Important Update (Wololo): Several members of the PS4 scene have let us know that this “overclocking” of the PS4 on Linux probably doesn’t actually change the processor speed, only how it is reported to the system! Although we haven’t been able to get a screenshot of the same benchmark running on a “regular” non-overclocked PS4 to confirm, it seems to be the consensus among PS4/Linux experts on the scene that the overclocking isn’t actually happening. Noob404, whose site specializes in Linux on PS4, in particular says: “I can say that, in the past, I have tried overclocked kernels and haven’t found any major difference in things that matter”.
In one way, that’s good news, as it means the PS4 gets those decent benchmark numbers out of the box! That being said, I apologize for the possibly misleading report. We’re leaving the original article below for reference.
If someone is able to provide a screenshot of the PS4 running the same benchmark without the so-called “overclocking” for a definite confirmation, please reach out to me e.g. on Twitter.
Original article below this line.
User 0-BLANK-0 over at Reddit has shared a screenshot of their PS4 running the Unigine Heaven Benchmark, with the (Slim) console’s CPU overclocked at 2.4GHz.
PS4 Slim running at 150% clock speed
The base PS4’s CPU typically runs at 1.6GHz, with the PS4 Pro running at 2GHz. On their screenshot, the tinkerer explains that they’ve managed to overclock their PS4 Slim to 2.4GHz, and run the Unigine Heaven Benchmark, a reference in particular for Linux users. This is a 50% increase of the clock speed which is pretty massive, but people seem to say the PS4 can handle it (we can’t vouch for that, try at your own risk)
Showing a score of 1245 in the benchmark, it appears the overclocked PS4 slim gets a pretty good result considering its release date of 2013, sitting close to the scores of some mid-to-high end Graphics cards of the time: From what we have found, folks running Unigine Heaven with the same settings back in the day could achieve a score of roughly 1000 with a GTX 760, and 1500 with a GTX 770. The PS4 GPU is a custom AMD one, but has been said to be roughly equivalent to a GTX 750 Ti (a Graphics card significantly slower than the GTX 760). So it would seem the overclocking is helping significantly in the benchmark.
Of course there are many factors at play, and individual benchmark results can vary a lot depending on CPU, RAM, etc… So an apples to apples comparison is practically impossible. It would certainly be interesting to see the same Benchmark being run without Overclocking.
Overclocking the PS4 – How it’s done
The trick which is not really one, is that you have to have a Jailbroken PS4, running Linux. The kernel files (specifically /arch/x86/include/asm/ps4.h) need to be modified before compiling an “overclocked” version of Linux running on your PS4.
There are plenty of guides out there on how to run Linux on your PS4, but you’ll need a Jailbroken PS4 to install Linux.
You can download the Unigine Heaven Benchmark here. My “Gaming” desktop’s score (with the same settings as shown on the screenshot) is 1475. My machine’s fairly old (it was awesome in 2014…?) but from my perspective it shows the PS4 still has life in it.
Last but not least, overclocking the PS4 with Linux will not keep it in “overclocked” state when you reboot to the PS4 OS. Sorry for those who thought they could run God Of War like they were on their PS5 or something 🙂
source: Reddit
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