Hardware Test: PlayStation 4

Digital Foundry's in-depth take on Sony's next-gen console.

[jackanderson1985]

damn you MariaHelFutura just about got it submitted before me

[sigfredod]

Greatness is here!!
What is curious is that firmware updates are no longer downloadable on your PC and flashable via USB storage - they're only available via retail disc and the internet. LOL big fail there Eurogamer

[jackanderson1985]

unless you're not in america then it's a 2 week wait

[Sarcasm]

Not really, it's still awaiting until I pick it up Friday Midnight

[KwietStorm_BLM]

What the hell why would they even say that. That's just like machinima saying the PS4 camera is a $100 add-on, right from the damn PlayStation event.

[imt558]

Very weird :

Max Temp 40 Degrees Celsius 41 Degrees Celsius 44 Degrees Celsius 45 Degrees Celsius
Power Draw 80W 100W 131W 140W
Noise: Close 42dB 42dB 51dB 53dB
Noise: 1 metre 40dB 40dB 42dB 42dB
Noise: 3 metres 40dB 40dB 41dB 41dB

ComputerBild had a different measures.

After 10 minutes of operation
PS3: 0.83 sone
PS4: 0.815 sone

After 60 minutes of operation
PS3: 2.1 sone
PS4: 0.83 sone

0.83 sone is about 28db

http://new.livestream.com/a...

[MasterCornholio]

I don't think this matters but Computer Bild was given a debug unit.

I have no idea if that has anything to do with it. But if I were to guess I would say that results depend on the enviromnent more than anything.

Nexus 7 2013

[imt558]

Very weird :

Max Temp 40 Degrees Celsius 41 Degrees Celsius 44 Degrees Celsius 45 Degrees Celsius
Power Draw 80W 100W 131W 140W
Noise: Close 42dB 42dB 51dB 53dB
Noise: 1 metre 40dB 40dB 42dB 42dB
Noise: 3 metres 40dB 40dB 41dB 41dB

ComputerBild had a different measures.

After 10 minutes of operation
PS3: 0.83 sone
PS4: 0.815 sone

After 60 minutes of operation
PS3: 2.1 sone
PS4: 0.83 sone

0.83 sone is about 28db

Sry! Double post

[TheXD305]

40° in idle
41° in watching a blu-ray
44° in playing a game
and 45° in game+UI

[HxCGamer]

Hey guys,
If anyone wants to play on friday. Add me: DanF425
I got KZ, FIFA and AC4

haha I just realized how childish that sounded... "let's go out and play GUIZZZ!"""

[TheXD305]

Someone on IGN comments posted this

The main components being compared are CPU, GPU, RAM, and BUS. This is what we know thus far, weeks from launch:

CPU:

PS4 = 8 core Jaguar processor. 1.6 GHz. 1 thread per core, and 2 ops per thread, for a total of 16 ops according to Sony.

X1 = 8 core CPU processor. 1.75 GHz. No detailed structure thus far, but Microsoft has confirmed that it performs 48ops total.

Point: X1, at the above specs, X1 CPU will have up to 3 Times the performance of PS4 CPU.

GPU:

PS4 = AMD SI based GPU. 800 MHz. Organized as 14:4 GPU: GPGPU split with 2 disabled CU’s. 1.84 Tflops of Raw performance.

X1 = AMD SI based GPU, 853 MHz. Again, no detailed structure thus far from Microsoft, but they have confirmed 768 ops per clock. 1.3 Tflops Raw performance

.

Point: PS4, PS4 has a 30% more raw Tflop count, as well as additional ROP’s, and ACE’s that should aid it in rendering. X1 structure has been silent as to the GPU internals it should be noted.

RAM:

PS4 = 8 GB of GDDR5. 176 GB/s Bandwidth.

X1 = 8 GB of DDR3. 68 GB/s Bandwidth + 47 MB of ODESRAM, 204 GB/s or higher Bandwidth.

Point: TIE. X1 has gone with a cheaper, faster, but more complicated route, the system should have no problem pushing around about 190-200 GB/s between the pools of ram as stated on Digital Foundry interviews, but this will come at a cost of more complicated use. The PS4 on the other hand went with a more expensive, but easier to use single pool of fast ram with a higher latency (opposed to X1's two pools, one extremely fast, one slow), but should be easier to develop for.

BUS:

PS4 = 3 Bus Pipelines. Onion, Garlic and Super Onion. These allow for HAS and Huma operations between processor and GPU in connection to the GDDR5 RAM.

X1 = 8 Bus Pipelines, 2x256 Bit Buses with 4 lanes each. One pipeline to the ODESRAM, and one to the DDR3 RAM. Additional Bus Pipelines to the CPU on both the DDR3 and the ODESRAM, as well as various Bus Pipelines to the Audio, Video, and Memory controllers and Kinect.

Point: X1, as it may be a more complicated solution with the multitude of Bus Pipelines and structures to all of these components, however the two main Pipelines are extremely robust: 2x4 lane 256 Bit Bus Pipelines will be able to move a MASSIVE amount of data while allowing the GPU/CPU to offload the work to the other systems like sound and memory.

OPTICAL DRIVE:

PS4 = BluRay

X1 = BluRay

Point: TIE. MS wised up and went with the most popular physical media currently.

HDD:

PS4 = 500 GB Removeable. 5200 RPM.

X1 = 500 GB Permanent. 7200 RPM. + 8GB Flash Memory HDD.

Point: TIE. PS4 HDD is removable, but slower. X1 is permanent, but faster, with an additional Solid State Flash Memory Drive.

EXTERNAL HDD:

PS4 = Will support after launch for storage.

X1 = Will support after launch for storage, game installation, HDD extentsion.

Point: X1, as game installation and ADD extension to external drive means it will actually be easier to increase disk space on the X1 than it will be removing the internal HDD on the PS4.

[hello12]

Kind of explains why there is virtually nothing between games on both consoles.

The XB1 isn't as weak, as some people thought.

[RBlue_Desire]

That CPU could provide an advantage.

[russo121]

Of course it is not a weak system - far from it. It only can't do 1080P, that's all...

Edit: Sorry, my mistake - it can do 1080P upscaled - now it's correct.