With Windows adopting ARM, have to wait and see what the actual adoption rate is (the last time it died on the vine), it's interesting to see that PS6 may also adopt ARM for their console and potentially for a handheld. The Apple/Sony merger acquisition or broad strategic alliance I've been wanting for years seems a bit closer to reality if this major ARM transition some rumors have been suggesting.
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PS6 potentially to use ARM...
- Thread starter Imhotep397
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Eh? Apple and Sony are not about to merge. And I really wouldn't bet on the PS6 being ARM as that means no real backwards compatibility and you'll have to rely on AMD producing the chips as they are Sonys chip supply partner, as far as I know they haven't got many if any plans for ARM currently.
We shall see but at present I wouldn't count on it happening.
We shall see but at present I wouldn't count on it happening.
That's where x86 emulation/translation comes into play. Intel's adoption of many RISC based components into CPUs over the last decade plus will expedite higher performance emulation/translation.
The number of software companies that expanded into mobile dev in the last 10+ years is quite large and means there's a ton of devs at traditional x86 companies that are most comfortable coding for OS' using ARM...including at Sony. This is also potentially where Apple and Rosetta could help Sony.
You're a little behind...there may be a major industry shift to ARM in the next couple of years:
AMD and Nvidia going ARM for PCs...
Qualcomm also offering ARM expands the potential options.
No official connection between Sony and Apple, but the tech and devs each use are getting closer and closer.
Think your living in a bit of a dream if you think Apple is going to ever help Sony with a games console. And AMD might be rumoured to be working on ARM but they haven’t released anything to market of note worthy performance. Also emulation, well they haven’t managed to get the PS3 emulated, and they aren’t going to waste too many resources in it either.
As I said, I wouldn’t hold your hopes up next gen will be ARM, it hasn’t proved itself with games performance yet, and Apple with its chips isn’t a reliable benchmark.
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You are about twenty years too late with that rumor.
Hmm. If you look at the latest rumours for the Switch 2, that’s supposed to use a new Nvidia Tegra SoC with 8 A78C Arm cores, 1536 Ampere CUDA graphics cores, real time ray tracing hardware and a custom AI coprocessor. So strong on graphics, not so much on CPU.
Whereas the general top of the line SoCs like the M-series and the Snapdragon X Elite are architectures that are strong on CPU but weak on graphics. You can understand why Nintendo is going with NVidia: when Kotick says in court the Switch to is roughly in the PS4 range, he is somewhat right, on CPU, and somewhat wrong, on graphics. The graphics are where the console will perform above its general class.
Whereas the general top of the line SoCs like the M-series and the Snapdragon X Elite are architectures that are strong on CPU but weak on graphics. You can understand why Nintendo is going with NVidia: when Kotick says in court the Switch to is roughly in the PS4 range, he is somewhat right, on CPU, and somewhat wrong, on graphics. The graphics are where the console will perform above its general class.
In the past for gaming consoles and PCs, only hardware mattered. Going forward software will be more important. AI features like DLSS and Frame Generation are truly game changing. Their implementation is excellent, class leading and reasons to work with Nvidia on the next generation of gaming hardware.
On handheld devices, AI enabled features are even more important as they help overcome CPU bottlenecks and avoid fitting power hungry components that generate heat, require heavy cooling and negatively impacts battery life.
On a gaming console the requirements aren’t as stringent as the performance just has to be equivalent to a mid-range PC. However AI features can save a lot of money on hardward. It will be interesting to find out who Sony is working with.
While a PS6 powered by an M5 and 8GB of RAM or even a 2nm M6 (let’s go even further, a custom made M6 with extra GPU cores) running tvOS (because, why not?) would surely be a wet dream for many of us, I don’t see that happening in this iteration of this simulation layer universe. I think it would be more likely a Nintendo-Apple collaboration (both share a similar philosophy), if -and only if- Nintendo wasn’t as successful as it currently is. In fact, Nintendo has been courageous enough to transition to ARM, but I don’t see that happening for the other gaming console manufacturers, at least for the foreseeable future.
So no, I don’t think Sony is going ARM at least not while Intel and, especially, AMD, are still developing x86 CPUs/APUs. At this point, my only hope is that whichever company that builds the next CPU/GPU for the upcoming PS6, most likely AMD, includes a decent NPU (neural engine) to integrate generative AI into the video games. It could well be the next big revolution in video games, at the same level as previous ones like: the invention of the sprites, the jump to polygons and 3D games, the jump to HD resolution, then FullHD, then 4K, or graphics advancements such as antialiasing, ray-tracing, or the latest AI upscaling resolution techniques. From the point of view of the narrative and the in-game immersion, especially for those story-driven single-player games, the inclusion of AI for the procedural generation of text, dialogs or even scenes (adding a touch of randomness and uniqueness to the experience) would be a big step forward. Not easy to implement, though, because such narratives have to be well ingrained with the script, unless the script can be changed on-the-fly of course.
I have no doubt that generative AI will be the next big jump in gaming, and this LLMs will eventually reach consoles, but I’m doubtful that this shift in the experience will come with the PS6 generation. Not only because the hardware is not there yet (at least not from AMD for low cost APUs), but also because the gaming industry is not prepared yet for such change in the way they conceive single player games. Also, a big chunk of money comes from multiplayer games with in-app purchases so… sadly, unlikely.
I still think a big advancement is coming with the PS6, in two or three years, hopefully by then, at least the APUs will be built on the 2nm technology, which at least will provide us with much better CPU processing power (one of the current bottlenecks) and GPU power with much more efficient and complex ray-tracing.
So no, I don’t think Sony is going ARM at least not while Intel and, especially, AMD, are still developing x86 CPUs/APUs. At this point, my only hope is that whichever company that builds the next CPU/GPU for the upcoming PS6, most likely AMD, includes a decent NPU (neural engine) to integrate generative AI into the video games. It could well be the next big revolution in video games, at the same level as previous ones like: the invention of the sprites, the jump to polygons and 3D games, the jump to HD resolution, then FullHD, then 4K, or graphics advancements such as antialiasing, ray-tracing, or the latest AI upscaling resolution techniques. From the point of view of the narrative and the in-game immersion, especially for those story-driven single-player games, the inclusion of AI for the procedural generation of text, dialogs or even scenes (adding a touch of randomness and uniqueness to the experience) would be a big step forward. Not easy to implement, though, because such narratives have to be well ingrained with the script, unless the script can be changed on-the-fly of course.
I have no doubt that generative AI will be the next big jump in gaming, and this LLMs will eventually reach consoles, but I’m doubtful that this shift in the experience will come with the PS6 generation. Not only because the hardware is not there yet (at least not from AMD for low cost APUs), but also because the gaming industry is not prepared yet for such change in the way they conceive single player games. Also, a big chunk of money comes from multiplayer games with in-app purchases so… sadly, unlikely.
I still think a big advancement is coming with the PS6, in two or three years, hopefully by then, at least the APUs will be built on the 2nm technology, which at least will provide us with much better CPU processing power (one of the current bottlenecks) and GPU power with much more efficient and complex ray-tracing.