Sony working on PlayStation 4?

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Sorry couldnt help myself lol:

Sony is reportedly looking into technical specifications for a PlayStation 4 console, despite recently stressing its commitment to the PS3's ten-year lifecycle.

http://www.digitalspy.co.uk/gaming/news/a193060/sony-working-on-playstation-4.html

when will people realise that a PS3 life cycle of 10years doesnt meen no new console for 10years ?

we have ps3 but ps2 is still going. Simples !
 
Kreeeee said:
They started work on it before the PS3 was released.
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Yup. If you bought an i7 on the day of release, to the manufacturer you are buying last year's tech already.

I have no doubt that all current console manufacturers are halfway through developing the next gen consoles.

However, as with anything, they will not release the next gen while the current gen are selling so well. The 360 came out in 2005 and with Nato out in 2010 I really can't see a new xbox until xmas 2011 at the earliest.
 
the best thing about waiting another 2 years is it wont be a rush job and the leapfrog in graphics should be greater.
remember the 1st ps3 and xbox360 games. they looked good but were only slighty improved graphics but at much higher resolution.
 
I reckon it's entirely possible and even likely that a lot of the technology in the PS4 will be derived from the PS3, because they've spent a ridiculous amount of money on R&D for it. I would not be surprised if it used a more modern iteration of the Cell processor at the very least. Developers are getting comfortable with the unique design, so there's a lot to be gained from keeping the technology going. Moving to a completely new design has innumerable risks.

Sony will not want to be repeating the PS3 launch; an overpriced console with developers struggling to make sense of it and barely utilizing the capabilities of the system.
 
KNiVES said:
I reckon it's entirely possible and even likely that a lot of the technology in the PS4 will be derived from the PS3, because they've spent a ridiculous amount of money on R&D for it. I would not be surprised if it used a more modern iteration of the Cell processor at the very least. Developers are getting comfortable with the unique design, so there's a lot to be gained from keeping the technology going. Moving to a completely new design has innumerable risks.

Sony will not want to be repeating the PS3 launch; an overpriced console with developers struggling to make sense of it and barely utilizing the capabilities of the system.
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Sony initially considered Cell and Intel's Larrabee-based systems, but opted against the approach due to the need for more power. After also dismissing a Synergistic Processor Unit, the firm instead gravitated towards a multi-core CPU.

no cell by the sounds of it or am i getting it wrong?
 
KNiVES said:
I reckon it's entirely possible and even likely that a lot of the technology in the PS4 will be derived from the PS3, because they've spent a ridiculous amount of money on R&D for it. I would not be surprised if it used a more modern iteration of the Cell processor at the very least. Developers are getting comfortable with the unique design, so there's a lot to be gained from keeping the technology going. Moving to a completely new design has innumerable risks.

Sony will not want to be repeating the PS3 launch; an overpriced console with developers struggling to make sense of it and barely utilizing the capabilities of the system.
Click to expand...

That was always Sony's intentions. They were very open about using multiple updated Cell processors (at least as supporting processors) in future iterations of the PS brand.
 
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I can't see the next generation of consoles being that much of a jump forward in power as the cost of developing games for the consoles is becoming far too expensive. With regards to what CPU they use my guess is it would be a modified Cell design with 3 or more PPU rather than the 1 the current cell process has and with 10 or so SPE to allow backwards compatability.
 
I'm also thinking it will be Cell, But Cell how it was meant to be. Not the broken Cell\GPU combo we got in PS3.

Although it'll be a better spec than the current Cell obviously
 
mglover070588 said:
Yup. If you bought an i7 on the day of release, to the manufacturer you are buying last year's tech already.

I have no doubt that all current console manufacturers are halfway through developing the next gen consoles.

However, as with anything, they will not release the next gen while the current gen are selling so well. The 360 came out in 2005 and with Nato out in 2010 I really can't see a new xbox until xmas 2011 at the earliest.
Click to expand...

Sounds about right, I think it may have been on noridichardware where they had an article stating next gen was in the 2012 time frame, due largerly to the ecnomic crisis.

As a mainly PC gamer, I am having a hard time putting up with the low rez on the current gen consoles, hoping for some full HD next time round, but, by 2012, arent we making the tranisition into those ultra HD monsters?

Suppose the goal posts are always moving.
 
interesting thread with mature posts (and with no evidence of any fanboyism!)

imho this is the way i think its being played out:

the next gen are ~half way through the development cycle

until they are released the next gen consoles are being constantly improved, resulting in a constant increase in performance

both ms & sony will release their next gen console when its right to strategically command any market dominance

in other words both main parties wont release their next gen consoles until its financially sound to do so. also the "specs" of the next gen consoles wont be "set" until its necessary to send it to market
 
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Another report.
http://www.andriasang.com/e/blog/2009/12/25/ps4_cell/

Quote:

Technology writer Hiroshige Goto has shared a few insider tips on the future of the PlayStation brand in the latest installment of his Weekly Overseas News column at Impress Watch.

Previously, Goto reported that Sony was looking both into a Cell-based and Intel Larrabee-based architecture for PlayStation 4.

Regarding Larrabee, in summer 2008, Sony began looking at the architecture, apparently because high ranking officials at Sony had expressed interest. Now, it appears that Larrabee is out of contention due to 3D graphics pipeline performance issues and low power efficiency.

Regarding Cell, some time in 2008, the company asked game publishers what they'd want of a Cell-based PS4 in terms of number of SPU co-processors and what kind of programming difficulties they've been having with the current design.

According to Goto, Sony, IBM and Toshiba recognized some of the problems programmers were having with Cell and, early on, came up with a couple of plans for fixing the issues. Included in these was a plan for something that was at one point called "SPU2." This new version of the SPU would shift the 256 kilobyte local store space that's included on each SPU chip into the role of a hardware management cache, allowing the SPUs direct access to main memory and allowing programmers to program for a single memory space, similar to a standard PC CPU (for Japanese readers, the original article explains this in much greater detail).

Goto says there are signs that some time this summer, Sony was looking into using this updated SPU design in the core of the PS4. At the very least, he says, the design was a strong candidate.

However, he's recently started hearing about other plans. While he's unable to get into the specifics, at a broad level, the new plans call for a PC-like multicore setup.

Goto also provided a few guesses as to when we'll see the next generation of hardwaree. He believes that because Sony, Microsoft and Nintendo, are looking into architecture solutions now in 2009, the next generation will come around 2012. The reason for this is that it takes 24 months to take a system from concept to production.

In addition, he expects next generation portable systems like PSP2 to precede the release of next generation consoles.
 
i wonder what kind of effect new hardware will have on the console dev pipeline, as it stands games require a large amount of optimization, if you think of how important normal mapping has become it makes me wonder weither in the future we will see a leap is visuals considering high detail assets and shaders are developed then cut back anyway.
 
what people dont get about this 10 ten year cycle is that its nothing new and effects nothing, the ps2 still has games released to this day, thats what is mean with the ps3, that they intend for games to be made for it in 10 years time. that doesnt mean ps4 can be released in 2012 at some point
 
With the PS4 sony definitely need to keep the pricing of the unit reasonable otherwise they're gonna lose out again like they did this gen.
I was a PS fanboy and bought a PS1 & PS2.I never bothered with the original xbox and was planning on getting a PS3 but got fed up of waiting for it to come out plus the pricing put me off as well.
 
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Guess it was a slow news day - why wouldnt Sony/MS already be thinking of next gen? Hell I wouldnt be surprised that they havent decided the general architecture and now its just an issue of costing and working out when launched what speed of tech is required. Im more interested in what MS are going to be upto, since its kinda a given Sony will still be involved with Cell...

Sony just need to ensure it has decent tools/support for developers to buy in as early as possible to mitigate any coding difficulties so that its not only 1st tier developers releasing games on launch day. Also the next gen PSN needs to be far more consumer/gamer centric - without Xbox Live MS wouldnt be in such a dominant position IMO...

ps3ud0 :cool:
 
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