Topic: PS3 hardware article (hail all techies)

[Shorty McNostril]

I found this article trying to explain ps3 hardware.

Because of the fact im not technically minded and therefore cannot understand this i thought i would post a link here and see what those of a "higher education" can make of it.

Link

Do you think its a fair analysis or a fanboys wishful thinking?


Edit: fixing link

[nitsu niflheim]

Corrected Link =)

Your link was messed up, I fixed it for you!

[KDR_11k]

No idea if its fair but it goes into the same general direction as what we've known before (good for vector ops, bad for everything else). The writer suggests that many algorithms could be altrered to work as vector problems but that can get very complex so you'd need good programmers for that (not just programmers, computer scientists. Maybe you're even better off with hiring a mathematician but then it'll get really ugly). The developer will also have to handle many things manually that were previously automated like cache behaviour and such. This will increase complexity and while it will make the system state more predictable it will also greatly increase the bug count in the software.

So in other words the performance of the PS3 will depend greatly on how much you can vectorize any given problem. If you can make AI vector-based it will boost AI performance, if not the AI will have to share CPU time with the general purpose stuff like entity scripts (which are often closely connected to the AI). The easiest to implement part is physics and graphics (since that's mostly vector math to begin with). The latter will be done by the GPU (which is still much better at it than the Cell) but the former will rely on the Cell. I'd expect many PS3 games to make heavy use of physics and even overuse them so there'll be many HL2-esque games that are mostly tech demos for their physics engines. In fact I'd expect a physics arms-race kinda like what we were seeing with graphics.

[Shorty McNostril]

Quote
Originally posted by: nitsu niflheim
Corrected Link =)

Your link was messed up, I fixed it for you!

Thanks for that.

Still sounds like a pain in the butt to work with. ( And probably to play with when it breaks down every 5 minutes.)

Any other thoughts?

[GoldenPhoenix]

Quote
Originally posted by: Shorty McNostril

Quote
Originally posted by: nitsu niflheim
Corrected Link =)

Your link was messed up, I fixed it for you!

Thanks for that.

Still sounds like a pain in the butt to work with. ( And probably to play with when it breaks down every 5 minutes.)

Any other thoughts?

You would think they would learn from PS2 which was also a pain to work with. But then again, we are talking about Sony.

[Requiem of Darcness]

If it were on an independent forum I'd be more inclined to take it seriously but its on a PS3 fan forum. He seemed to gloss over the weak points of the Cell. That and the fact that is common knowledge that the RSX is inferior to the 360's GPU. The fact that the final specs of the RSX have been kept underwraps only further proves that fact.

[ThePerm]

1 word...middleware

[IceCold]

What is it with all the jargon and parallelism on PGC these days?

[KDR_11k]

If it were on an independent forum I'd be more inclined to take it seriously but its on a PS3 fan forum. He seemed to gloss over the weak points of the Cell.

What do you mean? The PPE being relatively weak and possibly a bottleneck? He talked about that a lot and made sugestions on how to avoid that problem through altering algorithms.

That and the fact that is common knowledge that the RSX is inferior to the 360's GPU. The fact that the final specs of the RSX have been kept underwraps only further proves that fact.

1. How is that common knowledge?
2. What kind of proof is that? "They aren't telling us, THEY MUST BE WEAKER!" Perhaps they just decided the public has no use for those figures anyway? "OMG it has 5 MHz less than the 360 GPU!" These are different chips made by different companies. They have little in common so specs wouldn't tell us anything.

[ThePerm]

why are we bitching about ps3 specs, this is a wii forum..despite its shortcomings...im pretty sure its power kicks wii's ass...its just highly pricey

[Requiem of Darcness]

Quote
Originally posted by: KDR_11k
If it were on an independent forum I'd be more inclined to take it seriously but its on a PS3 fan forum. He seemed to gloss over the weak points of the Cell.

What do you mean? The PPE being relatively weak and possibly a bottleneck? He talked about that a lot and made sugestions on how to avoid that problem through altering algorithms.

That and the fact that is common knowledge that the RSX is inferior to the 360's GPU. The fact that the final specs of the RSX have been kept underwraps only further proves that fact.

1. How is that common knowledge?
2. What kind of proof is that? "They aren't telling us, THEY MUST BE WEAKER!" Perhaps they just decided the public has no use for those figures anyway? "OMG it has 5 MHz less than the 360 GPU!" These are different chips made by different companies. They have little in common so specs wouldn't tell us anything.

Well first off all the RSX didn't have the dev time of the 360 GPU. Sony was originally going to use two Cell chips in the PS3, but midway through development they found that two cells would be two expensive. So Nvidia didn't have the time to develop a truly customized chip. Also KDR, ever since the PS3 was announced Sony been showing the specs of Cell in an effort to show the PS3's superiority. If the RSX were truly more powerful than the 360s GPU, Sony would be shouting this from the rooftoops and pointing out its superior features. The PS3 launches in four months and there is detailed info on every aspect of the PS3 but the RSX. Developers have been saying that the PS3 has more CPU power and the 360 has the superior GPU. Now am I gonna trust a PS3 fanboy in a PS3 forum or developers that have actually gotten their hands on both architectures? Oh BTW actually the RSX runs 50mhz faster than the 360 GPU, its one of the few specs Sony has released on the RSX.  

[Galford]

Isn't the RSX based on the G80?  From what little has been released about the GPU of both systems I will go out on a limb and say the X360 GPU is more efficient.

[KDR_11k]

Well first off all the RSX didn't have the dev time of the 360 GPU.

And? Nvidia wasn't sitting idly until they got the order, they've been making 3d chips for a long time now. How custom does a chip have to be? These things are already optimized for their purpose which is 3d graphics. Furthermore, NVidia had a year more than Ati do get tech to fit in there so the RSX is going to be a later generation chip. I'm thinking it comes down to what tech Ati had a year ago vs. what tech NVidia has now.

The RSX isgoing to be better at graphics than a Cell, that's a given. Highly optimized vs. all-purpose? Even though the Cell is a more specialized chip than the IA32 it's not as specific as a GPU.

Also KDR, ever since the PS3 was announced Sony been showing the specs of Cell in an effort to show the PS3's superiority. If the RSX were truly more powerful than the 360s GPU, Sony would be shouting this from the rooftoops and pointing out its superior features.

Last I checked they were doing that (remember the 2 TFLOPS claim? The Cell accounts for ~600GFLOPS. The 360 claimed something like 1TFLOPS with ~350GFLOPS being in the CPU).

[Requiem of Darcness]

Quote
Originally posted by: KDR_11k
Well first off all the RSX didn't have the dev time of the 360 GPU.

And? Nvidia wasn't sitting idly until they got the order, they've been making 3d chips for a long time now. How custom does a chip have to be? These things are already optimized for their purpose which is 3d graphics. Furthermore, NVidia had a year more than Ati do get tech to fit in there so the RSX is going to be a later generation chip. I'm thinking it comes down to what tech Ati had a year ago vs. what tech NVidia has now.

The RSX isgoing to be better at graphics than a Cell, that's a given. Highly optimized vs. all-purpose? Even though the Cell is a more specialized chip than the IA32 it's not as specific as a GPU.

Also KDR, ever since the PS3 was announced Sony been showing the specs of Cell in an effort to show the PS3's superiority. If the RSX were truly more powerful than the 360s GPU, Sony would be shouting this from the rooftoops and pointing out its superior features.

Last I checked they were doing that (remember the 2 TFLOPS claim? The Cell accounts for ~600GFLOPS. The 360 claimed something like 1TFLOPS with ~350GFLOPS being in the CPU).

KDR you are being silly. Of course Nvidia wasn't sitting idly by. That is a ridiculous statement. My point is ATI developed the 360 GPU from the ground up to work in conjunction with its CPU. This is because MS had them as a partner in the 360's development from the beginning. Nvidia was called in half way through the process and had to modifiy an existing architecture. Nvidia had less time to develop the RSX than ATI had on the 360's GPU. If I remember correctly, Nvidia wasn't brought into the PS3's development process until last year. Yes the chip is coming out later but it has had less development time and less R&D dollars to be developed with.

That still doesn't answer why Developers that have worked on both consoles say the 360's GPU is more powerful. The RSX supposedly has the power of two GeForce 6800s, that isn't a weak by any stretch of the imagination but that isn't as powerful as the 360's GPU. If Sony wasn't so busy cramming costly features such as the Blu-Ray drive in the PS3, they would have been able to put out a PS3 that is more powerful and less expensive. When console launches a year after the competition at a cost that is $200 more than the competitors console a year later. It shouldn't be a debately weaker console.