Sony Unveiled PlayStation 5 Details During An Online Event

Dhir Acharya - Mar 20, 2020

Due to COVID-19, Sony couldn't hold a big unveil for its PlayStation 5, so the company hosted an online event to reveal details around the next-gen console.

When Sony presented at CES 2020, it didn’t speak much about PlayStation 5. The company had the plan for a bigger reveal that’s supposed to take place in a few weeks, but the pandemic ruins it. Hence, Sony switched to live-streaming the event, unveiling more information on the next generation of its popular game console.

Sony switched to live-streaming the event due to COVID-19

Mark Cerny, Sony’s lead system architect kicked off his presentation to a small number of people due to the social distancing concern. According to Cerny, Sony has enabled the 5GB/s SSD, the feature the developers have requested the most. Also, the system is expected to be almost 100 times faster than the PlayStation 4.

At the same time, Sony has ditched several; technical details for PS5, making it up to speed with Microsoft’s Xbox Series X. Not just the new SSD, the PlayStation 5 will also come with a custom AMD GPU featuring ray tracing, and as usual, 3D audio to deliver improved multimedia home entertainment for users. Like the Xbox, there will also be backward compatibility.

The PlayStation 5 will feature a Zen 2 from AMD, sporting eight cores clocking at 3.5 GHz. Meanwhile, the GPU is based on the RDNA 2 architecture also from AMD. The GPU offers users computer power of 10.28 teraflops with 36 CUs. The onboard memory capacity is 16 GB and the solid-state storage capacity of 825 GB. Then there’s a new boost feature that should regulate the system’s power consumption and heat better.

Cerny revealed that the system will not focus on the temperature only, but it will monitor the activities performed by the CPU and GPU and set the frequencies accordingly. Sony is promising to reveal details about system cooling in the coming time.

According to Cerny as gaming systems almost always prioritize graphics, audio is often underestimated, and the PS4 was the same. However, the PlayStation 5 will offer a version of PSVR’s immersive audio with additional benefits like locality and presence to the console. Sony promised to offer improved virtual surround sound that users can enjoy even if they’re on less advanced headphones and stereo systems.

The PlayStation 5 will come out by year-end.