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Forums - Gaming - Killzone 2 VS Gears of War 2 through the eyes of a programmer

Final-Fan on 09 February 2009
Navane said:
Actually, you've only read up until page 4, and then you read page nine, which makes a total of five pages read.

So yeah, everyone needs to play Elite Beat Agents. : - )

Or I have it set to 50 posts per page in my profile.  Unless that was an EBA reference?  (I wouldn't know...)



Tag (courtesy of fkusumot): "Please feel free -- nay, I encourage you -- to offer rebuttal."
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My advice to fanboys: Brag about stuff that's true, not about stuff that's false. Predict stuff that's likely, not stuff that's unlikely. You will be happier, and we will be happier.

"Everyone is entitled to his own opinion, but not his own facts." - Sen. Pat Moynihan
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I have the most epic death scene ever in VGChartz Mafia.  Thanks WordsofWisdom! 

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jetrii on 09 February 2009
mjk45 said:
@jetrii,my bad ,it could have been assembler,all i know it was seen as an advantage in the early days of ps3 development, i remember a UK developer saying in response to the problems getting to grips with the ps3 he said they had a lot of these type programmers going back to the amiga days and it would give them better access to the architecture,would it have anything to do with carmack's criticism of having to recompile for every spu, i dont know,ps my friends english i live in oz so dont hear from him very often

 

A well coded Assembly function will almost always give you more performance than one written in C regardless of the architecture. This isn't just a PS3 thing, developers also use ASM for some parts in Xbox 360 and Wii games.

The reason why Carmack, Gabe Newell, and other developers don't like the Playstation 3 isn't just because the cell processor requries a lot of time and effort to develop, they don't think the Cell processor has a future. They have a point. Right now if Sony and Toshiba decided to not use the cell in the PS4/HDTV/etc, IBM may consider ending it since the cell represents such a small percent of their business that it's not viable to spend so much time in R&D. However, that may change if more supercomputer begin to use it. Personally, I see the Cell processor dying in the long run and being replaced by powerful GPU-like chips.



Good news Everyone!

I've invented a device which makes you read this in your head, in my voice!

Navane on 09 February 2009

No EBA reference, just forgot/didn't consider setting the page post option in the profile settings. I'm still trying to get accustomed to this place. Please pardon my ignorance.



I don't know why people tell me to get a life. I'm a gamer, I have lots of lives!

Final-Fan on 09 February 2009
Navane said:
No EBA reference, just forgot/didn't consider setting the page post option in the profile settings. I'm still trying to get accustomed to this place. Please pardon my ignorance.

No problem, I just wanted to illustrate the danger of jumping to conclusions with incomplete info. 



Tag (courtesy of fkusumot): "Please feel free -- nay, I encourage you -- to offer rebuttal."
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My advice to fanboys: Brag about stuff that's true, not about stuff that's false. Predict stuff that's likely, not stuff that's unlikely. You will be happier, and we will be happier.

"Everyone is entitled to his own opinion, but not his own facts." - Sen. Pat Moynihan
- - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - -
The old smileys: ; - ) : - ) : - ( : - P : - D : - # ( c ) ( k ) ( y ) If anyone knows the shortcut for , let me know!
- - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - -
I have the most epic death scene ever in VGChartz Mafia.  Thanks WordsofWisdom! 

mjk45 on 09 February 2009

@jetrii,how much of the r&d is funded by IBM and how much by Toshiba and Sony and didn't i just read somewhere about Toshiba recently start putting them into there products and a cell super comp coming on line and 20m ps3 is a lot of chips so it seems to be picking up even if its slower than they like but i get your point about the market having to widen ,especially with programmable GPU's ready to take off even if it means a complete mobo overall.

Wasnt the purpose of the cell so you could have one in a variety of home products and be able to draw upon  the spare processing power of a range of appliances when you needed to.



Research shows Video games  help make you smarter, so why am I an idiot

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jetrii on 09 February 2009
mjk45 said:
@jetrii,how much of the r&d is funded by IBM and how much by Toshiba and Sony and didn't i just read somewhere about Toshiba recently start putting them into there products and a cell super comp coming on line and 20m ps3 is a lot of chips so it seems to be picking up even if its slower than they like but i get your point about the market having to widen ,especially with programmable GPU's ready to take off even if it means a complete mobo overall

 

IBM did most of the development but Sony and Toshiba contributed a lot in funds. Also, keep in mind that the Cell processors being used in supercomputers are not the ones inside of the Playstation 3. The Playstation 3 Cell processor is fairly weak and outdated compared to the one IBM uses. IBM uses the PowerXCell 8i which had its SPEs remade with improved memory addressing and dual-precesion improvements.



Good news Everyone!

I've invented a device which makes you read this in your head, in my voice!

Final-Fan on 09 February 2009

Even so people have been doing some amazing shit with PS3 clusters! I've seen any number of news items on so-and-so doing this or that with 'em.



Tag (courtesy of fkusumot): "Please feel free -- nay, I encourage you -- to offer rebuttal."
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My advice to fanboys: Brag about stuff that's true, not about stuff that's false. Predict stuff that's likely, not stuff that's unlikely. You will be happier, and we will be happier.

"Everyone is entitled to his own opinion, but not his own facts." - Sen. Pat Moynihan
- - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - -
The old smileys: ; - ) : - ) : - ( : - P : - D : - # ( c ) ( k ) ( y ) If anyone knows the shortcut for , let me know!
- - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - -
I have the most epic death scene ever in VGChartz Mafia.  Thanks WordsofWisdom! 

jetrii on 09 February 2009
Final-Fan said:
Even so people have been doing some amazing shit with PS3 clusters! I've seen any number of news items on so-and-so doing this or that with 'em.

That's because the Cell processor in the PS3 is still pretty powerful and much cheaper than an IBM Cell server. Sony should actually be worried about that, although it gives them good press, it makes them lose money and lowers their tiein ratio.

Good news Everyone!

I've invented a device which makes you read this in your head, in my voice!

Squilliam on 09 February 2009
jetrii said:
mjk45 said:
@jetrii,how much of the r&d is funded by IBM and how much by Toshiba and Sony and didn't i just read somewhere about Toshiba recently start putting them into there products and a cell super comp coming on line and 20m ps3 is a lot of chips so it seems to be picking up even if its slower than they like but i get your point about the market having to widen ,especially with programmable GPU's ready to take off even if it means a complete mobo overall

 

IBM did most of the development but Sony and Toshiba contributed a lot in funds. Also, keep in mind that the Cell processors being used in supercomputers are not the ones inside of the Playstation 3. The Playstation 3 Cell processor is fairly weak and outdated compared to the one IBM uses. IBM uses the PowerXCell 8i which had its SPEs remade with improved memory addressing and dual-precesion improvements.

But theres always this threat to worry about, the GPU market is steaming full speed ahead to take control of the GPGPU/Floating point intensive sections of the market.

OS Type Current TFLOPS* Active CPUs Total CPUs
Windows 267 280518 2454931
Mac OS X/PowerPC 5 6383 124259
Mac OS X/Intel 27 8868 76696
Linux 47 27848 360667
ATI GPU 1136 10324 37173
NVIDIA GPU 1915 17410 72354
PLAYSTATION®3 1393 49409 742102
Total 4790 400760 3868182

 Just from sheer economies of scale they could take this market segment away from the Cell. For example, if Sony shipped 20M Cell chips with the PS3, the GPU market shipped 70M in the last quarter alone.



Tease.

Procrastinato on 09 February 2009

Very interesting. I was kinda under the impression that, if a GPU decided to evolve into a CPU... it would, you know, kinda end up looking like... well, the Cell.

My beer tells me that transitors are transitors, and that what you name a processor has like... no real meaning. My beer has been wrong before though. Very wrong.