PlayStation 5 GDDR6 memory reaches potentially critical temperatures due to seemingly inadequate PS5 cooling solution design

PlayStation 5 owners living in countries where the temperature can rise above 35 °C (95 °F) during the hottest months, such as Australia, India, Brazil, and the warmer states of the US, should make sure they locate their brand-new console in a very well-ventilated area and even consider taking the plates off the device and leaving it bare. An expert-level PS5 teardown by the popular YouTube channel Gamers Nexus has revealed a considerable concern for owners of Sony’s latest console.

When testing the thermal development of the key components, including the GDDR6 memory, it was discovered that the bottom memory module reached a scorching temperature of 93.3 °C (199.94 °F). The temperature was still high with one of the PS5’s plates removed, while taking off both plates helped the situation a little, with the thermal measurement reaching 88.6 °C (191.48 °F). Testing was carried out in an ambient temperature of around 23 °C (73.4 °F). For the sake of context, Micron records a maximum operating temperature of 105 °C (221 °F) for its GDDR6 memory.

Further along in the Gamers Nexus PS5 thermal testing video there seems to be an explanation for why the memory module runs so hot, especially in comparison to the top memory module that hits a reasonable 65.5 °C (149.9 °F). The heavily finned heatsink inside the PS5 has the top memory covered, but there is no contact for the bottom module, leaving it to run at potentially critically high levels. While this might not be too much of a concern for gamers who live in cooler climates, those used to having ambient temperatures that are 10-15 degrees higher than those recorded in this PS5 teardown video could be faced with a throttling or crashing console.