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Forums - Sony Discussion - AMD on ps4: "It is by Far The Most Powerful APU we Have Built to Date"

irstupid on 26 February 2013
JWeinCom said:
Eh... that's nice and all, but AMD's APUs aren't really made for high power stuff. They're not usually made for high end gaming stuff. A gaming laptop will usually have a discrete graphics card. The PS4's APU is unique in having a pretty nice graphics card which alone makes it better than other APUs.

So, yeah. Cool, but APUs aren't really designed for high powered gaming, so this is hardly a surprise.

Hey now, let AMD have something.  They barely get anything these days.  Let them have this moment while it lasts.



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ethomaz on 26 February 2013
darkknightkryta said:
Why is it a T.V. manufacturer can design a CPU better than a CPU manufacturer?

AMD made the PS4 APU... not Sony.



disolitude on 27 February 2013

AMD has never built an 8 core APU, nor will they outside the consoles for a while.

These APU's are most likely built on the Piledriver architecture but with efficiency in mind. So we are probably looking at 1/2 the computing power of a FX 8320 8 core. If things are optimized for all 8 cores, this thing can be fairly powerful on the CPU side.

On the GU side, just how they managed to squeeze a 7970m like power in to an APU is the real mystery here. This is the expensive part.



ethomaz on 27 February 2013
disolitude said:
AMD has never built an 8 core APU, nor will they outside the consoles for a while.

These APU's are most likely built on the Piledriver architecture but with efficiency in mind. So we are probably looking at 1/2 the computing power of a FX 8320 8 core. If things are optimized for all 8 cores, this thing can be fairly powerful on the CPU side.

On the GU side, just how they managed to squeeze a 7970m like power in to an APU is the real mystery here. This is the expensive part.

Maybe it's because the PS4 GPU is a preview of GCN 2.0 (HD 8000)... the 7970m don't have the HSA (for unified memory with CPU) neither 8 queues pipeline and 8 ACEs... the 7970m have only 2 queues pipeline and 2 ACEs.

These modifications found in the PS4 GPU is documented into the GCN 2.0 arch: http://developer.amd.com/wordpress/media/2013/02/AMD_Sea_Islands_Instruction_Set_Architecture.pdf

Edit - A better post to show what I'm saying: http://gamrconnect.vgchartz.com/post.php?id=5166656



disolitude on 27 February 2013
ethomaz said:
disolitude said:
AMD has never built an 8 core APU, nor will they outside the consoles for a while.

These APU's are most likely built on the Piledriver architecture but with efficiency in mind. So we are probably looking at 1/2 the computing power of a FX 8320 8 core. If things are optimized for all 8 cores, this thing can be fairly powerful on the CPU side.

On the GU side, just how they managed to squeeze a 7970m like power in to an APU is the real mystery here. This is the expensive part.

Maybe it's because the PS4 GPU is a preview of GCN 2.0 (HD 8000)... the 7970m don't have the HSA (for unified memory with CPU) neither 8 queues pipeline and 8 ACEs... the 7970m have only 2 queues pipeline and 2 ACEs.

These modifications found in the PS4 GPU is documented into the GCN 2.0 arch: http://developer.amd.com/wordpress/media/2013/02/AMD_Sea_Islands_Instruction_Set_Architecture.pdf

That link don't work for me, but it doesn't matter... what you are saying actually makes sense.

It's probably a less powerful GPU than a 7970m in terms of raw power, but much more efficient and based on the improved 8000 series thats coming out shortly.

Honestly at 400 bucks(which I hope will be retail price), I think Sony built the best possible console they built for the money in terms of performance. Unless this costs like 500-600...



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ethomaz on 27 February 2013

disolitude said:

That link don't work for me, but it doesn't matter... what you are saying actually makes sense.

It's probably a less powerful GPU than a 7970m in terms of raw power, but much more efficient and based on the improved 8000 series thats coming out shortly.

lol they removed the link.

Here I listed something: http://gamrconnect.vgchartz.com/post.php?id=5166656

I will try to find the PDF again.

Edit - Here another link with the info but the PDF is gone: http://parallelplusplus.blogspot.com.br/2013/02/amd-sea-islands-instruction-set.html

Edit - More info about the PDF: http://beyond3d.com/showpost.php?p=1708222&postcount=1082



Stinky on 27 February 2013

It's good to see AMD carving their own niche. Intel goofed when they screwed MS on the xbox.



9087 on 27 February 2013

well they said its their best APU built ever.

and they're supplying APU to nextbox as well. 

 

So put two and two together



cbarroso09 on 27 February 2013

this thing is not a console anymore, its becoming an alienware! a gaming pc.



darkknightkryta on 27 February 2013
ethomaz said:
darkknightkryta said:
Why is it a T.V. manufacturer can design a CPU better than a CPU manufacturer?

AMD made the PS4 APU... not Sony.

The way things were worded sounded like Sony asked for certain customizations which pushed the APU beyond anything AMD was planning.  I mis understood the OP.