Playstation 4 – what should/could it be?
With Ken Kutaragi (the ‘father of the PlayStation’) wanting developers input into the next Playstation in development, I thought I would write a blog with a little bit of my experience with the Playstation 3, and what I could do with in the next console from Sony.
- RAM, at least 4x the amount. I know any game/tool developer working on consoles is always going to have to squeeze as much as possible into whatever RAM is given, but having more would definitely benefit my development.
- dual core PPU, and ramp up the clock speed. This would benefit smaller games so that Sony could directly combat Xbox on the Indie development front, while also giving larger games more processing power (besides the SPUs).
- keep the SPUs. Developers have invested a lot of time, money and effort into getting game code running on the SPUs, and it would be silly to just stop this important design now. With the cancellation of larrabee it shows that the heterogeneous model of processor design is where future performance lies.
- direct communication between the SPUs and the GPU. The speed of writing/reading (in particular reading) from the SPU is a major bottleneck at the moment. Allowing the SPUs a much faster time to write/read to the GPU will help fix this bottleneck.
- better GPU. Having to have lots of SPU jobs to perform some of the GPUs functionality is silly.
- tools! While a lot of the tools provided by Sony are very good (I much prefer PS3 debugging over Xbox 360) more tool support to get things onto the SPU is always welcome. It’s what we do here at Codeplay, allowing people to access the heterogeneous hardware in an easier manner.
- libraries! Again, Sony has a lot of libraries provided which are great, but more libraries with more functionalities would always be welcome.
- integrate shader debugging into the debugger. Just a little irk of mine, but I really like that the Xbox 360 shader debugging ability is in the debugger.
I have by no means covered all the things that could be improved with a new console, but instead quickly jotted down some specific things that I have encountered in my day to day workings with the Playstation 3.
Any comments from other developers with anything they would like would give me a much appreciated insight!
Category: Goings On 16 comments »
July 7th, 2010 at 9:47 pm
[...] This post was mentioned on Twitter by Bjoern Knafla. Bjoern Knafla said: RT @sheredom: Blog: http://bit.ly/cQkhxl Playstation 4 – what should/could it be? – With Ken Kutaragi (the ‘father… [...]
July 7th, 2010 at 10:23 pm
It would be cool if you could store game saved data on your user. like in a cloud. so if your “PS4″ breaks (which hopefully not
) you wont loose your game saved data cause it is stored within your PSN ID.
July 7th, 2010 at 10:27 pm
The only point(s) I will disagree on is that I believe an x8 increase in RAM (4G overall) would be preferable (and still realistic). And the CPU, where you say to ramp the clock speed. I don’t think it’s realistic to expect much of an increase in the clock speed. However, the PPU in the PS3 is pretty sorry in its own right (in-order etc.) whereas something based on the POWER7 or POWER8 line (depending on intended time of release) coupled with enhanced SPU’s could be a major improvement even if the cores still “only” ran at 3.2 GHz.
July 7th, 2010 at 10:29 pm
I would love it if there was 4GB of RAM, I just don’t expect it. Would think there would be power & cost issues in producing an affordable console. I would set the minimum mark of RAM to be 1GB was more my point!
July 7th, 2010 at 10:37 pm
I will love the ps4 if it have an affordable launch prize. That’s how it should be
July 7th, 2010 at 11:26 pm
IF PS4 turns out to be way too much, then fuck it I’ll just be buying or make my own PC Gaming rig. that’s of course if SONY blows me away with tons of new and really upgraded features. like major ones that turn meh on.
July 7th, 2010 at 11:38 pm
but i still love my NES
July 7th, 2010 at 11:38 pm
i hope MS and SONY join together to make one console !!!
this WILL benefit both companies !
one super console, rain of awesome games, no fanboyism and everyone happy !!!
ahh my dream …
July 8th, 2010 at 2:26 am
I’m not real familiar with all the Hardware inside the PS3 but I always found it weird that Sony didn’t put more RAM into the PS3, with all the other high end pieces of Hardware in it they skimped on the RAM? I would have at least thought they would have put at least 1-4GB of RAM in the PS3. I mean around the time the PS3 was being released most computers were releasing with a minimum of 4GB of RAM in them, so why skip out on the RAM with the PS3?
July 8th, 2010 at 4:41 am
[...] it comes to the expectation of the Sony PlayStation 4 we all have our own theories, such as Neil Henning. He has a few ideas as to what features should be included in the successor to the PS3 – one of [...]
July 8th, 2010 at 10:29 am
correction, father ken did not want developers in on hardware design that was kaz sonys new CEO.
Wolf26pack , where did you get the 4GB minimum idea?
ps3 released in 2006, i bought a top of the line gaming notebook from Asus exactly 12 days before the ps3 released and it only had 3GBs of RAM in it.
most notebooks only had 1, 2 max only the high gaming spec notebooks had 3.
only now have laptops started to come with 4GBs of RAM, i just bought a toshiba X500 which cost me 3500 AUD and it only came with 4GBs of RAM, which i upgraded to 12.
they did not add in more RAM because the type of RAM they use is faster than even DDR3 RAM and it is extremely expensive!
if sony added even just a extra 512MBs of RAM they would of had to increase the price and i think the price was already way too expensive!
id like to see sony keep the cell BE arrangement with the ps3, keep the architecture increase the PPE from 1 to 2 increase the SPUs from 8 to 16.
GPU wise id like to see IMB and intell take a shot at it, not Nvidia because all they will do is take a old GPU spaz it up a little like they did with the PS3.
the RSX is based on the freaking 7 series for gods sake, ancient history!!!!!!!
RAM wise same stuff as the ps3, just increased from 512 to 4GBs.
it MUST have backwards compatibility support, im talking ps1, ps2 and ps3 and even PSP.
add in a HD upscale so i can play my ps1,ps2, ps3, PSP games in full HD and full screen not the tiny 6×6 inch screen i currently get with my PSP!
All its games should be 1080P 120FPS all the time.
i can not believe allot of ps3 games are only 720P 30FPS.
what happened to the 1080P 120FPS father ken promised us at E3 in 2006?
it MUST have USB 3.0 support.
it MUST have 2 HDMI ports so i can hook up 2 screens.
it MUST have a proper wireless card inbuilt, and proper PSN servers.
for some reason i can download a full PC game through steam, a 4GB + game in the time it takes me to download a 1GB demo on my ps3.
i can not figure out why the hell the internet on my ps3 is so god dam slow!!!!!!!
o, and please bring back the piano black finish with the touch sensitive buttons.
i really miss that from the original ps3.
sure it was a finger print magnet, but who cares?
it looked 10 times better than the ps3 slim, even the new 360 looks better than the ps3 slim!
July 8th, 2010 at 2:35 pm
Loving the points Neil, didn’t thinbk they were going to make another one
, I like point 3, I heard the PS3 is the hardest conesole to devolp for?
July 8th, 2010 at 2:37 pm
It can be hard to develop for, its true. That’s why my company make tools to unlock the power of the SPUs quickly!
July 9th, 2010 at 7:55 am
XD …. can give the ps4 more flexible with mouse and keyboard???
July 9th, 2010 at 7:58 am
ps4??? cool… XD … can give the ps4 more flexible with mouse n keyboard???
July 15th, 2010 at 1:24 pm
Be my guest! As long as the post is linked back to this website and my name is put to it I am happy with you talking about anything said!
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