Sony are seriously considering not using the processor in the Playstation 4.



http://www.fragland.net/news/No-more-Ce ... ony/21839/

http://www.megagames.com/news/html/cons ... ion4.shtml

I think this will be one of the smartests decisions they will make for the PS4 if they decide to go with the more PC orientated architecture. Developers can focus less on "harnessing the power of the CELL" and more on what matters; Making great games.

i am yet to be convinced about "the power of cell" as 99% of games i have seen on 360 & PS3 run considerably smoother on 360

imo the PS3 was another SEGA Saturn, the fact sony were so far ontop with the PS2 was the only thing that saved them (might not be so lucky next time round)

The PS3 is really coming into the mainstream now though. With the great pricing and constant deals I think we'll be hearing a lot from it. The cell core may not be the greatest thing around but developers are starting to understand it.

Would be kinda stupid to not use the Cell nemore after all the devs have finally gotten over the 3 year learning curve...

It's not the learning curve that matters - its development time. Doing anything on the CELL processor means more work than on a traditional CPU and in a industry where release dates are constantly being pushed back - that's a bad thing. Console manufacturers need to be doing everything in their power to help developers and making a more "PC-centric" architecture just makes so much sense with regard to 3rd party developers - and they are the only ones having trouble with the PS3 - first party developers are doing fine.

Yes, those are very old rumours. Or rumours that come and go. Other rumours suggest both Microsoft and Nintendo have/are considering the Cell for their upcoming products. Wonder what they could be.

I personally doubt the PS4 would be coming in the form of consumer hardware.


Because the two are mutually exclusive, as has been proven, right rrunner?


Retard trolls can't stop talking about it, in one form or another.


Not to mention the production and cost woes.


Like EA? Who made a mess of The Orange Box? And now, according to the Saboteur thread, have done a better job on PS3 with Mirrors Edge, Dragon Age and Dead Space than on the 360?

/microwaves the popcorn and eargerly awaits the appearance of Rrunner.....

They probably won't have a choice.

http://www.techradar.com/news/computing ... or--653535


It doesn't matter since the people who actually make the cell are going to abandon it. The PS3 might have the most powerful hardware of any console but the processor is now legacy technology.

inb4 tears

Groundhog Day!

Actually, the latest rumor is that Nintendo is considering using an Intel chip in their new console.

no.. the new rumor is that the ps4 will incorperate a Mus musculus Wheel processor and will operate on an RPM basis not a mhz basis. check it out.

Gallus Gallus Wheel >> Mus Musculus Wheel.

Or THQ who cancelled PS3 versions of Saints Row, Smackdown vs Raw 07, Destroy all Humans and Frontlines.

Anyway - you seem to have missed the point which is quite simply that the learning curve is indeed gone for most studios - however the fact remains that anything you do on the CELL will take longer to program for than if you did it on a conventional CPU. (If you are using the SPUs - which all major systems should be imo).
This includes "debugging" code on the cell processor.

Hmmm. I think Sony are more worried about how much they would have to pay Toshiba for the Cell...
More mainstream hardware would be better for parity, and also quicker releases - and a cheaper launch price.

Now, where the hell is GT5...

Weren't most/all of them available on the PS2 already anyway?


That would be the key reason Sony would jump ship. After the millions of dollars put into R&D on the chip, IBM suddenly cancelling its future plans for it, Sony are left with a lower choice of competition (if any at all) for who to sign deals through. And Sonys relationship is not going to be on good terms with Toshiba - Toshiba will be wanting to recoup their losses from HD-DVD in any way they can.

It will be a shame if another superior CPU chip set loses to Intel.


Q1 '10 I'd say. Or if a 'proper' demo is released soonish, then possibly they can put it off until Q2.

I'm saying end of next year, minimum.

Not that it matters, Forza 3 came out 2 months ago.

Depends on your definition of 'superior' - As a programmer I think the i7 processors are superior for the simple point in that they are easier to code for. In other words I don't think the performance benefits CELL gives you is worth the extra work I need as a programmer to do to get it running faster than on a i7 processor.


Missed the point much?
But for your information - 1 came out on the PS2 - Smackdown vs Raw 07. So no, not "most" or "all".

Wasn't the cell built as a server chip? Sony stuck it in the PS3 because they needed to cut their losses producing something nobody was going to buy, sort of like Bluray. Whereas Bluray actually served a useful purpose for the console, the Cell ultimately just ensured that multiplat games looked like **** because nobody cares about the last place console.

I suppose it hasn't turned out so bad since Sony's thrown a lot of money at their first-party devs to get them to use it's magical multitasking abilities to make up for the pathetic graphics chip, but third party games are probably gonna look like **** on Sony's platform till the PS4.

Well, except for the best anti-aliasing in the universe only made possible by CELL™ which is all that matters.

It's short sighted logic like that that causes giants like id to fall. Intel have hit a wall with regards to speed - a wall they are unlikely to find a way around this time, any time soon. They already conceded years ago and started just adding extra cores to get more power. It is only going to get worse and you're doing yourself no favours by staying in the stone age.


My bad. I like to give benefit of the doubt to otherwise useless posts.


Well, as did Destroy All Humans. I was genuinely surprised to learn of Saints Row being cancelled, but PS3 got the clearly superior sequel, so it's not like it's missing much, and kind of proves whatever point I was making about EA anyway.


Well, no, IBMs own pre-release marketing was highly reliant on the gaming/multimedia/video processing aspect of the SPUs. They dropped that pretty quickly after the PS3 came out though


Well, the RSX was pretty much a last minute design decision. The original plan was to have two Cells but that proved cost prohibitive of course. I agree GeForce 7 era tech wasn't the best thing Sony could have chucked in there - but it was -late- in the consoles production and nVidia knew they had Sony in a tight position - hell I would exploit the crap out of that situation myself.

On the other hand, since shader cores are basically just simple SPUs anyway, it -kind of- makes sense to have a basic rendering chip with a Cell SPU or two (or four, in the case of Crystal Tools) doing what shaders normally would have. With a lot more control.

I think your confusing what I have said. I am not talking about single threaded applications here as you seem to be alluding to - I am talking multi threaded applications.

The only way CELL is going to get any faster is by increasing the amount of SPUs it has on chip - and that is the same thing intel and amd have done. (And what was on IBMs roadmap for the CELL before they dropped it).

Multithread programming is the future - I am well aware of this (and so are ID, so I don't really get your prevous comment - I mean their entire Tech5 engine is built around multithreading).

Larrabee was a better idea for a "stream" processor than what the CELL is - for the simple fact in that all of its speed advantages are handled on chip - no extra work is required from the Programmer - you just code away as per any other multithread application.



No it did not. We are (obviously I thought) talking about the Destroy All Humans "Path of the Furons" not the previous 2 which came out on xbox/ps2.


Missed the point again?

So instead of slightly worse looking multiplat games they wouldn't have any at all?

Lucky the cell was expensive, huh.

Benefit of the doubt again.


What bizarre and fascinating logic. Good luck with that.

I think the logic of not using the cell is more on the lines of "hey Nintendo uses crappy turd hardware and are selling bucketloads of it, so lets do that too".

Though of just I find very ironic how developers always praise the Xbox for using a PC like architecture but yet fail to produce competent PC ports.

Doesn't the 360 use a Cell(or Cell derived) CPU too?

No, 360 uses the Xenon, but they're both PowerPC derivatives I believe.

Think about it. The video card is the most approachable part of the PS3's architecture. Replace it with another alien space processor nobody knows how to use, and you've just made a convincing case for nobody to make any games for your platform.

Every single console , even the infinitely popular PS2, used alien space processors and I don't remember any developer complaining about understanding it. Though I suppose the whole reasoning behind prefering conventional architecture maybe derived from the GFC having stabbed those fat cats in the guts, making them order developers to seek cheapest possible means of games ie MW2.

The PS2's OS ran a derivative of Windows 2000 though, so it must have been some pretty similar architecture to regular PCs. Strangely enough that console went on to win at everything.

Also, alien space hardware is the reason both the N64 and Dreamcast failed.

Either way, though, it doesn't make much difference. When the competition has hardware that is easy to develop for, it doesn't matter if their older consoles used alien space hardware, just that their new consoles are the path of least resistance. Two cells would have made the PS3 seem a lot less friendly than the Xbox and Wii unless you were a PS3-only developer, and considering it was last to the party and not exactly selling like hotcakes when it first came out, it probably would have died like the dear old Dreamcast.

The DC didn't fail because of alien hardware

Funny that the DC runs a version of windows.....

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/GD-ROM

Proven by hundreds of failed projects that never got released with not a single thing to buy for it. Uh huh.

If the Cell was as much of a bottleneck as you're making it out to be then having one is going to be just as damaging as having two. The GPU can't run code.


Ha! There's a reason why the Oddworld series (for example) jumped ship to Xbox instead of PS2. Idiots who have a little hissy fit over xenophobia.


Hahahahahahahahahaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaa. Hahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahaaaa.

Hahahaha.

You'll need a link for that.

While we're on the subject, did you know that horses invented curry and the universe is the shape of a rainbow?

Saying completely unfounded random things as fact is fun.

I find it hard to believe that the PS2 ran on windows....

It's one of those things I'm sure I read somewhere, and now cannot find any trace of. You can assume I was talking **** until I find it, but I'm certain I read somewhere it was based on Windows.



Speaking of saying complete random things as fact... I never said anything about a bottleneck.

This is about developers taking the path of least resistance. They're having enough trouble making one CELL work. The most friendly piece of hardware to them is the videocard because its familiar architecture. Two cells would mean that only the most hardcore would even bother to port their games, nearly all of which are developed on the 360 and ported over to the other side.

The Wii uses it's own optical media and that didn't hurt sales.

Perhaps you should look up Sega Saturn and think twice before not posting anything at all.

I'm not talking about sales tardcakes, I'm talking about people developing games for the platform.

Alien space hardware has prevented people developing games for the platform. In the case of the Dreamcast and N64 it was limited space on the disk/cartridge, when everyone was making games for DVD-sized disks. Gamecube had the same problem. The Wii disk has the same capacity as a DVD, therefore there is no issue.

In the case of the PS3 it's the cell, the point being that two CELLs would make the PS3 hostile to developers instead of just difficult, and that since the PS3 was the last to the party and the slowest in sales that nobody would even bother to make games for it.

I don't doubt for a second that you read that somewhere. My response can be redirected to the fools that wrote it. Last I checked, MS hasn't made a RISC (which the Emotion Engine is a derivative of) version of the NT kernel.


It really isn't though, because the Cell is still there and still needs to be catered for - unless your 360 code is really light on the CPU straight ports just don't work anyway. Still, it's not like developers had a choice how many Cell processors they had to deal with - they dealt with the cards they were given.


Well you're right, I suppose - the PS3 would have seen many less 'successful' ports. It has also let developers get lazy and rely on the 'might' of the familiar architecture, instead of learning how to best harness the new architecture, resulting in the endless lazy ports. Since I never play any of them anyway I would personally prefer quality over quantity but that's neither here nor there now.

typical AD post full of fud & innuendo. I find it hilarious that this post has been made at a time when the ps3 (CELL) has just been responsible for the release of games such as KZ2, MGS4 & Uncharted2. Sure all they are all top tier Sony devs but we also now have a 3rd party dev with a technique mimicking 16x AA while the 360 version gets no AA......Add to that the sales results of the recent price cuts and those FACTS paint a different picture to the view your trying to present.

How bout we rephrase your title:

CELL is so good that recent games are setting the benchmark for future games to aim for........

I'll believe it when it happens AD, until then try again will ya!

Lol - apparently you have no idea what affect IBM stopping CELL research and manufacturing will have on Sony. Poor naive rrunner.

Maybe Sony have decided to finally listen to 3rd party devs and not make the same mistake they did with the PS3?

Although who knows - it might have something to do with the "Jaguar" supercomputer beating out the CELL equipped "roadrunner" - which is equipped with traditional AMD developed x86 CPUs.

But you don't care about this now do you? I mean the PS3 has a 10year life cycle right rrunner? So you can start caring in 7 years time.

AD: Lol - apparently you have no idea what affect IBM stopping CELL research and manufacturing will have on Sony. Poor naive rrunner.

Maybe Sony have decided to finally listen to 3rd party devs and not make the same mistake they did with the PS3?


Lots of speculation there AD, are we meant to take that for gospel, the world according to AD, lol you egomaniac!


AD: Although who knows - it might have something to do with the "Jaguar" supercomputer beating out the CELL equipped "roadrunner" - which is equipped with traditional AMD developed x86 CPUs.


more verbal diarrhea, Now considering no one on this forum can afford to have a supercomputer heating their lounge room what relevance does it have to do with the topic.

BTW:
Jaguar consists of
224,256 Opteron processor cores
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Jaguar_(computer)

Roadrunner consists of:
122,400 cores
6,120 Opteron (2 cores) + 12,240 PowerXCell 8i (9 cores) = 122,400 cores
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/IBM_Roadrunner

So roadrunner has half the number of cores as Jaguar & has only just been moved into 2nd place by Jaguar. I think you just made an argument for the CELL tosser!!!!

Keep speculating all you like, I have nothing better to do at work at present. Like I said, I’ll believe it when I see it.

Keep trying.

Hey I just noticed your sig, you've upgraded your box. If you have the time how are finding the 64bit version of Win7? Any sware compatibility problems?

???
IBM have publicly announced they will not be continuing with the CELL...



That's not the entire story though.
The CELL chips are running @ 3.2Ghz while the Opteron cores are running at 2.6Ghz.

Then you also take into account that you have to write specialized code for the SPUs where as the jaguar will just run anything you give it and I bet you the Jaguar will end up being cheaper to have developed overall - software and hardware included.


It's better than Vista (which isn't hard - Vista was ****) / XP imo. No compatibility issues thus far.

I knew you were retarded, that is a given. But have you now come down with sunstroke on top of that?

rrunner consists of:
nerd rage

Idiots consist of:
Corey fandom


There aren't any software wise (well, excluding anything that requires drivers or kernel level services). Any hardware created since the release of Vista should be fine in Win7 (and then some).


Umm... no you don't. That's what compilers are for.

I wasn't aware corey had fans?

Really?
So you're telling me the compiler handles DMA'ing memory to the SPUs local store huh?
And ensuring it is under 256kb in size, and if it isn't, to partition it up in multiple DMA requests but making sure not to eject data that the SPE is still processing?

I think not hotcakes.

Maybe, maybe not; I haven't tinkered with IBMs tools for Linux. There's certainly no reason why it can't manage that - the compiler would be much better at counting and auto managing that sort of code than a human would be.

And you wonder why developers were having such a hard time with PS3 development?

But I disagree regarding the compiler. It is not aware of how large the data is that you will be DMA'ing into the local store at compile time - that is something that needs handling by the programmer - via double buffering no less.

eg you might have a 1mb texture that you are performing some calculations on, the next texture might be 3mb. You need to handle the DMA'ing of the chunks to place in local store and then DMA'ing it back out to main memory.

Here's the best part though - your code that you are executing (which might get DMA'ed automatically by the compiler - I don't know about that part) also has to live in the local store - you don't know how "large" the code is, so you can't DMA too much data in at the risk of it not all fitting.

AD: That's not the entire story though.
The CELL chips are running @ 3.2Ghz while the Opteron cores are running at 2.6Ghz.

Then you also take into account that you have to write specialized code for the SPUs where as the jaguar will just run anything you give it and I bet you the Jaguar will end up being cheaper to have developed overall - software and hardware included.


A minor difference in clock speed doesn’t account for Roadrunner only having half the number of cores as Jaguar. The awesomeness of the CELL is the reason for its performance (memory management and data transfer that is).


AD: It's better than Vista (which isn't hard - Vista was ****) / XP imo. No compatibility issues thus far.


I guess you’re running compilers etc which can take a while to run so you’d benefit from the 64bit os & extra memory. How bout older hardware & drivers if you have any? (printers etc) I’m guessing you’re peripherals are all pretty new.


Hotcakes: There aren't any software wise (well, excluding anything that requires drivers or kernel level services). Any hardware created since the release of Vista should be fine in Win7 (and then some).


thanks, you may have answered my question to AD above.

AD: And you wonder why developers were having such a hard time with PS3 development?


There’s no doubt the spu’s require a different approach during programming but there also seems to be little doubt developers are getting results that can’t be matched on other systems. Do I need to keep bringing up Uncharted2 or 16xAA of Saboteur which was achieved using the spus.

Oh FFS man let it rest.