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PS4

Linux and Sony used to exist on skilful terms, if not the best of friends. Back in the early on days of the PS3, Sony actively talked up its support for "Other Bone," and encouraged programmers to call back about Prison cell as a potential competitor in HPC environments and as role of supercomputer clusters. Once hackers institute ways to use Other Bone in means Sony didn't conceptualize, however, the visitor patched the functionality out of the PS3 altogether. When the PS4 launched, there was no noise about any sort of Other Bone compatibility — the system would play games, pure and simple.

Except that's non exactly how things have turned out. The PS4 shares many commonalities with PCs, only according to hacking grouping fail0verflow, information technology'southward not a PC — there are legacy features missing in the PS4 and "the southbridge does a lot of things in nonstandard means and the way information technology is organized makes no sense" (that last is a quote from marcan, a fail0verflow member).

According to a YouTube video from April, modder OsirisX managed to get Curvation Linux running on a PS4, and so managed to install the Steam customer. The video below shows the entire boot upwardly process and ends with a gameplay segment from the game Bastion. According to comments OsirisX has made elsewhere, "Most games accept stable FPS when running low to mid graphics setting."

Notation that this required a PS4 that was already jailbroken (merely possible if you are notwithstanding running firmware one.76 or below) and some specific patches, available here. Nevertheless, current compatibility is unknown, equally is the overall operation level. Until someone builds a Steam Os box with a roughly comparable AMD GPU, we won't know how well the PS4 is actually performing relative to an equivalent PC.

The pros and cons of compatibility

In theory, bringing Linux back up to the PS4 could open up the console to a small-scale (albeit song and dedicated) group of gamers who view Linux every bit a preferred Os and want to play more games in that operating system. In practice, Sony will never allow information technology, for three reasons.

Offset, while the PS4 has much in common with a PC, information technology'due south not identical to your typical beige box. The CPU cluster is a pair of quad-core Jaguars and the GPU is a tweaked version of AMD's GCN architecture with its own set of custom capabilities. PS4 games have been optimized and designed to run on the PS4; the games available via Steam for Linux oasis't. In some indie games, this isn't likely to affair, simply more demanding titles could easily bog down. Sony isn't going to accept on the task of ensuring that Steam games run well on the PS4 when using an operating system information technology doesn't formally back up, and Valve won't target the PS4 as a platform for its own SteamOS unless Sony signs off kickoff.

Second, there's the piracy concerns. Sony yanked OtherOS support from the PS3 as presently as it got a whiff that at that place might be a chance the capability could be used for piracy. It's non going to hazard any emerging threat that could compromise the PS4 as a locked-down ecosystem.

Third, in that location'due south the simple fact that Sony doesn't demand to brand whatsoever dramatic product changes to increase PS4 sales. Information technology's already dominating this console generation with more than units shipped than the Xbox One and Wii U combined. The Nintendo NX and rumors of a new Xbox 1 are an opportunity for Nintendo and Microsoft to shrink the gap, but the PS4 Neo is expected to give Sony's hardware a boost equally well. Nintendo may interruption gratuitous of its doldrums thanks to stronger hardware, but it'southward not at all sure that Microsoft will exist able to steal Sony'south thunder nearly three years into the current panel generation.

It'due south cool to see these kinds of hacks as an illustration of what enterprising and talented individuals can practise — but nosotros strongly suspect that Linux gamers will exist ameliorate served by a PC designed for such titles than a PS4 that isn't.