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Forums - Sony Discussion - Sony Moving Away from Cell-based PS4

Pristine20 on 27 December 2009

I just hope they can somehow get ps3-bc without even without the cell then I'm sold. Ifnot, I'll seriously have to look around the market next gen instead of making an impulsive early decision on which console to get



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Aion on 27 December 2009

Why the ps3 is known for the cell, that would be a bad move imo.



 

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XxXProphecyXxX on 27 December 2009
4lc0h0l said:
Hus said:
4lc0h0l said:
best move ever cell sucks for game programming the industry is not rdy for it

Uncharted2 craps all over your opinion.

Plenty are ready for it and have taken advantage of it. 


lol sony put so much effort on the cell if they had done the same effort on a powerfull video card they could have done the same or more than uncharted 2 with less effort .... and naughty dog has A LOT more budget for developing games than normal studios... so no the industry is not rdy for a processor like the cell and that is shown with crappy ports that still happen today, because developers still use the main procesor of the ps3 and not the spu... and 1 game doesnt mean anything when u got an industry that is 100 times bigger than just uncharted 2

hey and for your information IBM OFFICIALY dropped Cell arquitecture =) because they realise it wasnt the way to go

http://www.hardmac.com/news/2009/11/24/ibm-to-drop-the-cell

IBM to continue developing cell processor technologies

Published on 26 November 2009



Kris Sangani

IBM has responded to reports that it is planning to end development of its cell processor, which is used in several supercomputers and powers devices such as Sony’s PS3 gaming console.

The company has suspended development of the next generation of the Cell chip, but a spokesperson has told E&T that it will still ply a role in future processor platforms – such as IBM’s forthcoming Power7 chips.

“Based on our experience gained from Cell, we now believe that the next generation of computing will rely heavily on the integration of multicore and hybrid technologies.  IBM continues to invest in Cell technologies as part of this hybrid and multicore strategy, including in new Power7 based systems expected next year,” said the spokesperson.

Additionally, the spokesperson said that the company plans to continue manufacturing the cell processor for Sony and hinted that it still hopes the technology will be the core of any future gaming platform.

“IBM continues to manufacture the Cell processor for use by Sony in its PlayStation3 and we look forward to continue developing next generation processors for the gaming market,” he added.

Rumours about the demise of the cell chip have been circulating since the German Website Heise Online quoted an IBM senior executive saying that the company was halting development of the next-generation processor.

David Turek, vice president of deep computing at IBM, was quoted as saying the next-generation PowerXCell 32i – designed for supercomputers and the high - performance computing space was being killed. The chip was to feature two PPEs (PowerPC Processor Elements) and 32 SPEs (Synergistic Processing Elements).

The original cell chip was developed by IBM in collaboration with Sony and Toshiba. Last year, Sony sold it’s the Cell manufacturing operation to Toshiba in a deal valued at almost US$ 900 million.

http://kn.theiet.org/news/nov09/ibm-cell-continues.cfm


Onibaka on 27 December 2009
Soleron said:
Firstly, while Goto is a good journalist, he doesn't usually have secret industry sources. He goes on very good guesswork and public domain information.

There are only four real choices of CPU for a performance-oriented PS3.

- Intel
- AMD
- IBM (Standard POWER)
- IBM (Cell)

Any other CPU vendor does not have the performance to compete. I'm thinking of ARM and VIA here primarily. Those three companies also have the strongest CPU manufacturing capability; choosing another company would mean negotiating with one of them for fab space anyway, because independent foundries like TSMC or UMC are too low-power oriented to do powerful CPUs in a reasonable time and budget.

So, the top two have the advantage of being x86 and hence easy sharing with the PC platform and easy to develop for as most developers understand x86 multi-core. The Cell would also be easy to program now, but since they would have to make architectural changes like the cache it would mean another learning curve, which a third-place entrant into next generation cannot afford to impose. And standard POWER would mean easy sharing with Xbox 360, though I believe MS will pick an x86 CPU this time around since it's their native platform and they only went away from it because Intel's architecture in 2004-5 when they were designing wasn't good enough.

The advantage of AMD (though for political reasons I think it's the least likely option) is that you get a great-performing GPU and CPU on one die from one foundry. That will bring down dev costs and manufacturing costs considerably; all previous Playstations trend towards greater integration like that. Although Intel can too, their GPU isn't good enough and the integration is on the package level rather than the die.

There are only two choices of GPU, now that Intel's Larrabee has been delayed over and over and indications are that its first iteration was hot and underperforming. Not something to risk a console on; at least AMD's Fusion uses a known CPU and known GPU, just new process and die layout.

- AMD
- Nvidia

Sony's choice of Nvidia was wrong this gen; the PS3 GPU is inferior to the AMD one. Nvidia's roadmap is also not strong, with the GT200 having been delayed 7 months and Fermi being similarly delayed and not out - and with a huge TDP of 225W it doesn't sound like derivative parts will be as low power consumption as is required for consoles. So I would say AMD is the most likely option. There's also the chance of a deal with AMD for both CPU and GPU too.

You forgot Imgtech`s PowerVR. Consoles use as gpu small chips integrated in the MB, like notebooks. Imgtech don`t make offboard GPUs but in the onboard territory PowerVR >>> Radeon and GF. It`s almost certain that PSP2 will use PowerVR. But for Ps3 is still unknow...however the Series 6 might be very powerful.



CommunistHater on 27 December 2009

Cell was a mistake. They could have just included a 8800 and more ram by the time they launched to get better performance.



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Xoj on 27 December 2009
CommunistHater said:
Cell was a mistake. They could have just included a 8800 and more ram by the time they launched to get better performance.

i am happy they didn't 8*** series cards are burning out especially on notebooks.

all gpus 8*** notebook and desktop have malfunctions by design.



drkohler on 27 December 2009
CommunistHater said:
Cell was a mistake. They could have just included a 8800 and more ram by the time they launched to get better performance.

Wow.. you do know you actually all these gadgets have a design time of roughly two years (not even mentioning ordering parts, software drivers etc. etc. But seeing your Obama nonsense, I understand your level of education)



coolestguyever on 27 December 2009
theprof00 said:
Sucks for developers who put their time and effort into learning how to program for the cell.
The games were starting to look really nice and gave Sony a kind of exclusivity that the other consoles didn't have.

Pretty much what I was going to say.

What a kick in the balls to all the developers that worked hard to make the games great on the PS3 and now they may have to deal with a brand new technology next gen.



CommunistHater on 27 December 2009
drkohler said:
CommunistHater said:
Cell was a mistake. They could have just included a 8800 and more ram by the time they launched to get better performance.

Wow.. you do know you actually all these gadgets have a design time of roughly two years (not even mentioning ordering parts, software drivers etc. etc. But seeing your Obama nonsense, I understand your level of education)

Dude keep living in your fantasy world that liberals are smarter.  Republican voters are significantly more likely to have a college degree.



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Seraphic_Sixaxis on 27 December 2009

A tweaked Cell would be nice. having a fair good amount of new power AND easier to make games for aswell.