Sony PlayStation 5 specs: how does it compare to Xbox Series X?

During a livestream YouTube commenters described as “zzzzzzz”, PlayStation’s chief systems architect Mark Cerny detailed the long-awaited system specs of the PlayStation 5.

We’ve previously heard from the architect via Wired’s two PS5 exclusives, but on Wednesday, he described the company’s end-goals with the console.

Like Microsoft’s Xbox Series X, the PlayStation 5 will launch at the end of the year and will also make use of AMD’s Zen 2 CPU and RDNA-based GPU.

On the PS5, the eight-core Zen 2 CPU will be capped at 3.5GHz, accompanied by an RDNA-based GPU capable of 2.23GHz.

Both frequencies will adjust on the fly, allowing the CPU or GPU to take power from the system where needed.

Cerny noted that the GPU will feature 36 compute units and feature a dedicated sector for processing audio. He called this the Tempest engine.

As for storage, PlayStation is quoting some big numbers.

A new custom SSD with 825GB of storage will be capable of hitting 5GB/s in bandwidth, transferring 2GB in just over a quarter of a second. 16GB of GDDR6 RAM will also be used.

Important to note, the SSD uses NVMe technology, which means it’ll be user upgradeable in the future, but this storage technology definitely isn’t as cheap as 2.5-inch drives. The console will still allow storage expansion via USB hard drives, though.

Finally, the console will support backwards compatibility with PlayStation 4 titles, but porting of some will take time. PlayStation had said that around 100 will work without issue at launch.

In terms of absolute silicon specs, PlayStation fans may be left disappointed.

Microsoft’s Xbox Series X is set to sport a 3.8GHz CPU, a 52-compute until GPU clocked at 1.8GHz and 1TB of SSD storage.

Sony’s console will likely have quicker storage though, while both consoles are aiming for gaming performance of 4K at 120 frames per second.

For a more technical breakdown of the PlayStation 5’s specs and features, Eurogamer dives deeper than most.

Finally, if you missed Cerny’s conference or are simply seeking the most soothing voice in gaming, catch the recording below.

Feature image: Andy Walker/Memeburn