Phil Spencer: 'I Like the Design' of the PS5, Respects What the Teams Do at PlayStation - News
by William D'Angelo , posted on 01 September 2020 / 2,339 Views
Head of Xbox Phil Spencer appeared on the latest Animal Crossing-themed Twitch talk show, Animal Talking, and was asked on what he thought about the design of Sony's next-generation console, the PlayStation 5.
Spencer says he is a fan of the design of the PS5 and he respects the work PlayStation does. He does say Xbox and PlayStation took very different approaches in designing their upcoming consoles.
"I like the design of what they did," said Spencer. "I have a lot of respect for what the teams do at PlayStation. But they’re running their box differently than we are, and it creates unique design challenges in how you keep these things cool. That’s a problem for both of us, so that’s not a shock. And they took an approach that is different than what we did."
He does say that it is hard to design a console with so much power as the real challenge is to keep it from overheating.
"It’s hard because I know the physics that we’re both dealing with when it comes to these consoles," he said. "And cooling these consoles — the power, the energy use — that presents real challenges this generation. We’re talking about consoles — with the CPU and GPU — that are real powerful computers, effectively.
"We chose our design because we wanted a large fan that we could spin a little more slowly so we’re not making noise. We wanted a very quiet console, so noise was something that we focused on. So we built a form-follow-function design so that we could draw a lot of air with a big fan spinning a little bit slower so we didn’t get those high-pitched whining sounds that sometimes consoles can make."
Thanks, VentureBeat and Twitch.
A life-long and avid gamer, William D'Angelo was first introduced to VGChartz in 2007. After years of supporting the site, he was brought on in 2010 as a junior analyst, working his way up to lead analyst in 2012. He has expanded his involvement in the gaming community by producing content on his own YouTube channel and Twitch channel dedicated to gaming Let's Plays and tutorials. You can contact the author at wdangelo@vgchartz.com or on Twitter @TrunksWD.
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36 Comments
I mean it looks stylish, but heat dissipation should be the main concern here.
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Yep, Cerny said they listened and heat dissipation and noise was a priority for them, but until we see it working we can't be sure.
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The noise of PS4 Pro was so loud that it impacted the fun of playing a game. I hope that PS5 is more quiet, but I wouldn't bet on that. Xbox Seriex X makes a more solid impression in case of cooling the system.
I agree. The PS4 Pro is ridiculously loud sometimes. I think of it as pretty significant engineering fail. I've been happy with it otherwise, but the most impressive characteristic the jet engine impression that it does.
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I sold my Spider-Man Pro because it was so loud. It was definitely a distraction while playing a game, especially because it seemed random as to the game and time it would fire up the jet engines.
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Saw a modder on YouTube who's been trying to figure out how to get his Pro to run cooler. While making some progress, he eventually noticed the APU was so convex that the flat heat sink only touched a small portion of the center of the die. Can't help but wonder if this is actually a widespread problem. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=tVkeZXvNfdU
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NSC Modz on YouTube has been trying to get his Pro to run cooler. He ended up noticing his APU was extremely convex and the flat heat sink was only touching a small portion of the center of the die. I wonder if this was actually a widespread problem for PS4 and Pro? With the newer models being much quieter, perhaps they solved this issue?
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I'm not a MS fan, but I totally approve any effort they make to keep noise low. I hope Sony carefully designed PS5 heatsink and fan to achieve the same result with their case. And I hope both designed their cooling system to stay not too noisy even in the worst case, when fans must spin full steam.
PS5 design will get old real quick, while Xbox Series X will just bland in. I know they want to push digital edition but the deformed disc drive version is embarrassing.
The Series X looks like a smoke eater, and is the most uninspired console design in the history of the industry.
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Phil, I like the Xbox One design more than the PS5. Stop trying to fool the unfooled.
I like the funky PS5 and the minimalistic Xbox. Those are both attractive products.
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I'm an odd person so I really like the PS5 design more, but market wise I think the Series X is better.
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Well, thank you, even if it isn't a popular opinion even among PS fans of VGC. On the heating challenge we are still to know if PS5 will be noisy and how much, but it is quite probable that XSX will be a lot more silent.
I think it is too early to say that. I do believe that their design is actually to address that. The Play Station Four sounds like a jet engine (at least mine does, original model) when I play Horizon Dawn. I believe part of the size if because they addressed that with the new console.
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Well it is just opinion at the moment, and mine is that Series X is likely more silent, but Cerny said they put noise and heat as priorities on the design so perhaps they have a clever solution.
My original is quite noisy as well, my pro (that people also say should really loud) is quite quiet.
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The external PS5 design can contain an internal air flow path designed for low noise, although its design surely should be more complicated than using the straightforward XSX design.
An equally or even better contribution to keep noise low could come from fan blades design inspired to birds of prey wings and feathers, a feature that, unlike silent air path, PS5 design doesn't make more challenging.
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Dear Phil. Please be quiet for just a day or two. Sincerely, everyone.
Nah, not everyone :) The people who cares about Xbox and the ecosystem want more of that!
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No sound warmup is your username and sounds like the XSX design. Jet engine meltdown seems more the PS5 design.
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Tbh I don't see why it's a big deal that he's always talking? I mean, the fact that literally everything he says has sometimes multiple articles about it makes it seem like he talks more than he does, but even if he was going around spouting some new PR bs in a new interview every single day I don't see why it's such a big deal. These articles take so little effort to read that I'm hardly invested enough to care one way or another.
- +5
- +11
This isn't about some new speech he gave, it's the same Nintendo Twitch interview that was previously publicized re: Nintendo IP or brand or whatever. It's not Phil's over-talking, it's click baiters trying to milk more out of the same by-now old interviews.
- +9
Well it's so big that I assume it's alright. Unless it's not, then what the fuck can we do?
Lets see how Many articles the dude who runs this section of the forum can Milk.
Yeah, everytime a mouse farts, WDA writes an article about it. Not everything is newsworthy. I really wish they'd focus on more substantial content, instead of spitting out 10+ single paragraph articles a day.
- +7
Thank God i AM not the only One thinking it, we dont need 10 fucking articles about the same PR interview phill Spencer Gave or a article everytime he gives a fart, we dont need a article for every fucking country ghosts of tsushima is Numbers 1 in sales... News section in vgchartz is a mess
- +8
I mainly come here for the forums. This site isn't so active that most threads will balloon to 10+ pages in a matter of hours. The news articles, and reviews on here are both pretty bad.
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Agreed. There is plenty of other news in the gaming world. They don't need to be reporting every time Phil Spencer coughs.
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The noise from my pro got me to start using mine and I actually prefer it now.
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That is a matter of perspective. Microsoft's design is highly innovative in terms of cooling, they're managing to cool a console that uses about 100 watts more power than PS4 Pro and XB1 X with a single fan through the use of innovative engineering. They specially designed a split motherboard that goes into the case sideways, allowing air flow along either side of the motherboard and all of it's components from a single fan. Sony's design may be more innovative in terms of aesthetics, but in terms of cooling I doubt it is anywhere near as innovative as XSX, that is why it is so much larger than XSX, they needed more space for airflow and extra fans just to keep it cool.
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