Sony Working On PS4 Already?

esmufc07

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http://gaming.monstersandcritics.co...brace_full_PlayStation_Backward_Compatibility

The newly released - and technically scaled back - 40GB PlayStation 3 may have arrived as a harbinger of doom for those gamers hoping to enjoy the classic joys of backward compatibility (BC), but current Net chatter suggests Sony is preparing to once again embrace BC through the PS3 and any future gaming platform waiting in the wings.


According to a job advert uncovered by German gaming site GameFront.de, Sony Computer Entertainment is presently on the prowl for a software engineer in order to develop backward compatibility for the PlayStation 3 and an unspecified next-gen console - which, given the inclusion of the PlayStation 3 on the ad, you’d have to assume is the PlayStation 4.

Sony’s employment listing reportedly outlines that the successful applicant will be tasked with creating and optimising emulation software for backward compatibility covering every gaming platform Sony has released to date, ranging from the original PlayStation through to the PlayStation 2, PSP handheld, and the PlayStation 3.

Again, another indication that development of the PlayStation 4 is moving along nicely, and perhaps that PSP emulation is finally coming to the PlayStation 3?

Sony has already filtered out its BC-equipped PlayStation 3 models from European retailers, replacing them with the 40GB version, and Japan is also set to lose its 20GB and 60GB models in favour of enhanced focus on the 40GB PS3.

However, while the cheaper 40GB model has successfully tempted more prospective consumers towards Sony’s system, its arrival has not been wholly welcomed by those who already have a sizeable collection of PS2 gaming titles that are suddenly no longer compatible with the PS3.

So, is this job ad evidence of Sony looking to implement a BC turnaround on the PlayStation 3 (and its eventual successor) after having listened to the negative feedback building since the 40GB model was unveiled - or is this simply a case of Chinese whispers from a research and development position being transmogrified into what the masses so desperately want to hear?

Either way, expect the usual wave of "no comment" statements from Sony sources in the near future, because these things never prompt a clear and detailed response from the only people who actually know anything of note.

So, think there is any truth in this? And if so when do you think it could be released?
 
Of course they are working on it. That however has nothing to do with it.

Stop reading NeoGAF!

You will see PS4 in around 2013, and it will be Cell based (no problem with backward compatibility - NONE!).
 
WeasteDevil said:
Of course they are working on it. That however has nothing to do with it.

Stop reading NeoGAF!

You will see PS4 in around 2013, and it will be Cell based (no problem with backward compatibility - NONE!).
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esmufc07 said:
:lol:Only had mine a year in March! Even if it is in development, the earliest I can see it being released is 2012/13, PS1 and PS2 lasted about 5/6 years each, so it's possible the PS3 would do the same.
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Fair enough.
 
PS4 will cost them very little, they could release it within 6 months of deciding to do so, there is no serious design work to do anymore, it's all set. The reason they spent so much on Cell is because it's an expandable technology. They could make PS4 tomorrow if they wanted - stick 8 Cells in a box with two NVidia 8800 GPUS, job done. Would cost mind. ;)
 
WeasteDevil said:
PS4 will cost them very little, they could release it within 6 months of deciding to do so, there is no serious design work to do anymore, it's all set. The reason they spent so much on Cell is because it's an expandable technology. They could make PS4 tomorrow if they wanted - stick 8 Cells in a box with two NVidia 8800 GPUS, job done. Would cost mind. ;)
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A slight contradiction wouldn't you say?
 
WeasteDevil said:
At the moment, yes! But they are not going to do it at the moment are they? :D

All I'm saying is that they have developed a scalable technology and probably paid dearly for it. All other console makers will have to go back to the drawing board for their next systems, Sony will not.
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I see what you're saying. 2008 will decide the PS3, if it still doesn't do well with all it's AAA games and Home, then you can't see a way back for it. Doubt that will happen though, too many ps2 owners out there who are just waiting for another price drop. The Wii however is just way out in front, and is continuing to sell phenomenally well, so I thin it's a race for 2nd between PS3 and 360.
 
Wii is something else, I do not figure it in the same area at all. It's a totally different market (it's a board game like Monopoly to me) - the two have split. Wii is a games console, XB360 and PS3 are not, this goes far deeper than many people realise. Why is Microsoft in this business? Why is Sony in this business? It has very little to do with games to be quite honest with you, it's rather control of the living room, no the entire house. Sony knew this when they introduced the PS1, then PS2, and now PS3.

This is not about games, it's about placing a standard control system for all your entertainment needs. This is Sony's natural ground. However, think about it, if every home on the planet was using Sony systems, this would pose a serious threat to who? Yes, Microsoft! Microsoft need to safeguard their operating systems - well, if every house on the planet was not running that, it's a serious problem. In ten years people will not have a PC box in the house - they will not, so what? Hopefully not Microsoft crap, I do not want their software controlling my fridge, it might RROD and al my food goes rotten!
 
WeasteDevil said:
Wii is something else, I do not figure it in the same area at all. It's a totally different market (it's a board game like Monopoly to me) - the two have split. Wii is a games console, XB360 and PS3 are not, this goes far deeper than many people realise. Why is Microsoft in this business? Why is Sony in this business? It has very little to do with games to be quite honest with you, it's rather control of the living room, no the entire house. Sony knew this when they introduced the PS1, then PS2, and now PS3.

This is not about games, it's about placing a standard control system for all your entertainment needs. This is Sony's natural ground. However, think about it, if every home on the planet was using Sony systems, this would pose a serious threat to who? Yes, Microsoft! Microsoft need to safeguard their operating systems - well, if every house on the planet was not running that, it's a serious problem. In ten years people will not have a PC box in the house - they will not, so what? Hopefully not Microsoft crap, I do not want their software controlling my fridge, it might RROD and al my food goes rotten!
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There is no doubting the PS3's potential as a Media Hub, and you can do pretty much everything you would want to do on it, with new features being released soon, it can go from strength to strength. For me, I bought it as a games console, I aint too fussed about the rest of it to be honest. People go on about the PS3's price point, but for what you get I think it is an absolute bargain. (Even at £425)
 
If you just bought it as a games console, you and the XBox owners come back in 12 months time, I guarantee you that even the most fervent Xbox owners will be buying a PS3. Yes, it is that powerful, it just needs to be used correctly, even the Sony software studios are nowhere near untapping what that monster of a processor can do.
 
Do many people know that there are 3 rather large chips in the PS3?

I think everyone knows about Cell BE and RSX, but the other? I will not give it a name! The one that is sitting there without any real use? ;)
 
CPU
Cell Processor
PowerPC-base Core @3.2GHz
1 VMX vector unit per core
512KB L2 cache
7 x SPE @3.2GHz
7 x 128b 128 SIMD GPRs
7 x 256KB SRAM for SPE
* 1 of 8 SPEs reserved for redundancy
total floating point performance: 218 GFLOPS

GPU
RSX @550MHz
1.8 TFLOPS floating point performance
Full HD (up to 1080p) x 2 channels
Multi-way programmable parallel floating point shader pipelines

Sound
Dolby 5.1ch, DTS, LPCM, etc. (Cell- base processing)
Memory
256MB XDR Main RAM @3.2GHz 256MB GDDR3 VRAM @700MHz

System Bandwidth
Main RAM 25.6GB/s
VRAM 22.4GB/s
RSX 20GB/s (write) + 15GB/s (read)
SB< 2.5GB/s (write) + 2.5GB/s (read)

System Floating Point Performance
2 TFLOPS

Storage
Detachable 2.5" HDD slot x 1

I/O
USB Front x 4, Rear x 2 (USB2.0)
Memory Stick standard/Duo, PRO x 1
SD standard/mini x 1
CompactFlash (Type I, II) x 1

Communication
Ethernet (10BASE-T, 100BASE-TX, 1000BASE-T) x 3 (input x 1 + output x 2)
Wi-Fi IEEE 802.11 b/g
Bluetooth 2.0 (EDR)

Controller
Bluetooth (up to 7)
USB 2.0 (wired)
Wi-Fi (PSP)
Network (over IP)

AV Output
Screen size: 480i, 480p, 720p, 1080i, 1080p
HDMI: HDMI out x 2
Analog: AV MULTI OUT x 1
Digital audio: DIGITAL OUT (OPTICAL) x 1

Disc Media
CD: PlayStation CD-ROM, PlayStation 2 CD-ROM, CD-DA, CD-DA (ROM), CD-R, CD-RW, SACD, SACD Hybrid (CD layer), SACD HD, DualDisc, DualDisc (audio side), DualDisc (DVD side)
DVD: PlayStation 2 DVD-ROM, PlayStation 3 DVD-ROM, DVD-Video, DVD-ROM, DVD-R, DVD-RW, DVD+R, DVD+RW
Blu-ray Disc: PlayStation 3 BD-ROM, BD-Video, BD-ROM, BD-R, BD-RE
 
It's only 6 SPUs, one is reserved for the operating system, the other (of the 8 shown my your asterix) is never made available for production reasons.

2 x HDMI never happened.

Apart from that it's basically right.
 
Look at his shit:

Toshiba putting Cell into TVs already....

The slide below shows four areas of development for consumer entertainment. The first box highlights the interactive features that are already offered by HD DVD, something that Toshiba was keen to point out isn't available on Blu-ray. Far more intriguing however, was the talk of Toshiba leveraging its CELL chip technology. Of course the CELL chip is best known for powering the PlayStation 3, but it was actually developed by Sony, Toshiba and IBM. Toshiba was very clear that the CELL chip will feature in future TVs, giving them significant processing power. In fact Toshiba stated that there will be TVs incorporating the CELL chip by 2009.
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5391-FutureToshiba.jpg


dg96_12.jpg


dg96_13.jpg


dg96_17.jpg
 
I'm pretty sure its true. Its like any sort of electronics, as soon as the company release something, they begin to work on the newer version almost instantly.

Sony usually release a new console every 6 years, so the PS4 won't be released until 2012.

PlayStation 1 (1994)
PlayStation 2 (2000)
PlayStation 3 (2006)
 
WeasteDevil said:
At the moment, yes! But they are not going to do it at the moment are they? :D

All I'm saying is that they have developed a scalable technology and probably paid dearly for it. All other console makers will have to go back to the drawing board for their next systems, Sony will not.
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Well said Weaste!
 
WeasteDevil said:
Do many people know that there are 3 rather large chips in the PS3?

I think everyone knows about Cell BE and RSX, but the other? I will not give it a name! The one that is sitting there without any real use? ;)
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I've heard this to mate.

I remember reading an interview with a dude from Sony and he was basically saying that there are chips within the PS3 that are currently laying dormant and that they will be, with want for a better word, switched on with future firmware updates.

He then went on to state that the PS3 has a good few tricks left up its sleeve and that the console is not even working at 50% of its ability at present.

This was from The official Playstation mag 3 or 4 months back.
 
Garethw said:
I've heard this to mate.

I remember reading an interview with a dude from Sony and he was basically saying that there are chips within the PS3 that are currently laying dormant and that they will be, with want for a better word, switched on with future firmware updates.

He then went on to state that the PS3 has a good few tricks left up its sleeve and that the console is not even working at 50% of its ability at present.

This was from The official Playstation mag 3 or 4 months back.
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The SCC (super companion chip) is a bit of a mystery; not that it is not known what it does (can do), but rather that it is in the PS3 in full blown form, yet does very little. They must be intending to use it, otherwise it would have been cut out long ago, but it's still there, even in the 40Gb models.
 
Do you still think we will see the PS4 around 2013?

It's the investment in the hardware technology, the investment in the software, and the fact the system is the real deal. In the old days, it was, "This thing is dead as a door nail in 5 years." Year one is very important, year three you're already starting to get to the other side of the hill and then there's a slippery slope. We've just passed the third year of the PlayStation 3 and we're just hitting our stride. And I don't think anyone is saying, "This is a five-year cycle; what's new on the horizon?" I can't even imagine what can be done technically beyond the PlayStation 3 in the near future. A question I often get is when we are going to see PlayStation 4. When somebody can craft the technology that exceeds what we're able to do on the PS3, but we are still just starting to harness it.

I don't know what the percentage would be, but we've clearly just scratched the surface in the PS3. You're just starting to see games like Little Big Planet, Uncharted 2, and Final Fantasy XIII, that are really taking advantage of the technology. You are going to see more and more value and more and more innovation across the board. Developers will say, "We are coming out with our big franchise on next-gen for the first time, we're bringing it to PlayStation 3. We have a 50-gig Blu-ray disc; there is so much more content and depth we can put it there." They are very open to creating unique characters for us, to really give a value-add to consumers. We talk about Batman: Arkham Asylum with the unique character in the Joker. We need innovation, we need differentiation. I think developers are getting that. They are putting the time and effort in to really make that happen.
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At the moment, I don't see a need for it. It might have a DX9 class 5 year old GPU in it, but the Cell, I still don't think they know how to use it properly. We'll see in time, but it's down to Microsoft and Nintendo now to make the move, because it's becoming very clear that XB360 can't compete on the audio-visual level. Sony don't even need to do much for a PS4, they just strap together two Cells, and put a FlexIO capable GForce 8800 in it - job done.
 
This chip within the PS3 is interesting, though consoles have had these for years to varying degrees going back to the Super Nintendo and the N64 Expansion Pack etc. etc. Whatever it does, the timeline to it will be key because if Project Natal for the 360 gets released this year and builds up a strong userbase within the next 18 months then Sony will have work to do just to keep the ship steady.

Also, whilst you discount wii from the equation, there have been murmurings in the last couple of months from Nintendo right up to their chief executive that the wii successor is under development, and if that converges back with the gaming mainstream whilst maintaining the wii originality then all bets are off.
 
The Cell is an odd thing, I'm becoming quite the expert on it. ;)

Sony, Toshiba, and IBM entered an agreement in sometime around 2000 to develop it. IBM wanted it one way (very similar to the CPU in the XB360, but with an extra core), Toshiba wanted it another way (because they want to use it in consumer electronics - don't want power hungry things), and in the Kutaragi smashes their heads together and says "we're paying the lions share for this shit, we'll have a bit of both". And so it was. The computing power per watt on Cell is quite astonishing, even now. If you look at the two most powerful supercomputers in the world, the one in second place has massive advantages over the one in first place, and the one in second place is Road Runner based on Cell. Cell has its problems in the general computing space because of how it was designed, but it packs one hell of a punch.
 
Team Brian GB said:
This chip within the PS3 is interesting, though consoles have had these for years to varying degrees going back to the Super Nintendo and the N64 Expansion Pack etc. etc. Whatever it does, the timeline to it will be key because if Project Natal for the 360 gets released this year and builds up a strong userbase within the next 18 months then Sony will have work to do just to keep the ship steady.
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Sony have been playing around with motion controllers for a long time. They didn't however do a Nintendo and make the PS Eye obligatory. If anything, the PS3 is by far the better machine to attempt something like Natal due to the power in the CPU. You need a 3D camera though.

What do you think about Sony's upcoming motion control efforts? They seem to be adamant that it can totally replace the standard controller.
 
WeasteDevil said:
What do you think about Sony's upcoming motion control efforts? They seem to be adamant that it can totally replace the standard controller.
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They look to be an imitator of the wiimote rather than natal building on the interaction for wii, to those who don't have the consoles already I'd be surprised if someone decided to buy a PS3 for it or indeed people who already have a PS3, as opposed to Natal which will probably be worth buying a 360 for if you don't have one if Microsoft do it right and not mess it up. It goes without saying there will be a massive media blitz come the autumn when Natal arrives whilst the PS3 motion controller may just fall slight under the radar.

Saying that after the 360 being on the market for five years by Christmas there can't be that many people still holding out whilst the PS3 goes from strength to strength.
 
I think that the problem that natal has is that they've moved their pattern matching algorithms onto the 360 itself, rather than having a specialised chip in the camera itself, which was what they were originally intending to do as far as I know. Is the XB CPU capable of this? I'm not too sure. Also remember, there is nothing stopping Sony using certain aspects of Natal - they have been doing it for years with the Eyetoy.

If neither of them however bundle this in as standard, it's not going anywhere.
 
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