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Hiku on 28 October 2020
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shikamaru317 said:

https://news.xbox.com/en-us/2020/10/28/a-closer-look-at-how-xbox-series-xs-integrates-full-amd-rdna-2-architecture/

"The long-term strategic relationship between Xbox and AMD over the past 15 years, beginning with the Xbox 360, is at the heart of the Xbox Series X and Xbox Series S. With the upcoming launch of the Xbox Series X|S on November 10, together we are ushering in the next generation of gaming delivering a level of power, performance and compatibility never before seen in console gaming, powered by AMD’s latest “Zen 2” and RDNA 2 architectures. Xbox Series X|S are the only next-generation consoles with full hardware support for all the RDNA 2 capabilities AMD showcased today."

The full list of RDNA 2 features on Xbox Series S and X:

  • Hardware accelerated DirectX raytracing (showcased in Watch Dogs Legions), which allows improved lighting, reflections, and acoustics.
  • Mesh shaders, which allow developers to manipulate game geometry in real-time, providing a higher level of fidelity and immersion than was previously possible.
  • Sampler Feedback, which only loads the portions of textures that are visible to the player into the RAM, offering 2.5x greater RAM efficiency (effectively a 2.5x increase to the amount of RAM available to developers)
  • Variable Rate Shading, which allows developers to focus GPU resources on the portions of any given frame that most need those resources

MS also talks about their partnership with AMD to work on DirectML, which is a set of hardware accelerated machine learning features that can be used to improve NPC AI, make more lifelike animations, and enhance resolution with ML powered Super Resolution (Microsoft's counter to Nvidia's DLSS).

What does "full RDNA 2 feature set" mean?
Which one of the listed RDNA 2 features does PS5 not have? And who decides what full means between custom chips that have unique properties that the other doesn't have?

Seems like standard PR here, where MS are playing off the fact that only AMD call theirs straight up RDNA2, while Sony and MS call theirs RDNA2-based.
And in this case they may just be referring to the DirectX part, since that's Microsoft's technology. Because we know PS5 has hardware accelerated raytracing.

shikamaru317 said:


This matches with the rumors that PS5 was originally designed as a 2019 console, but had to be delayed into 2020, full RDNA 2 wouldn't have been ready if PS5 was designed as a 2019 console originally. Also explains why PS5 has a 350 watt power supply compared to 320 watt for Xbox Series X, even though Xbox Series X is more powerful and has locked clocks compared to variable clocks on PS5; if PS5 is only RDNA 1.5 (RDNA 1 with some RDNA 2 features), we know that RDNA 2 is more power efficient, which would explain why Xbox Series can get away with a smaller power supply in spite of the console being more powerful.


The teardown and deep dive video's both says that PS5 is RDNA2 based.

There are a too many differences between PS5 and XSX that can lead to different power consumption to jump to conclusions about a baseless rumor. Sony would be the last to want to cut the generation short, with the amount of software they're selling.

Sony also helped AMD to develop RDNA 2.

So the idea that they'd somehow miss out on something they developed together sounds extremely unlikely.

I think the reason people got confused is because these chips were designed while AMD were still working on their PC mass market RDNA2. So in that sense both Microsoft's and Sony's solutions could be called RDNA 1.5. Not because they are inferior to RDNA 2, but because they are custom, different, and finalized around the same time as AMD's PC version. (Al three launch in the same week of November.)

But because 99.99% of people will look at 1.5 and think it means something negative, Sony and MS would want to call them RDNA2 based.

Last edited by Hiku - on 29 October 2020