PlayStation 5 uncovered: the Mark Cerny tech deep dive [Digital Foundry]

[Deleted member 60993]

I bet PS5 will be using something as efficient and capable like liquid cooling along with their innovative heatsink patent that is at the bottom of the board with rods going through the board and touch components. This way it will be silent and the SoC will be cool, though I bet the air it is pushing out through the back and/or top will be hot as hell -> meaning a successful cooling. And I think it will have some bizarre form factor that is really small, maybe even smaller in volume than the dev kits, not sure how it compares to SeX, might be similar in volume.

 

[Axel Stone]

Pretty sure they were being sarcastic.

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Ah, my mistake.

I taught English as a foreign language for several years. Old habits and all that.

 

[BobLoblaw]

English is not my native, is blow out of the water means has minor edge ?

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Clearly, 1.2 blows 1.0 out of the water. (Means major)

 

[McScroggz]

It sounds like they have boost clocks and are trying to rewrite the narrative to make people talk about the boosted frequency as the baseline rather than the standard running frequency.

"No, no, no. This isn't a 3.5GHz cpu that boosts to 4.6GHZ. This is a brand-new innovation, it's a 4.6GHz cpu that can lower itself to 3.5GHz"

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That's not even remotely accurate.

 

[sncvsrtoip]

Clearly, 1.2 blows 1.0 out of the water. (Means major)

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:d

 

[Calabi]

One thing I'm still not clear on... does the power limit on the PS5 allow for both the CPU and GPU to run at their highest/capped frequency? I'm guess no or otherwise there would be no need to divert power.

If not, then what I'd be curious to know is what is the highest possible CPU frequency when GPU is running at max frequency and what is highest possible GPU frequency when the CPU is running at max frequency?

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The CPU and GPU are not the only factors in the power limits there's the SSD Drive and also the Tempest engine whatever its called and who knows what else. The power limits are the sum of the whole system surely? Also are people forgetting its a 16 thread 8 core CPU maxing the utilisation on them all the time will be really difficult leaving power left over.

 

[lukeskymac]

Maybe both can execute NOP at peak frequency.

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Damn you got the whole squad laughing.

 

[zeuanimals]

I bet PS5 will be using something as efficient and capable like liquid cooling along with their innovative heatsink patent that is at the bottom of the board with rods going through the board and touch components. This way it will be silent and the SoC will be cool, though I bet the air it is pushing out through the back and/or top will be hot as hell -> meaning a successful cooling. And I think it will have some bizarre form factor that is really small, maybe even smaller in volume than the dev kits, not sure how it compares to SeX, might be similar in volume.

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I dunno about liquid cooling. Part of the reason people buy consoles is for their portability compared to PCs. Can't really be portable if there's a high chance of leaks.

 

[pixelation]

Man looking at the newly released TLoU 2 screens, I can't really imagine how good 1st party PS5 games are gonna look.

 

[zeuanimals]

Man looking at the newly released TLoU 2 screens, I can't really imagine how good 1st party PS5 games are gonna look.

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Now that it's delayed, what are the chances ND are gonna work to make it look crazy good as a cross-gen PS5 launch title?

 

[pixelation]

Now that it's delayed, what are the chances ND are gonna work to make it look crazy good as a cross-gen PS5 launch title?

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I think it's a cross gen title TBH, if that ends up being the case I'll wait until it launches on the PS5 and play it there.

 

[Wollan]

Now that it's delayed, what are the chances ND are gonna work to make it look crazy good as a cross-gen PS5 launch title?

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4K, 60fps, quality AA, higher quality textures (maybe already set aside for an intended PS5 update). All that's needed really. I expect it to be one of the most visually beautiful next-gen launch game with these attributes. It's likely the most expensive game ever developed in-house at Sony.

It won't explore what's only possible on next-gen though in terms of game design. I'm guessing whatever Guerrilla's cooking up will demonstrate that quite well.

 

[lukeskymac]

Now that it's delayed, what are the chances ND are gonna work to make it look crazy good as a cross-gen PS5 launch title?

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Zero. They're not going to delay it until the PS5 launches.

 

[dabri]

I disagree. I've followed most discussions on this subject and the question has always been how often will the clocks stick to these frequencies in real-world conditions.

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Pretty sure that's the whole point though. When the clocks don't need to stick to those frequencies to maintain the performance required, they will downclock to save on power/ heat.
If needed, both cpu and gpu can and will hold max clock speeds to maintain (or try to) the performance requirements.


Now I think a better question is how heat is a factor. If the system is drawing too much power and too much heat is being generated (say on a launch PS5 4 years after release with some dust built up inside), is it going to operate worse than it did at launch due to trying to maintain certain heat levels?

 

[Praedyth]

What I got is that the downclock is only a thing if the workload is heavy (and obviously devs would know beferohand), thus is perfectly normal for the game to run everything at max speed if the workload isn't that power demanding. Then Smart Shift comes into play when you have a light workload in CPU and a heavy one in GPU (just an example), this way Smart Shift lends the unused power budget from the CPU to the GPU (with or without downclocking the CPU, depending on it's own workload). With respect to the profiling tool, since many games are crossgen it makes sense to throttle the CPU and push most power into the GPU, but as the generation evolves devs would need to be more mindful of their workloads if they want to achieve the maximum clock on both. (This is what I got)

I think what's most exciting of the cooling solution is that it'll need to dissipate an specified amount of heat in a wide range of room temperatures. You know, life over the tropics is pretty different from life between the tropics. Maybe liquid nitrogen? /s

 

[RingRang]

Pretty sure that's the whole point though. When the clocks don't need to stick to those frequencies to maintain the performance required, they will downclock to save on power/ heat.
If needed, both cpu and gpu can and will hold max clock speeds to maintain (or try to) the performance requirements.


Now I think a better question is how heat is a factor. If the system is drawing too much power and too much heat is being generated (say on a launch PS5 4 years after release with some dust built up inside), is it going to operate worse than it did at launch due to trying to maintain certain heat levels?

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I would think it's still going to have variable fans that can ramp up to keep things below a certain temperature. Hard to imagine performance would degrade over time. That would be an absurd design flaw.

 

[EVIL]

Now that it's delayed, what are the chances ND are gonna work to make it look crazy good as a cross-gen PS5 launch title?

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Below zero, not gonna happen. It is a PS4 title and the most advantage it will have on PS5 is in whatever way they deal with PS4 gen games on the new machine (solid 4k 60fps performance but thats it.)

 

[Bold One]

Man I just want to see what this SSD can do y'all.

Fucking Destiny 2 with instant load times!!!!

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Oh god...

 

[2Blackcats]

Below zero, not gonna happen. It is a PS4 title and the most advantage it will have on PS5 is in whatever way they deal with PS4 gen games on the new machine (solid 4k 60fps performance but thats it.)

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What? You don't think they'll give the PS5 version a little tlc? Why wouldn't they update their biggest game to take advantage of PS5?

 

[TsuWave]

Below zero, not gonna happen. It is a PS4 title and the most advantage it will have on PS5 is in whatever way they deal with PS4 gen games on the new machine (solid 4k 60fps performance but thats it.)

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I doubt they are not going to touch it up for PS5

 

[Deleted member 60993]

I dunno about liquid cooling. Part of the reason people buy consoles is for their portability compared to PCs. Can't really be portable if there's a high chance of leaks.

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Well they are designing a console from the ground up, so I'm sure Sony engineers can figure out a way to make liquid cooling fool proof and easily portable. Maybe this method can be considered as something worthy of Cerny saying: "As for the details of the cooling solution, we're saving them for our teardown, I think you'll be quite happy with what the engineering team came up with."

It has to be either unique vapor chamber with a great heatsink and an exotic fan, or a complete liquid cooling solution with a radiator incorporated into their design philosophy and hidden, with a quiet inconspicuous fan. Also I believe the form factor has to incorporate the V shape of the dev kit somehow. Now I have seen from other places that there is a rumor it can be in pyramid shape but personally that is too far fetched. But if you consider how these rumors start it can be a complete gibberish or it can be someone describing it to others and how others might interpret a V shape they're told into pyramids in their minds and run with it, so there might be some truth behind it.

 

[Prototype Viktor]

PS5 threads are something else these days.

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back in my day we had to walk uphill in the snow to see this many alt accounts and only like half of them banned

 

[FIREKNIGHT2029]

PS5 threads are something else these days. I didn't know we had so many alt accounts and fanboys on Era lol.

 

[Cup O' Tea?]

I remember 2 or 3 years ago thinking it was unlikely console manufacturer's would adopt SSD's. Not only was I completely wrong, they're skipping regular SSD and moving ahead to NVMe. I will never make a hardware prediction ever again.

 

[Transistor]

PS5 threads are something else these days. I didn't know we had so many alt accounts and fanboys on Era lol.

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Let's not fuel that fire, ok?

 

[FIREKNIGHT2029]

Let's not fuel that fire, ok?

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Sure. I'll stay on topic, I was just noting a pattern I noticed lol.

I remember 2 or 3 years ago thinking it was unlikely console manufacturer's would adopt SSD's. Not only was I completely wrong, they're skipping regular SSD and moving ahead to NVMe. I will never make a hardware prediction ever again.

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🤣 I was the same 3 years ago. I thought SSDs would be too expensive for next gen consoles. I was damn wrong lol.

 

[褲蓋Calo]

Okay so genuine question. I'm not understanding the comments being made regarding CPU/GPU peaks and clock speeds. They're called variable, as in can fluctuate/are not fixed, but then as I understand it Cerny has confirmed both can run at max simultaneously? So why are they labelled variable? And don't just say "cause they run at different clocks depending on how intensive the game is" cause, like, don't all consoles/games do that? And then I've seen comments saying "if it's a more intensive game and there isn't enough power, one or the other will lower it's clocks accordingly". How does that pair up with both being able to run at peak performance? Is both running at peak only for very short bursts? Educate me.

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Damn you got the whole squad laughing.

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Okay, on a more serious note: Frequency is only part of the story, (at least on the CPU side) you have to look at the utilization of functional units, too. Modern CPUs have many, many different functional units within, but not all of them have to be working at the same time. One example that Cerny mentioned is AVX256, AVX256 unit is very power hungry, some CPUs even underclock when using it, but if the game engine doesn't use it at some moment, the power can be spent elsewhere. Another example, for games that only make use of 6~7 hardware threads, they may want to disable SMT to ensure the threads it runs run at best performance(highest clock). In both examples, the CPU may be running at maximum frequency, but not using all of its power budget.

 

[lukeskymac]

I could feasibly help with path tracing.

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I think it's more likely that some intersection engines will be used help Tempest than the other way around, IMO.

 

[Samanosuke Akechi]

Has this been discussed?

PlayStation 5's rumored heat issues should be solved in final console

Sources say the PlayStation 5 runs hot, but Sony should compensate with a powerful cooling solution.

www.tweaktown.com

"The heat problems may force Sony to redesign system's cooling and chassis design. Reports say current PS5 design is failing due to overheating and compare it to the Xbox 360's dreaded RRoD thermal issues. Now we understand why the PS5 devkit has massive ventilation."

 

[lukeskymac]

Yes, it's a bunch of bullshit and the fallout of it has caused multiple bans over the last ~5 pages. I'd take it down if I were you.

Edit: Oh god they're actually using that amateur-ass X design on the article

 

[bsigg]

Man I just want to see what this SSD can do y'all.

Fucking Destiny 2 with instant load times!!!!

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I'm really interested to see how games like Destiny 2 work with BC. Considering the PS5 will load exponentially faster than the PS4, will you still be stuck in orbit if you're waiting for someone a PS4 to load? Same goes for The Division 2, at what point is the loading so fast you're now stuck waiting for the network.

 

[Anatole]

EDIT: Deleting this post to stay on topic, because I didn't realize this was the Digital Foundry thread. This post originally expressed skepticism towards the tweaktown article.

 

[Nostremitus]

I think it's more likely that some intersection engines will be used help Tempest than the other way around, IMO.

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Really? It sounds pretty robust if it's capable of consuming 20% of the system's total power if allowed to go all out...

 

[TCG276]

I watched the full Cerny talk the other night and to me it seemed pretty clear if you listen to what he says that PS5 has legacy modes for base PS4 and Pro and can run those games in the native modes just fine, out of the box. The contention seemed to come from the next part which was specifically about the equivalent "Boost Mode" where some titles may run into issues, just as some titles didn't run well on the Pro in boost mode, and how there may need to be updating or specific titles to work properly in boost mode. But ultimately the PS5 can replicate running as a base PS4 or Pro just fine. People then wilfully misconstrued the entire segment and his wording and came up with totally different takes that made it sound like compatibility was on a title by title basis and not that many games.

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I hope you're right but if what you're saying is true, I don't understand why Sony went out of their way to update their blog to try and clarify BC on PS5 but failed to mention that PS4 and PS4 Pro legacy modes will play all of your PS4 and PS4 Pro games on day 1. It seems like an enormous oversight to not make that crystal clear, especially considering all the misunderstanding surrounding BC on PS5.

 

[freeradical]

Edit: Oh god they're actually using that amateur-ass X design on the article

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Didnt read content. Scrolled down page, saw that image and my reaction was "Nope!". That was enough for me.

 

[Rex1157]

Has this been discussed?

PlayStation 5's rumored heat issues should be solved in final console

Sources say the PlayStation 5 runs hot, but Sony should compensate with a powerful cooling solution.

www.tweaktown.com

"The heat problems may force Sony to redesign system's cooling and chassis design. Reports say current PS5 design is failing due to overheating and compare it to the Xbox 360's dreaded RRoD thermal issues. Now we understand why the PS5 devkit has massive ventilation."

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Yeah that source is very questionable and the original poster privated their twitter account after Jason Schreier called him out.

 

[jroc74]

I remember 2 or 3 years ago thinking it was unlikely console manufacturer's would adopt SSD's. Not only was I completely wrong, they're skipping regular SSD and moving ahead to NVMe. I will never make a hardware prediction ever again.

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That's right, didn't even think about this, lol.

Wild, isn't it?

 

[lukeskymac]

Really? It sounds pretty robust if it's capable of consuming 20% of the system's total power if allowed to go all out...

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Thing is, Sony has only talked about audio processing regarding the "last centimeters" of sound reaching your ears... the HRTF stuff has nothing to do with sound propagation, reverberation, and occlusion between its source point and the player - this, on the other hand, was Microsoft's focus with Project Acoustics. One way to deal with it is to make those calculations with rays from the intersection engine (this is also implied in that one slide from the tech reveal with multiple uses for raytracing). Another is to make a simplified waveform simulation (what Project Acoustic does). I guess you could use Tempest itself for it, but we don't know how taxing it would be - this would certainly decrease the number of distinct sound objects it can manage to process in time.

 

[Zukuu]

Man Sony sure made sure no consumer is excited about PS5.

Why aren't they showing games?

 

[WhiskerFrisker]

Has this been discussed?

PlayStation 5's rumored heat issues should be solved in final console

Sources say the PlayStation 5 runs hot, but Sony should compensate with a powerful cooling solution.

www.tweaktown.com

"The heat problems may force Sony to redesign system's cooling and chassis design. Reports say current PS5 design is failing due to overheating and compare it to the Xbox 360's dreaded RRoD thermal issues. Now we understand why the PS5 devkit has massive ventilation."

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Where do you guys find these no name sites from? And if it's the same person who made that tweet earlier, they got shut down by Jason.

Man Sony sure made sure no consumer is excited about PS5.

Why aren't they showing games?

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They just delayed their biggest game release indefinitely. You tell me.

 

[Hey Please]

Has this been discussed?

PlayStation 5's rumored heat issues should be solved in final console

Sources say the PlayStation 5 runs hot, but Sony should compensate with a powerful cooling solution.

www.tweaktown.com

"The heat problems may force Sony to redesign system's cooling and chassis design. Reports say current PS5 design is failing due to overheating and compare it to the Xbox 360's dreaded RRoD thermal issues. Now we understand why the PS5 devkit has massive ventilation."

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Here go. Round 2.

Ground Hog Day Le Thread

 

[Samanosuke Akechi]

Yeah that source is very questionable and the original poster privated their twitter account after Jason Schreier called him out.

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Oh ok. Wasn't sure. Stumbled upon this today at work.

 

[lukeskymac]

What? You don't think they'll give the PS5 version a little tlc? Why wouldn't they update their biggest game to take advantage of PS5?

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I think we both interpreted that post as "delay TLOU so it launches with PS5", which would be ridiculous. Of course ND is going to do *something* with it for PS5, but I don't expect a separate SKU.

 

[Deleted member 1003]

Well the article clearly disproved the idea that the CPU and GPU would have to tradeoff performance to run at the higher clocks which was something that seemed to be the case from the presentation.

I also thought the test between the two GPU's normalizing the TFLOPS with a 36cu and 40cu GPU was pretty interesting. I would not have thought you would see any material performance change when the FLOPS were the same but that was an interesting result.

Also nice to clear-up what appeared to be conflicting information where both sides turned out to be right (hearing from developers the need to "lock" clocks being a feature of the Devkit vs. final HW)

It looks like they have done something super interesting here which I admit I'm still wrapping my head around. Nice to get a little more detail and clarity on some of these points from DF.

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Hey, thanks for the input. I'm always interested in reading from those who understand this stuff better than me.

 

[DeoGame]

Yeah that source is very questionable and the original poster privated their twitter account after Jason Schreier called him out.

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That said, Jez Corden and another WindowsInsider guy backed up the source and I trust Jez. Although Jez said they may have fixed it already.

 

[nolifebr]

Man Sony sure made sure no consumer is excited about PS5.

Why aren't they showing games?

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If there was one thing that the TLOU2 delay without a new date proved, it was that Sony most likely is not thinking too much about the future at the moment. They will hardly show some PS5-only games if they are not sure that the console will be released in 2020.

But yes, I agree that they should have shown games. The hardware narrative is on Microsoft side and this is unlikely to change during the whole generation.

 

[BobLoblaw]

Has this been discussed?

PlayStation 5's rumored heat issues should be solved in final console

Sources say the PlayStation 5 runs hot, but Sony should compensate with a powerful cooling solution.

www.tweaktown.com

"The heat problems may force Sony to redesign system's cooling and chassis design. Reports say current PS5 design is failing due to overheating and compare it to the Xbox 360's dreaded RRoD thermal issues. Now we understand why the PS5 devkit has massive ventilation."

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True or not, I'm very interested in their cooling solution (more than even the design of the system). 2.23 GHz is no joke and I struggle to see how they can manage that under certain conditions (like high temp/humidity environments).

 

[OnPorpoise]

If a source is largely just a quote from a comments section and apparently not collaborated by anything else, maybe we shouldn't signal boost such low-grade stories.

 

[Ravage]

That said, Jez Corden and another WindowsInsider guy backed up the source and I trust Jez. Although Jez said they may have fixed it already.

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WindowsCentral is about the last place I'll look for reliable PlayStation news.

 

[Decarb]

That said, Jez Corden and another WindowsInsider guy backed up the source and I trust Jez. Although Jez said they may have fixed it already.

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It could point to what Cerny said, that they were having issues with earlier design pushing the GPU beyond 2Ghz. It also means that info is way outdated.