PS5 Pro – Specs, Price, Release Date and Everything Else You Want to Know

PS5 Pro – Specs, Price, Release Date and Everything Else You Want to Know

As a hardcore gamer with over two decades of gaming under my belt, I must say that the upcoming PS5 Pro has certainly piqued my interest. Coming from someone who has been through multiple console generations, I can attest to the fact that each new iteration always brings something exciting and innovative to the table.


The announcement has been made: the PS5 Pro is on its way! After numerous speculations, Sony has confirmed that the PlayStation 5 Pro will hit the market this year. Interestingly, this isn’t the first time Sony has released an upgraded console mid-generation – they introduced the PS4 Pro back in 2016 during the PS4 era. As such, there are many uncertainties surrounding the PS5 Pro: its design, new features, launch date, and most significantly, its price. Join us as we delve deeper into these questions and more to help you make an informed decision before purchasing the PS5 Pro.

The Purpose of the PS5 Pro

As per Mark Cerny, the principal architect of PlayStation 5, the intention behind the PS5 Pro is to eliminate the choice gamers currently face when choosing between performance and fidelity modes for a particular game. Cerny explained that most players (75%) opt for the performance mode, which prioritizes better frame rates at the expense of image quality and graphical details. While creators have made impressive use of the hardware capabilities, they often express a need for more graphics performance to realize their full vision, leading to the common aspect in modern gaming: graphics modes. By lessening this choice or bridging the gap, one of the main goals for PlayStation 5 Pro is to offer players the high-quality graphics that developers aspire to create, along with the high frame rates that gamers typically prefer. The PS5 Pro addresses this issue by focusing on its primary features: a more powerful GPU, advanced ray tracing, and AI-driven upscaling.

The GPU

According to Hideaki Nishino, CEO of Sony Interactive Entertainment’s Platform Business Group, as shared in the PlayStation Blog, the upcoming PS5 Pro boasts a significant enhancement in its graphics processing unit (GPU). This new GPU includes approximately 67% more Compute Units than the original PS5 console and offers memory that runs at about 28% higher speed. These upgrades lead to roughly 45% faster gameplay rendering, promising a smoother overall gaming experience. A detailed analysis of its specifications will be provided later on, but based on these numbers, the PS5 Pro is expected to have around 60 compute units compared to the base version’s 36.

Advanced Ray Tracing

PS5 Pro – Specs, Price, Release Date and Everything Else You Want to Know

The PS5 currently offers ray tracing in certain games, but it’s important to note that the execution has been somewhat inconsistent, particularly when set against a top-tier PC. However, the upcoming PS5 Pro is anticipated to deliver more sophisticated ray tracing methods, with expectations of significantly improved quality compared to the original model. As stated by Cerny, we’ve greatly enhanced ray tracing through a refined and speedy approach, enabling us to calculate rays at twice or thrice the speed of the PlayStation 5 in the PS5 Pro.

AI-Driven Upscaling

The PS5 Pro features a technology called “PlayStation Spectral Super Resolution” (PSSR), an upscaling technique designed to preserve high resolution even at high frame rates. Unlike methods like DLSS or FSR, the specific differences between PSSR and these techniques are currently unclear, but it seems Sony has developed their own unique technology for image resolution enhancement. As explained by Cerny, “PSSR examines game images on a pixel-by-pixel basis and can add an impressive level of detail, effectively boosting the resolution of games.

PS5 Pro Boost

PS5 Pro – Specs, Price, Release Date and Everything Else You Want to Know

In addition to its primary features, the PS5 Pro includes a performance mode, enabling enhanced resolutions for numerous PlayStation 4 games. This enhancement applies to over 8,000 backward compatible PS4 titles that can be played on the PS5 Pro. This feature appears quite similar to the resolution boost feature that Xbox has offered for some time.

Boost In Memory

As a dedicated gamer, I’m thrilled about my PS5’s 16 GB GDDR6 SDRAM, offering a breathtaking peak bandwidth of 448 GB/s. It’s exciting to hear that the upcoming PS5 Pro is expected to boost its memory by a substantial 28%, potentially pushing its bandwidth to approximately 572 GB/s. However, it seems that the CPU, powering the AMD Ryzen Zen 2 with 8 cores and 16 threads at 3.5GHz, remains unchanged, as reported by Cnet.

What else is inside and what is missing?

PS5 Pro – Specs, Price, Release Date and Everything Else You Want to Know

The PS5 features an 825 GB SSD which honestly gets filled up real fast these days. The PS5 Pro, however, will feature at 2TB SSD which should hopefully be enough for most games out there. According to reports, it will operate at the same speed as the base version which is 5.5 GB/s read.  It will also feature Wi-Fi 7 in locations where this standard is supported. However, the PS5 Pro is a discless console which means you would need a disc drive separately for the device if you are invested in physical media format. Furthermore, you will have to purchase the vertical stand separately since that is not included in the package.

Initial List of Games That Are Receiving PS5 Pro Support

As a gaming enthusiast, I can’t help but feel excited about the updates coming to my favorite games on the upcoming PS5 Pro. Titles like Alan Wake 2, Assassin’s Creed: Shadows, Demon’s Souls, Dragon’s Dogma 2, Final Fantasy 7 Rebirth, Gran Turismo 7, Hogwarts Legacy, Horizon Forbidden West, Marvel’s Spider-Man 2, Ratchet & Clank: Rift Apart, The Crew Motorfest, The First Descendant, The Last of Us Part II Remastered, and more are all getting a PS5 Pro makeover. Games like Gran Turismo 7 will now offer ray tracing during gameplay, while Hogwarts Legacy is set to feature enhanced ray tracing integration. I can’t wait to see how the PS5 Pro handles PS4 and PS5 games with unlocked frame rates; I’m expecting a significant performance boost there.

The Form Factor

PS5 Pro – Specs, Price, Release Date and Everything Else You Want to Know

From what we’ve seen so far, the PS5 Pro appears to be similar in size to the standard PS5. Unlike the layered design of the PS4 Pro, it doesn’t seem to have multiple layers. The DualSense controller and all other accessories like PlayStation VR2, PlayStation Portal, DualSense Edge, Access controller, Pulse Elite, and Pulse Explore are expected to function as designed with the new console.

Price and Release Date

Now, here is the hard part. The PS5 Price will launch on November 7 for a whopping $699.99/£699.99/€799.99/¥119,980. To put things into perspective, the PS4 Pro launched for 399 USD. Honestly, this pricing will likely be on the higher side for many consumers and given that the PS5, four years later since its launch, is still a perfectly fine machine, I don’t see a large segment of the market buying this. For those of who plan to buy this beast of a machine, preorders will begin on September 26, 2024.

Are you intending to acquire one? What do you make of the PS5 Premium Edition? Do you believe it’s worth upgrading to this model?

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2024-09-11 18:11