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Digital Foundry [1] (a popular game graphics YouTube review channel) not just put Linux on it, but made it run games, sometimes even with better perf than PS5 itself does. I'd say if you can do this, then it's pretty much general purpose!

[1] https://www.digitalfoundry.net/news/2026/05/playstation-5-li...

Back in the day, the Amiga had a Mac emulator (named Shapeshifter) that would run software faster than on a real Mac using the same CPU/clock rate.

No, but you can use a PS2 to guide a missile

You can run Linux (and NetBSD, obviously) on a PS2.

iirc it's something akin to R5 3600 + RX6700. 16GB of memory shared between RAM and VRAM (at most 12GB can be allocated to VRAM)

No need if you can get a BC250 for less than a PS5 these days - though even that may be difficult now

The BC250 is interesting, but you need a PSU, a case with a fan and a fan duct to push air through the heat exchanger or something similar. A used PS5 already has all that, plus the nice feeling it’d annoy Sony.

Also, the square tower Xbox has similar specs, and who doesn’t like to extend a middle finger to Microsoft?