A year behind schedule, can the PlayStation 3’s Cell shrug off vapourware claims?
Bold claims back strong ISSCC showing – PlayStation 3 launch timeframe revealed
At the International Solid State Circuits Conference (ISSCC) today, the PlayStation 3-powering Cell processor developed jointly by IBM, Sony and Toshiba was finally shown to an expectant crowd.
The unveiling has been a long time coming, with most estimates putting Cell development around 12 months behind schedule.
And down to business. The first point of note is that the PlayStation 3, arguably the Cell’s flagship host, will receive a prototype of the processor, hinting at Sony’s strong desire to expedite the launch of its next home console. The version to power the PS3 will have a 221mm² die and use 234 million transistors, made using ‘Holy Grail’ 90nm process technology.
It will contain eight 64-bit floating point processors, referred to as synergistic processor elements (SPEs), running along side a 64-bit Power processor capable of running two threads. The SPEs take will 128-bit operands and split them into four 32-bit words. Up to 128 operands can be stored in the Cell register file.
"Today, we are very proud to share with you the first development of the Cell project, initiated with aspirations by the joint team of IBM, Sony Group and Toshiba in March 2001," said Ken Kutaragi, executive deputy president and COO, Sony Corporation, and president and Group CEO, Sony Computer Entertainment Inc. "With Cell opening a doorway, a new chapter in computer science is about to begin."
Initial production of Cell microprocessors is expected to begin at IBM's 300mm wafer fabrication facility in East Fishkill, N.Y., followed by Sony Group's Nagasaki Fab plant, later this year.
For an idiot’s guide to Cell expectations, see our article here.
So we are left with the question, now that the Cell is more than a vapourware dream (various dies were shown at the event as pictured) where does this leave the PlayStation 3 and its launch? SPOnG considers it unlikely that the East Fishkill will manufacture PlayStation 3 chips, with that being left to Sony’s Nagasaki facility. Production there, as outlined above, commences at an unspecificed point this year. So essentially, the PlayStation 3 could be on shelves within 2005 though of course, that’s wildly unlikely.
What is more likely is first-generation hardware dev kits shipping in time for Christmas, replacing the high-end PC with port guidelines adopted by studios across the world. SPOnG then estimates that Sony could realistically see a PlayStation 3 launch in time for Easter 2006. Although software would be very thin on the ground, SCEI has never seen this as an obstacle to launching a home machine. Option two would be to launch the PS3 late 2006 in time for the holiday period, though with Microsoft already racking up a year of Xbox 2 by then, timeframes may have to overpower a credible launch line-up.
And of course, Sony still has its Dreamcast-killing trick up its sleeve. The dark horse of ‘wait and see’ which worked with lethal efficiency at the dawn of the current generation of platforms.
Expect updates on all things PlayStation 3, right here, as they break.
The unveiling has been a long time coming, with most estimates putting Cell development around 12 months behind schedule.
And down to business. The first point of note is that the PlayStation 3, arguably the Cell’s flagship host, will receive a prototype of the processor, hinting at Sony’s strong desire to expedite the launch of its next home console. The version to power the PS3 will have a 221mm² die and use 234 million transistors, made using ‘Holy Grail’ 90nm process technology.
It will contain eight 64-bit floating point processors, referred to as synergistic processor elements (SPEs), running along side a 64-bit Power processor capable of running two threads. The SPEs take will 128-bit operands and split them into four 32-bit words. Up to 128 operands can be stored in the Cell register file.
"Today, we are very proud to share with you the first development of the Cell project, initiated with aspirations by the joint team of IBM, Sony Group and Toshiba in March 2001," said Ken Kutaragi, executive deputy president and COO, Sony Corporation, and president and Group CEO, Sony Computer Entertainment Inc. "With Cell opening a doorway, a new chapter in computer science is about to begin."
Initial production of Cell microprocessors is expected to begin at IBM's 300mm wafer fabrication facility in East Fishkill, N.Y., followed by Sony Group's Nagasaki Fab plant, later this year.
For an idiot’s guide to Cell expectations, see our article here.
So we are left with the question, now that the Cell is more than a vapourware dream (various dies were shown at the event as pictured) where does this leave the PlayStation 3 and its launch? SPOnG considers it unlikely that the East Fishkill will manufacture PlayStation 3 chips, with that being left to Sony’s Nagasaki facility. Production there, as outlined above, commences at an unspecificed point this year. So essentially, the PlayStation 3 could be on shelves within 2005 though of course, that’s wildly unlikely.
What is more likely is first-generation hardware dev kits shipping in time for Christmas, replacing the high-end PC with port guidelines adopted by studios across the world. SPOnG then estimates that Sony could realistically see a PlayStation 3 launch in time for Easter 2006. Although software would be very thin on the ground, SCEI has never seen this as an obstacle to launching a home machine. Option two would be to launch the PS3 late 2006 in time for the holiday period, though with Microsoft already racking up a year of Xbox 2 by then, timeframes may have to overpower a credible launch line-up.
And of course, Sony still has its Dreamcast-killing trick up its sleeve. The dark horse of ‘wait and see’ which worked with lethal efficiency at the dawn of the current generation of platforms.
Expect updates on all things PlayStation 3, right here, as they break.
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Comments
Showing the 20 most recent comments. Read all 23.
config 8 Feb 2005 14:34
4/23
hsw wrote:
with the Xbox using IBM power proccessor's expect MS to port windows to power and the Xbox 3 to use the cell
Unless Sony vetos any contracts that would see MS being provided with Cell...
If MS chose to port Win to Cell, it'd be bye-bye Intel & AMD (assuming all the Win app developers follow suit and recompile their products for Cell)
config 8 Feb 2005 14:35
5/23
hsw wrote:
with the Xbox using IBM power proccessor's expect MS to port windows to power and the Xbox 3 to use the cell
Unless Sony vetos any contracts that would see MS being provided with Cell...
If MS chose to port Win to Cell, it'd be bye-bye Intel & AMD (assuming all the Win app developers follow suit and recompile their products for Cell)
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SPInGSPOnG 8 Feb 2005 14:57
6/23
saurian wrote:
the launch of PS3 might then clash with Xbox 3 !!!
Xbox 720, surely!
Or Xbox 4Pi.
Autobot 8 Feb 2005 15:07
7/23
I just see the whole cell thing to be a blackhole for Sony. They are going to have to sell a lot of cells just to make even on the deal. The amout of cells they would have to cell is humungous I doubt they can do it. If Microsoft doesn't allow Windows to run on it they will have even harder time selling. This could be the make or break for Sony but I think mostly break.
BTW, what does IP mean? People have been using this term to discribe games recently and I cannot find a single definition anywere.
BTW, what does IP mean? People have been using this term to discribe games recently and I cannot find a single definition anywere.
config 8 Feb 2005 15:15
8/23
Autobot wrote:
BTW, what does IP mean? People have been using this term to discribe games recently and I cannot find a single definition anywere.
Intellectual Property - ideas, concepts, creative output that is patented, copyrighted and basically owned by an individual or corporate entity.
These days it seems to be interchangable with the terms "brand", "franchise" and a bunch of others, which I'm not sure is entirely correct.
It also means Internet Protocol, but that's another thing altogether.
kid_77 8 Feb 2005 15:39
9/23
Crystal clear as always, Config.
In gaming terms:
Nintendo's IP: Mario, Zelda, Metroid etc.
Sega's IP: Sonic, Panzer Dragoon, NiGHTS etc.
Capcom's: Street Fighter, Resident Evil, Mega Man
I'm sure you get the idea.
In gaming terms:
Nintendo's IP: Mario, Zelda, Metroid etc.
Sega's IP: Sonic, Panzer Dragoon, NiGHTS etc.
Capcom's: Street Fighter, Resident Evil, Mega Man
I'm sure you get the idea.
Autobot 8 Feb 2005 16:11
10/23
I had a feeling that it was intellectual property, but because people were using it in very wrong ways to discribe things I thought it ment for something else.
IGN has a feature that said where are the original Ips?
Where are the original intellectual properties? just sounded a little fishy.
Thanks for clearing it all up :)
IGN has a feature that said where are the original Ips?
Where are the original intellectual properties? just sounded a little fishy.
Thanks for clearing it all up :)
hsw 8 Feb 2005 17:21
11/23
The cell will be a great success without windows
Every TV produce by Sony and Tos. in 2006 will hav a cell
cell phones will have a version of cell
every digital video or sound device could use a cell
The Windows market is only a small part of the over chip market.
by 2006 all game machines will use IBM chips that will blow away any intel PC.
MS has already change its XBox to Power because it is much better than anything Ibtel has to offer.
IBM Chips are going to dominate the server market.
IBM is selling it PC business to be able to sell chips to PC makers
Every TV produce by Sony and Tos. in 2006 will hav a cell
cell phones will have a version of cell
every digital video or sound device could use a cell
The Windows market is only a small part of the over chip market.
by 2006 all game machines will use IBM chips that will blow away any intel PC.
MS has already change its XBox to Power because it is much better than anything Ibtel has to offer.
IBM Chips are going to dominate the server market.
IBM is selling it PC business to be able to sell chips to PC makers
Autobot 8 Feb 2005 17:45
12/23
Thats mostly your opinion and I will respect that. you have to understand that about 90% of all computers use a Microsoft OS. If they do not have any Microsoft backing on there chipset I highly doubt they will get very far with it, the chip is so abstract and different Microsoft would have to custom built an OS just for the chipset something I doubt they want to do for a direct competitor. Sony has a very weird quirk, they like to force there new technologies and when the find one that sticks they begin to try and take over the medium and eventually the market. Microsoft is a little more wise than most people give them credit for. They are not a greedy company the just know that one small mistake can compromise the company because one great idea outside of there company can ruin them, so they have to be involved in everything that they feel is not only profitable but also keeps the integrity of the company.
Sure Sony and Toshiba are making TV's with the cell chip but they are only 2 of many tv companies. Great TV Ideas have failed in the past, I am not saying that this is going to be one of them but the fact that they have ambitions that seem to stretch out further than what is normally acceptable in our culture. People in general will accept baby steps into technology but not huge jumps and with huge jumps comes huge prices something else people try to avoid when buying electronics.
just think, how long did it take for the mass to accept computers in there life? and how long did it take for the internet to become mainstream? the cell chip just seems to want to take things soo far soo fast that its going to be too much to swallow to fast. If any one of there promises fails the whole project can be doomed.
Sure Sony and Toshiba are making TV's with the cell chip but they are only 2 of many tv companies. Great TV Ideas have failed in the past, I am not saying that this is going to be one of them but the fact that they have ambitions that seem to stretch out further than what is normally acceptable in our culture. People in general will accept baby steps into technology but not huge jumps and with huge jumps comes huge prices something else people try to avoid when buying electronics.
just think, how long did it take for the mass to accept computers in there life? and how long did it take for the internet to become mainstream? the cell chip just seems to want to take things soo far soo fast that its going to be too much to swallow to fast. If any one of there promises fails the whole project can be doomed.
fluffstardx 8 Feb 2005 19:27
13/23
Also consider who won't use it: many an electronics company will refuse to use the technology. Heck, i doubt all the consoles will use it ever. Will Apple put it in iPods? Will it be in Creative's Zen range? Will Soundblasters use it? Or Nvidia Graphics cards? How about Radeons?
There is many a place it won't be found, and as such it's still got a lot of people to convince.
There is many a place it won't be found, and as such it's still got a lot of people to convince.
hsw 8 Feb 2005 20:06
14/23
Companies can buy the chip from at least 3 companies
(I,S and T will al produce chips)
MS already announced that it will not support Intel true 64 bit Itanic (Projected 2004 sales 6,000,000 chips actual 2004 200,000 chips )
There have already been announced graphic Cards using the cell.
All 3 Major Game consul have already contracted to use IBM chips.
People will buy the Xbox2 because it blows away all existing game platforms including the fastest overclock PC's.
People will buy the PS3 because it will blows away the Xbox.
What about Nintendo?? Stay tuned.
(I,S and T will al produce chips)
MS already announced that it will not support Intel true 64 bit Itanic (Projected 2004 sales 6,000,000 chips actual 2004 200,000 chips )
There have already been announced graphic Cards using the cell.
All 3 Major Game consul have already contracted to use IBM chips.
People will buy the Xbox2 because it blows away all existing game platforms including the fastest overclock PC's.
People will buy the PS3 because it will blows away the Xbox.
What about Nintendo?? Stay tuned.
SPInGSPOnG 8 Feb 2005 21:05
15/23
Autobot wrote:
The chip is so abstract and different Microsoft would have to custom built an OS just for the chipset something I doubt they want to do for a direct competitor.
You seem to forget that Microsoft made a version of Windows NT for both the IBM/Motorola PowerPC chip and the DEC Alpha.
Plus the fact that Intel's existing chip technology is reaching its theoretical limits of speed, and will require a paradigm shift that will require work on Microsoft's part if they wish to keep using that chip line.
Apple took a difficult decision and changed CPU architecture in 1994/5 when they moved from Motorola 68000 series to PowerPC series Chips. Microsoft will have to do something similar at some point, or they will be running on machines that are left in the dust.
Sony has a very weird quirk, they like to force there new technologies and when the find one that sticks they begin to try and take over the medium and eventually the market.
Whereas Microsoft just buys and shuts down any competing technology, or use their market dominance to exclude it.
Microsoft is a little more wise than most people give them credit for. They are not a greedy company
*SPEECHLESS*
Microsoft not greedy.
Babies not cute.
Water not wet.
Sky not blue.
Discussion not possible.
Pandaman 8 Feb 2005 21:22
16/23
Now if only we knew what the hell the Revolution was, E3 would be all set!
Elysium 9 Feb 2005 02:52
17/23
Will you people listen to yourselves? Some of you are talking about the cell as if it were the holy grail of computing! All Sony have done is succeeded in making a more complicated device for developers to program, while boasting about something that has an ever decreasing relevance in games today: the processor speed. Since NVidia are developing the video processors, the only point of any relevance is the bus speed between video processors and the cell processors. If I had to bet which next gen machine developers will like the most, I would bet the farm on the XBox, as MS do one thing extremely well... Development tools. The developer API's (mostly DirectX) will be largely unchange for the next gen XBox and will be a no-brainer for developers to upskill, but I suspect the PS3 will be an entirely different beast, requiring developers to effectively start from scratch.
Being that a system's success is very much reliant on good software and games, I think we'll see a much greater percentage of XBox 2 games taking full advantage of the hardware available at launch, as opposed to a much smaller percentage of PS3 games, where developers will need time to come to grips with the architecture. Many people seem to use the fact that XBox architecture is similar to a PC, as a negative aspect of the console. It is in fact it's greatest asset, holding the door open for thousands of PC game development companies to develop for XBox. With the next gen, they retain this advantage, and bound ahead of the obstacles facing PS3 game developers.
Being that a system's success is very much reliant on good software and games, I think we'll see a much greater percentage of XBox 2 games taking full advantage of the hardware available at launch, as opposed to a much smaller percentage of PS3 games, where developers will need time to come to grips with the architecture. Many people seem to use the fact that XBox architecture is similar to a PC, as a negative aspect of the console. It is in fact it's greatest asset, holding the door open for thousands of PC game development companies to develop for XBox. With the next gen, they retain this advantage, and bound ahead of the obstacles facing PS3 game developers.
kid_77 9 Feb 2005 09:56
18/23
Elysium wrote:
If I had to bet which next gen machine developers will like the most, I would bet the farm on the XBox, as MS do one thing extremely well... Development tools.
And lets not forget XNA. If M$ really get behind this, dev studios will flock to them, because they need to design games with as little hassle/cost as possible.
Sony did this with élan when they implemented their 3rd party development support for PS, and perhaps M$ have been smart enough to get the dev-support ball rolling with XB 360?
If the Cell architecture is a pig to develop for, and if Sony doesn’t spend the time implementing excellent dev tools, then surely they'll loose (US) dev co.s?
The PS3 may have the potential to blow the XB 360 out of the water, but, like Elysium says, developers may struggle with the 1st wave of games, and 1st impressions count. If this happens, we could have a shift in power.
Ditto 9 Feb 2005 10:14
19/23
You've got to remember in all this that Cell is really just a more advanced PowerPC processor. The "Cell" is just a piece of software.
There is no doubt in my mind that this makes a lot of sense. It means that it is based on an already well-supported platform and it will be possible for cross-platform ports between PowerPC Xbox and Revolution. However ports would not take advantage of the Cell.
Kid_77 makes the most valid point about development tools. Just look at the rise of Visual Studio and the decline of Borland. Microsoft's biggest problem with XDA is that Sony owns the market and is hardly going to support their technology, and because of this most developers won't support it either.
Prehaps they could come to a compromise. At least for the next generation I can't see Microsoft XDA/Xbox affecting Sony at all. It has the power in the market at the moment and can set the standards.
There is no doubt in my mind that this makes a lot of sense. It means that it is based on an already well-supported platform and it will be possible for cross-platform ports between PowerPC Xbox and Revolution. However ports would not take advantage of the Cell.
Kid_77 makes the most valid point about development tools. Just look at the rise of Visual Studio and the decline of Borland. Microsoft's biggest problem with XDA is that Sony owns the market and is hardly going to support their technology, and because of this most developers won't support it either.
Prehaps they could come to a compromise. At least for the next generation I can't see Microsoft XDA/Xbox affecting Sony at all. It has the power in the market at the moment and can set the standards.
config 9 Feb 2005 12:26
20/23
Autobot wrote:
Sony has a very weird quirk, they like to force there new technologies and when the find one that sticks they begin to try and take over the medium and eventually the market.
On what basis do you make these claims? Show me one market that Sony has used its proprietary techology to take control. I cannot think of a single market that the company has done this. There are hundreds of consumer electronics firms out there, prolly a dozen of them in just as strong a position as Sony - though their brand may not have the caché that Sony seems to have. At PS1 launch there was SEGA and Nintendo, both of which lost ground due to their own inept methods.
The only Sony maneouvering I'm troubled by is it relentless aqcuisition frenzy in the music and movie production and publication arena, but that has nothing directly to do with technology.
Sure Sony and Toshiba are making TV's with the cell chip but they are only 2 of many tv companies.
It doesn't mean they won't licence out the tech to other companies. This goes on all the time in TV manufacture. I'll bet my hat that Sony doesn't manufacture all of the components inside its products, and that some of the components are produced by apparent competitors. Daewoo & Philips, for example, produce a lot of the CRTs in TVs and monitors. It's no big leap to see Toshiba or Sony producing the driver or signal processing components for TVs built and badged by other firms.
just think, how long did it take for the mass to accept computers in there life? and how long did it take for the internet to become mainstream? the cell chip just seems to want to take things soo far soo fast that its going to be too much to swallow to fast. If any one of there promises fails the whole project can be doomed.
I think you're expecting the Cell's built into TVs to do too much. There's all this posturing about Cells being able to chatter and share load, but in fact I highly doubt we'll see the Cells in TVs being able to communicate with PS3's from day one. It'll just be a processor to handle the computing currently done by a bunch of discreet components.
tyrion 9 Feb 2005 13:42
21/23
OK, some very valid points in this thread. I'm not going to reply to them all directly, but I'd like to talk in general terms about where I see the Cell fitting into the digital landscape.
First and foremost, Cell is not a Sony-only technology. Sony can't use it to dominate any market except maybe the games console market. All the other markets that Sony competes in are covered by Toshiba and IBM - Sony's partners in the Cell consortium.
OK, that said, I think that Cell has some design "features" that will make it a hard sell into the general computer manufacturing world.
Much of my assumptions are based on the following article about Cell by someone hardware-geeky enough to have been at ISSCC and understood what they were on about - don't worry there are also pictures!
Introducing the IBM/Sony/Toshiba Cell Processor
There's also a part two to the article that goes into more depth than just the SPEs.
Basically, Cell is only capable of single precision floating point calculations, at 32bit. This is not a good thing for heavy scientific analysis. It is an extremely good thing for games and embedded devices since it allows all instructions to have fixed execution times.
The Cell is not a drop-in replacement for G4 or G5, so Apple are very unlikely to use Cell in a Mac. One of the instruction sets that MacOS X relies heavily on is called "VMX/Altivec" - a system to allow a single CPU instruction to work on large sets of data. Cell has a worse than G4 implementation of this instruction set. This also makes it very unlikely that Microsoft will port Windows to Cell, even more unlikely than them re-porting XP to G5 or another PPC chip.
Also managing the on-SPE memory is entirely under software control, in the same way the OS manages the main memory of a PC. This is unlike the normal cache memory on a "traditional" CPU. This will make writing a general purpose compiler harder. Not that it will make it impossible, mind you, but getting the optimisation out of generated code that you would be able to with hand rolled is going to take a lot of work by compiler writers. Luckily for a lot of people, IBM have some very, very good compiler writers who will, no doubt, create a back-end for gcc (the GNU C/C++ compiler) that will jump start Linux and other open source projects on Cell.
Note: The above points are not "a bad thing" they are part of the reason Cell can execute so quickly and run at such high clock speeds.
In other news, the Cell is very similar to the PS2 in overall architecture, the G4 on the Cell takes the role of the Emotion Engine and the SPEs take the roles of the PS2's vector units. What this means is that people who write software close to the hardware on PS2 will feel at home writing software for Cell.
OK, all of the above points have led me to the following conclusions;
1) Apart from a few specialised workstations, Cell will not be used in destop computers.
I base this on the lack of the full set of VMX/Altivec instructions. This will make it difficult to get Windows or MacOS X onto Cell. Linux will appear, but I think it will be a specialised distribution, not a desktop one like Fedora Core. This will make it hard to buy computers with "Cell Inside" stickers in the short term, since Linux is not 100% ready for general desktop use. Please note that I use Linux as my home desktop and HTPC OS, but then I'm not "normal", in so many ways. :-)
2) For games, Cell will not be much harder to program than PS2.
The similar architecture to PS2 will enable games developers to move quite smoothly. This will be most apparent with middleware developers such as Criterion and Havok. This will make XNA largely irrelevant in the developer's mind. More and more companies are using middleware to develop their games, I can only see this trend accelerating. Development tools will mostly be created by the platform owners to help middleware companies develop their products.
3) Cell will be used in a lot of entertainment devices.
The Cell consortium will need to license the use of Cell to other manufacturers to recoup the cost of development. No way will Sony, IBM and Toshiba have enough product lines to make their money back themselves. If the Cell consortium produces a good embedded OS for TVs, DVD players and the like, other manufacturers will jump at the chance to just buy such a set-up. This OS will probably be an embedded version of Linux, keeping development and licensing costs down, ensuring a quick development and uptake. Note that I still believe that HD-DVD and Blu-Ray players will not be on Cell processors quickly due to MS licensing of WMP codecs.
4) Cell networking will not take off quickly.
Not until we have a high bandwidth wireless standard that can be built onto the motherboard of Cell-based units. Using a wired connection will require a lot of extra hassle that "normal" people will not put up with. Network switches, signal boosters and the cabling will put off so many people it's not true. However, a wireless networking technology that "just works" like Bluetooth with enable a distributed processing house as long as the bandwidth is high enough. By high bandwidth, I mean able to keep up with the Cell's 100GB/s IO speed. This means that PS3 will not make use of computing power from your TV.
OK, there are my four big predictions and some analysis of facts to back them up.
Discuss.
First and foremost, Cell is not a Sony-only technology. Sony can't use it to dominate any market except maybe the games console market. All the other markets that Sony competes in are covered by Toshiba and IBM - Sony's partners in the Cell consortium.
OK, that said, I think that Cell has some design "features" that will make it a hard sell into the general computer manufacturing world.
Much of my assumptions are based on the following article about Cell by someone hardware-geeky enough to have been at ISSCC and understood what they were on about - don't worry there are also pictures!
Introducing the IBM/Sony/Toshiba Cell Processor
There's also a part two to the article that goes into more depth than just the SPEs.
Basically, Cell is only capable of single precision floating point calculations, at 32bit. This is not a good thing for heavy scientific analysis. It is an extremely good thing for games and embedded devices since it allows all instructions to have fixed execution times.
The Cell is not a drop-in replacement for G4 or G5, so Apple are very unlikely to use Cell in a Mac. One of the instruction sets that MacOS X relies heavily on is called "VMX/Altivec" - a system to allow a single CPU instruction to work on large sets of data. Cell has a worse than G4 implementation of this instruction set. This also makes it very unlikely that Microsoft will port Windows to Cell, even more unlikely than them re-porting XP to G5 or another PPC chip.
Also managing the on-SPE memory is entirely under software control, in the same way the OS manages the main memory of a PC. This is unlike the normal cache memory on a "traditional" CPU. This will make writing a general purpose compiler harder. Not that it will make it impossible, mind you, but getting the optimisation out of generated code that you would be able to with hand rolled is going to take a lot of work by compiler writers. Luckily for a lot of people, IBM have some very, very good compiler writers who will, no doubt, create a back-end for gcc (the GNU C/C++ compiler) that will jump start Linux and other open source projects on Cell.
Note: The above points are not "a bad thing" they are part of the reason Cell can execute so quickly and run at such high clock speeds.
In other news, the Cell is very similar to the PS2 in overall architecture, the G4 on the Cell takes the role of the Emotion Engine and the SPEs take the roles of the PS2's vector units. What this means is that people who write software close to the hardware on PS2 will feel at home writing software for Cell.
OK, all of the above points have led me to the following conclusions;
1) Apart from a few specialised workstations, Cell will not be used in destop computers.
I base this on the lack of the full set of VMX/Altivec instructions. This will make it difficult to get Windows or MacOS X onto Cell. Linux will appear, but I think it will be a specialised distribution, not a desktop one like Fedora Core. This will make it hard to buy computers with "Cell Inside" stickers in the short term, since Linux is not 100% ready for general desktop use. Please note that I use Linux as my home desktop and HTPC OS, but then I'm not "normal", in so many ways. :-)
2) For games, Cell will not be much harder to program than PS2.
The similar architecture to PS2 will enable games developers to move quite smoothly. This will be most apparent with middleware developers such as Criterion and Havok. This will make XNA largely irrelevant in the developer's mind. More and more companies are using middleware to develop their games, I can only see this trend accelerating. Development tools will mostly be created by the platform owners to help middleware companies develop their products.
3) Cell will be used in a lot of entertainment devices.
The Cell consortium will need to license the use of Cell to other manufacturers to recoup the cost of development. No way will Sony, IBM and Toshiba have enough product lines to make their money back themselves. If the Cell consortium produces a good embedded OS for TVs, DVD players and the like, other manufacturers will jump at the chance to just buy such a set-up. This OS will probably be an embedded version of Linux, keeping development and licensing costs down, ensuring a quick development and uptake. Note that I still believe that HD-DVD and Blu-Ray players will not be on Cell processors quickly due to MS licensing of WMP codecs.
4) Cell networking will not take off quickly.
Not until we have a high bandwidth wireless standard that can be built onto the motherboard of Cell-based units. Using a wired connection will require a lot of extra hassle that "normal" people will not put up with. Network switches, signal boosters and the cabling will put off so many people it's not true. However, a wireless networking technology that "just works" like Bluetooth with enable a distributed processing house as long as the bandwidth is high enough. By high bandwidth, I mean able to keep up with the Cell's 100GB/s IO speed. This means that PS3 will not make use of computing power from your TV.
OK, there are my four big predictions and some analysis of facts to back them up.
Discuss.
LUPOS 9 Feb 2005 13:51
22/23
config wrote:
It'll just be a processor to handle the computing currently done by a bunch of discreet components.
yea theres that and... sony sucks!!! WOOOOO!!!!!
sorry i had to throw it in, its my calling card.
anyway, ive said it before, the whole cell thing looks really intreiguing, if it does half what they say it can do it shoudl easily be doign twice what its closest competetor is doing. I do agree that the ability of multipl cell device to work in tandem will most likely not really be used in any worthwhiel way for some time. More than likely i see it as a way to increase functionality in preexisting items. Example: I saw an add for a new tv the other day, made by HP... it has a memory card slot, cdr drive and a tiny photo printer all built into it. The interface and processign is probably done by something much more expensive or much weaker than a cell will suposedly be. Now take that same thing, throw a cell in it, and suddenly resiszing pictures, runing simple filter effects, and other more complex tasks seem resonable on a tv set (and probably cheaper).
Now they coudl also be sued in DVR's and DVD+-R's and in your console. Over the next few years i imagien the poor guys at best buy having a real hard time tryign to figure out how to display certain items as they all start to implement some of the functionality of each other.
I really believe it is a very genius angle to take on the whole thing, if the timeing is right and they can get people interested(sony is damn good ad advertising, not realy IBM or Toshis strong suit) in the tech then they could take a huge role in all branches of tech development for the forseable future. Hell even robotics would have an intrest in such a cheap powerfull solution... and then that leads to miltary contracting... thats some freaky skynet s**t right there! j/k(sort off)
:)
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schnide 9 Feb 2005 14:14
23/23
Oh my god! Yeah I agree! No way!
Okay so I'm posting to test out if I can post here okay again, so that's why I cleverly disguised this message with the valuable comments again.
Gotta love that Playstation! Right on! Go Nintendo!
Okay so I'm posting to test out if I can post here okay again, so that's why I cleverly disguised this message with the valuable comments again.
Gotta love that Playstation! Right on! Go Nintendo!