• Hey, guest user. Hope you're enjoying NeoGAF! Have you considered registering for an account? Come join us and add your take to the daily discourse.

XSX/PS5 Pro?

Yes, ofc they will "slim" it for cost reasons, but I can't see an angle where Sony needs a "pro" version of their console vs MS.

Well it's true 8K wouldn't be enough of a reason, but maybe simply as a means of retaining more users in their hardware ecosystem could be a motivating factor. Maybe for more headroom WRT PSVR 2 but aside from those it is kind of hard to think of any big reasons.

I would maybe say the same for Microsoft, except GamePass and higher-fidelity BC could be good enough reasons. Using a single Xbox mid-gen refresh design to stream 4-6 or so Series S game instances, then spinning that into something to sell to the console base, while phasing out Series X. The consumer side gets the benefit by relation, essentially.

If Sony does go in bigger with game streaming though, that could be enough impetus for them to design something befitting a mid-gen refresh, recouping R&D costs on a Pro model sold for a profit from the jump (IIRC both PS4 Pro and One X were sold for at least some profit out of the gate).

Why would MS need a pro console but Sony does not?

Not so much either probably really "needs" one but, cloud streaming on Microsoft's part could give an incentive to design a more powerful system to host more Series S streaming instances on a single unit in an Azure server stack, which they can then recoup a lot of the R&D from by spinning that design into a consumer "Pro" variant sold for slight profit to a segment of the base wanting to upgrade.

If Sony is getting really serious with their own cloud initiative now, using their own Pro-style PS5 server units to handle the loads would be more cost-effective in the long run than using a bunch of PC builds and 3P GPU cards, and then they also have an option to spin that out into a consumer mid-gen Pro console to sell for a profit to an audience segment wanting it, recouping a lot of R&D costs.
 
Last edited:
Why would MS need a pro console but Sony does not?

giphy.gif
 

RaySoft

Member
Well it's true 8K wouldn't be enough of a reason, but maybe simply as a means of retaining more users in their hardware ecosystem could be a motivating factor. Maybe for more headroom WRT PSVR 2 but aside from those it is kind of hard to think of any big reasons.

I would maybe say the same for Microsoft, except GamePass and higher-fidelity BC could be good enough reasons. Using a single Xbox mid-gen refresh design to stream 4-6 or so Series S game instances, then spinning that into something to sell to the console base, while phasing out Series X. The consumer side gets the benefit by relation, essentially.

If Sony does go in bigger with game streaming though, that could be enough impetus for them to design something befitting a mid-gen refresh, recouping R&D costs on a Pro model sold for a profit from the jump (IIRC both PS4 Pro and One X were sold for at least some profit out of the gate).
I agree with you that 8K is out of the question, and IF Sony would do it, it probably would be for more performance in something like the PSVR2, but I don't think it's a "winning" move. This gen have a lot of legs in them, not to be compared with the Jaguar of the past. There's no culprit weakness there, why use too much money for a refresh wich would be hamstrung by the original anyways?
In my mind, this is what they meant by "We believe in generations"
 
Last edited:

MikeM

Member
Yes, ofc they will "slim" it for cost reasons, but I can't see an angle where Sony needs a "pro" version of their console vs MS.
Sony would be stupid to not match their main competitor in a mid-gen refresh. Another way they could lose market share.
 

RaySoft

Member
I agree with you that 8K is out of the question, and IF Sony would do it, it probably would be for more performance in something like the PSVR2, but I don't think it's a "winning" move. This gen have a lot of legs in them, not to be compared with the Jaguar of the past. There's no culprit weakness there, why use too much money for a refresh wich would be hamstrung by the original anyways?

Sony would be stupid to not match their main competitor in a mid-gen refresh. Another way they could lose market share.
They would be stupid if they did, when they didn't have to.. stuff cost money you know...
 
Last edited:

Ozzie666

Member
It’s the freaking Switch that needs either a pro or the next gen one already. It’s getting painful.

I dunno, maybe developers need to lower themselves to the Switch level and make their games financially make sense. But yes, it needs a bump more than the others.

But I love the fact it's positioned as a cheaper cost environment that can bring good profits, at least companies who are way too greedy.
 
I agree with you that 8K is out of the question, and IF Sony would do it, it probably would be for more performance in something like the PSVR2, but I don't think it's a "winning" move. This gen have a lot of legs in them, not to be compared with the Jaguar of the past. There's no culprit weakness there, why use too much money for a refresh wich would be hamstrung by the original anyways?
In my mind, this is what they meant by "We believe in generations"

There's no doubt PS5 & Series are a lot more future-proofed than PS4 & XBO were. At the same time though, GPU tech just seems to be progressing faster than it did from the 2013-2016 period, or at least it feels that way. So maybe there is the belief that, even if the base systems still need to be accounted for, if GPUs on the non-console side keep advancing so much in just a short amount of time, that pushes up the perf spec of baseline on PC that much more.

It could be possible we run into a problem where, without mid-gen refreshes, there's little incentive for even 3P devs to take advantage of the additional power and newer featuresets, and a very real possibility of consoles "holding back" game design, at least that's how PC gamers would eventually see it. If, by 2026, there are no mid-gen refreshes but baseline on PC moves up to near PS5/Series X levels with more modern featureset support, let alone even mid-tier GPUs having 6-8x the level of performance when it comes to primitive/mesh shading, and very high strengths in pixel fillrate, texture fillrate etc. too.

I don't think Microsoft or especially Sony would want to entertain that happening, or entertaining the perf game on the mainstream smartphone side of things catching up to or (maybe with the higher-end smartphones) surpassing PS5 and Series X through combination of power, featureset support, etc. For example when talking featuresets or in this specific example, encoding/decoding support, think of something like H.264 encode/decode; you can try playing H.264 videos in 4K on a Core 2 Duo high-end build from 2009 but you're going to use a LOT more power (and resources) to do so compared to a modern-day cheap streaming tablet. That's partly because of app/browsers not supporting the older chipset and partly because the older chipset will just lack certain hardware built in for instructions that assist massively in those type of tasks.

Those might be some major, albeit external, factors also encouraging mid-gen refreshes from them.
 
Last edited:

RafterXL

Member
A refresh is going to happen, you can bank on it. I think it will happen later than 2023, though.
There's no need for a pro model unlike the last gen where the consoles were very underpowered
There's ALWAYS a need. We already have games that have to compromise either resolution or framerate. That's only going to get worse moving forward. In 3-4 years these consoles will be very underpowered, too.
 

EverydayBeast

thinks Halo Infinite is a new graphical benchmark
You have to give consoles space, PS4 pro, one of the best ever wasn’t release right away.
 
if they are gonna do 8K on PS5Pro and Xbox Series X Pro, i think it will be much easier to implement than 4K on Xbone X and PS4Pro because they will have:

(Besides Checkerboarding and reconstruction)
Fidelity FX Version 2.0 or whatever should be at least equivalent to soon to be release NVIDIA DLSS 3.0 by 2024
Establishment of 8k UHDTV's with HDMI 2.1 minimum as standard (might be newer HDMI version in future)
Dedicated and better-more efficient ML cores with better CPU

Also, i hope that any game built from the ground up for PS5 and Xbox Series X will prevent any 'remastering' of the same game. I hope to God all they need is some patch that automatically converts the game to 8K 60fps.
 
Last edited:

ParaSeoul

Member


I knew it! So the potential for PS5Pro and XsXPro for the GPU:

with MCM design double digit TFLOPS: 30+
increase in GPU Frequency: Up to 3Ghz
increase in RAM: 20-25 GB close to 1 TB/sec of GDDR7
implementation of infinity cache
dedicated and better Ray Tracing Cores, and Machine Learning Cores

For the CPU I am speculating:
3D V-Cache
8 Core (Zen 2) to 12 Core (Zen 4)
Between 4--5Ghz

SSD:
PCIE 5 implementation
between 15-30 GB/Sec close to the RAM bandwidth of PS3 and Xbox 360

Besides no brainer implementation for Wifi6E, i am not sure if OPTICAL DISK DRIVES are even worth it. What storage medium would they use to release games? 4K Ultra Blu Ray i think is just too small for XsX Pro and PS5 Pro

How does this dude still have an audience
 

01011001

Banned
the Xbox Series X2 and S2 are clearly planned... I mean the whole naming scheme is made for these upgrades.
so basically, of course this will happen
 
Waiting for a ps5 pro.

Haven't got the money to buy me a 4k yet, so by the Time i do do, may bé a ps5 pro will be out.

Smaller, without coil wine, bigger SSD, a bit more powerful ans i'm fine.
 
I don't think we'll get Pro models, but I hope we do. Current consoles can only do one of high resolution and high framerate simultaneously. We need a 30 TF chungus to do both.
 
I actually wanted to wait for a Pro model, but i start to think there won't be any and i should try to get a X as soon as i can.
 
Last edited:
There will not be Pro models. I don't think people understand why we even had them last gen.

It is just a sugar pill for those poor delusionals that still didn't succeed to get a regular PS5/XSX and somehow, need to justify their wait...

Well I think MS and Sony did indirectly or directly say they are already working on next gen consoles. They may not be called "Pro" they might as well call them PS6 and XsX2 or something. Im just speculating 🤷‍♂️

How does this dude still have an audience
I love his flowery language in his British accent:

"I heard from my sources that Zen 4 is going to be BONKERS" "RDNA 3 is going to be ridiculous" "My sources said this, and my sources that and he has been right"

His technical analysis on explaining things is just awful. I was hoping to get clarification on what geometry engine is and Variable Rate Shading so i can differentiate between the 2, and i still couldn't understand. I dont take him too seriously, but i posted his video because somehow my instincts were telling me that RDNA 3 was going to be faster than RDNA 2 in terms of frequency, because if Sony managed to reach 2.2Ghz, then i inferred that RDNA 3 would most likely reach close to 3 Ghz and I guess it was just confirmation bias with his speculation video lol

2020,2021 were transition years, but 2022 will be the year of amazing product line ups for:

8K UHDTV's with HMDI 2.1
Android Smartphones and Tablets
Apple Smartphones and Tablets
NVIDIA, AMD, Intel GPUS
AMD, Intel CPUs
 
i'm waiting for slim/pro revisions.

1. they will be cheaper (for slim models)
2. more games will be out (looking at you PS5)
3. should hopefully be easier to get hold of one
4. i really hate the PS5 design. that thing needs put on a diet.

i'll take a Series X Pro and a PS5 Slim.
 
Last edited:

JaksGhost

Member
These things should be refreshed at least every three years. Seven or eight year old tech in this sector is ridiculous.

Also I would pay more for a console with no compromises.
Every 3 years, and y’all talk shit about cross-gen now 👀 The market would be stale and there would be no noticeable advancements. Going by your cycle and with how long development currently is for games I should expect only 1 game from each first party studio, if that, that’s going to be cross-gen with either the prior or next console. The same could probably be said for all developers because why would you abandon a console’s audience that’s only 2-3 years old? You have to let this hardware mature as much as possible and see what they can squeeze out of it before introducing a new console. This gen is somewhat underwhelming now for people due to the release of the mid-gen refresh. This is sorta why Nintendo sees such big generational leaps within their ecosystem because they let their systems age to hell before releasing a new one.
 
Last edited:
A pro would be a bad idea I think.Especially now with chip problems.You would have 3 PS5s on the market a digital 399 one with a disc drive 499 and then a pro 599.
Only to play a few games at native 4K.
It would also take away from the PS6 if AMD can’t make big jumps the PS6 is already in the planing phase 2-3 years till release so they must finalize stats in 2023/24.If there is a Pro the upgrade to the PS6 will look tiny especially if Sony doesn’t goes all power for 599 at the start for the PS6.That would mean between pro and 6 will be a 10 to 15 TF difference would be a bad look for the PS6.Leave it like it is now 10 and the 6 will be around 40-60 TF that would be exiting.but not when you have a 30 TF pro on the market which will cost 599
 
That sounds very unlikely, I think they’ll keep the high clocks but increase CU count with the chiplet design

Wasn't there a reference RDNA 2 card (from who I can't remember) overclocked and hit around 2.7 GHz? I remember seeing a story on that, but don't recall anything else i.e did it sustain the clock, was the card fried etc.

There might be a modest clock uptick for the high-end card(s), but they probably won't go beyond 2.5 GHz - 2.6 GHz. They won't need to, either, in order to get >2x gains in FP32 since they're doing chiplets now.

A pro would be a bad idea I think.Especially now with chip problems.You would have 3 PS5s on the market a digital 399 one with a disc drive 499 and then a pro 599.
Only to play a few games at native 4K.
It would also take away from the PS6 if AMD can’t make big jumps the PS6 is already in the planing phase 2-3 years till release so they must finalize stats in 2023/24.If there is a Pro the upgrade to the PS6 will look tiny especially if Sony doesn’t goes all power for 599 at the start for the PS6.That would mean between pro and 6 will be a 10 to 15 TF difference would be a bad look for the PS6.Leave it like it is now 10 and the 6 will be around 40-60 TF that would be exiting.but not when you have a 30 TF pro on the market which will cost 599

PS6 (and Series X-2) will be comfortably more than 40 or even 60 TF, I have good faith on that. And you wouldn't need $599 for a Pro of either PS5 or Series X; $499 would be doable. Also, PS5 Digital only technically exists; they barely make any of them the vast majority of PS5s are the Disc model, by far.

We're just really trying to figure out reasons to justify a mid-gen refresh; I have thought of some personally, the question is how big would they realistically factor into motivating for a mid-gen upgrade into the consumer market? I guess that is something we'll find out in a couple of years.
 
Last edited:

Genx3

Member
Instead of giving us Pro consoles after 3 years and no stock available in the first 2 years, just give us the PS6 and XSX Mark 2 after 5 years and LOAD this bitch up with the Best HW they can do for $800. I'm ready to pay for that for a Beast Console.

This Gen would've been even better had they launched at $600 like I wanted. We could've had 24 Gigs of 600+GBps bandwidth Ram and slightly faster GPU's. Easily worth the $600 and they would've still been sold out like they currently are.
As of I now I own a $500 XSX and $240 expansion SSD. Almost the $800. Just give us the XSX Mark 2 and PS6 loaded up with $800 of HW. Inflation is killing the jump in console HW improvements.
 
Every 3 years, and y’all talk shit about cross-gen now 👀 The market would be stale and there would be no noticeable advancements. Going by your cycle and with how long development currently is for games I should expect only 1 game from each first party studio, if that, that’s going to be cross-gen with either the prior or next console. The same could probably be said for all developers because why would you abandon a console’s audience that’s only 2-3 years old? You have to let this hardware mature as much as possible and see what they can squeeze out of it before introducing a new console. This gen is somewhat underwhelming now for people due to the release of the mid-gen refresh. This is sorta why Nintendo sees such big generational leaps within their ecosystem because they let their systems age to hell before releasing a new one.
Yeah, I don’t believe in generations… Therefore I haven’t ‘talked shit’ about cross gen…
 
Last edited:
Can we all agree on one thing?

OPTICAL DISK DRIVES ARE ARCHAIC
T65anAQ.jpg


The data transfer rate from my understanding is: 92Mb/s-144 Mb/s

Meanwhile you have SD cards that can go up to 1 TB+ with read and write speeds (SD Express 8.0 specifications with PCIE 4.0) up to 4GB/Sec, if they are going to make SD Express 9.0 specifications, i am going to assume double that.

If we want cartridge like experience, then the storage medium HAS to change.

If you want to stick to digital distribution, then the amount storage has to increase also. PS5Pro/PS6 and XsXPro/XsX2 games will be 100GB+ if its gonna be the start of 8K, the current storage capacity despite fast SSD speeds is pathetic.

I don't care how cheap it is to manufacture optical disks, there has to be another solution.
 

MikeM

Member
They would be stupid if they did, when they didn't have to.. stuff cost money you know...
It depends on how they bet on market share loss should they not. Remember- they make money on people being in their ecosystem. Not having a Pro when your main competitor does gives you a significant disadvantage.
Only one of my ps5 or XSX is going to get a pro update if they come out. I'm not going to spend $1000 on getting 2 of them.
Same here. Probably going to be the PS5 unless the Xbox version is a significant difference.
 
The Series S next will the exact Series X specs.
A new more powerful Series X will come in 5 years.


Sony has a harder time with just 1 console.
We'll just see a new generation compared to a mid generation refresh.
 

RaySoft

Member
It depends on how they bet on market share loss should they not. Remember- they make money on people being in their ecosystem. Not having a Pro when your main competitor does gives you a significant disadvantage.

Same here. Probably going to be the PS5 unless the Xbox version is a significant difference.
They won't release a "Pro" just because the competitor does, they would have to have a proper reason for doing so.
PS and MS are in complete different ecosystems, where MS will probably upgrade in the same vein as PC players, but Sony is still playing the generation game. The only reason would be to reach 60fps on 30fps PS5 titles, but that's way off yet.
 
Last edited:

NinjaBoiX

Member
I’m not too bothered about “Pro” models this gen, but I’m certainly waiting for a redesign on the PS5, as it’s enormous and hideous at the moment.

I have an XSS at the moment (along with my PS4Pro), and I’ve not really touched my Pro in months. I’m strongly considering getting an XSX for the living room and just having the Pro and XSS in the spare room.
 
Can we all agree on one thing?

OPTICAL DISK DRIVES ARE ARCHAIC
T65anAQ.jpg


The data transfer rate from my understanding is: 92Mb/s-144 Mb/s

Meanwhile you have SD cards that can go up to 1 TB+ with read and write speeds (SD Express 8.0 specifications with PCIE 4.0) up to 4GB/Sec, if they are going to make SD Express 9.0 specifications, i am going to assume double that.

If we want cartridge like experience, then the storage medium HAS to change.

If you want to stick to digital distribution, then the amount storage has to increase also. PS5Pro/PS6 and XsXPro/XsX2 games will be 100GB+ if its gonna be the start of 8K, the current storage capacity despite fast SSD speeds is pathetic.

I don't care how cheap it is to manufacture optical disks, there has to be another solution.
Physical media probably won't go away for 10th gen, but if it sticks around it won't be optical discs like Blu-Ray IMO. I've had an idea for a while that they could just go with small, cheap 128 GB or so microSD cards, that wouldn't even need to be very fast, say 72 MB/s, 90 MB/s or so.

The benefit comes from interfacing the microSD with the decompression I/O; you could store potentially upwards 512 GB worth of data on a single card and decompress it at up to 360 MB/s. Writing to the internal SSD from there is criminally quick compared to copying files from a UHD Blu-Ray to storage; even a 512 GB game would take only about 23 minutes to fully transfer to SSD, and you'd be able to start playing the game way before the file has finished transferring.

You can get a good 128 GB microSD with 60 - 80 MB/s read speeds for $10 or so dollars today. Over time those prices will continue falling, and if companies like Sony and Microsoft get millions of them in bulk, it becomes even cheaper for them. By 10th-gen we should be able to get microSD cards of 128 (or slightly larger) capacities and reads of 80 MB/s (or higher) for roughly the cost of a UHD Blu-Ray ROM disc today. Even if it ends up being slightly more expensive, well game prices seem to be trending upward anyhow so that slight extra cost is baked in, and you get a hell of a lot more performance.

It'd be one of the few things we can thank Nintendo for, given this is essentially what they do now (albeit not quite the same way, both in capacity and speed, let alone lacking any decompression I/O) with the Switch.

EDIT: We also have to consider internet speeds and data caps, globally, that's another reason physical won't go away for 10th-gen. And, very few people are going to have gigabit internet; even if they did the peak theoretical (the actual will be much lower) download speed would be 128 MB/s. Which would be somewhat faster than some of the microSD raw read speeds I posted (even if those are somewhat conservative), however that internet traffic would be going through the southbridge and then processed to be stored on the SSD, then decompressed by the I/O and rewritten back on the drive, if the data was compressed.

Which involves a lot more hops than the microSD, physical-based solution (which would also produce near-theoretical peak speeds much more reliably) and again can eat into data caps (even many of the "unlimited" plans aren't truly that, since they throttle your bandwidth hard after reaching an invisible limit, you simply aren't charged for exceeding that invisible limit), meaning microSD would easily still win out compared to relying on the internet for large game file downloads.

The Series S next will the exact Series X specs.
A new more powerful Series X will come in 5 years.

Yes to the 2nd part, but a bit sooner than 5 years (2024 is my guess). No to the 2nd part; they literally cannot get a refresh with Series X specs @ $299 by the time of a mid-gen refresh.

...Well....kind of. You can do it with something close to that spec in at least some of the GPU aspects, dunno about RAM, storage etc. though (unless Microsoft would want to lose a lot of money on each unit being sold).

Sony has a harder time with just 1 console.
We'll just see a new generation compared to a mid generation refresh.

At the very least they'll have a PS5 Slim, that is pretty much Sony tradition since the PS1 gen (tho PS1's "slim" came at the tail end of its lifespan).

There are some specific reasons they would want to do a PS5 Pro model, tbh, but it depends on a few things i.e what their push for cloud services looks like (Project Spartacus will give us a hint at this), etc.

No.
I very much enjoy when my friends lend me a game they finished and vice versa.

I also don't see how e.g. a USB dongle or similar would be cheaper than an optical disk.

Maybe not by 2024 but by 10th gen they are practically guaranteed to be at least as cheap as UHD Blu-Ray ROMs are now, as long as you stick with realistic size capacities and speeds.

And for that, you will get much more storage (thanks to compression/decompression) and bandwidth (same) than any current or future Blu-Ray or other optical storage spec with a semi-realistic chance of coming to mass market in the next 6-8 years, could ever hope to offer. Basically, what Nintendo is doing currently with Switch cartridges, Sony & Microsoft will standardize as the physical media for 10th-gen systems, and that will help with QoL of those systems.

It's practically inevitable.
 
Last edited:

sankt-Antonio

:^)--?-<
Usually I would be all for it, but given that PS still has no ,non remaster AAA, games out that I care about, and has cross gen games on the horizon... Nah im good.

Show me games that look so good I would want to spend money to enjoy them in 4k/120fps. I still don't see where al these TF's are used for this gen.
 
Top Bottom