Sony Playstation 5 can be based on AMD’s architectures Zen and Navi

In the fall of 2013, both Sony and Microsoft launched the gaming consoles Playstation 4 and Xbox One, both of which came with system chips from AMD and 8 GB of primary memory – many times more than the duo’s predecessors. Since then, both players have released both shrinking and more powerful variants within the same family.

Now what is said to be the first details about Sony Playstation 5 are published. The source is Charlie Demerjian at Semiaccurate, who among other things was the first to reveal Nintendo’s partnership with Nvidia for Switch and to announce the specifications for Playstation 4.

According to the report, AMD is once again responsible for the system circuit, where the processor cores will be based on the company’s architecture Zen and the graphics part on the future Navi. In both cases, these are tailor-made solutions, where AMD’s architectures thus lay the foundation for more specific adaptations to Sony’s needs.

Provided that the information about an AMD system circuit is correct, it also opens the door for backward compatibility with game titles for Playstation 4, which is based on the considerably lower-performing processor architecture Jaguar and an older graphics generation from the Graphics Core Next family (GCN).

This also includes adaptations for virtual reality (VR), but exactly what this means is not clear. It is possible, however, that the graphics architecture AMD develops for Sony will have special adaptations for VR, but also that more electronics will be built into the game console itself than is the case with Playstation 4 and Playstation VR.

Furthermore, the next generation should not be far from completion, as a “large number” of developer units should have already been sent out to game developers. Due to this, there is speculation in a launch already this year, but it is more likely that Sony will not release the Playstation 5 until 2019 or 2020 at the earliest.