Former Sony Developer Reveals Why Xbox Could Finally Surpass PlayStation

The year 2020 has been a tumultuous one up until now, and it could get more so before it gets better. The COVID-19 pandemic has thrown a spanner in the works for pretty much every industry across the globe. The PlayStation 5 and Xbox Series X is scheduled to be launched later this year and gamers have been awaiting the introduction of the next-gen consoles for a while now.

There was a fear among fans that the pandemic could disrupt Sony and Microsoft’s plans to release the next-gen consoles this year. However, neither company has indicated any plans to do so. Given the intense rivalry between the two consoles, you know neither company wants to be late to the party.

Xbox to Finally Surpass PlayStation?

Over the years, it has been Sony’s PlayStation that has edged the rivalry between the two consoles. This is not just in terms of the popularity or the sales, but also in regard to the performance. Fans partial to the Xbox may not agree with this, but rest assured, I’m not saying the difference has been too great but ever so slight. All that may change with the next-gen consoles if we are to believe a former Sony employee.

Chris Grannell worked at Sony’s European headquarters for about 15 years, in video game innovation for PlayStation and other platforms as well. So it is safe to say Chris knows a thing or two about performance technology.

About a month ago, Grannell tweeted out something that worried PlayStation fans.

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The hardware specifications of the Series X are a shade better than the PlayStation 5. Check out both console’s specs below.

Xbox Series X Specs

• CPU: 8x Zen 2 Cores at 3.8GHz (3.6GHz with SMT) 7nm
• GPU: 12 TFLOPs, 52 CUs at 1.825GHz, Custom RDNA 2
• Memory: 16GB GDDR6
• Storage: 1TB custom NVMe SSD
• Optical drive: 4K UHD Blu-ray
• Ports: HDMI 2.1 output, 3x USB 3.2, networking port, expanded storage slot, power input
• 120 fps support
• Potential 8K resolutions
• Ray-tracing technology
• Variable Rate Shading for more stable frame rates
• Compatible with Xbox One accessories
• Smart Delivery

PlayStation 5 Specs

• CPU: AMD Zen 2-based CPU with 8 cores at 3.5GHz (variable frequency)
• GPU: 10.28 TFLOPs, 36 CUs at 2.23GHz (variable frequency)
• GPU architecture: Custom RDNA 2
• Memory interface: 16GB GDDR6 / 256-bit
• Memory bandwidth: 448GB/s
• Internal storage: Custom 825GB SSD
• IO throughput: 5.5GB/s (raw), typical 8-9GB/s (compressed)
• Expandable storage: NVMe SSD slot
• External storage: USB HDD support (PS4 games only)
• Optical drive: 4K UHD Blu-ray drive

Chris Grannell has his say

Grannell recently opened up further on the subject during an RDX podcast episode.

“PS5 is not a bad console, it’s an absolute beast of a piece of hardware, but it’s just a piece of hardware which is slower on numerous kind of paths than what Microsoft has put together. I think Sony has kind of rested on their laurels a little bit. They’ve got this massive market share and lead and they’ve done a kind of PS3 is what I’ve been hearing. It’s not that bad in terms of hardware and complications and things like that, but just a little bit of they didn’t really kind of appreciate what Xbox were going to try and do in terms of this power narrative.”

He also went on to suggest that Sony were possibly caught off guard with Series X’s specs.

“If you look at the throughput and ray tracing capability (of the Xbox Series X)  then you start to understand why developers would be saying it’s kind of staggering. So you’ve got the math, then you start looking at the real-time ray-tracing capability and that’s where Sony has been caught off guard.”

In a chat with IGN, Phil Spencer, the brains behind Series X said that he “felt really good about how Series X lines up” after having seen the PS5 specs reveal. However, he was also quick to heap praise on Cerny and the PlayStation team by saying “their SSD technology is impressive.”

While all this could be worrisome for Sony and PlayStation fans, there are other aspects where the PS 5 would reign supreme over its counterpart. You can get an in-depth analysis of the PlayStation 5 from Mark Cerny himself here in an exclusive sit down with Wired.com.