Yesterday, PlayStation released an intriguing video featuring Mark Cerny, who held a PS5 Pro Technical Seminar at Sony Interactive Entertainment’s headquarters. As the system architect, Cerny offered a comprehensive exploration of the PlayStation 5 Pro’s cutting-edge hardware, while also addressing some circulating rumors about the console. One of the rumors involved “FLOPflation,” stemming from a leak that inaccurately pegged the PS5 Pro at 33.5 TFLOPs. This figure was based on a leaker’s misinterpretation regarding the deeper integration of RDNA 3-inspired architecture.
In truth, the PS5 Pro reaches 16.7 TFLOPs, a notable upgrade from the PS5’s 10 TFLOPs. One accurate leak hinted that the new console achieves 300 TOPS during 8-bit calculations, while pushing to 67 TFLOPs with 16-bit calculations. Cerny clarified that the PS5 Pro’s architecture, dubbed RDNA 2.X, is a customized AMD RDNA 2 design that incorporates several RDNA 3 features. Importantly, it retains enough of the original framework, ensuring developers aren’t forced into completely rewriting code for the new hardware.
Cerny highlighted the PS5 Pro’s major enhancements, particularly in its Ray Acceleration with the use of BVH8 (Bounding Volume Hierarchy) and its improved “stack management in hardware.” This advancement means that the graphics shader code now runs more efficiently and is easier to manage on this new platform.
Understanding BVH is key, as it relates to 3D rendering techniques using bounding boxes to streamline graphics computations like reflections. The previous PS5 utilized BVH4 (four bounding boxes) for ray tracing tasks, but the PS5 Pro steps it up to BVH8 (eight bounding boxes). Likewise, the Ray Intersection Engine now doubles its capabilities, checking rays against eight boxes and two triangles instead of just four boxes and one triangle, as seen in the PS5.
These refinements in the PS5 Pro’s ray tracing hardware, achieved through a specially tailored version of RDNA 2, dramatically enhance performance with curved and textured light reflections, although improvements in shadows and flat reflections remain more modest.
For those keen on diving deeper into the technicalities, the entire 37-minute video on the PlayStation 5 Pro is well worth watching. It’s packed with insights into the console market and the technological advancements necessary to remain competitive.
