz.5billion Transistors.Independant unified Pixel/Vertex Shaders.960pixel pipelines.320vertex pipelines.Displaying @ Ultra Definition/UDHD or Quad HD 7680x4320p.4GB DDR7 video memory. 5-10TB HARD DRIVE. Blu ray2.0 disc storage 500GB to 2TB.Drive Speed 8-12x.USB3.0x2(atleast).Blue Tooth 3.0.WiFi2.0.Dual Shock4/Move2.Remote play2.0(compatability and features with PSP2),Playstation Cloud Intergration(to be explained another time).Next time I will do the xbox 720specs.(Sorry about not spacing this with bullet points I typed this on a phone.)And pls make the ps4 easy to develop for I can imagine how much the dev kits alone would cost.Hope ur lisening SONY.Somebody call Ken Kutagari to make this happen.

[rwarner174]

32Ghz is not possible on today's silicon. A new technology will have to come about, like optical transistors or something like that. Clock speeds have remained relativly stable for the last 3 to 5 years at around 3.2 Ghz. While clock speeds have stayed realtivly stable, the number of cores on a chip keep going up. What I think is more likely for the ps4 is a 16 to 32 core processor as opposed to a 32Ghz processor.

[jneul]

I wish people would stop talking about ps4, we have not even seen ps3 completely maxed out yet, why hurry into the next gen whilst things are just starting to get sweet for ps3, lets just enjoy this gen for now I don't want ps4 (maybe in a couple of years time like 2014)

[Hotel_Moscow]

CPU: will be similar to the blade center qs22
http://www-03.ibm.com/syste...

DISC DRIVE: will still be blu ray which is also back wards compatible with current blu ray systems
http://www.neoseeker.com/ne...

Ram: xdr2 ram probably around 4-6 gb shared between cpuj and gpu

GPU doesnt have to be one of those high end cards it just needs to be able to out put 1080p by its self

leaving the new cell to do everything else idk what kind of processing power 2 fully functioning cell units have but it should be a massive jump

im pretty sure the current system cpu and gpu is capable of 1080p but its the ram holding it back

[Tsar4ever01]

Interesting, about the BLADECENTER QS22, Hey, Hotel_Moscow, How did you find this link, and how old or current is it?

I'm STILL convinced that sony wants to move away from the CELL type of design. And go for a more mainstream type mulitcore cpu. Sony's already confirmed they won't be using Intel cpu/gpu. And IBM's Power7 is the most logical way to go. And it's already been confirmed that it's processing capablity trumps the current cell BE by more than 10 fold.

[DigitalHorror81]

be pre-ordering the PS4. That way, I can save up for it. 2012 maybe?

[RacingLightning01]

This author is defintally dreaming....
With only three systems, looking towards the past, to determine the future, leads to Overlly speculative results.
Playstation has another 4 years (give or take) left in it's life cycle. Most game developers havn't even began to take advantage of the current systems capabilities, so investing the kind of money like they did for the PS3, would be silly.
Not to mention if you look at the hardware side of this, your expecting to buid tech that won't exist for ten years. Besides who needs a 500GB Blu-Ray?

[I Call 9MM]

I don't think Sony, or Microsoft and Nintendo for that matter, are going to risk as much money this next round on more exotic, expensive tech in the next round of consoles, until the time is right where they can sell them at or close to cost. Both Sony and Microsoft lost enough money when they sold their consoles at a loss, I don't think they are going to risk as much going into this next generation.

I can see some powerful new hardware coming into play in the next generation, probably very powerful, but it will most likely be economical for them to manufacture. Sony isn't going to want to lose hundreds of dollars on each console again, they still haven't recovered.

Nintendo has always made money on their consoles just by selling the hardware, and I think this is a philosophy that Sony will begin to take. By 2012-2013, it shouldn't be hard to come up with something really powerful. We won't be seeing PS3 1.5 like the Wii was compared to the Gamecube, but it will be economical and powerful. They might just take the risk and cut even on the hardware, or a minimal loss, they probably won't make much if any direct hardware profit with the first few batches of PS4. The competition is way tighter than it was in the PS2 generation, where Microsoft and Nintendo were distant thirds. All three are much closer this generation, and probably will be next generation.

[I Call 9MM]

If I was to hazard a guess, we will be seeing a new, powerful Nvidia GPU coupled to a derivative of the Cell CPU, something that is at least hardware compatible with the last one. I think the initial teething that went into programming for the cell has past, and Sony will utilize that design in the new console. Probably the Cell with upgraded SPUs and multiple PPUs, based on next generation tech.

As for discs, blu-ray compatibility will be there, but who knows what they will do for storage.

RAM is another iffy one. Sony will use a decent amount, but RAM prices will have to go down enough in order to save costs. That stuff is expensive right now, hopefully in the future the prices drop to the point where 3-5 gigs is economical to put in. Look at the original Xbox, it was designed with 128 megs in mind (even places for the chips on the motherboard) but Microsoft scrapped it down to 64 megs because costs were to high.

[HelghastGeneral]

Now that I put some thought into it I think sony has no choice but to make the same moves as ps3. Unless they make a new type of cpu design that isn't the traditional type but is easier and just as powerful as cell to work for. At least now at this point most developers know how to program for cell. Putting a more powerful cell in ps4 is the only thing ps4 will have against the next xbox and make it superior. They just need to fix the the ram and make it one type instead of splitting into two types. They also need to do something about those installs for games because that is really annoying. They should use existing blue ray technology and make a drive that can read old blue ray discs and new types that have more space. A better xmb interface would be nice too and make sure they have a powerful gpu obviously.

[yamzilla]

why are so many people convinced the ps3 has 5 years left??

You are completly insane if you think this.
The games run @ or below 720p (as low as 540p) with low (20-30fps) framerates in many cases....this points to unqualified hardware for what devs are trying to do. Consumer grade tv's are standard 1080p now....the next iteration of tv will launch within a year and most likely have a reslution of 2560x1600p.The Next high capacity bluray will be out within months to a year that can store 200-500gb of data on disc.....do you honestly think devs will wait around to play with these new toys 'cause trailer park billy just bought his 4gb 360 for $199 and wants it to last for 7 more years.....tech moves on.....and people who try holding it back are suckers...Bungie is most likely already working on a next-gen game....reach is, complete, gold, finished, done...do you think they are just gonna wait....they have stated publicly their next game will be on next gen consoles....what do you tink other devs are doing...they are developing next gen tech on pc and waiting for their dev-kits from ms and sony....this type of industry does not reward playing catch-up...you gotta be ahead of the curve....what does this mean to you....obviously there will be a new 360 within 15 months...new ps4 within 26-28 months....nintendo......who cares...I'm not 8 years old.

[Paballo]

Yes technology in the video industry advances quickly in it.Today standards are merely yesterday last gen advances.It takes a merely two months for your technology to be regarded as last gen regardless if this is the video game industry,medical science,physics,consumer electronics,engineering ect....but gamers forget one thing.Its all about making money in the end.you can't invest billions upon billions of dollars into R&D and manufacturing and still end up making a loss to only start breaking even to jst start churning profits just to scrap that and start all over with another console.Even if M$ and Sony support there respective consoles after releasing the new ones.They would jst run there division let alone there companys to the ground.There are shareholders constantly on there backs wanting there returns and renumerations and deficits to overcome.It questions me why so many gamers believe that M$ or Sony will release next gen consoles anytime soon from 2011 to 2012.At EARLIEST we can expect new consoles at 2013 at EARLIEST.2014-2015 is we will really see next gen consoles.We have barely even hit the midpoint of this gen let alone the consoles have yet to hit the 199$ sweet spot but I keep hearing"Next gen consoles will release in 2011 or 2012".Its upsurd.Gamers even forget other variables such as the fact that dev cycles have moved from the typical 2years to 3-4years.So that's less time to make returns on investment.More cost.Smaller profits or the fact that dev cost have moved from the manageable 4-8million$ to now 13-20million as the norm.As well as variables that we are just from an economic downturn that this world has never seen since the 1980s.Think about it for second.Sony for example has yet to release a psp2 but people believe ps4 is around the corner.Releasing two consoles two years apart will be financial suicide let alone 1year apart.I am not saying I am 100percent correct but come on guys.All facts point to a 2014-2015 release dates.All company that can release a console within now to 2011-2012 is Nintendo but wii still sells like hot cakes so why bother?And even if they do since the gaming industry is an oragopoly(excuse my spelling),the wii2 will proberly be between 360 and a ps3 if not slightly more powerful.Sony and M$ will have to worry about what Nintendo next input device will be.Not that Wii2/HD games will make Ps3 or 360 games look like garbage.They proberly won't anyways.Last point;I posted the specs of what I believe the specs of ps4 are going to be when it releases in 2014/2015 and I know they may seem upsurdly powerful but thing is.The Next gen of consoles won't be rendering the same way as the previous gen of consoles.Both Epic games and John Carmack believe that Ray tracing is Next Generation of rendering and both are working on Next Generation engines that render that way and given the horse power needed I don't believe ps4 nor xbox720(or whateva they call it)will be a mere 2-8more powerful.what would be the point!?what is being done GAMEPLAY WISE on the more powerful PC bother that can be done on consoles?Nothing.So let's enjoy this Gen while it last.(Sorry for my gammer I typed this on a phone).

[yamzilla]

someone will come out of the gate first...if sony was smart, they would release a fully 100% backward compatible ps4 with an 285 gtx or similar gpu and quadrouple the ram with a similar but faster clocked processor with more l2 cache...this will display all games in 1080p with ability to scale to 1600p....250gb storage standard, premium version with 1tb storage....this type of unit could be manufactured and sold for $450 in one year and still turn a profit.....this would be like a bad ass ps3.5...also...unclock the framerate on ps3 titles to allow killzone 2, uncharted 2, god of war3...ect. in 60fps.....

Even at $550 people would jump all over it

People who think we won't see new consoles till 2013 are absolutely off their rocker....these things barely play the games we have now at sub-hd with 30 fps...the 360 should already be $150 with a 20gb hardrive...it IS already last-gen...ps3 i would still call current gen sorta...but compare these consoles to the PC....they look like the wii.

[Trroy]

Wow they let anyone write "tech" articles these days.