Playstation 4

[Sides]

OMG it happend!
PS4 adds proper external storage support over usb! source: gematsu.com
It finally happend and I think like me a lot of people are going to be happy about it. Additionally the upcoming firmware will add a boost fucntion to ps4 pro machines to boost old game like bloodborne, that don't and probably will never receive a ps4 pro patch.
So if you never owned a ps4 get a pro!

[felix]

How exacly does the boost work? since if they're frame locked that's that.

[Sides]

Originally Posted by felix

How exacly does the boost work? since if they're frame locked that's that.

Not 100% sure, but some of the older games never actually met the targetted framerate, like bloodborne. If the game is locked to let say 30fps, like a lot of first wave games, they were actually running around 20-30fps. With the boost/overclock now, those games will be much closer to the targetted frame rate. This mean the game will run much more smoother.
Other games that have variable framerate will obviously see a much larger boost. But bear in mind, apart from giving some older games a performance boost, it can also break other games.

[felix]

Oh I think I know now.

I remember reading that for compatibility sake they made it so if a game wasn't patched it would run at only half the power (ps4pro is essentially a 2x ps4 with 2x independent graphics cards). This boost probably is a overwrite for that, so that you can tell the ps4pro to forget compatibility and just use full power regardless.

Yeah that would work. It should produce at least stable framerate like you say. Then again best layed plans still fall apart quite easily when pitted against the real world. Hopefully they've tested this and have had some success.

[Dextro]

Originally Posted by felix

Oh I think I know now.

I remember reading that for compatibility sake they made it so if a game wasn't patched it would run at only half the power (ps4pro is essentially a 2x ps4 with 2x independent graphics cards). This boost probably is a overwrite for that, so that you can tell the ps4pro to forget compatibility and just use full power regardless.

Yeah that would work. It should produce at least stable framerate like you say. Then again best layed plans still fall apart quite easily when pitted against the real world. Hopefully they've tested this and have had some success.

It's a bit more complex than that: the GPU compute unit count is effectively doubled (18 to 36) from the original PS4 to the Pro (Sony won't admit it but they basically did it to allow PSVR to reach the target 1080p resolution) while the CPU remains unchanged in core count and architecture. There's also a newer architecture in the GPU but it's just a minor bump with some newer features and better power optimizations, not much in the way of Instructions Per Clock (IPC).

The real change is the frequency at which they operate. The PS4 had 1.6GHz for the CPU core while the Pro has 2.1GHz (1.3x) and the GPU got bumped from 800MHz to 911MHz (1.1x) and, more importantly, RAM bandwidth got upgraded from 176GB/s to 218GB/s.

The problem is that the Pro currently, when running an unoptimized game, will shut down half of the GPU compute units and downscale frequencies to match exactly the original PS4 in specs (including RAM bandwidth).

Theoretically what Sony is doing now is the same as Microsoft did with the XBox One S: they removed that cap from old games and let the system use the full resources available. I'll give a 50/50 chance on whether Sony has actually unlocked the full 36 GPU compute units though.

CPU clock and RAM bandwidth in particular should prove very effective at reducing stuttering from many of the games that originally failed to reach their target framerates. Remember that the original PS4 system design was slightly unbalanced in favour of the GPU with a large amount of compute units compared to what would be expected with Sony hoping that developers would use the GPU to offload traditionally CPU bound tasks (and Mark Cerny said has much in the original presentation).

The XBox One, for example, has 12 compute units versus the 18 in the PS4 and that's not an unbalanced system (just mildly lower spec than the already mediocre specs of the original PS4).

As a Pro owner I'm very happy that this is coming but also that the new update seems to clean up the notifications menu.

[felix]

When do ps+ games usually switch?

Originally Posted by Dextro

As a Pro owner I'm very happy that this is coming but also that the new update seems to clean up the notifications menu.

As a fellow Pro owner happy here too.

[Dextro]

Originally Posted by felix

When do ps+ games usually switch?

I think it's Wednesday but I'm not 100% sure.

[TnAdct1]

Originally Posted by Sides

OMG it happend!
PS4 adds proper external storage support over usb! source: gematsu.com
It finally happend and I think like me a lot of people are going to be happy about it. Additionally the upcoming firmware will add a boost fucntion to ps4 pro machines to boost old game like bloodborne, that don't and probably will never receive a ps4 pro patch.
So if you never owned a ps4 get a pro!

One more cool feature worth mentioning: the update will PSVR owners to use the VR headset to watch 3D movies.

[Dextro]

According to the folks at Digital Foundry it looks like my bet on the GPU core count was right on the money:

The working theory we have is pretty straightforward. In graphics-limited tests, boost mode consistently delivers a 14 per cent increase in frame-rate and we suspect that it is not coincidence that the GPU clock speed bump from base to Pro hardware is 111MHz - pretty much exactly 14 per cent. The suggestion is that when running base mode with boost active, the Pro 'half' of the larger GPU remains inactive, but additional clocks are deployed instead.

Meanwhile, the CPU appears to enjoy the full benefit of the additional power the Pro provides. The Assassin's Creed Unity tests we carried out show an almost linear scaling in performance - 23fps gameplay on base scales to 30fps in boost mode, exactly in line with the additional 31 per cent of CPU power the Pro is capable of delivering. Drops to 22fps on base see boost mode hit 29fps - we've hit the limit there in terms of the improvement offered by the increased CPU clocks. Project Cars' impressive 35-38 per cent increase? Perhaps this is a combination of all of the boost mode's CPU and GPU upgrades.

[Chosen_Hero]

[Chase]

Coming to the west this fall

[Sides]

It is up and real! Taiko is back on PS home consoles. Hori will be making the new taiko drum
http://taikops4-ses.taiko-ch.net/
Hopefully the hori controller won't be too expensive to import.

In case someone missed it, .hack//G.U. Last Recode was announced which will include .hack//G.U. Vol. 1//Rebirth, hack//G.U. Vol. 2//Reminisce, and hack//G.U. Vol. 3//Redemption remastered(?). Anyways you can read more on Gematsu, siliconera, aso
btw it will be on pc as well

[Kid Ryan]

Kohl's will be selling the 1TB PS4 Slim for $199.99 during Black Friday, plus you'll get $60 in "Kohl's Cash".

Source 1: https://www.reddit.com/r/PS4Deals/co..._slim_1tb_for/
Source 2: https://slickdeals.net/f/10693448-ko...hl-s-cash-more