Noobie said:
There are couple of other points i will like to make.. 1. i remember PS3 boss saying that they r going to get smaller 45nm Cell and 65nm Graphic chip in 3rd quarter ... so i think they r going to further reduce the cost of the PS3 hardware and i think it will be profitable pretty soon if they don't drop the price. so maybe now PS3 doesn't need PS2 hardware support to bear its losses... if in this quarter they have shown that the gaming division can earn a profit with higher PS3 sales then PS2 sales then i think future is bright..
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It's just the RSX getting reduced to 65nm this fall, Cell probably won't drop to 45nm until next year.
Hirai said during a Thursday PlayStation business briefing that Sony has been cutting PS3 manufacturing costs by reducing the number of components and decreasing the size of chips.
"The Cell and RSX used in PS3s at launch were manufactured using a 90nm process technology. And now all PS3 Cells have shifted to 65nm process technology since last holiday season," he said.
The smaller chip technology runs more efficiently and costs less to produce.
While the improved Cell is in circulation, the RSX graphics chip, created in tandem with Nvidia, still uses 90nm technology.
But a more efficient RSX will be in PS3s shortly, Hirai says. "As for RSX, 65nm process technology has begun this year already, and will be ready for installment in autumn."
They are making rapid progress on reducing the manufacturing cost though. Since the original 40Gb launched (CECHG) it's already gone through two revisions (CECHH & CECHJ). There have since been two new models registered, CECHK (which I suspect is simply CECHJ with a 80Gb HDD), and most recently CECHL. It's possible that CECHL will be the 65nm RSX model, but the current is still 3A (when 40Gb with 65nm Cell released the current had dropped 3.2A on the 60Gb to 3A), so it may just be a more efficient revision of CECHK before 65nm RSX comes in maybe CECHM. The third generation heatsink for 65nm Cell + 65nm RSX was shown a few months ago.
The company defines the first heat sink mounted in the PS3, which was released in November 2006, as the first-generation product. And it already begun commercial production of the third-generation heat sink for the PS3. The third-generation product is characterized by its small size, light weight and low cost.
The heat sink developed by Furukawa Electric is used to cool the microprocessor "Cell" and graphics LSI "RSX." When Nikkei Electronics Teardown Squad disassembled the PS3 in November 2006, this heat sink, together with a large cooling fan whose diameter is more than 13cm, drew its attention (See related article).
The PS3, at first, is equipped with the Cell produced in 90nm process technology. But it was replaced with the Cell produced in 65nm process technology to reduce the cost and power consumption. Along with this change, Furukawa Electric reduced the size, weight and cost of the heat sink by, for example, decreasing the number of its components each time its generation changed.
Especially, the shift from the second generation to the third was drastic. In the first and second-generation products, a large heat sink cooled both the Cell and RSX. But they are cooled by separate heat sinks in the third-generation product.
Furthermore, copper heat pipes, which were used in the first- and second-generation heat sinks, are no longer used in the third-generation product. Five and two copper pipes were used in the first- and second-generation products, respectively. Furukawa Electric realized enough heat-radiation performance without using a heat pipe, the company said.
The first-, second- and third-generation products support power consumptions of about 200, 160 and 130-140W, respectively, for both the Cell and RSX.
The kinds of components are more than 20 for the first generation and about 10 for the second. But the third-generation product has only three kinds of components, a fin and pin made by aluminum and a thick aluminum plate used as a substrate. As a result, the weights of the first-, second- and third-generation products are about 700, 500 and 350g, respectively.
So even without 65nm RSX they'll have made at least like three (possibly four) revisions to the second-generation (65nm Cell + 90nm RSX) mobo. Changing the 40Gb HDD to 80 GB was probably cost neutral, although 80Gb may actually be cheaper than what the 40Gb was.
Third generation 65nm RSX PS3 coming in FY08 Q3 is one of the reasons I'm thinking PS3 has a good chance of being profitable in that quarter.
