| melbye said: PS3 isn't $99 yet |
Doesn't matter and it doesn't work that way.
OT: Cost of hardware is extremely predictable if you narrow it down to what actually makes hardware vost what it does. I don't know about $99, but it could definately retail for $149, but that depends primarily on if sony wishes to continue supporting it in full.
Cost of hardware (and those generations people like talking about) is all tied to what fabrication process the chips inside the machine is built on. Right now the PS4s is built on a 16nm process or so. When we get to 7-10nm then it's starts getting interesting. If sony chooses to make a PS4ss using 7nm then they won't need to make the console with a cooler since it will draw very little power which means very little heat generated. No cooler, smaller chip, smaller chassis, smaller all round package means it won't cost them much more than $100 to make each unit and I'm turn the PS4proS could drop in price to around $250-$300 too on a 7nm process for all the above reasons. Just that in the case of the pro we aren't talking about no cooler (it will still need one) but rather smaller eveeything.
Chances are tho that will not likely happen. It's more likely that Sony discontinues the PS4s and replaces it with the PS4proS at about the same time that the PS5 is announced. Cause that will most definitely be built on a 7nm process. As I've said before, when we start seeing 7nm Chios, then we know a new gen is tight around the corner.
PS3 pricing doesn't tie into this at all. For a number of reasons. It was always an extremely specialized chip, and chances are that they never felt the investment required shrinking it down to 28nm or even 14nm was justified. And when it comes to chips, complexity aside, a wafer is a wafer. You can only get so many chips from a given wafer, the smaller the fab process, the more chips you can get. Basically, it will cost Sony more money getting PS3 chips from a wafer using its current 45nm process than it woukd vost them to make a PS4 chip at 28nm. Actually almost twice as much.
