Sony Playstation has lifted the veil over the PS4 Pro, a beefier PS4 that has some nice improvements to it. Sony Playstation also announced the PS4 Slim and new accessories.
The most apparent upgrade of the PS4 Pro is a new GPU. To be exact, AMD’s new Polaris GPU is inside. The exact GPU is not known, but considering its specs of 4.2 TFLOPs and 8GB GDDR5, we believe that it could be a scaled down AMD RX470 GPU. Why is this important? Well, the AMD RX470 allows the PS4 Pro to do a couple of things the standard version can’t. At 4.2 TFLOPs, the PS4 Pro’s GPU is more than twice as powerful as the one on the PS4 (1.8 TFLOPs). It achieves this without a significant hike in power consumption; from 250W to 310W, the PS4 Pro only uses a 60W larger PSU. Technicalities aside, this essentially allows the PS4 Pro to output on higher resolutions like 4K, though Sony’s press release clarifies that it’s more of a graphics upscaling. Regardless, those who have a 4K HDR display can expect improved graphics fidelity and dynamic range.
The PS4 Pro’s AMD Jaguar APU has a higher clock speed compared to the standard one, which should also translate to better overall performance of the OS or loading speed of games. Other things worth noting in this mid-generation refresh is that the optical/SPDIF port has been removed, the Bluetooth connection is now 4.0 instead of 2.1, and there’s three USB ports now. Physically, it’s also a bigger and heftier model with a dimension of 295mm x 55mm x 327mm and a weight of 3.3kg. It’ll also have a large 1TB HDD.
Sony also announced a new PS4 Slim, a new version set to replace the previous model. Barring existing unsold units, the PS4 Slim will essentially be the new basic model and will come in 500GB storage and 1TB storage variants. What’s new with the Slim version is support for HDR, which helps output greater brightness, contrast and colour levels, when connected to a HDR-compatible display. Accessories were also touched on, with the Dual Shock 4 (DS4) controller and Playstation Camera getting a refresh. The new DS4 now has a light bar that will shine through the touchpad, display a colour that corresponds to that player’s colour. Basically, this allows users to visually differentiate which controller is assigned to the players. As for the new PS Camera, it now comes in a cylindrical form and has Playstation support.
Gamers itching to get their hands on the new PS4 Pro will have to wait for a bit. PS4 Slim is expected to launch here in mid-October 2016 . The PS Camera and new DS4 will also be available by mid-October 2016.
