AMD Suing Ex-Employees Involved With PS4, Xbox 720 & Wii U

[X2]

Well I guess is some truth to what's been leaked out, but what is truth and what is not.

AMD Suing Ex-Employees Involved With PS4, Xbox 720 & Wii U

Adam Barnes

One of the key figures behind AMD's next-gen console development is alleged to have stolen sensitive documents from AMD.

Published on Jan 16, 2013

AMD has filed an injunction against four former employees accused of stealing over 10,000 sensitive documents containing trade secrets, confidential information and material pertaining to technology currently in development at AMD.

Robert Feldstein, Manoo Desai, Nicholas Kociuk and Richard Hagen are the four named in the document.

Robert Feldstein in particular was the head of AMD's console initiative before leaving to work for rival competitor NVidia. It is said that Feldstein played a large part in AMD acquiring the contracts to work on the Wii U, the PS4 and the Xbox 720.

Very little info about next-gen consoles was revealed in the news, however it does lead to other, more interesting speculation.

A while back a NeoGAF user by the name of Sweetvar69 posted on the forum, claiming that his friend worked at AMD and had access to details on the next-generation of consoles.

Initially the user struggled to present information properly, leading many other users to cast doubt on the initial teases.

However, Sweetvar69 revealed the codenames of Xbox 720's Kryptos and the PS4's Thebes ahead another, later confirmation that these are the names being used for the next-gen machines.

It's believed that Sweetvar69's information and the four ex-AMD employees are connected, and though many of the details have since been deleted we have still managed to discover a few extra details of next-gen hardware.
Xbox 720 and PS4 Rumours Detailed:

Durango (the rumoured codename for the Xbox 720 used by Microsoft) is taking priority over Sony's PS4.
The Xbox 720 will have 8 cores at 1.6GHz each.
Durango is described as having a "super computer architecture"
The PS4 will feature the Starsha APU (detailed below)
Sony's PS4 (codenamed Orbis) was delayed for 6 months to keep it on track with Durango. The RAM revealed (2GB) has since been rumoured to be upgraded as a part of this move. It is now believed that Sony is on track with the original schedule.
Both the PS4 and the Xbox 720 are expected to run a two Jaguar systems - in other words, an APU design with additional processing units. Originally Sweetvar69 claimed the PS4 would have two separate GPUs, however.

PS4's Starsha APU Design:

New Starsha GNB 28nm TSMC
Milos
Southern Islands
DX11
SM 5.0
Open CL 1.0
Quad Pixel pipes 4
SIMDs 5
Texture Units 5TCP/2TCC
Render back ends 2
Scalar ALUs 320

Sweetvar69 posted these details - among others, since deleted - in a thread, but after scanning one of these documents when prompted, thereby validating the rumours, he decided to delete the posts for fear of AMD getting involved.
Latest PS4 Orbis Tech Specs

AMD x86 3.2GHz APU Solution (Jaguar/Steamroller), 4 cores (2 core pairs), [Higher Clock than Xbox 720/Durango]
Maybe AMD 8000 series GPU solution [Customised Solution Possibly utilising GPU + APU combo]
2-4GB GDDR5
Launch Fall 2013/Early 2014

Latest Xbox 720 Durango/Kyrptos Tech Specs

AMD x86 Jaguar 1.6GHZ 8-Core [Targeting one core being dedicated for OS tasks]
AMD 8000 series GPU
ESRAM on the GPU (unknown amount)
8GB Ram DDR3, [1.5GB of RAM likely reserved for the operating system]
Launch 2013

UPDATE: It turns out Sweetvar69's friend and source of these details is not one of the four people named in this AMD injunction.

http://www.nowgamer.com/news/1768355...720_wii_u.html

[skynet212]

See now this is some shit.....who KNOWS what information was givin to what company. As far as we know these guys could have given 720 information to PS4 so they could automatically have better specs or vice versa. Now this gen is gonna suck because one company might know about the other system when they shouldnt.....figures, say goodye to regular competition

[X2]

See now this is some shit.....who KNOWS what information was givin to what company. As far as we know these guys could have given 720 information to PS4 so they could automatically have better specs or vice versa. Now this gen is gonna suck because one company might know about the other system when they shouldnt.....figures, say goodye to regular competition

Yep

[JustinPinter]

2-4GB for the PS4 Orbis is a huge difference. I'm not too sure about this source. I highly doubt Sony will release a 2GB RAM next gen console.