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RUMOR: PS4 CPU to run at 2GHz
- Thread starter Lagspike_exe
- Start date
Beermeister
Banned
Dat megahurtz!
Is it harder to shrink 28 -> 24 compared to 32 -> 24? Or what do you mean? Because starting out at 28nm seems like an advantage to me...
Kill Your Masters
Member
Since the character design will probably stay the same, no.
Opus Angelorum
Member
Reading some of the AMD 28nm roadmap, it seems the initial focus will be to reduce power usage.
dragonelite
Member
Wtf happened microsoft did sony steal all your guys secret sauce and wizard jizz..
ColdDeckEd
Member
yeah, but what happens when you double the core count, and put 7850 level gpu in there? tdp of this chip is going to be at the very least equivelent to 7850...
cooling will be a issue with the ps4. i look forward to crazy watercooling case mods.
I imagine it gets exponentially more difficult the smaller the die gets. And I would think that starting with a smaller die would be advantageous in terms of heat and power but harder to get good yields.
Die shrinks in general are hitting technical limits. Manufacturing processes used to shrink faster and farther, Moore's law type of stuff. Not the case anymore.
I'll admit, bad example. But what I was saying still stands, you won't notice the difference (without measuring/bechmarking) on this cpu with a 400mhz overclock.
So we are most likely looking at an additional 5fps - 10fps, in performance terms.
If this pans out as true and it's reasonable that dev kits were undercooked to be safe than that means the PS4 will be able to handle CPU tasks about 25% more efficiently but it will increase the heat factor of the unit.
Or 400mhz faster meaning a 1.6gz CPU can theoretically perform 1.6 BILLION instructions in a second. at the same time, the 2Gz CPU can perform 2 billion instructions.
Or 400mhz faster meaning a 1.6gz CPU can theoretically perform 1.6 BILLION instructions in a second. at the same time, the 2Gz CPU can perform 2 billion instructions.
So, yes, it will get harder but that's because they are at 28 already. This will probably result in worse yields compared to going 32...but that was not the original point?
I think native resolution gets cut before framerate.
That's a pretty strange way of imaging the results, because that can't be how the performance is used. People want to run at 30, or 60, 35fps would be horrible. What would this mean in real-world application? More sparks? More NPCs?
No, because the CPU doesn't render anything (generally).
RamzaIsCool
The Amiga Brotherhood
What's up with all these better then expected specs? The GPU with it's custom parts was also a positive surprise, not to mention the whole RAM thing. I allmost would think that it was some kind of tactic from Sony to leak out some specs and then go beyond that in the real thing.
zomgbbqftw
Banned
28nm (2011) -> 20nm (2013) -> 14nm (2016) -> 10nm (2020) -> 7nm (2025) -> some new style of computing
That's the current plan for silicon transistors, and there will be stuff like FinFets and stacking that will ease the need to shrink down further.
Lagspike_exe
Member
What this means is that, for example, in a game that's locked at 30 FPS it would reduce the amount of framerate drops below 30 FPS in situations caused by insufficient CPU performance.
Ninja Moomin
Banned
.... if true.
I'm an expert
Formerly worldrevolution. The only reason I am nice to anyone else is to avoid being banned.
1.21 gigawatts
Sony spec porn. They did it with PS3 too.
I have a feeling they didn't let many devs know final specs outside of first parties and they're less likely to leak. PS4 seems significantly more powerful than leaked specs indicated. 25% more CPU power, double the RAM, and, while raw power is the same as rumors, the GPU seems much more efficient and flexible than originally thought.
So would you say a die shrink within two years of launch (and accompanying price drop) wouldn't be out of the question?
Are they going to reach 7nm? :O That's insane.
dragonelite
Member
I heard that graphene is the new holy grail in computing chips.
Yeah, I can't wait to see the second wave of games really, given all these updates. SSM or ND for Christmas 2014 to pretty much steal the show.
It has a theoretical limit of 2.4GHz from what I hear. These consoles are aiming for much higher performance goals and TDP than the laptops and tablets that Jaguar is aiming for so a higher clock speed isn't out of the question.
zomgbbqftw
Banned
Definitely. 20nm is proving very difficult to get working right, I would be surprised if it was available for Sony to use before late 2015.
Extreme UV lithography. Intel have planned all the way to 5nm, but people think that is pie in the sky.
Less slow down from pretty explosions you mean?
I don't know if we'll get that though, wouldn't developers just push more pretty explosions and accept the performance decreases? People have always been compromising performance for graphics.
In modern computing it actually doesn't matter much. The number of processors is more important than the clock speed.
The Bookerman
Member
ScepticMatt
Member
I'm not believing it until we get a more reliable source.
Never heard of Amdahl's law, I take it?
If the core voltage remains constant, it would result in a 25% power usage increase, witch isn't much in a jaguar core.
luckily upping the clock speed generally cost's nothing
Especially on a Jaguar. There will be no reason to even have to adjust cooling.
zomgbbqftw
Banned
So IBM and Cambridge Uni have been saying for years, we'll probably get to 10nm before Graphene becomes a serious product.
its unlikely that it would cause instability either, especially as they already run at such a low clock!
depends on the CPU and the clock speed you are overclocking to.
But the Jaguar cores are designed to be low power and have low heat dissipation so overclocking to a slighly higher clockspeed would cause a minimal increase in temperature.
if they were upping it to 4ghz id be worried about heat but not to a still measly 2ghz
MikeE21286
Member
luckily upping the clock speed generally cost's nothing
Well then clock it up as high as we can!
This wouldn't really be an overclock. It'll be manufactured at this clock speed. It just means they could get it a bit faster than originally planned. Jaguars run extremely cool anyway. Adding the extra 4gb of GDDR5 would have added way more heat than upping the clock speed on the CPU.
Panajev2001a
GAF's Pleasant Genius
If you are lucky
. Jokes aside, getting linear or close to linear scaling just by increasing the frequency is hard.Lagspike_exe
Member
Depends on which CPU you're overclocking, how much you're overclocking it and what cooling system are you using. For example, you could overclock old Conroe E4300 Pentiums from 1.8GHz to 3.2GHz on stock air cooling. Older Netbursts that ran on 80c, not so much.
No. The reason we are getting more parallel is that we can't get higher clock speeds.
If you are lucky
Because instruction execution rate is determined by the weakest link in the chain, which isn't always pure clock speed, correct?
I don't think this slight bump would cause any trouble but who knows for sure? Depends on how lazily they're thrown together. The RAM bump causes more concern in that regard IMO.
Panajev2001a
GAF's Pleasant Genius
Well, the issue is mainly related to voltage. If you have to increase the voltage to increase the clock-speed you will get a much bigger increase in power consumption.
Maybe the adding of another 4Gb GDDR5 meant that they had to redesign the box and system, allowing more airflow and thus also allowing for a slightly higher clock frequence (because the impact of that wouldn't be that big). Maybe that's why they couldn't show it either, because it wasn't ready due to the RAM change.