Again, with that Radeon chip!
IGN is churning the speculation mill again with reports from their “sources” of the hardware being used in Sony’s next-generation gaming console. According to them, the PlayStation 4, allegedly code-named Orbis, will sport a central processor based on AMD’s Llano A8-3850 APU and feature a Radeon 7670 for the GPU.
The A8-3850 Llano APU is one of AMD’s CPU/GPU hybrid chips that has a Quad-core 2.9 GHz CPU and a Radeon 6550HD GPU built-in. The Radeon 7670 is a re-branded budget card that was formerly the 6670 with a performance comparable to the GTS 450, making it weaker than a GTX 260. Just how Sony would plan to use these two chips in conjunction remains to be seen, but it isn’t without precedent; the Cell processor was considered to be an early CPU/GPU hybrid itself.
If you’ve been paying attention to the past rumors, you’ll notice that this states the PS4 and Xbox 720 will have virtually the same graphics processor.
If true, this may be a disappointment for many hardware enthusiasts: none of this would even come close to the Unreal Engine 4 specifications that Epic Games has been pushing. GTX 680 chip? We’ll have to wait and see.
Source:
IGN
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Going the APU route makes some sense, but the HD 6550 on-die GPU will not work miracles. However, they’re claiming that the on-die GPU will work in tandem with the HD 7670 similar to a Crossifre configuration. If this is possible, then both GPUs operating at the same time would make the systems performance a bit more feasible. But, all of this sounds a bit too unlikely. They did go with the first unified shader architecture with the XBOX 360 GPU. So, a hybrid Crossfire configuration using the on-die GPU isn’t completely out of the ball park. I just think that the end product will probably come packaged with a more capable GPU (at least I hope so).
Another important aspect is the amount of memory. Developers maybe complaining about the lack of performance, but a much larger number of developers are complaining about the lack of video and main memory. I’m sure we’re going to see at least a few gigs to give developers more leg room. In the end, if they decide to go with the HD 7670, they can immediately throw their 10 year life cycle philosophy out the door.
Insert “What is this shit” picture here.
I seriously hope this is far from the truth. It will be a power increase compared to current consoles but it offers an even more limited lifespan… Unless that’s the idea? Cheaper consoles with less time between each other?
Could work… if the consoles had backwards compatibility… -_-