A Japanese gaming magazine are today claiming to have received a blueprint for Sony’s Playstation 4 roadmap. The supposed official document highlights a number of the PS4’s technical features and details how the PS4’s development will progress.

Here’s a computer generated translation of the Japanese article, so my apologies if it isn’t all too correct. If anyone would like to translate the information properly the original Japanese article can be found here.

The PS4 with the development of CPU-Cell B.E.


Sony Computer Entertainment (SCE) is the next game console “PLAYSTATION 4 (PS4)” a, Cell Broadband Engine (Cell BE) are starting to take full consideration based architecture. Currently, much of the reaction GEMUDIBEROPPA, said that the stage of exploring the concrete implementation. The SCE, PS4 generation PS3 production costs are lower than at the same time and generation, seems to be a way to curb investment to continue development architecture.

Cell BE with SCE PS4 are still kept away from the possibility that, for now, Cell BE & expansion seems to be moving in that direction based on the improved version. SCE was originally a PS3 at the stage of concrete projects, Cell BE architecture PS3 was planning to continue in subsequent generations. Therefore, over the huge cost, to endure over the long term development as a CPU developed the Cell BE architecture. Cell BE-based PLAYSTATION original plan was put in a magnificent sight on the distributed computing network in the end.

Related source: (url) [www.ps4forums.org]

PS4 to Dump Blu-Ray for Holography?

by Matthew on May 14, 2009

 

As ever, rumours are still moving around the net about the arrival of a PS4 in a couple of years time. No official specs or even a mention have been found yet except for a few comments made by Sony people saying the expect there to be more and more playstations over the years.

The next question asks if Sony will dump blu-ray in favour of holography. Some content over on the NY Times recently indicated that GE were researching storage capacity on holographic disks (HVD). The technology has been around a few years but isn’t yet available on the market. A theoretical 3.9 TB of data could be stored if the companies working on it get it right. Given those numbers and the time left until a PS4 launch (2012 at a guess) it would appear that HVD’s might be the way forwards.

“This could be the next generation of low-cost storage,” said Richard Doherty, an analyst at Envisioneering, a technology research firm.

 

As of now the technology is expensive, but given a few years and a lot more research we could see prices drop to a more normal and acceptable level.

As well as being capable of playing HVD’s it would be possible to be backwards compatible too making all your old DVD’s and Blu-Ray discs compatible. This would add convenience to the system while allowing the limits to be pushed on the cutting edge games of the new generation.

Of course you also have to wonder if the PS4 will completely do away with an optical drive and go based on downloadable content only. With Virgin Media testing 200 Meg connections at the moment in the UK there might not even be a need for optical storage on the device (titlehough we do understand that not every country would have access to fast connections).

 

Source: PS4Talk.com (http://www.ps4talk.com/ps4-to-dump-blu-ray-for-holography-05140831/#more-222)

 

Speculation is rife that the next console battle will be fought around 2012-2012. This is when Crytek's CEO Cevat Yerli and industry analyst Colin Sebastian believe that a potential Xbox 720 and PS4 could appear.

Recycling PS3 for PS4

To imagine what a PS4 might be capable of we should look at what the current PS3 doesn't have or doesn't do well. For starters, Sony will need to closely integrate the hardware and software development for its next console.

According to SCEA's CEO Jack Tretton: "The hardware guys developed the [PlayStation 3] fairly independently, then dumped it onto the software guy's lap, effectively saying 'do something with it.'"

Considering that Sony spent around $3 billion developing the PS3, it seems likely that it will use an improved version of the Cell processor for a PS4. IBM has already released an improved version of the Cell for its blade servers. The PowerXCell 8i is a 65nm chip, with support for 32GB of DDR2 memory and eight fully-functional SPEs (compared to seven on the PS3).

The advantage of recycling the Cell is that Sony could retain a familiar development environment and use existing code libraries. The modular design of the Cell architecture could also allow extra Synergistic Processing Elements (SPEs) to be added to future chips. Twenty or more SPEs might be possible on a single 32nm Cell processor.

And if increasing the on-chip SPEs isn't an option in the proposed 2012-2012 time frame, then a PS4 could incorporate multiple Cell chips. IBM's Cell roadmap includes a PowerXCell 32iv, which appears to feature four PPEs (Power Processor Elements) and 32 SPEs, ie four Cell chips running in parallel.

Inside the PlayStation 4

If the PS4 is a revamp of the PS3, we're likely to see some obvious technology upgrades – 802.11n to replace the existing 802.11b/g chipset; an external power supply (to reduce the size of the box and to improve cooling); a massive hard disk; new graphics processor and an increase in the onboard memory.

The memory architecture in the PS3 splits 512MB equally between graphics and application use and it's been suggested that this limits developer freedom. You'd expect the PS4 to address this issue, giving developers more dedicated memory in which to load game levels. titlehough it's worth pointing out that the PS3 (and any future Cell-based consoles) can use the SPEs for maths-intensive tasks like physics.

New graphics processor

What about a replacement for the PS3's NVIDIA-built RSX graphics processor? We've already speculated that Microsoft could use Intel's general purpose Larrabee chip in its next Xbox to handle real-time physics and AI. Rumours also suggest that Intel is pimping Larrabee to Sony for the PS4.

Like any Xbox 360 replacement, the PS4 is also going to have a much bigger hard disk. This will be in readiness for a wetitleh of downloadable content that will include games, demos, music, movies and TV shows. A terabyte HDD isn't out of the question. And in a world that will increasingly be looking to online services for content, does any PlayStation 4 still need a Blu-ray drive?

A PS4 without Blu-ray?

While the PS3 was instrumental in helping Blu-ray beat off HD DVD, there's a strong argument for dropping an optical drive from the PS4 titleogether. Console owners are already downloading gigabytes-worth of game demos, video trailers, full-length movies and TV shows. With a giant hard disk in the PS4, games could simply be piped straight to the console on release day; long install/level load times would be eliminated.

Along with the Cell processor, the Blu-ray drive is one of the PS3's most expensive components. The PS3's high price has forced it into third place behind the Nintendo Wii and Xbox 360. Sony will be keen not to price itself out of the next console battle.

As Acclaim boss Dave Perry recently claimed: "Because of the cost of making the PlayStation 3 and because they sold it at a loss, Sony basically has pretty much no chance of making money on the PS3, because it's lost more money than they made during the entire peak of the PlayStation 2 – it's not going to happen again for Sony."

Sony can't simply slash its prices like Microsoft has recently. And Blu-ray is partly to blame. Billy Pidgeon, an analyst at market researcher IDC points out: "Blu-ray licensees would be threatened by pricing the PS3 below stand-alone Blu-ray players. The PS3 is a bit challenged on that side."

Chasing the dream of a digital hub

Do consumers really want a PlayStation 4 that does everything? Sony's next console needs to be a machine that plays the best games. Just like the PS2 did. The PS4 could go one of two ways – a premium all-in-one box that offers Blu-ray, integrated playTV and a much larger hard disk; or a pure games machine, stripped of its expensive technology in favour of mass market appeal?

Whatever the PS4 looks like, the final question to be asked is: when will it launch? Sony's Kaz Hirai has already given us a hint: "If you look at the history of the way we've managed our console business," he said, "we always try to hit a 10-year life cycle "

That might put any PS4 launch back to 2016. But when you consider that the PS2 is still chugging along in the shadow of the PS3, a PS4 could easily sit alongside and overlap the existence of the PS3.

 

Article by Dean Evans.
This page is taken from Techradar.com
The full article can be found here: http://www.techradar.com/news/gaming/consoles/playstation-4-everything-you-need-to-know-464657