cyberheater
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I like the idea of this. A sort of PS3.5 but more dedicated to being a media hub.
PSM: PS4 specs more powerful than Xbox 720
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I like the idea of this. A sort of PS3.5 but more dedicated to being a media hub.
AgentP
Thinks mods influence posters politics. Promoted to QAnon Editor.
I'm glad there are smarter people working on this at Sony. They will take all they learned and developed from the PS3. This includes fast BD for obvious reasons. Some Cell derivative for BC and existing library support and probably another Nvidia GPU. Slap those into a shared memory pool of ~4GB and you have a kick ass PS4 that plays PS3 games and is no more than $399.
Starting over from scratch is pretty dumb. You may reach some optimal performance for the money, but you lose 6+ years of developer knowledge, PS3 BC, etc.
You know this despite not a single game being announced for the system?
Robot Pants
Member
Sony and MS should stop this stupid console war and start working together, Sony works on Hardware while MS takes care of the software, then say fuck you to APPLE!
Yea if the software is anything like Metro, then no thanks.
If anything, you should probably switch the two roles. But also, no.
What would it take to emulate that architecture? Is PS3 emulation even a thing yet?
This is serious journalism ?
Serious about page hits.
Definitely shitty that kids don't have respectable journalism to grow up with, though. Unless they know where to look (but that "official" moniker always drew me in as a kid).
I can feel it in my water!
iamshadowlark
Banned
Can you read?
It doesn't make any since to make the SPEs out of order due to their design and purpose. You would only need to alter the PPE . Its still not a total rebuild.
Also MS settled for the in-order PPE because they needed the clock speed to counter the Xenon/PPE's weak branch prediction.
He believes it? Does belief equal unmoving objective truth in your world?
Yes it does. No CPU or GPU could emulate Cell. It's not just the calculation power (which would emulatable at some point) but its design is totally different from normal CPUs or GPUs, which makes it impossible to emulate.
Xenon's weak branching performance is
Semantics. Creating fundamental execution order changes to poth the PPEs and the SPEs means revising and re-evaluating much of the important silicon on the chip. It's not a total rebuild no, but they couldn't get much closer. Seems a pretty lame effort for a dead architecture to me.
Robot Pants
Member
You know what's depressing? A new Sony system is right around the corner, and I've barely used my PS3 in the 2 years I've had it :/
I should really start splurging on cheap PS3 games and get some use out of it.
I should really start splurging on cheap PS3 games and get some use out of it.
cyberheater
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I like the less then subtle implication that I'm a thickie.
Here's a quote from Sony's executive vice president and chief financial officer Masaru Kato:-
So it's likely that Sony will use more off the shelve parts and cheaper components for PS4 which greatly reduces the chances of achieving BC.
But what constitutes off-the-shelve for Sony? I'd say it's dramatically different from Microsoft. I just don't see the Cell going anywhere; not after they purchased that plant back from Toshiba. Or am I looking too much into that?
NemesisPrime
Banned
Good luck trying to emulate Cell.
Sony has a serious dilemma. Use Cell in PS4 and have a bad price/performance machine or don't put Cell in PS4 and have no BC. MS has played this game much smarter.
You are assuming the new system will just run a PS3 game straight from BD. They can preprocess it first, and then run from HDD.
Cell works on the principles of strict and "manual" data locality (Local Store), DMA and many cores. Timing may be tricky for some games especially highly parallel ones like Uncharted, but it may not be impossible in general, especially with a powerful system.
It's a business decision first.
It will be really interesting to see what sony and MS are trying to do when they show the 2 consoles.
If MS are bundling kinect 2.0 with the nextbox then Sony will have to really mess up to keep me from going back to playstation at launch.
I can't help but feel that with the loyal EU and Japanese PS fanbase that MS will take a different approach to their next console. I don't think they are going to try and win over those areas like they have with the 360.
If MS are bundling kinect 2.0 with the nextbox then Sony will have to really mess up to keep me from going back to playstation at launch.
I can't help but feel that with the loyal EU and Japanese PS fanbase that MS will take a different approach to their next console. I don't think they are going to try and win over those areas like they have with the 360.
bgassassin
Member
I can read just fine, I just chose to bold that sentence. You keep making it sound like it's some type of simple procedure when it wouldn't be. You're suggesting the the SPEs remain in-order while the PPE is made OoO? You then want assume that would be easier than utilizing GPGPUs computing functions? And you want to believe that would be nothing more than a customization? That's asinine. You can have the final word on this discussion because I'm done with it after this post.
And the last sentence makes no sense because the PPE was designed to be in-order and maxed at 3.2Ghz. That why Cell and Xenon are the same clock speed.And no they settled for PPE's because they couldn't get an OoO processor. They originally planned to make a 3.5ghz OoO processor with three cores and two threads per core. The block diagrams are still out there showing this as they were still targeting 256MB at the time as well. They didn't allow enough time to have it made. There's a book about the 360's development that talks about it.
LowEndTorque
Member
With the cash cow that previous gen HD re-makes have become, I wouldn't get my hopes up for BC in the PS4, whether it requires a cell or not.
Syphon Filter
Member
Will be a huge mistake since i am sure MS will have everything bc with the nextbox. XBOX 1 gamertags,friends,dlc all transferred to XBOX 360.
I agree totally.
We will undoubtedly see HD collections of uncharted, gears of war, COD:MW etc. on both consoles.
Preprocess what? The old Cell instructions into new system instructions? There's no way to resolve the core interdependencies between them! If that were the case then you could just take your PS3 game and "preprocess" the machine code to output a PC game. I think you're talking mumbo jumbo here... If not, you should write a scientific paper on this and have a marvellous academic career.
Full HD Collections®
How much will Cell's cost in two years from now? Sony don't have to reuse it for PS4 itself just to include it if it's cheap.
But they took out PS2 BC and how much did that cost?
Not much, but their system's price tag was still inflated by bluray, which they couldn't drop, so everything else had to go. That won't be the case next time.
Theonik
Member
weekend_warrior
Banned
Why does using Cell in PS4 automatically mean it will have bad price/performance? It must be cheaper to produce then in 2005, and it's performance was good this generation, why wouldn't they be able to improve on it for next-gen?
cyberheater
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Wasn't cell development halted in 2009.
If so. I can't see Sony spending the cash to develop another one.
iamshadowlark
Banned
Again, it wouldn't make any since to change the SPEs to OOO so I'd doubt they would change it. Still changing instruction cycles, updating CUs, implementing instruction windows, re-arranging caches, etc is hardly more work than editing a COTS part.
With PSN games that claim to use CELL heavily such as flower, how will they offer a full transition of everything you've purchased over to a PS4 if it doesn't use CELL?
I can't help but feel that this is were MS have them cornered and will surely exploit them at conferences and on advertising.
I can't help but feel that this is were MS have them cornered and will surely exploit them at conferences and on advertising.
clutch.as.it.gets.
Member
It seems so, yes. MS seems to want the new Xbox being a machine that can do everything but nothing great, and on top force feeding their Kinect technology to the customer. That would explain the rumored not so impressiv xbox 720 specs.
In the end i think there`s a very good chance that we will get the choice to choose between a 2GB and a 4GB gaming console in the future., and it will be interesting which direction pays off more.
Speaking for myself, an Xbox 1 and 360 launch buyer, i would go with the PS4 as my only gaming machine, because with Sony`s superior first party output and the domination of third party games generally i see no reason to invest in a inferior xbox 720.
This is what intrigues me, is there no need to go any further with an updated CELL due to modern CPUs today or maybe their first party companies such as ND will insist they use it.
Actually looking back I may have misunderstood what you were saying, my apologies. I agree that a dedicated CPU would be better suited for simulations and GP related tasks.
By core interdependencies, you mean mapping the 7 SPUs to fewer new cores ? In Cell, the software doesn't know which cores it will use too. They just know how many cores are available.
On PC, the GPU is too far away from the CPU. You need to go through APIs to access the GPUs too. On consoles, the architecture is more compact and flexible (e.g., sharing memory between CPU and GPU more efficiently).
Modern emulators already use dynamic compilation to keep the emulated code in native form too. It is clearly a difficult proposition but may not be impossible in general.
Ok, let's not start a yes/no discussion here. Supposing you're right, what would Sony get from it? Do you think using an updated Cell as the main chip in the PS4 will be beneficial in any way over a POWER7 or AMD Bulldozer based design?
No. I mean the dependence each core has on data processed by other cores. Even if it is a very, very small amount of data that does this, it is impossible to preprocess.
I'm skeptical. Even so, there are no architectures, not even GPGPUs, that can achieve the same performance on the specific type of combination of logic and high-performance vector and floating point operations used on the Cell. Not even when executing native code. Preprocessing the instructions can never keep the same semantics and yet transform the code in such a way that it can be processed on a CPU (high logic performance) or a GPU (high vector / floating point performance).
I think some companies called it quits, but not all? I know there was a GAF thread on it.
http://www.neogaf.com/forum/showthread.php?t=416673
http://www.hardwareheaven.com/news.php?newsid=344
higherARC05
Banned
And what are these so called specs for both these systems to make such a baseless claim?
Microsoft knows that staying highend on these consoles is key for them. They saw how important it was for these 3rd party games to perform better on their system 5 years into this cycle. Also the last rumored spec for the Next XBOX is really highend.
6 core power7 cores that very well be out of order as they wanted for 360.
2+ gb ram
Dual gpu that will have exclusive features because Microsoft makes DirectX just as Xenon was.
iamshadowlark
Banned
bgassassin said:
I beg of you to explain why it is asinine. Pretty Please? Please explain to me the wonder-fullness of these GPGPUs?
A what lol? Im pretty sure the reason they didn't get that is because it was impossible.bgassassin said:
higherARC05
Banned
That would ensue major face palms at the unvieling. Gifs here they come.
Those are usually protected by concurrency control mechanisms like barriers and semaphores. They still can be translated statically.
It's when the system can't tell if a blob is data or code that will create trouble (self modifying code). But as I understand this is forbidden in PS3 ?
Sony can also run the emulated code ahead of time. Let a dynamic compiler does its job, tweak and then load the whole bundle on your HDD.
Cell is unique in its LocalStore + DMA treatment, and simplicity; but it is abstracted from these special hardware. A Cell software makes very little assumption about the run-time except for the LocalStore with L1 cache-level performance, and DMA. I remember there is also a trick to have SPUs communicate quickly. As long as Sony knows these ahead if time, they can make the necessary changes. After all, they also changed the Vita GPU for their purposes.
Some high end games may require special treatment but the average ones may be ok.
AngelSoldier
Banned
Not even close.
IBM and Sony are both still putting money/research into it. IBM has already hinted that the Wii U is using their latest CELL processor.
cyberheater
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If you have to spend a shed load of cash designing a new cell then it takes a long time to claw the money back. Which means a higher cost console.
If you use off the shelf parts then upfront dev cost are considerably cheaper.
Lagspike_exe
Member
They could double the amount of SPEs, clock at 4.8GHz and get great CPU with virtually no R&D.
iamshadowlark
Banned
Well the PPE in the cell would most likely be replaced with a POWER/PPC core or two. My argument mostly pertains to the fact that going for GPGPU cores would be counter-productive considering that spes can still do there job better and those transistors could go to way better uses. Basically you get the benefits of OOOE cores with proper branch prediction and the raw performance of the SPUs with a capable GPU to free up its resources. None of that would break sonys bank either.
Also im pretty sure bulldozers disappointing performance has turned off any interest it had in this field. I don't see anybody ditching IBM's CPUs.
Kaltagesta
Banned
He or she said "belief", and I don't think it's a wildly unrealistic one, either. There are quite a few first party developers whose projects we are unaware of. Of course, they could be PS3 or Vita projects, but at least the potential for them working on PS4 launch titles exists (I'm thinking Guerilla, SSM, Naughty Dog, Media Molecule and more). Likewise, the quality of the Vita launch line up vs the PS3 one suggests that they might have changed their outlook and put a greater emphasis on a strong launch lineup.
Is any of this bullet proof? Of course not. But one can still make educated guesses based on the information that's available.
I think IBM said development would continue in the context of hybrid designs and next-gen architectures that carry some cell flavourings.
Honestly don't see what would be so outlandish or undesirable about a 'beefed up' Cell design - or - for example, a hybrid design with a few larger, newer, cores and an array of SPU compliant processors. 6 SPUs, with some tweaks, would be a fantastic for BC (obviously) and could do their bit for native PS4 applications alongside other main cores - and I have to guess would take up relatively little die area in 2013 (?) Reworked memory interfaces would help a lot there, IIRC it was holding back shrinkage to date, but they'd have the opportunity to revise that totally in a new system. They could probably clock them quite substantially higher too, for the benefit of PS4 code.
I have a feeling, though, that the new systems will have a higher focus on GPU processing power, a higher ratio of gpu:cpu than the current systems did. There may be relatively 'small' CPUs in the next systems.
Honestly don't see what would be so outlandish or undesirable about a 'beefed up' Cell design - or - for example, a hybrid design with a few larger, newer, cores and an array of SPU compliant processors. 6 SPUs, with some tweaks, would be a fantastic for BC (obviously) and could do their bit for native PS4 applications alongside other main cores - and I have to guess would take up relatively little die area in 2013 (?) Reworked memory interfaces would help a lot there, IIRC it was holding back shrinkage to date, but they'd have the opportunity to revise that totally in a new system. They could probably clock them quite substantially higher too, for the benefit of PS4 code.
I have a feeling, though, that the new systems will have a higher focus on GPU processing power, a higher ratio of gpu:cpu than the current systems did. There may be relatively 'small' CPUs in the next systems.
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