Stefan Mileschin

Chalk up another potential win for AMD. The latest report on the next PlayStation console (courtesy of Kotaku), allegedly codenamed "Orbis," puts AMD at the heart of both CPU and GPU: an eight core AMD64 CPU and an AMD R10XX GPU are said to drive the system. That's at least the dev kit that the site's tipster has as of right now, but those specs -- yes, even biggies like these -- could change completely by retail availability. Should AMD remain the CPU/GPU manufacturer, both Nintendo's Wii U and the next PlayStation will be powered by AMD chips; not too shabby for a company that's been bleeding talent. The rumors we've seen of the next Xbox also point to x64 architecture, but it's unclear whether that'll be supplied by AMD or another manufacturer. If those rumors pan out however, it would mean that a single unified architecture would power two of the major gaming consoles as well your laptop and desktop -- something that would have been unthinkable just a few years ago. (And would open up a world of possibilities.)

We're inclined to trust the current specs of the dev kit, as they're said to be sourced from "official Orbis documentation ... a hive of more than 90 PDFs about the forthcoming console." One slide culled from that official documentation also outlines Sony's vision of user accounts, allowing multiple Sony Entertainment Network accounts to be signed in simultaneously (thus allowing for individual Trophies, and potentially cloud saves, among other uses). The piece also details a new controller -- though it is noted that the current dev kit supports both DualShock 3 and Sixaxis controllers (and the image above shows a Move, so probably that too) -- which is supposedly known as "the Orbis Development Tool." It's said to resemble the DualShock, albeit with the addition of a capacitive touchpad -- a rumor also posited by some UK outlets earlier this week.

Whether any of this is actually true is another question altogether, and we can't be sure until Sony gives official word. It sounds like some form of information isn't too far off -- E3 perhaps? Regardless, head over to Kotaku for the alleged full (current) list of specs on the dev kit and even more speculation.

http://www.engadget.com/2013/01/23/r...dev-kit-specs/