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Did Sony Fall Into the Same Hardware Trap Sega Did With The Saturn?

ManaByte

Member
Back when Sega was developing the Saturn they got wind that Sony was focusing on 3D with the PlayStation and quickly slapped 3D support onto what was meant to be just a 2D system. The result was a system much more difficult to develop for than the PSX and one where most people couldn't program the 3D well as a result.

Jump forward 25 years and Microsoft had a 12TF beast with the Xbox Series X and it does look like Sony had a 9TF PS5. The DF Direct video alluded that the 9TF leak was correct, as it didn't reflect the boost being turned on for the chips.

Could Sony have not learned from what they caused Sega to do and added the variable clock rates on the PS5 to make the high-end of that performance appear closer to the Xbox?
 

Kacho

Gold Member
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DunDunDunpachi

Patient MembeR
Saturn was a mess because it was designed as a 2D arcade-porting beast and SEGA scrambled to tack on an extra CPU for the sake of 3D rendering. In almost any instance of 2D rendering, Saturn looked better than PS1 or N64.

Sony's design choices do not seem rushed or tacked-on. Rather, it seems they designed this thing from the get-go to use variable frequency for the sake of consistent power usage (which means consistent heat).

Much ado is being made about the "boost" but that boost would only be possible with the underlying hardware design in place. If it was hastily overclocked for the sake of number comparisons, why would they have designed the airflow and frequency control around it?
 

JohnnyFootball

GerAlt-Right. Ciriously.
Back when Sega was developing the Saturn they got wind that Sony was focusing on 3D with the PlayStation and quickly slapped 3D support onto what was meant to be just a 2D system. The result was a system much more difficult to develop for than the PSX and one where most people couldn't program the 3D well as a result.

Jump forward 25 years and Microsoft had a 12TF beast with the Xbox Series X and it does look like Sony had a 9TF PS5. The DF Direct video alluded that the 9TF leak was correct, as it didn't reflect the boost being turned on for the chips.

Could Sony have not learned from what they caused Sega to do and added the variable clock rates on the PS5 to make the high-end of that performance appear closer to the Xbox?
No. I wish people would do a little bit of thinking before they made these threads.
 

Ellery

Member
Looking at your post history your intentions of this thread are quite clear. You can do better than that, but if you are genuinely curious about the bad analogy you made then the answer is : lmao no.
 
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RAIDEN1

Member
I wouldn't say the PS5 is the next Sega Saturn in the making, far from it, unlike the Saturn it won't be difficult to develop for, and the difference in "power" won't be on the levels as comparing a Saturn to N64, and unlike Sega, the whole of Sony is united behind the vision of what PS5 can bring to the table, you haven't got a case of Sony America thinking hey why not have a 32x for the PS4 forget about what Sony of Japan thinks about PS5....the Sega Saturn undid all the great work that made Genesis as popular as it was, for some reason Sega didn't think about taking a leaf out of the Genesis book to see what made that a successful console, and then apply that in the design of the Saturn.....ironically it was a Sega game that convinced Sony to go for a bigger push on the 3d-front, and that game was Virtua Fighter....
 

Stuart360

Member
The Saturn wasnt a good system, power wise, or the weird way it was configured. PS5 is still a very good system, just not as good as XSX.
 

marquimvfs

Member
Hell no! The way I see, the major flaw that Saturn had was the difficulty to program for. Since PS3, Sony wont6 make that mistake again.
 
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