AMD just released its quarterly earnings call, notably with the report revealing three new chips for gaming products. Could these be for the practically confirmed PlayStation NEO, Nintendo NX and Xbox One Slim?
Now, these calls are good sources to confirm rumors and uncover developments, and as expected, virtually everyone keeping tabs on the chipmaker's ventures are up and about in coming up with some grounded guesswork of what's to come, particularly in the console scene.
PlayStation NEO
Codenamed NEO, the PS4.5 is the more capable sibling of the PS4, bumping up the clock speed from 1.6 GHz to 2.1 GHz and packing in a stronger AMD GCN GPU along with 4K support.
Details of Sony's new console are currently sparse at best, but according to them, the PS4.5 is expected to sport AMD-branded CPU and GPU. In other words, if that tidbit holds true, then the news of the upcoming chips is more or less in line with the rumored specifications.
Nintendo NX
It's no mystery that Nintendo is developing a next-generation console called the NX, and a more than generous amount of rumors has been cropping up since last year. Even though there's no info beyond those just yet, Nintendo has been employing AMD GPUs for more than a decade now since the GameCube.
As for an official update, Nintendo is believed to disclose some nitty-gritty details of the NX sometime this year or in the early part of the next.
Xbox One Slim
Based on Microsoft's track record of changing up the hardware of the Xbox before and after releasing a Slim variant, it's safe to assume that this won't be an Xbox Two, Xbox One-Half or anything else along those lines.
In other words, the next console from Microsoft is likelier to be the Xbox One Slim or a modest upgrade rather than a bigger step-up like the PlayStation NEO.
Did AMD Get Ahead Of Itself?
Short answer is no. AMD didn't exactly give out any confirmation too soon, leaving the huge announcements to the console makers themselves – as it should be, really.
To boil things down, the chipmaker only said in its quarterly earnings call is that it's looking to boost revenue in the second quarter by 15 percent mainly because of orders for three semi-custom system-on-chips.
Nevertheless, this could be the earliest sign for the arrival of the PlayStation NEO, Nintendo NX and Xbox One Slim, but it's probably better for everyone to hold on to their horses until the companies themselves give the official word.
Photo: Farley Santos | Flickr
