shikamaru317 said:
They did detail what Velocity Architecture and DirectX12 Ultimate features will do for Series X, at least somewhat:
Yes, but MS is going to sell SSD cartridges that match the speed of the internal drive soon after the launch of the system, meaning that you will be able to install Series X games on your 2nd SSD with no disadvantages. Sony is not going to be selling SSD's that match the speed of their internal SSD, and we won't see off the shelf SSD's that have speeds over 7 GB/s for at least several more years, at least not ones that are affordable. Which basically means that you are limited to the the 825 GB internal SSD for the first several years of the generation, which will be more like 750 GB accessible by the player thanks to space taken up by the OS. You can expand PS5 storage with a slower off the shelf SSD, but you will basically only be able to install PS4 BC games to it, as PS5 games will be optimized to take full advantage of the faster internal drive, and therefore PS5 games would run like dog crap if you tried to play them from a slower off the shelf SSD. |
Yes I had seem these info on the Velocity Architecture, and is similar to what Sony put (although for me it was HW based as well similar to PS5 not SW). That is why I said it will have a impact on improving the I/O in general, but if it is sw based it probably won't be as efficient as the HW based solution of PS5 (there is a compression/decompression block on the silicion, there is direct lines for the CPU/GPU to get info from SSD without passing through RAM, the Tempest Audio will totally bypass the RAM, etc).
From what we know Sony is not going to sell SSDs, but they could partner with the major SSD providers to have certified SSDs (with 5.5 Gb and 6 layers) soon after launch (no information of it but we never heard neither company talking about the HDDs and SSDs certified devices this gen but they do exist), but yes it is fair to assume that for like 1 year you won't be able to expand the memory while playing directly on that expanded drive (be it changing the original or adding a driver) on PS5. You can always do memory management and also transfer from the external to internal drive even if it is a bother.
I'm curious on what prices MS will practice on the SSD cartridge since accessories are usually sold with a very big margin (sometimes they sell for like 3x the cost of manufacture, all big 3) but yes it is an option and when we discover the average size of games we will see how willing people will be to buy these.
duduspace11 "Well, since we are estimating costs, Pokemon Red/Blue did cost Nintendo about $50m to make back in 1996"
http://gamrconnect.vgchartz.com/post.php?id=8808363
Mr Puggsly: "Hehe, I said good profit. You said big profit. Frankly, not losing money is what I meant by good. Don't get hung up on semantics"
http://gamrconnect.vgchartz.com/post.php?id=9008994
Azzanation: "PS5 wouldn't sold out at launch without scalpers."