Earlier this year, rumors began to fly that Sony would release an upgraded version of the PlayStation 4, a console often called the PS4.5 or the PS4K by fans and press. Today, multiple sources have confirmed for us details of the project, which is internally referred to as the NEO. No price was provided, but previous reports indicate that the NEO would sell at $399. At time of publishing, Sony has not returned our request for comment, but we will update this story if the company responds.
The NEO will feature a higher clock speed than the original PS4, an improved GPU, and higher bandwidth on the memory. The documents we’ve received note that the HDD in the NEO is the same as that in the original PlayStation 4, but it’s not clear if that means in terms of capacity or connection speed. Starting in October, every PS4 game is required to ship with both a “Base Mode” which will run on the currently available PS4 and a “NEO Mode” for use on the new console.
I’m not sure what to think of this. It just feels like this wouldn’t go down well with consumers who just bought a regular PS4, and developers would have to actually worry about all of this, do additional testing, possibly extra coding, and so on. It feels needlessly convoluted, especially since the PS4 isn’t that old to begin with.
Meanwhile, Microsoft claims it isn’t interested in doing this, but you can bet your vanilla red pinky that Microsoft would follow suit in a heartbeat if this turns out to be a success.
As someone who never owned a console, can someone explain the appeal of a console compared to a PC?
It seems to me that the PC wins on almost every possible angle one might have.
– cheaper: software and nowadays even hardware.
– upgradable: just replace the RAM or GPU when you need it.
– extendible: different controllers, cameras, gadgets
– more versatile: can also be used as a HTPC, server of web browsing machine.
– more choice in software.
Only disadvantage I can think off is that the PC isn’t really a ‘turn-key’ living room device, though nowadays PCs are just as small and fast bootable as a console.
This upgrade is making the point for PCs too I think as it shows that consoles are often behind the curve on the hardware front a few years after they are initially released.
Only two reasons I bought a PS4.
1) my PS3 decided to randomly not read blurays or DVDs or both.
2) I only had a PS3 so that my brother and I could play more cooperative games.
Number two is the only real advantage I see (maybe if you absolutely have to have some exclusive titles!) because so many times the exact same game on a PC doesn’t have local co-op mode. Nope, they rip that out of the PC version specifically so they can force people to buy twice as much (hardware / software). If you’re like my brother and have an old Laptop that can barely play anything newer than 2013, then a console is the only way to go.
Only other advantage I see goes hand in hand with one of the disadvantages of a ‘PC’, and that’s hardware conflicts, or the operating system sucking (Windows *cough*). While you can upgrade the snot out of your computer, that means games will end up being buggier due to having such a wide range of hardware to support, whereas consoles all have the same hardware… well until Sony mucks it up. This will be the same thing as the SegaCD, or JaguarCD. Add-ons never sell correctly. And if this PS4 Neo is required for their VR headset, that’s going to fail miserably too.
I don’t see this as a good idea at all. I had read the rumors, but I definitely wouldn’t buy an upgraded PS4. I hardly take advantage of the hardware I have now. Maybe Bloodborne, but the rest of the games I have for it also run on the PS3 and don’t look any different.
Upgrading PC hardware means changing drivers, and every driver for a PC video device has a list of games fixed by the new driver, and an even longer list of games broken by the new driver. AMD’s advice for when a new driver breaks your favorite game? Downgrade the driver to the older version.
Traditionally, this isn’t a problem for consoles since they always have the same hardware. This might become a problem for Sony depending on how compatible the upgrades are with the old hardware.
the answer to that is simple…stay 1 or 2 driver versions behind. I’ve been AMD exclusive both at the shop and in my family since 07, how many driver issues have I had? None, how? Always stay 1 or 2 versions behind.
And just ignore those game lists on release notes as I have yet to see a game where they made any impact. its always “ohh we added 4 FPS on this action scene” well whoop de fricking doo. Staying a version or 2 behind I’ve never had an issue with any games that would work on bleeding edge and not on stable, and getting rid of the mess that is bleeding edge saves a LOT of headaches.
And now that it looks like Sony and MSFT are gonna be releasing new $400 consoles every 2 years (and lets be real, that is what it is, with devs on YouTube talking about how vanilla PS4 is just gonna get bad textures and lousy framerates while the 4.5 gets the love like vanilla 3DS is now) its actually cheaper to go PC as you really do not need to upgrade much to stay kicking. Heck the oldest is still using a Phenom II X6 from 2010 and paired with an R9 280 that cost a whole $130 on sale he can play the latest shooters and RPGs with lots of bling.
With the consoles using weak x86 APUs this gap will be with us for quite awhile so that $500 system you put together now can easily be gaming 5 years from now at 1080P with lots of bling.
That was/is a an issue. I love coop too and I created a second PC game desktop just to play Left for Dead with my wife. But there are only few PC games out there were you can hook up 2 controllers to one PC though it is getting better.
I think this is the key right here. People keep telling me that PC gaming these days is basically a hassle-free experience where you don’t have to dick with drivers and shit anymore. Of course, people also said the same thing about desktop Linux in 2001, so you can forgive me for being skeptical
People will say just about any bullshit they can think of to push their platform(s) of choice.
As for the console itself, if they put in a 4k blu-ray player and you have a 4k TV, that might be a pretty compelling reason to buy one.
Uhhhh…PC gaming really IS now, as long as you use common sense. Simply 1.- Don’t go downloading random crapware from the Internet, and 2.- Always stay one or two versions behind on drivers. let some other sucker run bleeding edge and find all the driver bugs FOR you, then you get the nice bug free version a year or so down the line.
I’ve had my entire family exclusively on PC gaming since 07 and thanks to hardware vastly outperforming software its actually been waaay cheaper than the consoles, the hardware also lasts longer. the wife is in fact playing her games on my hand me down Phenom II X4 from 2009 but with an R7 250 plays her World Of Warships and her RPGs just great in 1080P and the only upgrade I’ve had to do to it in 5 years is a $50 SSD to cut down the boot time.
But if you want to know the real reason you should look at PC gaming? Because its a perfect example of a free market in action. I can buy games from Steam, GOG, Origin, Amazon (both retail and digital),Humble Bundles or direct from the game devs themselves and because of all that competition? There is a wealth of games to choose from at all price points and prices drop faster for PCs than for consoles for triple A titles.
With both Sony and MSFT running AMD X86 APUs you are essentially buying a PC anyway, you are just buying one locked with DRM to a single digital market and limited retail channels so they don’t have to compete. With Win 10 Insider being free you can easily put together an AMD APU PC that games well for sub $300 USD if you need a cheap way to get into PC gaming and for me having real open market competition is the clincher, because thanks to having so much competition I have spent less on gaming per year than I ever did on consoles while getting a lot more, so many in fact my steam library is filled with games I haven’t even gotten around to playing yet.
It’s a wonderful thing indeed once you understand hardware and what to search for and I do relate to it.
This unfortunately does not apply to everyone just searching for singing alone in front of a TV or playing pool with the stick.
Going blindfold into buying PC hardware won’t get you the performance that you need everytime unless you know what you are doing.
In all honesty it’s been getting better today to buy good PC hardware because most manufacturers are focusing on gaming performance as much as they can.
This may very well be one of the usability aspects that will keep the PC market in shape for the next years.
Everyone else has already shifted to consoles, tablets and cloudops.
Edited 2016-04-23 07:24 UTC
You have teh YouTubes? Well there ya go, just look up “Cheap gaming PC” and take your pick. Heck most even have partspicker links so you don’t even have to remember what parts they list, just click on the links and nearly all of them have footage at the end showing how the completed build handles games so no guesswork required.
If you want the easiest to put together? Grab one of the AMD quad APUs, tons of builds using those and showing it play games like BF 4 and if you want to upgrade down the line? Just get an AMD graphics card and you can use Zerocore which will turn off the card when you are not gaming and just use the APU which lets it save a lot of power.
Frankly its never been easier to throw together a PC, you have videos that will walk you step by step, you can literally build a gaming PC that only has 3 parts you have to install (board, APU, and SATA SSD, as you can get plenty of nice cases with PSU and fans already installed) and thanks to HDMI and USB plugging it into a TV is plug and play simple.
Last time I bought a console, it was cheaper than a PC, had better graphics, plugged into your TV, and used cartridges…
Well, some advantages:
-Turn it on and go – okay, less of an advantage now, because you have to deal with software updates and what-not (Fark you, Microsoft, for bringing this “feature” to the console market), but it’s at least simple to do
-Guaranteed hardware compatibility – you don’t have to deal with driver or hardware issues, you don’t have to worry that your game is optimized for nVidia when you have an AMD
-HTPC, especially with the newer consoles. Maybe no DVR capability (Not sure, don’t have any), but they all have Netflix, Amazon Video, play DLNA content, YouTube, too.
-No need to upgrade RAM or GPU “when you need it”, because you never need it. All the games target that single config
Often times consoles are cheaper for what you get, especially at launch. Sony and Microsoft both sell their systems at a loss early in the product cycle, and keep margins really thing throughout the lifetime of the system.
Many consoles get exclusive games or content, especially for blockbuster games. Or, lately, better versions (Often, PC versions are a shitty afterthought)
Plenty of Indy games make it to the consoles, also, since Unity3D and other toolkits are available. Even MonoGame runs the XBox and PS4!
But, generally, they’re much simpler to use for most home users, very app-centric, like cell phones.
Sadly, PS4 doesn’t do DLNA yet… It hasn’t been a problem for me, since I have a Plex server and there is a Plex app for it.
I play video all the time through DLNA on my PS4,
I use the Playstation Media App. It’s fast and better than the media app on the XB1.
Cool, I wasn’t aware they’d added that in yet. When I tried looking it online (granted this was probably a year ago when I first got my PS4) it wasn’t capable of doing that yet. Granted, as I said my Plex/DLNA server are the same anyhow at this point, so it was more for other things that’ll do DLNA, like my phone.
I can see your points, it’s convenience but are PCs not quite stable enough by now? In the end it is just clicking an icon to launch a game?
For me the biggest gripe is the price of a game. New games are 60 euro and even older games are often at least 20. I rarely buy PC games > 20 euro and most games drop under 10 after 2 years.
Granted you don’t have to (can’t) upgrade the hardware on a console but it’s quite nice to be able to play a game on Ultra settings after an upgrade of a GPU on a PC.
Stable maybe, but there are always issues, like being dumped back to the desktop when the game’s still running because something or other needed to tell you something really important. There’s also the occasional notification that tells you your display could be quicker if you change your settings, which again dumps you back to the desktop and often at a critical moment. And then you get driver updates that need to be installed, which then need some games to be patched to work around newly discovered glitches. Then you’ve got virus checkers deciding to do a scan or popping up a notification while you’re playing… The end result on a PC will almost always look better, but there’s a long way to go yet before a PC can match any console for convenience and “just working”.
It’s weird that people gripe about the price of games so much, even when they’ve remained flat or are even cheaper, even for blockbusters.
23 years ago, I paid $83 for Final Fantasy III for the SNES. Chronic Trigger was $65 or so a couple years later.
Not sure I would agree that pcs are cheaper. I wouldn’t think of running new titles on a pc that cost the same as a ps4/xbox these days. I mean, I’d spend more on a work computer with onboard graphics, for petes sake.
Though there’s a lot to say for a PC, console hardware is much cheaper in comparison (and typically sold with a loss). A high-end GeForce is more expensive than an entire PS4!
I agree, but I also get the impression that my gaming interests are different from the market as a whole:
– I am interested in fun games, not necessarily the latest release.
– The games I enjoy are usually “PC exclusives”. They are more likely to be ported to Linux than consoles.
– Even if they are ported to consoles, the PC version of the types of games I play are usually better.
– Even if they are ported to consoles, the PC version of the types of games I play usually support mods. I find third-party mods more interesting than DLC in most cases.
As for the convenience of consoles, I don’t see the benefits anymore. They are yet another computer to maintain (configuring, installing games, dealing with updates). Now that Sony is pushing more significant hardware updates, I can only imagine the compatibility situation becoming more complex.
Cost is another issue. I will pay full price for a recent game that I’m intensely interested, but the market for older games is much more competitive. Since most of the games that I play are in the category of, “they aren’t quite worth that price,” I can wait and get them for a pittance.
For me, it’s performance and money.
Games that are released to run on a console are optimized for the best performance and graphics settings so you just enjoy the game.
The same games that run on my PC leave me in an endless tweaking cycle to see how high I can get the graphics settings and still get good FPS and performance. You’re supposed to be having fun but instead you’re wondering, “Hey, there’s some slowdown here, let’s fix it.” Or, “Hey, let’s see if we can get that texture sharper without sacrificing FPS,” and “What about those improving those shadow and water effects?”
You don’t have to do that on the console and you just enjoy the game.
Get better hardware peasant!
One thing people never mention is that a lot of old PC games just don’t work on Windows without fiddling.
I love Rome Total War (not the awful sequel) and getting it running on Windows 8 and above requires googling. AA isn’t supported anymore (dunno why). Red Alert 2 took me 4 hours of fiddling to get working … Unreal doesn’t work unless you roam the web for patches.
Also some games belong on a Console rather than a PC and vice versa. Rome doesn’t work on a Console and Street Fighter doesn’t really work on a PC (yes I know they have a port it isn’t the same, especially if you are a semi serious player like me).
Edited 2016-04-20 16:03 UTC
the way i understand it – you have a fixed configuration hardware, games are optimized for it.
you have a guarantee to be able to play the games for it like the developer intended, if the developer knows what he’s doing – games run great.
with pc you might run into various compatibility issues, sometimes you have to pick specific drivers for better performance with games – basically a bit of a hassle sometimes. and old games might not work at all.
So how’s your PS3, PS2 and PS1 games running on the PS4 again?
If you’re going to state that you can still launch those on the old consoles, then my answer is you can also still boot an old PC with an old Windows for the same old PC games..
true, but you need a separate pc.
ps4 has various games from older generations ported over, and they are supposed to work well. i don’t have a ps4 to say for sure.
Price is something to consider as well.
To have a really good PC that can play all games, you need som really hardcore graphics and in some cases cpu.
For an console, you get games that are optimized to be running on that single hardware/platform. No stutter, no selections of appropriate resolution based on hardware and so on.
Personally for me it’s the “feature” of not caring about the hardware/software. You have a box and some thingy you use to control it and that’s it.
I don’t want to use windows, haven’t touched it for years now and do not want to pay for it just so I could play games.
I own a laptop that I use for work too and when choosing build options I went with not including a dedicated GPU (so less noise, more battery) – meaning that the choice of titles to play is greatly diminished. Also there is no need for a dedicated “desktop” space.
You know, after reading these points I believe I should be the perfect Steam Box buyer (-.
In reality that is all this is. It wont be long until there is a two tier market at play. New games, new console only. Nintendo and others tried similar in the past, but they kept it under control (3ds vs new 3ds) but already its starting to happen there too.
With all new games being required to also operate with the original PS4 that will not happen.
What is sure to happen is that AMD will take some nice benefits from this in a new surge in sales as will Sony. Microsoft will surely copy this and release an update console. Maybe they’ll call it the XBox One Two?
In addition, the software changes will likely be about 0%. The API and such will be the same, so game developers will simply need to support two levels of detail or effects. The easiest, and therefore most likely, way for this to happen is through resolution, AA, post-processing, AI, and other changes rather than providing two sets of textures.
In the end, the changes for the games will be relatively minor, with Game A only doing real 1080p+ on the Neo, for example.
Probably not AI (Or physics, for that matter), since that will mean the game will play differently for each version.
Possibly higher-resolution textures, but not too likely, since the amount of RAM is the same.
The easiest graphics improvements would be draw distance, increased tessellation, particles, and higher framerate, followed by improved post-processing/shader effects.
I believe the solution will sadly be similar graphics (little differences) but 20-30 fps on PS4 and 60 fps on the Neo…
As someone who values 60fps more than the graphics quality, I hate that idea but I bet this is what is going to happen.
Maybe, but I doubt it. Game makers have no incentive to cripple their games on the older systems, since they get no money from new console sales. Having a games with half the frame rate would only hurt sales.
Besides, tesselation is super cheap, at least in terms of programming effort. Adjusting draw distance is, too.
If you take old examples of “upgrades” to consoles;
Expansion port for N64, optional, but required for many games (Zelda)
32X for the Mega Drive, optional, but required for some games (Star Wars but cant think of many others as it was a bit of a flop)
The “requirement” to make the game backwards compatible will quickly fall by the wayside if economics demands it.
If EA (or any other big games company) say they will only make their 2018 version for the PS4K then Sony will drop that “requirement” in a heartbeat rather than let XBox get the exclusive
There were only three games that required the N64 Expansion Pak: Donkey Kong Country (which launched with the Expansion Pak bundled), Perfect Dark, and the second (and better, IMHO) Zelda game, Majora’s Mask, which were all published by Nintendo
60 other games could use it, typically for higher resolution textures, or just higher screen resolution.
You know the 90s were over a while ago, right?
Games are done at the engine level. Nobody in their right mind is hand coding games anymore.
Yeah having to support 2 HW levels is not ideal, but its far more trivial than what you guys are making it out to be.
They’re already did, actually.
AMD just hinted they had 3 new console SoCs.
I thought this was supposed to be a bolt-on box for powering the upcoming 3D hardware, not an entirely new upgraded system.
1 – Add-ons ALWAYS fail.
2 – Making an all new system was probably cheaper than an add-on.
It is “bolt-on” motherboard =)
Yeah, double work will be true the first 2 or 3 months after the release of PS4.5… then all developers will focus on 4.5 and games will run horrible in the original PS4 with no testing at all and no guarantees at all. Sony opened the Pandora box.
But all of this shit was pretty obvious to me (and anyone with a basic hw knowledge) because Sony used low-end off-the-shelf x86 hardware for its console. A very short life cycle was somehow expected.
In fact, PS4 and XBone were shamelessly outdated from day 1… they weren’t even capable of running modern games at 1080p 30fps!! Console fanboys denied it, but that was the truth.
The long 8-year cycle PS3 and 360 had, was possible thanks to customized ahead of its time hardware. With this low-end x86 shitty hardware, in just 2 years, We will be in the same problem as today because 4K native games need much more muscle than a barely “updated” PS4. Mark my words.
Edited 2016-04-20 02:44 UTC
There are only 2 HW profiles dude. It’s pretty trivial in the grand scheme of things.
The real question becomes, will the VR headset for PS4 fully support the older models.
Hey the only reason at this point I’d get a PS4 Neo is if they added in the backward compatibility that the PS4 should have had from the beginning!
I have tons of PS1-PS3 games that go unplayed because my fatty PS3 (second one) has weird issues.
PS1-PS2 is possible.
PS3: I wouldn’t count on it due to the weak CPU the PS4 has.
It’s fully possible, but only by recompiling the games. Seeing as that’s how MS did all their BC on the XB360, many game devs are now used to that. I expect many PS3/XB360 games will get recompiled for the PS4/XBOne.
> Yeah, double work will be true the first 2 or 3 months after the release of PS4.5… then all developers will focus on 4.5 and games will run horrible in the original PS4 with no testing at all and no guarantees at all.
Bullshit. There are currently 35M PS4 consoles, PS4.5 will be lucky to have an install base of 3M 3 months after launch
It wasn’t that the hardware was “shitty”, it was that both Sony and MSFT were trying to get it to do things they were never designed for. I mean would you call the Intel Atom shitty for not running the latest CoD at 60 FPS? No because it was never built for gaming…and neither is the AMD jaguar.
Look up the original white papers for the Jaguar and AMD spells it out quite clearly, its a quad core APU (the one in the consoles is just 2 quads bolted together in a MCM) that was designed for tablets, netbooks, and laptops. It was built to compete with the Intel Atom (hence why I mentioned it) while giving you slightly better CPU performance and MUCH greater GPU performance while still staying in the power budget of a tablet or netbook. Sony and MSFT bought ’em because they were cheap, were low power enough they could overclock ’em a bit and stay within their power budget…oh and did I mention they were cheap?
But you can’t slap racing stripes on a Pinto and expect it to compete with Porsche, and you can’t take a sub $50 ULV netbook chip and expect it to be competitive with even a $400 PC built with the AMD desktop APUs, its just not designed for that function.
1) It is not off-the-shelf, but seriously customized.
2) After 3 years, devs just scratched the surface of the tech.
“It just feels like this wouldn’t go down well with (…) developers [who] would have to actually worry about all of this, do additional testing, possibly extra coding, and so on.”
The very same developers are probably also developing for XBox and PC, and PC developers deal with that and much more all the time. Also, the upgrade seems trivial: just more powerful hardware, not totally different one.
They used to use custom cartridges, with code that was very hardware specific.
Then the PS1 era started and the media became standard and most programming was C based.
And so on.
We are getting close to the point where the Console OS is the more important part jigsaw than the hardware.
Look at Nintendo, they essentially ran three generations of console on upgrades of the same basic hardware Gamecube to Wii to Wii U. They were all essentially PPC CPUs + AMD GPUs just scaled up twice.
I fully expect the NX to be a platform, not a console. Nintendo is now in the Khronos Group and that is telling. Vulkan will more than likely be the API for graphics on the NX.
So look on the bright side, more OSs for OS News
You’re buying a current Android phone in Europe. It comes with Chrome as the standard and best web browser on the platform. Can you choose your search engine ?
I tried to use duck duck go, I couldn’t.
You can choose Bing or Yahoo (who have paid to appear here ?).
Still don’t see a problem here ?
Edited 2016-04-20 15:51 UTC
I do believe you posted this for the wrong article. That sounds like one for the Android monopoly article.
Anywho, DuckDuckGo makes an iOS and Android app to use their search engine that’s (supposedly) far better than trying to use the PC web page. That’s common in the mobile world and will continue as long as mobiles are rather different from PCs.
Whoops – was for the post above this one… not sure how it didn’t come under it. :/
Edited 2016-04-20 20:16 UTC
This is horrible idea and it might well lead to downfall of Sony, and the rise of a new console player. You can’t half-ass this sort of thing. You’ll just end up alienating players and developers.
Sony would be better off waiting a year and then announcing a whole new next gen platform.