PSP2 features - the handheld version *renamed [Archive]

Jack_Tripper

07-Jul-2009, 20:31

http://www.eurogamer.net/articles/digitalfoundry-psp2-features-quad-core-gpu-blog-entry

excerpts:

The site claims to have insider sources that reckon that a quad core iteration of the low-power SGX543MP chip, codenamed "Hydra", will be present in the next generation handheld, not to be confused with the forthcoming PSPgo.

According to the original report, PSP2 opts for a quad configuration offering notional specs of 133 million polygons per second, and 4Gpixels/sec fillrate, assuming that Hydra operates at the chip's low-end of 200MHz (higher speed variants are also available, presumably for desktop use). While specs like this are always subject to interpretation, these figures are a ballpark match for the original Xbox.

Thoughts, comments, opinions, speculations?

Sounds like it's going to be a hot little device....seriously...hot.

:)

Seriously though, I'm not nearly as interested in the graphics end as much as I am things like motion sensativity, content delivery method and viability of connectivity. And god help us if we have to deal with any more ridiculous proprietary media format from any other console until the end of time - no more UMD...ever (PSP-Go gives me hope).

I think one of the major travesties in this hardware generation was the lack of online multiplayer support - via some internet matching service as well as peer-to-peer. I can think of a few glowing exceptions - but overall, I found both the DS and PSP to be a total wash on MP gaming. With Wireless-N becoming more available....I don't think it'd be insane to think that online gaming through a handheld is all that far fetched - and good to boot.

And can we please stop focusing on handhelds to be portable media players?? I've got a cell-phone, and I-pod and a PSP that can all play MP3's and movies and games...none of them does all three particularly well - so can we please just make the portable gaming device...a gaming device - and NOT A MOVIE PLAYER/MP3 PLAYER

Here's hoping....cheers

Jack

Mobius1aic

07-Jul-2009, 20:52

Interesting on how developers would have to balance graphical tasks with orchestration/AI/physics on such a solution, so Sony could say their handheld is as powerful as the Xbox........assuming you used the graphics capability of all 4 cores. I wonder though if it would have multi-texturing and what about ROPs? But of course it's just a rumor, however it's nice to see evidence of an actual new PSP and not another goddamn hardware revision a la PSP Go.

Mobius1aic

07-Jul-2009, 21:01

To be as potentially graphically powerful as the Xbox would be interesting, but the screen will need a bit higher resolution to make it more noticeable. My other concern is will their be TMUs and ROPs? I sure hope to god there is, oh and another analog stick. If there isn't a second analog stick, I will be so pissed.

As for media playback, I hope it's still there, but of course the sheer focus being games.

Sigfried1977

08-Jul-2009, 01:26

I'm more worried about controls and battery life. The old PSP is insanely uncomfortable to use.

Dr Evil

08-Jul-2009, 05:09

To be as potentially graphically powerful as the Xbox would be interesting.

Considering that the first PSP is quite close to the PS2 and was released in 2004, then a PSP2 released in 201X with Xbox1 level of power doesn't seem that interesting or impressive to me.

grandmaster

08-Jul-2009, 06:53

Dr Evil

08-Jul-2009, 08:41

Well, PSP isn't quite close to PS2 really is it? Compare Ridge Racers to Ridge Racer 5, GT4 to GT Mobile, Burnout 3 to Burnout Legends in terms of textures, geometry etc, factor in the lower resolution and it's a long way off.

Assuming - conservatively - that iPhone 3GS is a match for PSP then the potential of a quad core version of that part is quite staggering, especially bearing in mind that screen resolution will be kept low on purpose.

Well yes the PSP isn't really as powerful as the PS2 and I was kind of giving it the free pass on resolution as that don't matter that much, when its' display is so small. PSP resolution on such a small display is quite good compared to PS2 on a big screen. I thought GT mobile looked quite good compared to GT4. Are those other games using the full 333mhz?

Anyways I still think that the comparison to Xbox1 on handheld that is coming in 201X does not sound that impressive. Your Iphone comparison sounds better to me.

Mobius1aic

08-Jul-2009, 08:59

Considering that the first PSP is quite close to the PS2 and was released in 2004, then a PSP2 released in 201X with Xbox1 level of power doesn't seem that interesting or impressive to me.

It's taken long enough :grin:

What I find more interesting if it is a GPGPU solution that handles all the processing, both graphical and general. Then I'd wonder how much memory would probably be appropriate for such a handheld. I can see it having 256 MB of total memory, appropriate for a machine even twice as powerful as the original Xbox, plus it would be plenty for media functions even at the same time as a game running (simultaneous music playback during game play anyone?:wink:). Plus it would be very cool to leave the game in-state, quick "alt-tab" into the web browser to do something, maybe find a walkthrough for the place you're stuck at and go directly back into the game. I always loved that about PCs. I'll get mad when Sony tries to turn it into a phone though.

Ailuros

08-Jul-2009, 09:49

Just because a graphics core is capable of GPGPU tasks it doesn't mean it'll replace a CPU entirely in a system. I hope the author understands what exactly SoC (system on chip) stands for.

As for a hypothetical SGX543 MP4 running "hot", the SONY next generation console isn't mostly likely to appear on shelves neither this or the next year. By that time at least 32nm should be mainstream for the embedded markets.

Each 543 core is at 8mm2@65nm * 4 cores = 32mm2@65nm; do the math yourself how much die area such a config would consume under a much smaller manufacturing process and 200MHz is damn conservative for that one either.

Considering that the first PSP is quite close to the PS2 and was released in 2004, then a PSP2 released in 201X with Xbox1 level of power doesn't seem that interesting or impressive to me.

Assuming the next generation PSP has only 4MP cores and not more at 400MHz you could have close to half the XBox360 graphics performance and a higher level of capabilities. If SONY would go for the maximum latency of the MP ie 16 cores (which is unlikely due to die area/power consumption constraints) you'd end with something that could embarass even some of today's performance GPUs.

tangey

08-Jul-2009, 10:00

I stuck my neck out back in march/april and said that Sony would realise a new SGX based PSP2, and I'm keeping to the timeframe of Xmas 2010.

wco81

08-Jul-2009, 14:51

Doesn't the DS continue to stomp PSP in sales?

What is the evidence for a quasi-console performance in a handheld?

I'm sure PSP will get a boost with the Go and release of games like GT Mobile.

But the market for deep gaming experiences on the go may get crowded out between the big Nintendo franchises on the one end and the simple, casual iPhone games on the other end.

Then of course, the Zune HD story on games has yet to be told.

Crowded field.

Npl

08-Jul-2009, 15:53

Doesn't the DS continue to stomp PSP in sales?

What is the evidence for a quasi-console performance in a handheld?Hypothetically speaking... imagine you could play your "PS3Mobile" at home with controllers and then merely grab it and continue playing somewhere else.

Of course we wont see anything close to PS3 Performance, but something exceeding the Wii capabilities should be easily possible as portable in 1-2 years.

PS. quadcore just sounds ridiculous for a GPU, the only reason to have multiple seperate cores is if the diesize otherwise gets too big, or if its not worth to scale up a monolithic core (which aint the case if the PSP is expected to sell millions).

Shifty Geezer

08-Jul-2009, 16:49

Doesn't the DS continue to stomp PSP in sales?...It's not just a matter of competing with DS, but with every handheld out there, which just keep on coming. Sony need to differentiate if they are to compete in some niche. A high-performance media device would be feature-competitive. The current PSP has TV out. A PSP2 with full HD video out or somesuch would turn it into a unique media-everywhere device. Allow Blue Tooth support for keyboards etc., it becomes a mini plug-in browser etc. so people can browse the web on their HDTV at home and buy content to watch on the go.

A low-spec gaming only machine will likely crash against the mobile phone sector, where those games can thrive in devices people are going to own anyway. I think Sony's best chance is in the high-end, including mobile communication features, and Nintendo will start to feel the squeeze in the low-end (if they go there which is typical of Nintendo philosophy).

wco81

08-Jul-2009, 17:10

When the PSP came out, that was the theory, to be more powerful than any other portable device.

That certainly attracted a number of buyers, including those interested in playing downloaded video on it.

But other devices came along with media playback capabilities and it seems the PSP momentum stalls in the absence of blockbuster releases. Last blockbuster was what, probably God of War?

HD video out will be dependent on whether the studios play ball. That's probably why UMD movies originally couldn't be outputted to TVs. They didn't want people to buy UMDs instead of DVDs. They wanted people to buy UMDs in addition to DVDs.

And if the studios allow it for PSP2, you can bet iPhone and other devices will get the same capabilities.

As for PSP2 becoming an extension of home console gaming, well that was supposedly possible on the PSP as well. That is, the carrot for buying both console and PSP versions of games would be that you could play the PSP version during the day and then when you got home, you could sync up your progress to the home console version.

But did any game really do that? Or what about the idea of PS3 preprocessing some content and then downloading that to the PSP? It doesn't seem like these fanciful ideas were ever realized.

The probability is that PSP2 games will be standalone experiences, just as PSP games were -- well other than some PS2 ports or game which were modestly different from the console versions.

Shifty Geezer

08-Jul-2009, 18:22

And if the studios allow it for PSP2, you can bet iPhone and other devices will get the same capabilities.Well, yes, that's competition gfor you. You don't avoid an idea just because you're going to be copied! PS3 has HD download movies already (as I understand it) and certainly Sony have bigger plans for content distribution. A handheld that stores and plays media across devices is a very good idea. At the moment the handhelds are all focussed on remaining handhelds rather than portable CE/AV devices. You put the movies on the handheld to watch on the handheld screen. Sony can extend that.

This is also different from PSP. That was a portable media device, and it had some fans as a result. You only need view previous debate to see many saw buyers of PSP as being more interested in media than games given lacklustre game sales versus a many millions strong install base. Remember, though PSP isn't a DS, it has sold 50 million, which is flippin' good going for a non-Nintendo handheld! Clearly PSP offering a bit of everything was enough of a USP to attract 50 million buyers versus a cheaper portable game platform and the ubiquitous mobile phone. If Sony hadn't have gone with substantial performance, where would PSP be now?

However, now mobile phones are extending into the portable media space, with iPhone catapulting things forward at a rate of knots towards a mini portable computer, Sony are facing competition on that front. They need to compete. High performance is going to be key to that, along with the right software.

What else would you suggest? A mediocre games-only platform that doesn't live up to the PlayStation brand, lacks media features, and lacks the originality of GameBoy and DS? Why will people play games on that instead of on their mobiles? Why will they buy PSP2 instead of the Nintendo DS2? Why pursue a huge media portal dream where Sony sells Sony content to Sony devices if you aren't going to provide the devices that would benefit from it?

wco81

08-Jul-2009, 21:40

50 million isn't bad but what has the DS done in the same time? What will the iPhone/iTouch do in that time?

Emphasis on specs is something that appeals to geeks. But the greater number who bought DS and Wii and Apple products demonstrate the limitations of that strategy.

Certainly there already are PMPs which are meant to be repositories not just for mobile media but home media as well, such as the Archos.

But more than the hardware, they need a content strategy. What would it be about the PSP2 content which makes it compelling? Another digital media download infrastructure isn't going to do it. Sony had problems in the DAP market because people hated their software and the store and their attempt to push ATRAC over more widely-used codecs.

They still make Walkman players and now eBook readers but I heard the experience for loading content is still as horrible as ever. Will the PSP2 use PSN and a more streamlined interface/experience for getting content?

Will they have exclusive content which will sell the hardware? More importantly, is there still demand for deep, console-like games on a portable device which people will carry in addition to phones?

tangey

08-Jul-2009, 23:23

I see the stop gap Sony psp go as Sony making it's way into digital download.
The real beauty on digital download is that it allows you to make hardware differences totally transparent to tour user base --- you have ridge racer 3 or whatever on your psp go, when you upgrade to the psp2 the digital store allows you to Download the psp2 version for free which will actually be a totally different piece of software designed for a different platform, it provides the manufacturer the capability to eliminate the issue of incompatibilty of existing bought games

wco81

08-Jul-2009, 23:45

I would doubt they would give you the PSP2 version of a game for free just because you had downloaded the PSP version.

obonicus

09-Jul-2009, 05:00

One reason to go for PSP2 is to have a fresh start, one that is possibly more difficult to mod and run homebrew/backups. Even if they can't restrict piracy completely, but can avoid simple softmods it'd be an advance.

Ailuros

09-Jul-2009, 11:14

Assuming next generation handhelds appear somewhere in the 2011 timeframe, you have to ask yourselves what the hw capabilities of the Apple smartphones could be for that specific timeframe.

Also those willing to bet that SONY's next generation handheld will contain IMG IP should also starting to place their bets for NINTENDO having Tegra IP inside for their next generation handheld.

All in all it gets far more complicated then some of can imagine if you keep in mind what future Zune/iPhone devices might look like.

If an iPhone 3GS can host a SGX535@65nm today, remains the question what under future manufacturing processes a ~2011 iPhone XXX could host under roughly the same die area as the first.

50 million isn't bad but what has the DS done in the same time? What will the iPhone/iTouch do in that time?

Emphasis on specs is something that appeals to geeks. But the greater number who bought DS and Wii and Apple products demonstrate the limitations of that strategy.

Certainly there already are PMPs which are meant to be repositories not just for mobile media but home media as well, such as the Archos.

But more than the hardware, they need a content strategy. What would it be about the PSP2 content which makes it compelling? Another digital media download infrastructure isn't going to do it. Sony had problems in the DAP market because people hated their software and the store and their attempt to push ATRAC over more widely-used codecs.

They still make Walkman players and now eBook readers but I heard the experience for loading content is still as horrible as ever. Will the PSP2 use PSN and a more streamlined interface/experience for getting content?

Will they have exclusive content which will sell the hardware? More importantly, is there still demand for deep, console-like games on a portable device which people will carry in addition to phones?

All good and interesting questions. Shall I assume that Apple's strategy for the iPhone as it might stretch over the coming years makes more sense today under that light as you might have originally thought? ;)

tangey

09-Jul-2009, 11:48

I would doubt they would give you the PSP2 version of a game for free just because you had downloaded the PSP version.

Yes but the point being is that it gives them the option to auto select software based on the hardware totally transparent to the user, and maybe 50% off if you already have the PSPGO version....helps to retain the user base

tangey

09-Jul-2009, 11:56

Assuming next generation handhelds appear somewhere in the 2011 timeframe, you have to ask yourselves what the hw capabilities of the Apple smartphones could be for that specific timeframe.

If an iPhone 3GS can host a SGX535@65nm today, remains the question what under future manufacturing processes a ~2011 iPhone XXX could host under roughly the same die area as the first.

Apple will have to decide on a physical control mechanism for "proper" gameplay. I imagine a "gamers" iphone as an additional product which sacrifices the purity of the one button product, for improved gameplay.

Once they get that sorted, I think they could possibily be a serious threat to traditional players in this segment. Their userbase this time next year could be close to 80M (iphones and itouches) and along with their distribution mechanism, it becomes extremely attractive to developers.

Ailuros

09-Jul-2009, 12:34

Apple will have to decide on a physical control mechanism for "proper" gameplay. I imagine a "gamers" iphone as an additional product which sacrifices the purity of the one button product, for improved gameplay.

Once they get that sorted, I think they could possibily be a serious threat to traditional players in this segment. Their userbase this time next year could be close to 80M (iphones and itouches) and along with their distribution mechanism, it becomes extremely attractive to developers.

As I said in the past I'd expect the lines that differentiate various product families to get blurrier over the years. That shouldn't mean that a smartphone won't be in the end a smartphone in the future or a handheld console a handheld console.

wco81

09-Jul-2009, 14:37

At some point, the smart phone makers may decide battery life is more important than raw performance.

They might aim for things like HD video recording, since more and more digicams are getting that capability.

In a recent interview, Carmack said a $10 iPhone game could be more lucrative than PSP or DS games. The rub is that at that price point, sales volume is at least an order of magnitude lower than at say $3.

So deep, high-performance games which not only tax the processor/GPU but also require longer sessions, draining the battery, may become more of a curiosity than the norm on smart phones, especially with the pricing issue.

A PSP2, with a bigger battery and a bigger form factor (for dual analog sticks) may carve out a niche or it may be that most people, even those with consoles at home, settle for whatever they can get on their iPhone, Pre, Android or whatever.

World may have changed since the PSP originally came out.

Shifty Geezer

09-Jul-2009, 15:24

50 million isn't bad but what has the DS done in the same time? What will the iPhone/iTouch do in that time?Okay, I return to my above question. What do you think Sony should do? Because I'm interpretting everything you've written as 'Sony should give up, everyone else will do better than them.'

wco81

09-Jul-2009, 15:31

If Sony made money on the PSP, if they think they can make money on the PSP2, they should do it.

But they shouldn't be shocked if they find that the paradigm for gaming on the go has changed since whatever successes they had during the past 5 years.

I recall that when the PSP price was announced, people thought it was a great deal, because to have that size screen and performance at that price point was unheard of. They may have subsidized or eaten some margins.

They only had to target the Gameboy at the time but now, they have to go up against subsidized cell phones.

I'd want to see it come out, just for the technology. But would I invest in it if I had doubts about the viability of the platform?

Fafalada

09-Jul-2009, 16:35

Well, PSP isn't quite close to PS2 really is it?
Like with DC vs PS2, PS2 vs GC, GC vs XBox etc. - the answer changes based on where we move the goalposts :razz:

So deep, high-performance games which not only tax the processor/GPU but also require longer sessions, draining the battery, may become more of a curiosity than the norm on smart phones
I was under impression games of this type are completely impossible on iPhones to date (unless you carry a car-battery charger with you). Then again, battery technology hasn't exactly been advancing fast, so there's no indication that a mythical PSP2 on steroids would be any better off in terms of battery life.

wco81

09-Jul-2009, 17:06

Well presumably, they can make the PSP2 big enough to fit in a big enough battery in there.

iPhone more than other devices strives to be as thin as possible, so it's limiting itself from that standpoint.

There are accessories which incorporate a bigger battery into a case which makes it thicker and longer. Maybe they could do that along with some game controls. But there seems to be no great demand for games which demand longer sessions and more battery draw. Instead, simple games like Flight Control seems to get the buzz rather than something EA publishes and sells at $10.

Shifty Geezer

09-Jul-2009, 17:56

If Sony made money on the PSP, if they think they can make money on the PSP2, they should do it.

But they shouldn't be shocked if they find that the paradigm for gaming on the go has changed since whatever successes they had during the past 5 years.But I think because the paradigm is shifting, they need to make these changes. I don't think PSP2 is all about graphically lovely console-type games, but every game, every media. It needs to offer casual phone-like games to compete with phones, and 'proper' games to compete with Nintendo's offering, and media features to compete with Archos and Zune and whatever else. If it can't do everything, it'll be a niche device, and I don't think any niche device will sell tens of millions. The reason the iPhone is doing so well is versatility. Versatility generally improves with performance.

Regards batteries, I remember before PSP launched there was a good chance of fuel-cell tech appearing early on. Whatever has happened to that?! Why isn't a methanol fule-cell available for use in handhelds?

obonicus

09-Jul-2009, 19:05

I think that if Sony can manage some sort of revival with the PSP, and if the PSP2 offers a somewhat secure platform against piracy then they'll get a ton of dev support. Especially for Japanese devs; they need a platform to put their PS2-scale games. Everyone does. In Japan, the PSP is gradually becoming the platform for 'games that are too big for DS but unfeasible on HD'. As such, I don't think portable gaming's paradigm has changed quite as much. The style of games the DS offers are different from the games the PS2 gets, but they're much much closer to each other than what's going to the iPhone. Bitesized gaming has a niche, but it's not the natural conclusion of portable gaming.

obonicus

09-Jul-2009, 19:09

iPhone more than other devices strives to be as thin as possible, so it's limiting itself from that standpoint.

Isn't the Go! about the size of the iPhone?

There are accessories which incorporate a bigger battery into a case which makes it thicker and longer. Maybe they could do that along with some game controls. But there seems to be no great demand for games which demand longer sessions and more battery draw. Instead, simple games like Flight Control seems to get the buzz rather than something EA publishes and sells at $10.

But that's the iPhone; pubs have made quite a bit of money off the DS with longer-form games. And big-name games have sold very solidly on the PSP, even if in general its sales are low. I'm sure you'll see the end of those ultra-budget 'play chess/backgammon/parcheesi' games on the DS but not of higher-production games.

Ailuros

09-Jul-2009, 23:33

At some point, the smart phone makers may decide battery life is more important than raw performance.

They might aim for things like HD video recording, since more and more digicams are getting that capability.

If a future SoC can't have all that w/o necessarily sacrificing raw performance, then there might be something wrong with the design itself all along. With MIMD units on board, highly advanced programmability and embedded OpenCL profiles I wouldn't worry that much in that regard. It's most likely the others that have to look over their shoulders sooner then they'd expect.

Well presumably, they can make the PSP2 big enough to fit in a big enough battery in there.

iPhone more than other devices strives to be as thin as possible, so it's limiting itself from that standpoint.Assuming the rumors are true and the future hypothetical "PSP2" truly carries a SGX543 MP4 it captures according to IMG under today's 65nm 4*8mm2=32mm2. I don't think they'd release such a device before 2011 so shouldn't we be talking about something closer to 32nm as a manufacturing process and what would the estimated die area be for such a hypothetical cluster there?

The ultra thin and light iPhone 3GS incorporates apparently a SGX535@65nm probably at ~100MHz and I'd say that it captures somewhere in the 6-7mm2 league.

If Apple continues roughly the same trend and of course continues to use IMG IP for future SoCs the "2010 iPhone" could incorporate under 45nm a far more capable SGX540 or even 545 at roughly the same die area as today's 3GS and probably even with a slightly higher frequency w/o shooting necessarily power consumption out of the roof or cutting short in capabilities au contraire.

Those who dare can continue to speculate for hypothetical yearly iPhone updates what 2011 could bring in that regard. Let's say my 6-7mm2 estimate for the 3GS is correct, what could you theoretically cram into as much die space under say 32nm?

I'm in no way saying that the iPhone will replace handhelds; my gut feeling however tells me (and it doesn't look the other way up to now) that the iPhone along with other possible emerging "gaming" smartphones of the future might aid tremendously the entire mobile gaming market as a much wider deployment base.

09-Jul-2009, 23:57

Assuming the rumors are true and the future hypothetical "PSP2" truly carries a SGX543 MP4 it captures according to IMG under today's 65nm 4*8mm2=32mm2. I don't think they'd release such a device before 2011 so shouldn't we be talking about something closer to 32nm as a manufacturing process and what would the estimated die area be for such a hypothetical cluster there?

Two node shrinks, about 8 mm2 in 32nm. Pretty doable, no ?

Someone remain me again how big the PSP SoC was when it was released ? How big is it now ?

wco81

10-Jul-2009, 00:12

If Apple continues roughly the same trend and of course continues to use IMG IP for future SoCs the "2010 iPhone" could incorporate under 45nm a far more capable SGX540 or even 545 at roughly the same die area as today's 3GS and probably even with a slightly higher frequency w/o shooting necessarily power consumption out of the roof or cutting short in capabilities au contraire.

But that's the question, will they continue the same trend?

And actually, even though the GS doesn't seem like a big upgrade, some have noted in the registry that it's iPhone2,1, whereas the original was iPhone1,1 and the 3G was iPhone1,2, suggesting that the G to GS jump is more significant than the 2G to 3G jump.

The process shrinks for sure but will they try to maintain the same die size or will they shrink it after they reach a certain plateau of features/performance in the silicon?

That is, will they always need to push for more graphics pipelines, more shaders, etc. if iPhone doesn't become a gaming platform for higher-end graphics?

Ailuros

10-Jul-2009, 00:16

Two node shrinks, about 8 mm2 in 32nm. Pretty doable, no ?

Best case scenario probably yes; but even if it ends up at say 10 sqmm it isn't necessarily a disaster either. The maximum possible frequency IMG gives so far for 65nm is 200MHz and for 45nm 400MHz. In reality you'll see integration to come at slightly over the half of those frequencies (like ~100MHz (?) for SGX535/iPhone or ~115MHz (?) for Intel GMA500), meaning that under 32nm something like 400MHz could be a viable possibility.

Maybe I'm too optimistic while speculating on 32nm, but for 2011 something like 45nm doesn't make much sense.

Someone remain me again how big the PSP SoC was when it was released ? How big is it now ?

I don't recall to be honest; Arun might recall the original die area if he's lurking somewhere in the background and decides to give up his sock puppet theatre :lol:

Ailuros

10-Jul-2009, 00:41

But that's the question, will they continue the same trend?

Do you have at least one serious indication that they won't?

And actually, even though the GS doesn't seem like a big upgrade, some have noted in the registry that it's iPhone2,1, whereas the original was iPhone1,1 and the 3G was iPhone1,2, suggesting that the G to GS jump is more significant than the 2G to 3G jump.

Anand has updated his 3GS article and it's worth a read (and no I don't necessarily agree with everything there either to make that one clear); hardware improvements aside it seems that Apple might want to improve a bit on the OS/software side of things.

The process shrinks for sure but will they try to maintain the same die size or will they shrink it after they reach a certain plateau of features/performance in the silicon?

Apple keeps its plans (like any other manufacturer out there) close to its heart; if I knew what they intend to use for their 2010 "iPhone" I could eventually answer that question. In retrospect I myself was caught somewhat surprised when I found out that the 3GS is using actually a SGX535 instead of the much smaller SGX520 (which would had been a healthy graphics upgrade to the MBX Lite of the original iPhone already). I suspect the reason might have been that 535 must have been ready earlier for integration but can't know for sure.

But yes let's assume they'll keep that SGX535 for the 2010 iPhone and they go for 45nm. They can aim roughly half the die area and twice the frequency (or even more than that) which means at least twice the performance at roughly the same power consumption.

That is, will they always need to push for more graphics pipelines, more shaders, etc. if iPhone doesn't become a gaming platform for higher-end graphics?

As stated above there are many ways to increase performance for any kind of chip. My own gut feeling though tells me that they won't follow the frequency increase route but take the SGX54x (4 ALU) route just as Intel, Texas Instruments, Samsung and others intend to follow. And what exactly do you mean with "becoming" a gaming platform anyway?

I had the other day a disagreement with someone in another forum where I claimed that the iPhone is and will remain primarily a smartphone and no I didn't ignore the fact that games are the highest selling applications through their online application store. Folks are actually playing games with it and yes that includes primitive 2D games and for some more demanding stuff like that:

http://www.dailytech.com/Weekly+IPhone+Gaming+Review++Doom+Resurrection+and +More/article15597.htm

There's the question if the media coverage it gets is purely orchestrated by Apple's marketing machine or if folks are actually playing games with it.

tangey

10-Jul-2009, 12:02

In reality you'll see integration to come at slightly over the half of those frequencies (like ~100MHz (?) for SGX535/iPhone or ~115MHz (?) for Intel GMA500), .

GMA500 runs at 200MHz, thats at 130nm
http://download.intel.com/design/chipsets/embedded/specupdt/319538.pdf
see page 11.

Expect a BIG power reduction in the next chipset when Intel moves SGX on-chip/on-die and down to 45nm.

tangey

10-Jul-2009, 12:09

But that's the question, will they continue the same trend?

That is, will they always need to push for more graphics pipelines, more shaders, etc. if iPhone doesn't become a gaming platform for higher-end graphics?

As much as the 3D hardware is for games, its also in there for the UI, which I see Apple continuing to push forward and make ever greater demands on the hardware.

Mike11

10-Jul-2009, 12:55

I don't know why everybody thinks that the 2010 iPhone will have a different SoC. Maybe die-shrink or a higher clock speed, but new CPU and GPU? Apple aimed pretty high with the 3GS hardware, some people (me included) wouldn't have been surprised if this year's iPhone would have had just a higher clocked ARM11 and a SGX520.

This year was all about the new SoC, and I think Apple plans to keep it around for next year's version. The major (hardware) selling point of the next version, apart from more storage, could be a new design (since it didn't change at all this year) and some new gimmicks (for example HD video, front-facing camera, finger-print reader etc.). A two year cycle makes sense to me, new SoC one year, new design/new features the next year. Also it doesn't make sense for Apple to change the SoC every year, it's far more beneficial for developers to keep the core platform stable for two years (and the 3GS is already the fastest smartphone out there, no real need to improve unless you change something drastic like the resolution or offer full multi-tasking). And IMHO Cortex-A9 multi-cores probably won't show up in retail smartphones before Q4/2010, so there's no real pressure on Apple to deliver on this front in June/July.

So IMHO Cortex-A9MP and SGX543MP in 2011, I think this will be the BIG iPhone update with a new SoC, new resolution/display and full multi-tasking (with limited multi-tasking in 2010, something like you have to preselect some background apps and/or it's limited to the x most recent non-Apple apps etc.).

tangey

10-Jul-2009, 14:17

This year was all about the new SoC, and I think Apple plans to keep it around for next year's version. The major (hardware) selling point of the next version, apart from more storage, could be a new design (since it didn't change at all this year) and some new gimmicks (for example HD video, front-facing camera, finger-print reader etc.). A two year cycle makes sense to me, new SoC one year, new design/new features the next year. Also it doesn't make sense for Apple to change the SoC every year, it's far more beneficial for developers to keep the core platform stable for two years (and the 3GS is already the fastest smartphone out there, no real need to improve unless you change something drastic like the resolution or offer full multi-tasking). And IMHO Cortex-A9 multi-cores probably won't show up in retail smartphones before Q4/2010, so there's no real pressure on Apple to deliver on this front in June/July.

So IMHO Cortex-A9MP and SGX543MP in 2011, I think this will be the BIG iPhone update with a new SoC, new resolution/display and full multi-tasking (with limited multi-tasking in 2010, something like you have to preselect some background apps and/or it's limited to the x most recent non-Apple apps etc.).

You make a good argument for your case, and could well be right.

Of course, it depends on whether 18-24 months down the road from them gathering up PA-semi, ARM licence and IMG licence (which happend mid-08), they find themselves in a position to produce something more power frugal and importantly cheaper. The production of a new Soc might also be dependant on whether they have a bigger, more capable platform (itablet, ithingy) in the road map, and if so whether they see mileage in having their own in-house stuff inside that, which might lead to that processor migrating down the product line.

Ailuros

10-Jul-2009, 20:12

GMA500 runs at 200MHz, thats at 130nm
http://download.intel.com/design/chipsets/embedded/specupdt/319538.pdf
see page 11.

Expect a BIG power reduction in the next chipset when Intel moves SGX on-chip/on-die and down to 45nm.

Thanks for the correction; are there any die area estimates under 45nm available already (and yeah you may excuse the off topic)?

This year was all about the new SoC, and I think Apple plans to keep it around for next year's version. The major (hardware) selling point of the next version, apart from more storage, could be a new design (since it didn't change at all this year) and some new gimmicks (for example HD video, front-facing camera, finger-print reader etc.). A two year cycle makes sense to me, new SoC one year, new design/new features the next year. Also it doesn't make sense for Apple to change the SoC every year, it's far more beneficial for developers to keep the core platform stable for two years (and the 3GS is already the fastest smartphone out there, no real need to improve unless you change something drastic like the resolution or offer full multi-tasking). And IMHO Cortex-A9 multi-cores probably won't show up in retail smartphones before Q4/2010, so there's no real pressure on Apple to deliver on this front in June/July.

So IMHO Cortex-A9MP and SGX543MP in 2011, I think this will be the BIG iPhone update with a new SoC, new resolution/display and full multi-tasking (with limited multi-tasking in 2010, something like you have to preselect some background apps and/or it's limited to the x most recent non-Apple apps etc.).

Mike,

As tangey said most of them are good points; I'm merely asking myself if Apple might be driven into a different hw direction due to the majority of the competition (ie smartphones from other OEM manufacturers) going into the SGX54x/OMAP4 direction.

It's no coincindence that I'm asking if anyone has a die size estimate on the embedded graphics part of Intel's coming 45nm SoC.

Something else: at the moment a SGX543 4MP might sound great for a say 2011 handheld console. I'm afraid though that - albeit on a different scale - similar trends to console vs. PC hardware might appear in that timeframe. Either before this year runs out or early 2010 I wouldn't be surprised if IMG announces their next generation IP.

We could open a new "Series6 speculation" thread but I'd still say it's too early for that. Fields that the PowerVR folks might have looked into could be:

a) Updates to the programmable geometry processor to yield X11 compliance.
b) Double precision
c) A completely new HSR unit
d) A digital programmable integrated teapot and Lord knows what else *snicker*

IMHLO Series5XT was merely a bridge in relative terms to their next generation and probably a quick move to deliver a lot more performance for a future handheld console. Remember that if silly triangle rates would be a performance measurement to go by you have similar performance with a high end 200MHz MBX@65nm and a lowest end SGX520@65nm (all other efficiency improvements of Series5 aside). The next move might very well follow that trend always of course on a single core comparison basis between generations.

The limiting factor for all embedded chips will always be die area and power consumption, but alas if IHVs wouldn't increase efficiency or pick any possible low hanging fruit with each new generation.

RudeCurve

13-Jul-2009, 01:28

IMO Sony is focusing on the wrong things. They'll need to sell the PSP2 at a price that people will pay and I'm not sure people are going to pay big bucks for better graphics in a handheld. The iPhone is extremely acttractive because it has an OS that supports all kinds of apps + phone + internet browser + camera etc. People are willing to pay for that complete package. Even if Sony could copy the iPhone hardware feature for feature they'd still fall short in the apps department and need to subsidize the hardware somehow, maybe partnering with Verizon or somesuch.

Blazkowicz

13-Jul-2009, 05:14

I held an iPhone for a few seconds, played the 3D racing game and thought graphics were bad. mostly the IQ, aliased and not enough filtered. I'm spoiled maybe, but I would want something better. (actually I don't care much about the graphics themselves but I'm used to anti-aliasing and aniso filter, even on ten-year-old games)

I don't want smartphones. Too expensive (like 500€ or 100€ + 24 monthes contract), worthless after a year or so. They are crippled computers that drain the battery of your phone if you use them. They have webcams and non standard headphones. And what if the phone part fails?

I prefer keeping the phone/modem and amusement device functions separate.

warmi

13-Jul-2009, 06:07

I held an iPhone for a few seconds, played the 3D racing game and thought graphics were bad. mostly the IQ, aliased and not enough filtered. I'm spoiled maybe, but I would want something better. (actually I don't care much about the graphics themselves but I'm used to anti-aliasing and aniso filter, even on ten-year-old games)

Yeah, but it has nothing to do with the hardware .... aa is currently not supported because iPhone OpenGL apps are restricted to rendering to a texture (where AA is not supported) as opposed to a framebuffer.

Dr Evil

13-Jul-2009, 14:42

I think Sony needs to put the phone in PSP2. People don't want to carry two different mobile devices with them. Everyone has a phone with them, so it makes sense to add more features there.

Blazkowicz

13-Jul-2009, 15:56

there's a point to having two devices : the phone is a more transient device (can be lost, can fail), you don't want to suck up the phone's battery to play games, you can carry a smaller phone and lend the console or leave it at home.
People will want to steal that PSP2, too.

warmi

13-Jul-2009, 16:44

there's a point to having two devices

I doubt it .. the market has spoken , standalone PocketPCs are essentially dead, which tells us that people don't really want to carry multiple devices.

Xmas

13-Jul-2009, 17:08

I'd say the iPhone and iPod touch show in a way that the market wants both kinds of devices.

Shifty Geezer

13-Jul-2009, 17:16

Hmmm. I think many get an iPod touch when they already have a phone+contract etc. I expect the majority would prefer an iPhone if the services made it viable. That's just a guess though.

wco81

13-Jul-2009, 18:37

Room for both but what kind of price point can the PSP2 hit that's viable, when it's going against iPhone and other devices which are subsidized at $200 or 200 Euro?

Sure there are gamers who'd spend $300 or even $400 for a portable device but would that be a big enough market?

Or alternatively, how much more performance would Sony be able to pack in at the $200 price point than other device makers?

Shifty Geezer

13-Jul-2009, 18:50

It's not just performance, but also library. Sony's 1st party devs and PS background means lots of real games on a PSP platform. You aren't likely (at the moment anyhow) to get Monster Hunter on iPhone or any phone device. A PSP phone will get such games. So even if the same price or slightly more than phones on contracts, PSP2 should offer a USP in content. Just so long as Sony don't price it too high (and when have they ever fallen for that mistake? :p) it should be competitive.

The biggest issue at the moment is iPhone's apps. People buy iPhone for zillions of utilities to boot. There's been rumour of non-gaming apps on PSP. Sony would have to open homebrew and extend their PSN store to compete.

Lazy8s

17-Jul-2009, 02:12

With the iPhone/touch's proficiency at scaling images and text for navigating large pages on a small screen, I think Apple feels they already have the device to address the personal computing/multimedia market.

Unlike other classes of device targeting a similar market like the MID, smartbook, netbook, and UMPC, Apple realized that only the smartphone is small enough to truly be a personal companion, so they didn't compromise that essential and instead sought a solution to the challenge of efficiently scaling images/text.

I think Apple realizes the strength inherent in concentrating their product support solely on the iPhone platform for that market, so I don't expect they're designing an iTablet, a large iPod, a netbook, or any other compromised form factor for release in the near future. Likewise, I wouldn't expect them to separately pursue a niche like the toy sector by making a portable video game console. While some analysts wait for them to bring out an iGame or whatever, the iPhone's game market will continue to overtake the dedicated platforms.

If the niche is still profitable, Sony could continue to play there, but they'll have to look at what Apple is doing if they intend to overlap their market.

17-Jul-2009, 10:45

You aren't likely (at the moment anyhow) to get Monster Hunter on iPhone or any phone device.

I think there is Monster Hunter for mobile phone, at least in Japan.

Shifty Geezer

17-Jul-2009, 18:17

There may be a Monster Hunter title, but the gameplay won't be the same, like GTA on the GameBoy. At least, I presume. The controls just aren't there for mobiles to handle 'real' games.

Pressure

17-Jul-2009, 19:14

18-Jul-2009, 00:03

There may be a Monster Hunter title, but the gameplay won't be the same, like GTA on the GameBoy. At least, I presume. The controls just aren't there for mobiles to handle 'real' games.

Look similar enough last time I saw the screens. The graphics aren't bad either. Remember mobile phone has buttons like PSP. And those text msg happy trigger thumbs are pretty dextrous among those buttons.

Last time I played Street Fighter 2 on mobile phone just fine to kill off time while waiting and the phone wasn't even mine. I played Tiger Wood Golf too, and that wasn't bad either.

Ailuros

16-Oct-2009, 19:23

http://www.brightsideofnews.com/news/2009/10/16/exclusive-sony-psp2-arriving-in-20102c-features-powervr-sgx543-graphics.aspx

wco81

16-Oct-2009, 19:33

New PSP SKUs just about every year and then PSP2 a year after they put out the PSP Go?

Who does Sony think they are, Sega?

Ailuros

16-Oct-2009, 19:55

I'm not so sure the timeframe is accurate since I would had rather guessed 2011, but what has a refresh of a rather aging handheld console exactly in common with a new generation handheld?

Npl

16-Oct-2009, 20:12

I'm not so sure the timeframe is accurate since I would had rather guessed 2011, but what has a refresh of a rather aging handheld console exactly in common with a new generation handheld?I wouldnt count PSPgo as refresh, given that it doesnt play any of the UMDs. Its not really replacing the old model (which stays on sale) but rather augmenting a niche.

Seems like the whole article is guesswork, nowhere theres a reasonable hint of Sony actually using the PowerVR for the PSP2 or a timeframe.

roninja

16-Oct-2009, 21:09

I wouldnt count PSPgo as refresh, given that it doesnt play any of the UMDs. Its not really replacing the old model (which stays on sale) but rather augmenting a niche.

Seems like the whole article is guesswork, nowhere theres a reasonable hint of Sony actually using the PowerVR for the PSP2 or a timeframe.

There is too much evidence out there concerning the powervr PR last yr and the announcement of SGX 543 and a limit number of "new" licensees wanting to be lead partners in such a project. All indicators point to Sony.

wco81

16-Oct-2009, 21:21

Sega alienated some part of the US market by releasing in rapid succession the SegaCD, 32X, Saturn, Dreamcast.

Npl

17-Oct-2009, 00:18

There is too much evidence out there concerning the powervr PR last yr and the announcement of SGX 543 and a limit number of "new" licensees wanting to be lead partners in such a project. All indicators point to Sony.Still Sony has tons of consumer devices(including smartphones and laptops), what indicates that it will use this specific Chip in 2010 for the PSP2 (and no successor 1-2 years later). This could well be similar to the PSP-Phone myth that crops up every 6 months.

Ailuros

17-Oct-2009, 08:25

Still Sony has tons of consumer devices(including smartphones and laptops), what indicates that it will use this specific Chip in 2010 for the PSP2 (and no successor 1-2 years later). This could well be similar to the PSP-Phone myth that crops up every 6 months.

You asked for an indication and not proof: http://www.imgtec.com/News/Release/index.asp?NewsID=412

Imagination expects that this significant agreement with the new partner will extend the reach of its POWERVR technology into another high-volume consumer device segment.
Forthcoming member announced: http://www.imgtec.com/News/Release/index.asp?NewsID=449

Albeit I don't see any connection between different markets but Sony Ericsson has smartphones with SGX535 on shelves and no there's no connection to the above.

As for the timeframe as I said above, it sounds too early for me too but I won't insist either if it's true or not since I can't know. However if it's supposed to be late 2010 that's two years after the first announcement above.

Sega alienated some part of the US market by releasing in rapid succession the SegaCD, 32X, Saturn, Dreamcast.

Again the successor of the PSP we're talking about here is a new generation handheld. How long has the PSP so far been on shelves? (and I'm not even using Npl's legitimate clarification above).

Lazy8s

17-Oct-2009, 09:14

OMAP3430 uses SGX530. Apple is the only phone maker using the 535, as far as I know, via their custom SoC.

If Intel's new platform gets inside some phones, more phone companies beside Apple could be using the 535.

Ailuros

17-Oct-2009, 09:34

Ailuros

19-Nov-2009, 11:23

http://www.eurogamer.net/articles/digitalfoundry-ds2-vs-psp2-article

Eurogamer's article for DS2 vs. PSP2 speculation.

On a less serious note: http://fgnonline.webs.com/

Uhhhm huh?

Sony has chosen the GPU for the next generation PlayStation.We can officially reveal in this world exclusive that SCEI has officially chosen the Imagination Technologies currently in development PowerVR Series 6 architecture for it's next generation PlayStation console scheduled for 2012 worldwide deployment.
The PlayStation 4 shall use a high end variant of the Series 6 line. Performance, specifications and features are at this time unknown. The Series 6 shall receive an official announcement from IMGTEC sometime in 2010, with initial models targeting the smartphone and netbook sector.
It is believed that Sony has gained exclusive rights to the technology for the console space.
IMGTEC's PowerVR technology uses an advance technique called TBDR which can outperform a competing IMR product from nVidia/ATi by 3-5 fold whilst maintaining equal die size and price point. TBDR was the primary reason the SEGA DreamCast was capable of such astonishing graphical feats as early as 1998.
Interestingly SCEI has also chosen IMGTEC as the graphics provider for their next generation PSP. That particular product shall however be using the Series 5XT.
Mr Zachary Morris

I believe it when I see it.

flynn

19-Nov-2009, 12:34

http://www.eurogamer.net/articles/digitalfoundry-ds2-vs-psp2-article

Eurogamer's article for DS2 vs. PSP2 speculation.

Some interesting comments but we will have to wait and see.

On a less serious note: http://fgnonline.webs.com/

Uhhhm huh?

I believe it when I see it.

That article is total BS, don't know what those guys are smoking.

Ailuros

24-Nov-2009, 10:31

http://www.imgtec.com/News/Release/index.asp?NewsID=497

Imagination reports that three of its partners now have licences for SGX MP technology, which continues to extend Imagination’s leadership of the embedded graphics acceleration market with multi-processor, shader-based solutions which address the rapidly growing demands for high performance graphics in a wide range of consumer electronics segments.

Hmmm I can speculate on two (one of them possibly being Mediatek); wonder who the 3rd is.

tangey

24-Nov-2009, 23:47

I assume the three to be Sony,Intel and Apple, given that the mediatek license was only announced in June of this year for a single member of the SGX family, whereas Intel and Apple have been licensees for ages, Intel is a lead partner, Apple's license annoucement was such that it gave them options on just about EVERYTHING, and Sony is widely thought to be using a multi-core for the PSP2.

Lazy8s

25-Nov-2009, 00:49

TI would seem more likely than Intel for a 543 variant.

Ailuros

25-Nov-2009, 06:25

Hmmm.... http://www.imgtec.com/News/Release/index.asp?NewsID=469

tangey

25-Nov-2009, 10:39

Yes thats the mediatek license announcement I referred to, its for a single member of the SGX family, given their product range I assume its something like 530.

THe IMG announcement from yesterday said multiple "LEAD PARTNERS" have been working with it for many months, that description doesn't fit with Mediatek IMO.

On a different note I see the same PR says "The highly efficient POWERVR SGX543MP family delivers near linear progression in vertex and pixel processing performance, unlike competitive solutions which scale only pixel performance"....a clear dig at MALI400MP

Ailuros

25-Nov-2009, 11:06

Yes thats the mediatek license announcement I referred to, its for a single member of the SGX family, given their product range I assume its something like 530.

Imagination Technologies licenses high-performance graphics processor core to MediaTek

It's the high performance part that got me thinking. If it should be a single core variant then I'd rather think into the SGX54x direction for "high performance".

THe IMG announcement from yesterday said multiple "LEAD PARTNERS" have been working with it for many months, that description doesn't fit with Mediatek IMO.

Hmmm that's true.

On a different note I see the same PR says "The highly efficient POWERVR SGX543MP family delivers near linear progression in vertex and pixel processing performance, unlike competitive solutions which scale only pixel performance"....a clear dig at MALI400MP

Typical PR/marketing.

tangey

25-Nov-2009, 14:30

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It's the high performance part that got me thinking. If it should be a single core variant then I'd rather think into the SGX54x direction for "high performance".

"high-performance" is that marketing speak again -- this IMG announcement in August said in the title that Ambrella licensed a "high performance" SGX core.

http://www.imgtec.com/corporate/newsdetail.asp?NewsID=475

Lazy8s

26-Feb-2010, 09:14

PowerVR uses multi-core with their Series 5 to address all of the possible, arbitrary die size demands that the GPUs of devices larger than mobiles could need, so a sizeable, dedicated gaming portable like a hypothetical PSP2 would use more than one PowerVR GPU core.

With the Kutaragi administration out of power at Sony, they're certainly not going to try to pass over market competitve choices of GPUs in favor of their own, less proficient in-house design capabilities again.

Ailuros

26-Feb-2010, 09:25

PowerVR uses multi-core with their Series 5 to address all of the possible, arbitrary die size demands that the GPUs of devices larger than mobiles could need, so a sizeable, dedicated gaming portable like a hypothetical PSP2 would use more than one PowerVR GPU.

The sw and in extension the developer would see just "one GPU", but that's just stating the obvious.

NeoTechni

26-Feb-2010, 10:04

With the Kutaragi administration out of power at Sony, they're certainly not going to try to pass over market competitve choices of GPUs in favor of their own, less proficient in-house design capabilities again.

It's not really up to them though, if they want BC (and they do) they must use the existing GPU. If they use the existing GPU, it makes no sense to use another one and becomes difficult/wasteful/expensive to do so.

Lazy8s

26-Feb-2010, 10:21

They'll probably work on porting/emulating just specific titles from the library of the first PSP and sell them again as downloads on their network for a little extra revenue next generation.

Shifty Geezer

28-Feb-2010, 10:44

UMD talk moved here (http://forum.beyond3d.com/showthread.php?t=56681).

Lazy8s

14-May-2010, 10:36

So, the word is "PS3 in your pocket", 32x the performance of current generation mobiles like the Droid and N900, etc.

The 32x would add up from: (performance improvement from SGX53x to SGX54x) + (performance improvement from USSE1 to USSE2) + (performance improvement from single core to multiple cores) + (performance improvement from the clock rate increase which results from moving from 65nm to 45/40nm and from moving from a phone to a more dedicated game player)

... and with that, I set a single-sentence record for the most occurances of the word "from".

wco81

14-May-2010, 17:28

What kind of battery life though? What price?

Smart phones with the best SOCs cost carriers $600 and up. So is there a subsidization model for the PSP2?

What is the game distribution model? Heard the PSP with digital distribution failed misearably.

DS is on the verge of surpassing the PS2 for the most units sold ever. Is there really a demand for "PS3 in the pocket"? It seems the market has much lower expectations for portable gaming, as far as performance goes. iPhone is also damping down what people expect from portable/mobile games, especially price-wise.

Especially if they can't find a pricing/subsidization model which makes it competitive, it's not going to find a very receptive market. Then after finding a competitive hardware price, games which take advantage of that kind of power will have to be priced at $40 or more. How many of those games will sell in big volumes?

aaronspink

14-May-2010, 17:53

Especially if they can't find a pricing/subsidization model which makes it competitive, it's not going to find a very receptive market. Then after finding a competitive hardware price, games which take advantage of that kind of power will have to be priced at $40 or more. How many of those games will sell in big volumes?

The fundamental trend is that portable game machines are an endangered species. Phones however that play games have a fairly bright future for new hardware. Sony would be better off teaming with SE to develop a future phone infrastructure for games than releasing another handheld gaming only device.

Exophase

14-May-2010, 18:12

Smart phones with the best SOCs cost carriers $600 and up. So is there a subsidization model for the PSP2?

The cost of these phones isn't really representative of the high-end 3D capabilities. The pertinent features of the OMAP3430 found in N900, Palm Pre, Droid, etc are equivalent to those in the OMAP3530, which can be bought in low volume for under $50/unit. This is expensive when compared to current gen offerings by Freescale (i.MX51) and Samsung (S5PC100), although both are using weaker GPUs.

For a gaming handheld a more customized and streamlined SoC would be used, and most likely a tighter business arrangement would be formed which would have much less overhead. My guess is that Sony and their partners would be designing the chips while licensing IMG cores which probably won't be too expensive per unit.

The fundamental trend is that portable game machines are an endangered species.

How can you say that when Nintendo's currently selling handheld will soon have outsold every other gaming platform ever, including their breakthrough and highly acclaimed current generation console? I won't deny that phone gaming has been successful but it's hardly all encompassing. Phone games are mainly driven by low cost casual endeavors with limited/alternative input schemes. While "mainstream" gaming has shifted somewhat towards this direction (particularly with DS and Wii) it has hardly converged and I don't see that happening any time soon.

eastmen

14-May-2010, 18:15

The fundamental trend is that portable game machines are an endangered species. Phones however that play games have a fairly bright future for new hardware. Sony would be better off teaming with SE to develop a future phone infrastructure for games than releasing another handheld gaming only device.

I certianly believe that handhelds have at least another generation of hardware left.

Many made the claim that gps units were done with gps phones and it hasn't happened in fact gps sales are going up.

For the majority of people battery life on a phone is very important and secondary tasks like gps or gaming will allways take a back seat. However there are allways car trips , airplane rides and other things that warrent a dedicated gaming device.

I just hope the psp 2 gets at least 10 hours of battery life while playing a game.

MfA

14-May-2010, 20:07

Trends are nice, but in the meantime mobile phone gaming still sucks and portable game consoles are still profitable ... it's not something to make huge investments in any more, but at the same time once the 3DS hits it will probably swallow the market whole if not opposed by new hardware from their competitors.

I don't think Sony has the option not to go autostereoscopic either ... the 3M directional backlight film seems to be just the ticket.

aaronspink

14-May-2010, 23:00

How can you say that when Nintendo's currently selling handheld will soon have outsold every other gaming platform ever, including their breakthrough and highly acclaimed current generation console?

iPhone/iPodTouch = 85 million in half the time. Eventually,
Android will be in the same range over the same time period. Which means both are selling FASTER than DS ever has. Both have significantly better hardware, both are heavily subsidized by an existing model in addition to effectively royalties on software sold. Both come out the box with a digital content distribution system that completely bypasses the retail/wholesale chain.

I won't deny that phone gaming has been successful but it's hardly all encompassing. Phone games are mainly driven by low cost casual endeavors with limited/alternative input schemes. While "mainstream" gaming has shifted somewhat towards this direction (particularly with DS and Wii) it has hardly converged and I don't see that happening any time soon.

Well the PSP hasn't exactly taken the world by storm. For mobile devices you want games that are more on the casual side. Its not like you are really going to sit around with one and play a hardcore game all day.

The thing is, while the games may cost consumers less, it is likely that the developers make the same if not more money per sale on the phone platforms than through retail on DS.

MfA

14-May-2010, 23:39

As long as there is no standardized and good controls for mobile phones it's simply not a competition to hand held ... it might be a bigger market in the end, but it won't kill the handhelds.

iPhone/iPad might go there given the patents on a control dock, Android though is in a bit of a bind ... who is big enough to standardize controls and present a big enough platform for developers at the same time? I think Sony is the only one who could do it.

It would be nice if Sony came out with an Android based PSP2 and then licensed out the ability to run the games on mobile phones who met minimal spec and interface requirements (so they would need either a D-Pad on the phone, or a dock with a D-Pad). Would be great for both Sony and Android. The PSP2 would be to Sony what the iPod touch is to Apple.

PS. Android piracy is not really a problem, they can simply tivoize it and include a small secure computing environment (a dongle running over MicroSD).

Exophase

15-May-2010, 01:52

iPhone/iPodTouch = 85 million in half the time. Eventually,
Android will be in the same range over the same time period. Which means both are selling FASTER than DS ever has. Both have significantly better hardware, both are heavily subsidized by an existing model in addition to effectively royalties on software sold. Both come out the box with a digital content distribution system that completely bypasses the retail/wholesale chain.

And those things are phones, which is not the same market. You can't say that handheld gaming is dying when it's doing better than ever, just because another product that does a bunch of other stuff is doing well too.

Yes, the hardware on devices 5 years newer is better. What's your point? Nintendo would have been selling competitive hardware too, except they actually can still be wildly successful selling ancient hardware.

At any rate, "endangered species" is blowing things way out of proportion at best. There's room in the world for both markets.

Well the PSP hasn't exactly taken the world by storm. For mobile devices you want games that are more on the casual side. Its not like you are really going to sit around with one and play a hardcore game all day.

Where did I even say PSP? DS has certainly taken the world by storm. PSP has done OK, of course.

For mobile games maybe you want games "more on the casual side" - for many others there's still a market for games that use buttons.

The thing is, while the games may cost consumers less, it is likely that the developers make the same if not more money per sale on the phone platforms than through retail on DS.

Yeah, it's likely that they make the same on <= $5 sales as $40 ones.. wait what? Let's see some profit numbers, I guess.

silent_guy

15-May-2010, 02:39

I won't deny that phone gaming has been successful but it's hardly all encompassing. Phone games are mainly driven by low cost casual endeavors with limited/alternative input schemes. While "mainstream" gaming has shifted somewhat towards this direction (particularly with DS and Wii) it has hardly converged and I don't see that happening any time soon.
You seem to be less concerned about the threat of Apple than Nintendo themselves lately...

Exophase

15-May-2010, 04:13

You seem to be less concerned about the threat of Apple than Nintendo themselves lately...

Of course Nintendo should be concerned, just like they should have been rightfully concerned when PSP was released. When you own this big of chunk of the market you have more room to fall than grow. That doesn't mean Nintendo thinks iPhone has made them an "endangered species." For as successful as iPhone has been I doubt it has stolen a lot of DS sales. I doubt a lot of people have been saying "well, I was going to get a DS but I decided to buy an iPhone contract instead", and I also doubt an especially staggering number have been saying "well, I was going to buy this must have DS game but these 10 iPhone app impulse buys were more important to me".. the App Store strikes me more as a way to make people run their budgets without ever thinking about it instead. But still buying their DS games.

So what concern has Nintendo been visibly showing anyway?

I think the real point of contention for me is I don't know where gaming handhelds would stop being gaming handhelds exactly (and thus, I don't know what's supposed to be endangered). The remark has been made about them being for more than just gaming, but they've been for more than just gaming for a while now, and gaming has included digital/wireless distribution for a while now too - the real claim being made is that they'll become phones. And I think that'd be a bad idea, because then they would be competing with Apple (and and Android, etc) in a market that those companies do currently dominate. You don't need a cell connection and data plan to download games - even the App Store makes you use WiFi for games of any appreciable size (20MB, was 10MB for the longest time) and gaming handhelds will have no problem continuing to do this. At the same time, people will probably continue to feel more comfortable buying their $40+ games on physical media. At least for now.

The console industry has done well with cheaper/more casual/retro digitally distributed games, supplementing the more mainline endeavors. There's no argument against that. I just don't see becoming a phone or dropping most of your useful interfaces as being prerequisites.

aaronspink

15-May-2010, 13:24

And those things are phones, which is not the same market. You can't say that handheld gaming is dying when it's doing better than ever, just because another product that does a bunch of other stuff is doing well too.

They compete for both consumer dollars AND developer dollars, currently the developers outside of Nintendo first party, are concentrating on the phones. They are both competing in the mobile gaming marketplace, don't fool yourself, there is no reason to include the level of 3D support they do in the smartphones outside of games.

Where did I even say PSP? DS has certainly taken the world by storm. PSP has done OK, of course.

PSP is at best a joke.

For mobile games maybe you want games "more on the casual side" - for many others there's still a market for games that use buttons.

They make plenty of game that use buttons for mobile phones.

Yeah, it's likely that they make the same on <= $5 sales as $40 ones.. wait what? Let's see some profit numbers, I guess.

$40 - $10-15 to get it to the consumer, -$10 to nintendo, -$5-10 for the rom and packaging vs 70% of $5-$20 with no overheads and sunk costs. I think you are vastly overestimating the developer profit on the DS. Ever notice that most of the games are First or Second party? There is a reason for that.

MfA

15-May-2010, 15:12

Be that as it may, Nintendo makes lots of money on those first party games ... they will almost certainly make lots of money on the 3DS too. Sony can either try to split the handheld market and get some of that money, or let Nintendo take all of it.

BTW, what high profit mobile game used buttons?

The only major platform which has buttons at all is Android and Android is simply not a threat ... the 3D hardware in some of the phones might be capable, but for some reason extracting it seems rather hard. Moorestown is the only platform which has demonstrated it can extract that power in practice (kwaak3 scores I see on the web are more in the region of <25 fps rather than the >100 demonstrated on Moorestown). Questionable drivers, lack of minimum specs, lack of standardized controls, PIRACY ... in the end unless a big party stands up and solves all those it sucks as a gaming platform. Google won't do it, their partners already feel they are being railroaded too much as is ... so there is only Sony really.

tongue_of_colicab

15-May-2010, 16:34

Phones wont compete with handhelds. I don't know why people keep thinking that. First of all lets just compare price. A phone decent enough to actually play decent games, along with a 2 year contract will cost you easily 700 euro's. A handheld will cost you 150 - 200 euro's and will last 5 or 6 years. As phone tech will get better you will also need to buy new phones if you want to play new games. So you can either pay 200 euro's for a handheld and you are done for 6 years or you have to pay 3x700=2800 euro's. Rather expensive if you ask me. Especially if you are not too interrested in the other benefits high end hardware might offer you. Out of every 10 people, how many own a high end phone? Not a lot.

Than there are the games. Touchscreen only works for some games, but plenty still need buttons. You wont get buttons on your phone. Why not? because it sucks. It makes your phone ugly and larger. People dont want that. So either your phone will suck at gaming because it lacks buttons/decent ergonomics or you will look like a ass because your phone looks retarded because it has all the gaming controlls added on. There is a reason N gage failed.

Than there is the traget audience. A large part of the handheld market are people below 20 years old. How many of them do you see buying expensive phone hardware for playing games? I can already imagen families buying 2 or 3 500+ euro phones for the whole family. Can't you?

Anyone who thinks something like a iphone is a real threat to handheld systems should get out of his/her B3D world and have a look at the real world.

wco81

15-May-2010, 16:43

Wait, iPhone and iPhone class phones are 700 Euro WITH contract?

That doesn't sound right.

No you're not going to get rich, high-production games on smart phones, especially when the smart phone users are consistently opting for cheaper, simpler games over branded games like those from EA.

But people may be willing to make that tradeoff, go with time killer types of games for playing games on the phone when they have some free time and then saving their serious gaming for home.

You may get PS3 power in a portable device but on a little screen, it's just not going to be the same. It could be a repeat of the PSP -- good sales because it's a lot of power in a portable device and that appeals to gadget-philes but software sales aren't on par because people don't want to spend that much on games which should really be played on a big screen.

silent_guy

15-May-2010, 18:03

So what concern has Nintendo been visibly showing anyway?
You obviously missed that quote last week from the Nintendo CEO. :grin:

"Apple is the Enemy of the Future (http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2010/05/07/satoru-iwata-nintendo-ceo_n_568045.html)".

They don't care anymore about Sony.

MfA

15-May-2010, 18:14

If Sony really wanted to they could certainly bring out both hardware and first party games to compete with the 3DS, they have the technical capability ... the people at the top just can't get their shit together.

silent_guy

15-May-2010, 18:23

Anyone who thinks something like a iphone is a real threat to handheld systems should get out of his/her B3D world and have a look at the real world.
In my real world, pretty much everybody in my social circle has an iPhone and nobody has a DS.

Your example of $2800 etc doesn't fly: a handheld gaming device is not a necessity. A phone is. When you've already decided you need a phone, it's a much smaller step to add an additional $200 for a better phone instead of buying yet another dedicated device. The initial purchase price is the same, the only difference is the monthly cost, which will be something like $100 for the voice+data plan vs. $60 or so for the voice plan alone.

Total difference over two years: $960, not including $40 games.

That's still quite a bit of money, but not as dramatic as how you're depicting it.

There's no doubt that there's still a market for hard core gamers, but the few times that I've seen somebody play with a DS, it was always a game that required a stylus or a low speed maze/adventure game that would have worked just as well with a touch screen.

And that's not even talking about the instant-gratification impulse buy aspect: I must have at least 20 games on my iPhone that I bought because it got a great review, played for a day max and never touched again. $2, $5 or even $10 can do that. $40 does not.

Nintendo won't die anytime soon, but they're right to be concerned.

eastmen

15-May-2010, 18:44

In my real world, pretty much everybody in my social circle has an iPhone and nobody has a DS.

Your example of $2800 etc doesn't fly: a handheld gaming device is not a necessity. A phone is. When you've already decided you need a phone, it's a much smaller step to add an additional $200 for a better phone instead of buying yet another dedicated device. The initial purchase price is the same, the only difference is the monthly cost, which will be something like $100 for the voice+data plan vs. $60 or so for the voice plan alone.

Total difference over two years: $960, not including $40 games.

That's still quite a bit of money, but not as dramatic as how you're depicting it.

There's no doubt that there's still a market for hard core gamers, but the few times that I've seen somebody play with a DS, it was always a game that required a stylus or a low speed maze/adventure game that would have worked just as w$3ll with a touch screen.

And that's not even talking about the instant-gratification impulse buy aspect: I must have at least 20 games on my iPhone that I bought because it got a great review, played for a day max and never touched again. $2, $5 or even $10 can do that. $40 does not.

Nintendo won't die anytime soon, but they're right to be concerned.

A data plan will cost $30 more a month with att . So thats $360 more a year.

However that is alot of money that will eat into game buying and games aren't free with that extra $30 a month.

Lets also not forget that many of the games are shallow and affct the already poor talk time of the phone

wco81

15-May-2010, 18:56

You can get an iPod Touch, get access to games, media and non-game apps. There's something for everybody which they can find useful.

In the last week, I've gotten into Words with Friends, available for free with ads (really annoying but tolerable for a turn-based game) or an ad-free version.

It doesn't require a lot of time from you. You get notified when it's your turn and you can take your turn at your convenience, which is the perfect pacing during a work day. Even sneak in a couple of turns at work, which you can't do with a more intensive game.

For serious games, I can wait until I get home and sit in front of the big screen. Otherwise the iPhone ecosystem is shaping up nicely -- plenty of free or affordable games which keep you entertained and coming with iPhone OS 4, their clone of XBL with achievements and better online support.

My cell phone bill is paid for by work but even if it wasn't, I'd at least have an iPod Touch before I'd have a PSP or DS. The question is, how many others who game on console or PC think this way or are coming around to this conclusion, that you don't have to take the console experience on the go?

tongue_of_colicab

15-May-2010, 19:24

Wait, iPhone and iPhone class phones are 700 Euro WITH contract?

That doesn't sound right.

Sorry, maybe I wasn't clear. Its 700 euro's including the phone ofcourse. In my country if you buy a high end phone the contract usually is between 30 and 40 euro's a month for 2 years and the phone will be ''free'' then.

In my real world, pretty much everybody in my social circle has an iPhone and nobody has a DS.

The real world doesn't stop at your social circle. Look at the age 5 to 25ish. That is where the main handheld sales are I think. Have you ever seen how many kids up to 16 or so have a handheld? tons of them. But now way that they can afford a phone as a gaming device. Sure 30 year olds with no kids and a decent job probably wont care so much about handhelds but that isnt the market Nintendo or Sony is aiming at anyway I think.

Your example of $2800 etc doesn't fly: a handheld gaming device is not a necessity. A phone is.

Since when is a mobile phone a necessity? It's damn convinient but you can easily live without.

When you've already decided you need a phone, it's a much smaller step to add an additional $200 for a better phone instead of buying yet another dedicated device.

I don't think so. If you just want a phone, maybe takes pictues and listen to some music these days 100 euro's is already more than enough for that and if you don't call that much you can go pre-paid or take a cheap sim only contract. You will be off far far cheaper than when you take a high end phone which will cost you atleast 600 - 700 euro's in total over 2 years.

Even if it would only be 200 euro/dollar, why would you do that? If gaming is a priority than you will know that gaming on a handheld will give you much better games than on your phone. And if gaming isnt that important to you you probably also wouldn't want to pay 200 extra just to play a game so that wont even impact the handheld market.

That's still quite a bit of money, but not as dramatic as how you're depicting it.

You are right. But that is only 2 years. After 2 years we will have much faster phones again. Your 2 year old phone wont play the new games anymore. So if you want to keep playing games (you wont be playing the same games for 6 years), you have to buy a new phone again adding those high costs. You don't have that with a handheld. Buy the device and you are done for 5 or 6 years.

There's no doubt that there's still a market for hard core gamers, but the few times that I've seen somebody play with a DS, it was always a game that required a stylus or a low speed maze/adventure game that would have worked just as well with a touch screen.

Well just take a look at DS software sales and you see that isn't true and that plenty of the big hitters require a decent button lay-out.

And that's not even talking about the instant-gratification impulse buy aspect: I must have at least 20 games on my iPhone that I bought because it got a great review, played for a day max and never touched again. $2, $5 or even $10 can do that. $40 does not.

No, instead you think a bit longer about spending your 40 bucks and you end up with mariokart, playing 1000's of matches (I got like 3000 on my card over the years, all with friends and family), or end up spending 30 hours on zelda or something. I rather spend 40 and enjoy a game for weeks and maybe replay it later than spending 2 or 5 euro's for something that I don't give a shit about anymore after just 1 day.

I know where my buying gratification will be coming from.

My cell phone bill is paid for by work but even if it wasn't, I'd at least have an iPod Touch before I'd have a PSP or DS. The question is, how many others who game on console or PC think this way or are coming around to this conclusion, that you don't have to take the console experience on the go?

But tell me how many parents will be buying a 500 euro phone for their 5 - 16 year old? You don't seem to understand that the point of entry is just a lot lower on a handheld console. Sure, you can buy the cheapest ipod touch wich is about the same price as a handheld but what do you get in terms of games? Nobody will buy a ipod touch if gaming as its main use. Its only usefull if you are bored and want to play a couple of minutes. Anybody really interrested in doing gaming while on the road (or even at home) wont buy a phone/ipod, they will get a handheld because the games are just way way way better.

eastmen

15-May-2010, 19:29

wco81

15-May-2010, 19:35

I haven't really played too many 3D games. Like I said, for filling some time throughout the day, these simpler games are good enough.

And I'm by Wifi at the office and at home. If I'm out and about, I'm not going to be gaming much.

I did have to create an account for this game. Apple is trying to change that with GameCenter due for OS 4. We'll see if it has any traction. I'm winning these little Scrabble-clone games but there's no record tracking, no achievements or any kind. So maybe that will change.

Blazkowicz

15-May-2010, 19:43

but what are you going to play, solitaire Mahjong and tilt maze?
nothing wrong with your approach if you like it better, but even the 1989 Game Boy, which brought mobile computing to the masses, did successfully recreate the home console experience.

Years ago I bought a pirate flash cartridge for the original game boy and loaded it with games and I could play side scrollers, fighting games, shoot'em'ups, zelda, even a few windows 3.1-like games (minesweeper and mario picross) and I even included an e-book there (there's a rom generator which takes a .txt file as input).
I liked it, I'm probably old-school but I'll choose a handheld console with a D-pad over one without. that way I can even hold it with both hands, and not look like I'm browsing 3G porn.

a very interesting one is the Dingoo A320, it has specs similar to a PSP without 3D acceleration (but decodes SD video fine), game boy advance form factor, lack of DRM and a 65€ price :) (the downside is it probably doesn't have a huge lot of native games, but a few are included)

Exophase

15-May-2010, 20:10

PSP is at best a joke.

I think you exaggerate a lot.

They make plenty of game that use buttons for mobile phones.

Not for iPhone, the dominant platform (by far). "Buttons" on other platforms are not remotely like the gaming buttons I'm referring to.

$40 - $10-15 to get it to the consumer,

$10-$15 spent on what? Shipping?

-$10 to nintendo, -$5-10 for the rom and packaging

The money to Nintendo includes the ROM and cartridge. It's probably closer to $10-$15 for all of that, depending on the size of the game.

vs 70% of $5-$20 with no overheads and sunk costs.

Big seller iPhone games are $5-$20? Probably trend closer to < $5. It'd be good to see a graph or something for this though. And a breakdown of DS game costs from an actual source.

I think you are vastly overestimating the developer profit on the DS. Ever notice that most of the games are First or Second party? There is a reason for that.

DS has thousands of releases (the number is easily competitive with the best of any other platform), most of them aren't first or second party. And a lot of them sell very well and are actually pretty good. I think you have your numbers totally confused (maybe you're thinking more of Wii).

aaronspink

16-May-2010, 01:50

Phones wont compete with handhelds. I don't know why people keep thinking that.

phones ALREADY compete with handhelds. Apparently the only people to realize it are the cheerleaders on the sidelines. Nintendo has already realized it for a while.

First of all lets just compare price.

Love to! But its an unfair comparison that handhelds will lose. See the fundamental problem is that handhelds are and always have been an optional expense. Mobile phones in many markets are now a baseline expense.

Handhelds generally range in the 150-200 price point. Smart phones in the 99-199 price point. The contract is effectively free since you would need it anyways and in general, the mobile phone baselining also means that ~$99 of the mobile phone is also part of the baseline. So the smart phone actually has the marginal cost of $0-$99.

Out of every 10 people, how many own a high end phone? Not a lot.

The market penetration is already fairly high and growing higher. In some markets, it is already over 25% and growing. We're talking installed bases bigger than the total installed bases of the DS over just a 2 year period. And as I said, its a growing market

Than there are the games. Touchscreen only works for some games, but plenty still need buttons. You wont get buttons on your phone. Why not? because it sucks. It makes your phone ugly and larger. People dont want that. So either your phone will suck at gaming because it lacks buttons/decent ergonomics or you will look like a ass because your phone looks retarded because it has all the gaming controlls added on. There is a reason N gage failed.

additional buttons and controls can be added via attachments when required.

Than there is the traget audience. A large part of the handheld market are people below 20 years old. How many of them do you see buying expensive phone hardware for playing games? I can already imagen families buying 2 or 3 500+ euro phones for the whole family. Can't you?

you mean 100-200 $ phones that people are already buying at a fast rate with hardware as good if not better than what is available in the handheld market. I know lots of people with them. Kids with them all over. When mommy or daddy upgrades, the pass the old phone to the kid. Or when the kid needs a phone they just buy him one.

Anyone who thinks something like a iphone is a real threat to handheld systems should get out of his/her B3D world and have a look at the real world.

You mean like Nintendo who sees iPhone and other smart phones as the #1 threat to their market share in the mobile gaming space?

aaronspink

16-May-2010, 01:53

No you're not going to get rich, high-production games on smart phones, especially when the smart phone users are consistently opting for cheaper, simpler games over branded games like those from EA.

But people may be willing to make that tradeoff, go with time killer types of games for playing games on the phone when they have some free time and then saving their serious gaming for home.

Its a trade-off that Nintendo is all too familiar with since it was the fundamental trade-off that they used when designing the Wii.

aaronspink

16-May-2010, 01:56

A data plan will cost $30 more a month with att . So thats $360 more a year.

However that is alot of money that will eat into game buying and games aren't free with that extra $30 a month.

Lets also not forget that many of the games are shallow and affct the already poor talk time of the phone

The question is though, is that an additional cost, or a baseline cost which merely exists, like the rent/load, etc. For a growing population, the monthly phone costs ARE a baseline cost. They really don't factor into a cost comparison with a handheld game device.

aaronspink

16-May-2010, 02:02

The real world doesn't stop at your social circle. Look at the age 5 to 25ish. That is where the main handheld sales are I think. Have you ever seen how many kids up to 16 or so have a handheld? tons of them. But now way that they can afford a phone as a gaming device. Sure 30 year olds with no kids and a decent job probably wont care so much about handhelds but that isnt the market Nintendo or Sony is aiming at anyway I think.

I have multiple schools near me, and the penetration of smart phones is pretty high and growing. Same at the schools of friends of mine who are teachers.

Since when is a mobile phone a necessity? It's damn convinient but you can easily live without.
By that definition, clothes are by and large a convenience. And yes, at this point in time, mobile phones are effectively a necessity, largely replacing landlines around the whole, even in places with good landline infrastructure.

aaronspink

16-May-2010, 02:12

$10-$15 spent on what? Shipping?

Supply chain margins. The difference between retail pricing and vendor pricing. It is effectively the incentive for the stores to carry the games and the distributors to distribute the game. This isn't anything knew and is also a factor in $60 console games and $50 pc games. For a $60 console game, the publisher/developer is lucky to make $20-25 per copy. It is one of the big drivers for developers/publishers to do things like DLC and DCD over physical distribution. Think of it this way, one of the largest factors in the profit that a company like Amazon makes is the fact that they act as both the distributor and retailer and so have both cuts of the margin to play with allowing them to offer higher discounts while still making more money than a brick and mortar.

DS has thousands of releases (the number is easily competitive with the best of any other platform), most of them aren't first or second party. And a lot of them sell very well and are actually pretty good. I think you have your numbers totally confused (maybe you're thinking more of Wii).

yes, but where does the money go? I'd wager if you did a game revenue breakdown between first, second, and third party games for the DS, the first and second party numbers would dwarf the third party.

Exophase

16-May-2010, 02:31

Supply chain margins. The difference between retail pricing and vendor pricing. It is effectively the incentive for the stores to carry the games and the distributors to distribute the game. This isn't anything knew and is also a factor in $60 console games and $50 pc games. For a $60 console game, the publisher/developer is lucky to make $20-25 per copy. It is one of the big drivers for developers/publishers to do things like DLC and DCD over physical distribution. Think of it this way, one of the largest factors in the profit that a company like Amazon makes is the fact that they act as both the distributor and retailer and so have both cuts of the margin to play with allowing them to offer higher discounts while still making more money than a brick and mortar.

That's comical, you think vendors make $10-$15 per game. The real number is probably well under $5, especially for a lesser priced DS game (this is not including stores marking up the price additionally). Game-only stores like GameStop rely tremendously on used-game sales (http://www.1up.com/do/newsStory?cId=3178585). Chains like Wal-Mart can obviously run on low margins since they just need to keep the space for the games and very few personnel to sell them.

I know I've seen articles from online (not even brick & mortar) stores who went out of business due to being forced to sell at profit margins that were close to zero and stock B-games that no one wants as arrangement deals to get the company's killer titles. But obviously the big chains can still take it.

yes, but where does the money go? I'd wager if you did a game revenue breakdown between first, second, and third party games for the DS, the first and second party numbers would dwarf the third party.

Show us some actual numbers and come back to it - at any rate, you were wrong about the ratio of games, and you're probably wrong that games on iPhone tend to make an amount per sale comparable to DS games. It doesn't matter if first or second party games make more - the fact that several hundred third party games are being made with relatively big budgets behind them shows that it's still a profitable market. Unlike with Wii, people actually are buying third party games for DS.

aaronspink

16-May-2010, 03:03

That's comical, you think vendors make $10-$15 per game. The real number is probably well under $5, especially for a lesser priced DS game (this is not including stores marking up the price additionally). Game-only stores like GameStop rely tremendously on used-game sales (http://www.1up.com/do/newsStory?cId=3178585). Chains like Wal-Mart can obviously run on low margins since they just need to keep the space for the games and very few personnel to sell them.

Reading comprehension is something that might help you. That $10-$15 is split among the various actor throughout the supply chain. Importer, distributor, retailer. A decent amount of that money for the distributor and retailer is eaten by a combination of baseline and variable costs (wages, rents, cost of inventory, etc). Profit wise the money that the distributor and retailer make are much less. But that doesn't really matter as far as calculating the revenue split from a $40 game.

As an FYI, walmart like amazon tends to have extra margin room as they also act as their own distributor in many cases.

aaronspink

16-May-2010, 03:32

Show us some actual numbers and come back to it - at any rate, you were wrong about the ratio of games, and you're probably wrong that games on iPhone tend to make an amount per sale comparable to DS games. It doesn't matter if first or second party games make more - the fact that several hundred third party games are being made with relatively big budgets behind them shows that it's still a profitable market. Unlike with Wii, people actually are buying third party games for DS.

EA, you know massive big publisher/developer of third party games generally makes more on PSP per quarter than on DS. In fact, if not for a quarter 4-5x higher than average in Q3 on the DS, they would have made 50% more money on the PSP. This despite the DS having over 2x the installed base. The trend is fairly consistent over time as well. Its not like its some secret that Nintendo takes the vast majority of the game sales on its consoles via first and second party games. It has been like this for quite a while too, dating back to the N64.

In fact, for the DS, all 10 of the top 10 selling games are Nintendo first party IP. The only 3 that aren't first party developed are 3 pokemon titles that were developed under license/contract for nintendo by Game Freak. The top 20 best selling DS title are all first or second party with the vast majority being first party. In fact you have to go pretty far down the list before it isn't dominated with first/second party titles.

Exophase

16-May-2010, 04:50

Reading comprehension is something that might help you. That $10-$15 is split among the various actor throughout the supply chain. Importer, distributor, retailer. A decent amount of that money for the distributor and retailer is eaten by a combination of baseline and variable costs (wages, rents, cost of inventory, etc). Profit wise the money that the distributor and retailer make are much less. But that doesn't really matter as far as calculating the revenue split from a $40 game.

As an FYI, walmart like amazon tends to have extra margin room as they also act as their own distributor in many cases.

Importer, for domestically made games..? Distributor probably takes next to nothing, and certainly doesn't need to make nearly as much as the vendor per copy. I'm still waiting for actual sources on any of this, of course (but that goes for most of the things you say).

EA, you know massive big publisher/developer of third party games generally makes more on PSP per quarter than on DS. In fact, if not for a quarter 4-5x higher than average in Q3 on the DS, they would have made 50% more money on the PSP. This despite the DS having over 2x the installed base. The trend is fairly consistent over time as well. Its not like its some secret that Nintendo takes the vast majority of the game sales on its consoles via first and second party games. It has been like this for quite a while too, dating back to the N64.

In fact, for the DS, all 10 of the top 10 selling games are Nintendo first party IP. The only 3 that aren't first party developed are 3 pokemon titles that were developed under license/contract for nintendo by Game Freak. The top 20 best selling DS title are all first or second party with the vast majority being first party. In fact you have to go pretty far down the list before it isn't dominated with first/second party titles.

The first/second party to third party distribution for GBA and DS are nothing like how it was for N64, nor to lesser extent Gamecube and Wii. This is obvious just by comparing the number of releases.

The sales are, again, relative. Even though first party dominates the top sales there are still over a couple dozen third party sales over 1m. Also, Nintendo has gotten far more liberal with who they'll publish; they used to only have dedicated second parties, but now they're publishing a lot of things from big players.

Yes, EA doesn't make a lot on DS because outside of Sims they don't do much that appeals to the DS userbase. They're hardly characteristic of all third parties - compare with Square Enix, who is doing quite well with sales on the platform (at least 13 million sold from the 1m+ sellers)

And of course I'm still wondering how this demonstrates your initial claim that handheld gaming systems are an endangered species. With over 700 million game units sold it seems pretty alive and kicking, regardless of who is making the sales.

You could make the argument that some of the most popular DS games could work on typical phone controls (touch + motion) but you can also make the argument that most of them can't.

The downloadable content arguments are still moot given that both current handhelds provide it and future ones obviously will as well. Again, they don't have to be phones to do this.

Also, I think that Nintendo DS does cater to a market that Apple doesn't nearly as much, such as children and older adults. Parents are reluctant to buy children an expensive phone even if it's an add-on to their existing plans, and they certainly should be reluctant to let them run wild with their credit cards on the App Store. Children also have longer stretches of free time (including time when their parents would prefer to keep them distracted) to play more involved/less casual games.

Ultimately for handheld consoles to cease to exist one of two things must happen - either phones must get traditional gaming controls (meaning some directional input, face buttons, and shoulder buttons that are all ergonomically placed with gaming in mind) or interest in playing portable games that require, no, benefit at all from these interfaces must disappear completely. I just don't see either happening any time soon. I contend that no major nor competitive phone on the market is designed with gaming given even the slightest consideration; the inputs used for games (touchscreen and motion) were done solely to aid the interface of the packaged software. I also contend that Apple got a gaming market almost completely serendipitously. Of course, these things can change, but I think more evidence is necessary (outside of patents for add-ons that I honestly don't think will actually happen). I don't question that Apple is a threat to Nintendo (including a bigger one than Sony) nor do I question that Nintendo should show concern. But thinking that Nintendo has already been substantially damaged, much less destroyed by Apple is blowing things way out of proportion.

eastmen

16-May-2010, 04:59

I likke how all the iphone users are ignoring the battery life questions .

Exophase

16-May-2010, 05:53

BTW, the top selling iPhone games here:

http://www.joystiq.com/2009/12/09/and-the-best-selling-top-rated-iphone-games-of-2009-are/

Are all < $7, with most around $5. The top RATED games were around $3.

But yeah, I guess if you define things exclusively in terms of what EA does then iPhone destroyed DS.

Ailuros

16-May-2010, 06:34

Otherwise the iPhone ecosystem is shaping up nicely -- plenty of free or affordable games which keep you entertained and coming with iPhone OS 4, their clone of XBL with achievements and better online support.

Bite me, but when we had relevant conversations in the past did you expect their ecosystem to build up as well?

My cell phone bill is paid for by work but even if it wasn't, I'd at least have an iPod Touch before I'd have a PSP or DS. The question is, how many others who game on console or PC think this way or are coming around to this conclusion, that you don't have to take the console experience on the go?

I would personally even draw a line between a PC and a console gamer before I'd even go to handhelds but that's besides the point here. I stick to my opinion that irrelevant of which lines between different handheld devices start to meet at several points as years go by a smart-phone or PMP is still going to be a smart-phone or PMP and a handheld console a handheld console.

I haven't followed all posts in detail here, but Exophase's point about age targets is something I can completely agree with. Anyone will have a damn hard time convincing me that a Nintendo DS or any other handheld console isn't primarily targeted at children. Of course doesn't it mean that there aren't any adults using handheld consoles, but to me the majority of users and age target groups is clear.

The entire debate here seems to be about where lines possibly can meet in the future. They will meet in some spots IMHO, but I don't see any fundamentals to change nor can I predict any direct threats but mostly indirect. Weird example but assuming future handheld consoles have phone capabilities: can you imagine an executive carrying a Nintendo as a smart-phone?

thop

16-May-2010, 06:54

http://www.irwebcasting.com/090508/72/b3f960eca6/image_l/p43.gif

http://www.irwebcasting.com/090508/72/b3f960eca6/image_l/p44.gif

Exophase

16-May-2010, 07:27

Now post the ones for iPhone gamers, I want to see if anyone in Japan is using one ;)

I like how the 19-24 USA female crowd is above using DS, but then gets over it at at age 25 (or at least to the extent 16-18 year olds did)

Then that hard drop all of a sudden later. Man, you can see the life correlations around 18 but what's going on at 16, 25, and 45? For women anyway. Totally bizarre.

wco81

16-May-2010, 11:39

Bite me, but when we had relevant conversations in the past did you expect their ecosystem to build up as well?

I would personally even draw a line between a PC and a console gamer before I'd even go to handhelds but that's besides the point here. I stick to my opinion that irrelevant of which lines between different handheld devices start to meet at several points as years go by a smart-phone or PMP is still going to be a smart-phone or PMP and a handheld console a handheld console.

I haven't followed all posts in detail here, but Exophase's point about age targets is something I can completely agree with. Anyone will have a damn hard time convincing me that a Nintendo DS or any other handheld console isn't primarily targeted at children. Of course doesn't it mean that there aren't any adults using handheld consoles, but to me the majority of users and age target groups is clear.

The entire debate here seems to be about where lines possibly can meet in the future. They will meet in some spots IMHO, but I don't see any fundamentals to change nor can I predict any direct threats but mostly indirect. Weird example but assuming future handheld consoles have phone capabilities: can you imagine an executive carrying a Nintendo as a smart-phone?

Yes I don't believe in paying for online console games so I'm not a fan of XBL, the business model. But from all accounts, the service is great, superior to PSN. For instance, I heard that voice chat for Street Fighter 4 on PSN just doesn't work while on XBL, it works fine and is essential to the online experience of that game.

But I'm not yet ready to pay to play.

My only point about what Apple may to with GameCenter is to copy some of the good features of XBL -- universal login and achievements/trophies would be a great start. Also seems like they may host online games so smaller developers will be more likely to enable Internet games.

Without charging any additional fees of course.

As for the different demographics, yes I agree children aren't going to have expensive smart phone contracts, even through college. So I was thinking more of working adults, who are going to be busy for intensive gaming sessions during the day.

But there is the iPod Touch options, which doesn't require a contract. If Sony and Nintendo offers a mobile data option, they will have the mobile contract problem as well with regard to younger consumers.

Bringing both issues together, I see one consolation of smart phone gaming would be that you're less likely to encounter kids online as you would on PSN or XBL.

aaronspink

16-May-2010, 11:59

Importer, for domestically made games..? Distributor probably takes next to nothing, and certainly doesn't need to make nearly as much as the vendor per copy. I'm still waiting for actual sources on any of this, of course (but that goes for most of the things you say).

Distributors generally take as large a cut as the retailer.

The first/second party to third party distribution for GBA and DS are nothing like how it was for N64, nor to lesser extent Gamecube and Wii. This is obvious just by comparing the number of releases.

Its roughly the same.

The sales are, again, relative. Even though first party dominates the top sales there are still over a couple dozen third party sales over 1m. Also, Nintendo has gotten far more liberal with who they'll publish; they used to only have dedicated second parties, but now they're publishing a lot of things from big players.

sure there are some over 1m, but not a lot. All the second party title I was referring to were either done under contract for Nintendo or by studios they fund/license IP to.

Yes, EA doesn't make a lot on DS because outside of Sims they don't do much that appeals to the DS userbase. They're hardly characteristic of all third parties - compare with Square Enix, who is doing quite well with sales on the platform (at least 13 million sold from the 1m+ sellers)

EA seems to do rather well on all other platforms.

And of course I'm still wondering how this demonstrates your initial claim that handheld gaming systems are an endangered species. With over 700 million game units sold it seems pretty alive and kicking, regardless of who is making the sales.

Nintendo might survive, selling only Nintendo games, but everyone else is either already putting their dev money into phones or currently planning to.

You could make the argument that some of the most popular DS games could work on typical phone controls (touch + motion) but you can also make the argument that most of them can't.

Almost all of the most popular ones can do just fine with the controls that exist on phones.

The downloadable content arguments are still moot given that both current handhelds provide it and future ones obviously will as well. Again, they don't have to be phones to do this.

Sure they don't, but the phones are the ones pushing it heavily and making it their standard distribution method.

I contend that no major nor competitive phone on the market is designed with gaming given even the slightest consideration;

Which is why they include rather beefy 3D IP and apple has integrated numerous gaming only features within OS 4.0? Did apple plan for it with iphone 1.0? nope, but they certainly saw the trend and got on the bus rather quick.

I don't question that Apple is a threat to Nintendo (including a bigger one than Sony) nor do I question that Nintendo should show concern. But thinking that Nintendo has already been substantially damaged, much less destroyed by Apple is blowing things way out of proportion.

I already know lots of people that ended up buying iPhones/iPodTouch instead of DSs. There are plenty of developers doing iphone apps that would work perfectly well on a DS. Game developer and publishing interest and money is now heavily targeting iphone and android. Ever since the iPhone, smart phones are penetrating into markets and price points that most people thought they wouldn't.

Do I think Nintendo will cease to exist? no, they managed to get through N64 and gamecube, they make their consoles effectively to sell their games, so they'll still be there, I just don't think as much 3rd party will be there nor do I think their sales will be as high as they've been with the DS. I also don't see any chance of another gen PSP unless its done in conjunction with SE.

tongue_of_colicab

16-May-2010, 15:25

sure there are some over 1m, but not a lot. All the second party title I was referring to were either done under contract for Nintendo or by studios they fund/license IP to.

DS
There are 114 Nintendo DS games that sold over 1 million units
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_best-selling_Nintendo_DS_video_games

Wii
There are 79 Wii video games that sold over 1 million units.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_best-selling_Wii_video_games

So you are trying to claim that out of almost 200 games the majority are Nintendo made/publised? :lol:

EA seems to do rather well on all other platforms.

As said, maybe thats because they actually bother to release some decent games on those platforms.

Nintendo might survive, selling only Nintendo games, but everyone else is either already putting their dev money into phones or currently planning to.

So that means they wont invest into handhelds anymore? it are different markets. Sure if you only make small puzzle games you might be better of working on the iphone or something but there is still the market of more complex, more expensive handheld games and that just wont work on phones. Certainly not as long as there is no decent gaming button lay-out.

Almost all of the most popular ones can do just fine with the controls that exist on phones.

Mariokart, supermario, final fantasy etc all working perfectly on touch screen only phones? Yeah... right...

Which is why they include rather beefy 3D IP and apple has integrated numerous gaming only features within OS 4.0? Did apple plan for it with iphone 1.0? nope, but they certainly saw the trend and got on the bus rather quick.

3d hardware probably has much more to do with modern interfaces having all sorts of neat effects, more focus on video playback and connecting to tv using hdmi etc. I doubt they put in in there for the sake of gaming alone. Certainly as most phone makers dont even benefit from games played on their platform.

The point is, gaming phones, and gaming on phones has been going on for ages. Japan has ''plenty'' of big phone games, they got phones especially aimed at playing games on them but still Nintendo is selling boatloads of DS hardware and software every week, for like 5 or 6 years at a time already. Even more than with their previous handhelds. Gaming on your mobile phone just wont kill handheld gaming or even pose a large threat.

MfA

16-May-2010, 16:35

A big reason why DS profits are dropping and it is getting less attention developer wise is because huge parts of the market are being wiped out by piracy ... since the industry finally realized how to stop piracy, about a decade late, this will presumably stop with the 3DS.

I'll reiterate ... Android is not a threat because piracy is so trivial there. Apple is essentially modulating the level of ease of piracy to drive adoption (same as Microsoft a decade ago), the process of jailbreaking and worrying about firmware updates represents a big enough hurdle for most users ... and they can just keep making it less and less convenient.

tongue_of_colicab

16-May-2010, 17:46

If that really is the case, than why didnt that happen years ago? It's not like flashcarts are anything new. Hell, untill not too long ago you could just buy them in stores in Japan along with complete guides that even had links in them on where to download software but still software charts are full of DS software. Not that I claim piracy isnt a big problem but piracy is there on phones too. Sure you got the firmware thing, but how many people care about that? wait a week and its cracked again.

MfA

16-May-2010, 18:17

Most of the users aren't that internet savy so it took a while to diffuse through their user base.

From the recent 3DS interview :
We fear a kind of thinking is become widespread that paying for software is meaningless. We have a strong sense of crisis about this problem

PS. I hope Nintendo is not stupid enough to simply use Secure Digital DRM (key sizes are tiny and and the implementation might be secret, but you can just dig up an old SD card implemented with some huge feature size for convenient reverse engineering).

Exophase

16-May-2010, 19:48

Distributors generally take as large a cut as the retailer.

Like usual, care to actually give a reference on this? Since the big chains cut out distributors and smaller stores are known to mark up cost over them I'm not sure if this is even being added to vendor margin like you think.

Its roughly the same.

Sigh.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_best-selling_Nintendo_64_video_games

11/40 third-party games over 1m. The more interesting features are that almost all of them are sports or FPS, many part of the same serieses, and many sold very poorly in Japan where regional sales are listed. In terms of first/second party domination N64 was worse, and in terms of developer and especially genre diversity it was much worse.

Of course, all of this looking at 1m+ sellers obscures things quite a lot. A game doesn't have to sell over 1m to be commercially viable and worth the company's investment; for typical DS game budgets selling over 100k or somewhere around there is probably sufficient.

sure there are some over 1m, but not a lot. All the second party title I was referring to were either done under contract for Nintendo or by studios they fund/license IP to.

There are tons over 1m... the point I was getting at with second parties is that there's far more company diversity behind it - even if a company is under contract for that game it's still bringing in additional industry tested talent. Even as a first party Nintendo has become far more genre diverse than since the N64 days and has so many splinter divisions that it doesn't make much of a difference to consumers if most of their games end up being first party. Of course developer houses lose, but I didn't think that was the point behind the "endangered species" remark. And they have more options under the DLC avenue than they had in the past.

EA seems to do rather well on all other platforms.

So DS's demographics like different games. You can't judge its third party viability solely by the kind of games one major western third party makes.

Nintendo might survive, selling only Nintendo games, but everyone else is either already putting their dev money into phones or currently planning to.

As I said already, "Nintendo games" means damn near anything these days.

Yes, a lot of companies are investing more in cell phones, but your implication that they are or are planning to be putting more (or even all) money into phones over handhelds is quite different. It doesn't take a lot of insight to see that budgets for DS third party games are much higher than those behind the $3-$7 iPhone games; big third party companies are largely pushing ports on iPhone at best (and really it's mainly just EA selling things there right now), while DS gets a ton of original content from them instead.

Of course, I'm talking to someone who thinks more money is made per-unit on those $3-$7 games than the $40 DS ones.

Almost all of the most popular ones can do just fine with the controls that exist on phones.

Just fine for you, maybe, but I'm not about to play any game that requires moving something around a screen for any amount of time using a touchscreen or accelerometer, and I'm definitely not the only person who feels this way. This is much more true for platformers. You just can't pretend the interface is the same.

Sure they don't, but the phones are the ones pushing it heavily and making it their standard distribution method.

The potential for DLC to be pushed heavily on handhelds is there - the difference is that it's going to be consumers pushing it instead of the hardware manufacturers by deciding what they're more interested in buying. Which do you think is more representative?

Which is why they include rather beefy 3D IP and apple has integrated numerous gaming only features within OS 4.0? Did apple plan for it with iphone 1.0? nope, but they certainly saw the trend and got on the bus rather quick.

Please, iPhone's beefy 3D IP was hardly innovative. Phones have had 3D (including MBX) for years without an awful lot to show for it. I don't think Apple had a realistic option of not including MBX or better, as it would have made them look much worse on paper and would have precluded fancy hype building demos.

When it comes down to it some acceleration is needed just for the compositing the phone does, so when decent 3D is an option and doesn't kill your die or power budgets you'd may as well bring it in. Apple may have been saying "and it could theoretically do games!" but even if they made something with every intention of NOT playing games I think it still would have had the 3D IP.

I already know lots of people that ended up buying iPhones/iPodTouch instead of DSs. There are plenty of developers doing iphone apps that would work perfectly well on a DS. Game developer and publishing interest and money is now heavily targeting iphone and android. Ever since the iPhone, smart phones are penetrating into markets and price points that most people thought they wouldn't.

All of this "all my friends use iPhone, not DS" talk is very uninteresting to me, especially given the demographics of the people you know.

I don't disagree with the other things you've said, but using any of that to conclude that handhelds are endangered is extremist reasoning.

Do I think Nintendo will cease to exist? no, they managed to get through N64 and gamecube, they make their consoles effectively to sell their games, so they'll still be there, I just don't think as much 3rd party will be there nor do I think their sales will be as high as they've been with the DS. I also don't see any chance of another gen PSP unless its done in conjunction with SE.

Third parties have been absorbed as second parties more, as I mentioned, and that's a viable route that everyone wins under - except competing hardware manufacturers. Yes, PSP2 might not do well (it'll definitely happen, that shouldn't even be questioned), but so what? The handheld market has done fine being owned by Nintendo since the original Gameboy. That doesn't really have to change; likewise, Apple will continue to own phone gaming, as I don't really think Android is going to be that competitive, probably much less than PSP was vs DS.

Granted, you at least seem to be admitting that your endangered species remark was a gross exaggeration.

thop

17-May-2010, 01:59

This discussion reminds me of 2004 when the PSP was about to spell the end for Nintendo handhelds.

Simon F

17-May-2010, 09:22

Since when is a mobile phone a necessity? It's damn convinient but you can easily live without.
Slightly OT, but wait until your wife is, say, 7months pregnant and then re-evaluate your statement. :wink:

wco81

16-Jun-2010, 16:24

So apparently PSP2 wasn't announced at E3 as speculated. Instead they talked more about the PSP (and took a shot at iPhone games)? Also saw a commercial mocking "apps."

Well some of us think the world has passed the PSP by and the PSP2 can't catch up to it either.

So PSP2, however interesting it might be technologically, would be a dubious economic proposition.

But flogging the PSP again? It's been flogged so much that it's no longer recognizable as a dead horse.

MfA

16-Jun-2010, 16:34

People still make money selling games on the PSP. Obviously the 3DS will have a huge impact, but it's not there yet.

tangey

16-Jun-2010, 23:21

But flogging the PSP again? It's been flogged so much that it's no longer recognizable as a dead horse.

The most notable thing for me from the Sony presentation is that the PSP-GO did not get even so much as a mention.

ltcommander.data

17-Jun-2010, 13:41

It didn't seem like 3D displays were destined for the PSP2, but maybe they delayed it to add it in? I'm not sure consumers are exactly scrambling for 3D, but it certainly seems like content producers and hardware manufacturers are pushing it hard, so it may well be a checkbox that in the end needs to be checked.

Plus, they might not have wanted to overshadow the new PSP God of War release by releasing new, more capable PSP2 hardware. Certainly the God of War IP is popular enough to sell more PSP even with the 3DS inbound.

Ailuros

16-Jul-2010, 12:00

http://www.semiaccurate.com/2010/07/14/sonys-psp2-powered-nvidias-tegra-line/

:roll::cool::razz:

Exophase

16-Jul-2010, 16:11

Dear god.

At least if this is true it'll mean the first Sony platform (aside from Pocketstation) that doesn't have vector capabilities as a CPU coprocessor, if you consider the Cell SPEs to be of that classification anyway. Kind of ironic, for them to end up with the one Cortex-A9 implementation without it.

So if it really does happen where will our nice SGX543MP4+ platform be coming from? Automotive displays? :(

flynn

16-Jul-2010, 16:35

Hopefully as trustworthy as the rumors saying the 3DS would use Tegra.

Exophase

16-Jul-2010, 19:00

Hopefully as trustworthy as the rumors saying the 3DS would use Tegra.

I dunno, sounds more likely given that the claim is made that the news is coming from nVidia themselves.

It also seems like a better fit than it ever did for Nintendo. Sony already has a relationship with nVidia and Tegra 2 is more in line with performance expectations for PSP2 than those for 3DS.

Nonetheless, I'm sort of wondering if Tegra 2 is really that great of a choice for a new gaming platform at this point. GPU looks outpaced by SGX540 which is already shipping. Instead the big performance boost vs what's out now is on CPU but only for general purpose, not vector (where a single core Scorpion will probably still destroy it). I guess games will have to leverage the 2 full-precision vertex shaders for general purpose vector processing in addition to vertex/geometry processing.. I wonder if this will be at all inhibiting.

The rumored bad power numbers don't really help things.

I don't even want to think of how far behind performance Tegra 2's GPU will be compared to SGX543MP4 levels.

Shifty Geezer

16-Jul-2010, 19:37

If PSP2 is supposed to have Tegra 2, what are the possible options for Sony pulling out and switching to something else like SGX? Presumably it's only contracts that could lock Sony in to a delayed nVidia component, and if nvidia aren't keeping up their end of the contract, will it still stand? Having an entire platform delayed for uncertain duration while missing key features is going to be damned expensive, so there must be a reason for Sony to stick with it if they are.

aaronspink

16-Jul-2010, 22:22

http://www.semiaccurate.com/2010/07/14/sonys-psp2-powered-nvidias-tegra-line/

:roll::cool::razz:

Yay, it means that everyone can ignore the PSP2 now: devs, customers, writers, sony!

Tegra = fails and in failing or canceled designs
PSP2 = failure or canceled.

So who wants to take bets on when/if PSP2 gets canceled? And we should probably set some over/unders on failure points for PSP2.

wco81

17-Jul-2010, 00:06

Doesn't matter what they put in it.

The mobile SOC sector seems so competitive and fast-moving that in a year or two after a PSP2 release, some smartphone will have more horsepower while PSP2 is still early in its life.

Of course, PSP2 is going to have to sell itself with unique or exclusive software. With smart phone apps. market conditioned towards cheap or free games, Sony may be able to carve a niche along with Nintendo for more expensive portable games.

Or maybe it won't be able to.

Exophase

17-Jul-2010, 02:40

Power doesn't matter that much for smart phones, until big companies are really willing to spend full budgets on new games it's just going to remain relatively untapped..

And this will likely continue to be the case so long as popular phones don't contain controls beyond touchscreen and motion. And that too will likely continue to be the case.

flynn

17-Jul-2010, 07:31

So who wants to take bets on when/if PSP2 gets canceled? And we should probably set some over/unders on failure points for PSP2.

Why? All they have to do is dump Nvidia like N did. Problem solved.

aaronspink

18-Jul-2010, 10:07

Why? All they have to do is dump Nvidia like N did. Problem solved.

Hmm, we'll call that a kinning of the psp2 and refer to the new device as psp3. So do we put you down for pre-release?

Npl

19-Jul-2010, 16:07

Hmm, we'll call that a kinning of the psp2 and refer to the new device as psp3. So do we put you down for pre-release?If you want to believe all rumors, then its already PSP5 or 6. There were people claiming every revision of the PSP beeing PSP2 (with hopefully 2 analog sticks and touchscreen/whatever stupid fad was running at that time), then the rumored SGX543-PSP, some Cell-based stuff, etc.

I dont believe a PSP2 was ever planned to hit before 2012, so if its released somewhere in late 2011 then its ahead of schedule. It just requires taking my opinion as fact, but thats still better than basing it on unfounded rumors :razz:

Ailuros

18-Sep-2010, 09:33

Time for a revival for the thread I guess:

http://www.xbitlabs.com/news/multimedia/display/20100917121928_Sony_Starts_to_Supply_PSP2_to_Game_ Developers.html

rpg.314

18-Sep-2010, 09:48

Cell with 4 SPEs for the cpu. Interesting. :???:

Ailuros

18-Sep-2010, 09:59

Cell with 4 SPEs for the cpu. Interesting. :???:

He's just repeating popular speculations for the device the way I read it. The interesting part is that Sony is supposed to have sent out dev-devices to developers. Else it won't take too long until some folks know for sure.

Grall

18-Sep-2010, 15:14

Cell with 4 SPE would be extremely unexpected. I don't know how realistic we could expect this to be; it would have to be cut-down SPEs both in per-clock computing performance and local store size I assume or else it would be a very large (and likely power-hungry) chip compared to today's ARM-based processors.

Considering IBM - and probably also Toshiba - have stopped further Cell development, who would have designed such a beastie? Did Sony take Toshiba's Spurs Engine and perhaps modify it? Last I checked, Spurs Engine chips required heatsinks with fans on 'em, not really what's suited in a battery-powered handheld games console...

I'm very sceptical of this rumor, although I'd be pleasantly surprised if Sony somehow manages to pull it off - assuming they didn't end up with a running life of 30 minutes from a laptop-sized battery of course... :lol: Battery life is more important than EVERYTHING else in a portable device, according to a survey I saw at Ars Technica I believe a couple weeks ago.

Ailuros

18-Sep-2010, 17:15

I'd rather bet on an ARM quad-core but could be wrong (again).

Npl

18-Sep-2010, 17:44

Dual-core MIPS (maybe Quad-core), everything else just doesnt make sense.

Exophase

18-Sep-2010, 19:39

Backwards compatibility worth anything means retaining the UMD drive, which wouldn't be a very good idea. Sony should just cut their losses on that.

Without backwards compatibility there's no reason to cling to MIPS.

If they did go MIPS they'd probably get a custom embedded design from Toshiba, but I don't think it'd be that competitive with Cortex-A9 in terms of power consumption (based on numbers seen in data sheets for ie TX49) and I don't think that they have experience with multicore or out of order. Their latest offering, TX99, is dual issue, but it doesn't appear to be available yet.

Npl

18-Sep-2010, 20:09

Backwards compatibility worth anything means retaining the UMD drive, which wouldn't be a very good idea. Sony should just cut their losses on that.

Without backwards compatibility there's no reason to cling to MIPS.PSN-Games? If the PSP2 has no backwards compatibility then they messed up big time, some big PSP titles still are beeing developed. Having some 100s of playable game at launch surely would help, I think the DS was primary used as GBA+ for a long time.
(And I would prefer an UMD Drive, but thats not necessary.)

If they did go MIPS they'd probably get a custom embedded design from Toshiba, but I don't think it'd be that competitive with Cortex-A9 in terms of power consumption (based on numbers seen in data sheets for ie TX49) and I don't think that they have experience with multicore or out of order. Their latest offering, TX99, is dual issue, but it doesn't appear to be available yet.Do you find the PSP`s chips in Toshibas portfolio? Sony if perfectly capable to roll their own Socs, and Mips` 74K is already an out-of-order chip, putting 2 of them together shouldnt be an issue.
Cortex-A9 is a tad better in performance but not by that much: some synthetic benches (http://blog.linleygroup.com/2010/04/arm-outmuscles-atom-on-benchmark.html). Quite possible Sony will add some Vector co-processors again, they arent going to just use an off-the-shelf SoC designed for phones with 1 week idle runtime.

So apart from losing backwards compatibility (or atleast making it alot harder), what would ARM bring to the table?

Edit: another point (don`t see any comparisons vs A9):
As Joe Byrne, a senior analyst with the Linley Group, mentioned, specs indicate higher power per operating frequency (mW/MHz) for the MIPS 74K than the ARM Cortex A8. However, specs also show the MIPS 74K ate about half the die size of the Cortex A8.

Since the average power consumed by handset chips today is more from leakage than active power, that die size advantage for MIPS is significant.

Urian

18-Sep-2010, 20:42

My bet is for a Dual Core MIPS 1004K running between 0.8 and 1.2Ghz.

Exophase

18-Sep-2010, 20:59

Npl

18-Sep-2010, 21:54

PSP Go was really unpopular. While they may sell some PSN games, it won't be enough to be a selling point for the system. Plus, they've sold some games made for PSP on PS3 store, so they're capable of some level of porting/emulation.

So long as it doesn't have the UMD drive it can't be called backwards compatible and no buyer is going to see it as such. Claiming compatibility via games you have to buy again is probably going to hurt Sony's ability to sell PSP2s, not help it.Well, I cant imagine Sony not offering some level of backwards compatibility. It would be insane not to - I could imagine the new GoW could sell PSP2 aswell if the console is announced with backwards-compatibility (in any form) early enough.
Maybe even allow better filtering/antialiasing/higher res if ran on PSP2, the first couple years always are lacking a healthy amount of (native) games.

Of course, for hardware backwards compatibility they'd also be saddled with handling the peculiarities of the PSP GU which has a pretty low level interface. They'd also need a compatible VFPU, of course. Emulating the MIPS part is much easier than trying to emulate either of these, and could probably be handled pretty well with a standard recompiler to ARM - it's to Sony's benefit that the PSP platform was pretty high level and doesn't need that expensive emulation for ie memory access. Hopefully they won't just choose to extend the existing GU design, that probably wouldn't work out that well for them.Sure.. but given that you may have another free core for handling this kinda stuff I think it would be quite doable - the GU is not such an ackward beast like the PSP GS for example. And I dont see why a VFPU2 wouldnt be a nice thing, I dont know how ARMs Neo and MIPS standard vector extensions compare though.

No, I don't find the PSP's chips, but I find things that are pretty similar in terms of technology. The point isn't what they were selling, but their capability level. Anyway, yeah, let's say Sony doesn't go with Toshiba this time. I know they're not going to just use some "off the shelf SoC."MIPS provides the IP - any reason you wouldnt use the more recent 74K core (if 2007 could be called recent), regardless if you go Toshiba or not.

I don't know what the multicore options are for 74k, ie availability of shared L2 and coherent L1 dcache and whatever else you need for multicore.. I'm trying to find information on the L2 cache controller MIPS makes available but I can't even find it listed, nor can I find a reference anywhere to the named datasheet MD00506, if you have a link for it I'd appreciate it :/ Of course, L2 cache is an absolute must.Nope, but I doubt this could be a big issue (to get it working)?

What they gain with ARM is using a more mature and industry standard platform that various various companies have more experience pairing competent graphics IP with. It's designed for use with AMBA AXI which is more supported (as evidenced by MIPS' willingness to sell an OCP2AXI bridge module)In terms of Smartphone`s thats true, ARM has Symbian and Apple locked down. But I`d guess that the existing libraries of PSP devs are bursting with MIPS code. So, where would you want a leg-up if you are Sony - Full quality Games or appstore stuff?
The "standards stuff" aint that important for a single closed system.

I will concede to the MIPS chip quite a bit though, I didn't know that they had gotten this competitive on perf/Watt for mobile. Cortex-A9 still seems better, though. I'd say it could go either way, I just don't see MIPS as being the only sensible option.Actually I think MIPS was always atleast comparable in perf/Watt but not in absolute low power.
In terms of performance I think Cortex-A9 is the first time ever that ARM has an advantage.

Everything considered, I think Sony wouldve been more likely to adopt ARM in PSP1, yet they went with MIPS.

Exophase

18-Sep-2010, 22:43

Well, I cant imagine Sony not offering some level of backwards compatibility. It would be insane not to - I could imagine the new GoW could sell PSP2 aswell if the console is announced with backwards-compatibility (in any form) early enough.
Maybe even allow better filtering/antialiasing/higher res if ran on PSP2, the first couple years always are lacking a healthy amount of (native) games.

I definitely don't see PSP games selling PSP2, even if they're visually improved, which is quite a design challenge to throw in higher resolution without glitching up the games.. hence why PS2 only added optional filtering to PS1 titles. I don't really think it's insane for them not to, I don't think PSP1 was strong enough of a software platform for them to be missing out.. but like I said, I don't think it can even be called backwards compatibility w/o the UMD and surely Sony isn't going to give you a way to get free versions of UMDs you own. I'd be a little surprised if they even let you transfer existing PSN bought games.

Releasing a new version of the game that is explicitly improved for the new platform would sell a lot more of both the console and the game.

Sure.. but given that you may have another free core for handling this kinda stuff I think it would be quite doable - the GU is not such an ackward beast like the PSP GS for example. And I dont see why a VFPU2 wouldnt be a nice thing, I dont know how ARMs Neo and MIPS standard vector extensions compare though.

Handling GU is not so simple as throwing a CPU core at it, you need some glue logic to handle the interface quickly and you need support deep in the graphics pipeline for various things like its paletted modes, especially the > 8 bit + masked indexing it. You may or may not be able to handle it properly in decent shaders. Another really big challenge is that PSP's VRAM is directly mapped to the CPU bus, and allows for fast texture uploads and framebuffer reads. This is not going to be easy to emulate for a platform that doesn't support this, and many will give problems.

Of course, if you control what's available (via PSN) you can limit availability to compatible titles, but the same goes for any level of pure software emulation (ie with PS1 support on PSP)... I just don't think that'll be that popular. PS2 support would probably sell more consoles, not that it's any more feasible.

NEON is much less powerful than PSP VFPU and much less suited for 3D. But if Sony uses a core with unified shaders (like SGX) having VFPU will be redundant. And I think SGX543MP is definitely one of their better options, although it's currently rumored that they'll be using Tegra graphics instead. I'm sure nVidia would still prefer to sell them on their vertex shaders rather than VFPU. And I'm sure developers would prefer being able to use GLSL than having to write VFPU code, although I suppose they could do a GLSL target for VFPU.

MIPS provides the IP - any reason you wouldnt use the more recent 74K core (if 2007 could be called recent), regardless if you go Toshiba or not.

Sure, I'm just saying it's not like it's completely zero work to drop an IP provided CPU into an SoC, having more familiarity with it does help. But I do think you're right, if they chose MIPS it'd probably be 74K or 1004K.

Nope, but I doubt this could be a big issue (to get it working)?

I'm sure there's a reason MIPS isn't advertising 74K as multicore capable, and why there was ARM11MP and not just "ARM11 with roll your own dual core with shared L2"

In terms of Smartphone`s thats true, ARM has Symbian and Apple locked down. But I`d guess that the existing libraries of PSP devs are bursting with MIPS code. So, where would you want a leg-up if you are Sony - Full quality Games or appstore stuff?

I think to survive in the current market Sony needs both, just like Nintendo with DSiware. Sony would do better to allow anyone to develop and sell things in an app store, where ARM would help them.. but knowing Sony I don't expect this to happen.

The important hand-tuned code is really going to be VFPU ASM, not MIPS ASM. MIPS is not exactly chock full of optimization opportunities, and I doubt games had a lot of hand rolled MIPS except to do VFPU. Even that was largely contained in Sony libraries. If VFPU goes away due to having other vertex shaders then that's all moot.

The "standards stuff" aint that important for a single closed system.

No, but it helps having better compilers and a pool of people more experienced with the platform.

Actually I think MIPS was always atleast comparable in perf/Watt but not in absolute low power.
In terms of performance I think Cortex-A9 is the first time ever that ARM has an advantage.

MIPS isn't giving power consumption numbers at 40nm so I don't really know, but at 45nm at least Cortex-A8 is beating 74K in both Watt/MHz and perf/MHz, so clearly better perf/Watt.

Everything considered, I think Sony wouldve been more likely to adopt ARM in PSP1, yet they went with MIPS.

Yeah I think that was just momentum behind that decision. People think it helped PS1 emulation, but I doubt it did very much.

Npl

28-Sep-2010, 23:16

Apparently they heard your concerns about L2-Cache: http://mips.com/products/cores/32-64-bit-cores/mips32-1074k/

I definitely don't see PSP games selling PSP2, even if they're visually improved, which is quite a design challenge to throw in higher resolution without glitching up the games.. hence why PS2 only added optional filtering to PS1 titles. I don't really think it's insane for them not to, I don't think PSP1 was strong enough of a software platform for them to be missing out.. but like I said, I don't think it can even be called backwards compatibility w/o the UMD and surely Sony isn't going to give you a way to get free versions of UMDs you own. I'd be a little surprised if they even let you transfer existing PSN bought games.its a challenge to improve old existing games, new games could be just be tested and potentially white-listed to enable some enhancing features (adjust for a bigger framebuffer or whatever). And there are quite a few gems on PSP, its sure as better than having nothing except a couple launch titles. I dont see why PSN stuff shouldnt be transferable (as long as its technical feasible), expect a big outcry if it aint.

Releasing a new version of the game that is explicitly improved for the new platform would sell a lot more of both the console and the game.Matter of resources and quite possibly licensing. Just look at how few PS2-PS3-ports there are to date, and the different availability of PSOne games.
NEON is much less powerful than PSP VFPU and much less suited for 3D. But if Sony uses a core with unified shaders (like SGX) having VFPU will be redundant. And I think SGX543MP is definitely one of their better options, although it's currently rumored that they'll be using Tegra graphics instead. I'm sure nVidia would still prefer to sell them on their vertex shaders rather than VFPU. And I'm sure developers would prefer being able to use GLSL than having to write VFPU code, although I suppose they could do a GLSL target for VFPU.I doubt a good vector-instruction set will be redundant anytime soon for multimedia-media, there is more that uses it than just transforming vertices. Also it surely is nice beeing able to devote the GPU entirely to pixel-processing if you need it (assuming it has unified shaders).
I think to survive in the current market Sony needs both, just like Nintendo with DSiware. Sony would do better to allow anyone to develop and sell things in an app store, where ARM would help them.. but knowing Sony I don't expect this to happen.I dont think most of the games available there have much specific code for ARM, rather they are beeing tied to the iOS - which Sony plainly wont use Im sure. Adding an isolated Android-runtime to tap into those apps would be the most logical IMHO.
No, but it helps having better compilers and a pool of people more experienced with the platform.I cant speak of compilers, I dont have access to the proprietary ones and gcc seems to put out equivalently bad code for everything not x86. Given that every Sony-console prior to PS3 was MIPS and a good part of the devs doing big games have experience with those Id say that going ARM would be a change and not MIPS. But as you said yourself, the ISA itself wont matter that much with most of development beeing done in C/C++ or even higher level stuff.
MIPS isn't giving power consumption numbers at 40nm so I don't really know, but at 45nm at least Cortex-A8 is beating 74K in both Watt/MHz and perf/MHz, so clearly better perf/Watt.In perf/MHz 74k is leading (2.5 vs 2.4) in the link I posted... I know synthetic tests.. but thats all I have.

(I agree with the rest you posted, trying not to get the posts bigger and bigger with all those quotes)

Exophase

28-Sep-2010, 23:56

Apparently they heard your concerns about L2-Cache: http://mips.com/products/cores/32-64-bit-cores/mips32-1074k/

Looks like I got the rug pulled out from under me on this one.

its a challenge to improve old existing games, new games could be just be tested and potentially white-listed to enable some enhancing features (adjust for a bigger framebuffer or whatever). And there are quite a few gems on PSP, its sure as better than having nothing except a couple launch titles. I dont see why PSN stuff shouldnt be transferable (as long as its technical feasible), expect a big outcry if it aint.

I didn't know you meant new games. If they have to distribute digitally to begin with exactly what do they gain in selling a dual-platform binary?

Matter of resources and quite possibly licensing. Just look at how few PS2-PS3-ports there are to date, and the different availability of PSOne games.

And how about PS1 games that have been hand improved for a new platform? I don't know of any.

I doubt a good vector-instruction set will be redundant anytime soon for multimedia-media, there is more that uses it than just transforming vertices. Also it surely is nice beeing able to devote the GPU entirely to pixel-processing if you need it (assuming it has unified shaders).

And there'll be more to GPU shaders than just transforming vertices (and lighting pixels) too.

I dont think most of the games available there have much specific code for ARM, rather they are beeing tied to the iOS - which Sony plainly wont use Im sure. Adding an isolated Android-runtime to tap into those apps would be the most logical IMHO.

Lots and lots of Android apps do run native code, Android off of ARM is probably not much of a starter at this point...

I cant speak of compilers, I dont have access to the proprietary ones and gcc seems to put out equivalently bad code for everything not x86. Given that every Sony-console prior to PS3 was MIPS and a good part of the devs doing big games have experience with those Id say that going ARM would be a change and not MIPS. But as you said yourself, the ISA itself wont matter that much with most of development beeing done in C/C++ or even higher level stuff.

Fortunately developers do have access to the proprietary stuff, where performance matters for ARM talking about GCC is kind of irrelevant. The best ARM compiler is beating GCC by a margin as much as 2x in many apps. PS2 and PS1 are ancient history now and there are probably more devs experienced with the myriad of ARM devices than PSP.

In perf/MHz 74k is leading (2.5 vs 2.4) in the link I posted... I know synthetic tests.. but thats all I have.

Interesting. Is it lower numbers on the new part doing it?

Npl

29-Sep-2010, 00:24

I didn't know you meant new games. If they have to distribute digitally to begin with exactly what do they gain in selling a dual-platform binary?

And how about PS1 games that have been hand improved for a new platform? I don't know of any.I wasnt talking bout 2 binaries, rather an embedded configuration file for the "PSP emulator" (game works with antialising and higher res so use that)... or some stricter conformance rules on new games so those enchantments work.

And there'll be more to GPU shaders than just transforming vertices (and lighting pixels) too.If you are talking bout something like "Compute Shaders", I think thats still way off to gain big traction. And even longer on Handhelds where absolute performance is not the only concern but power-efficiency too. eg. running physics on a GPU is fast, but not really efficient for the power used compared to a CPU - compared to how much more efficient a GPU is at shading pixels at the very least. Putting a good vector extension onchip only takes transistors (rather laughable die-space nowadays), which might not be used but is preferable to pushing data back and forth to the GPU if it can be used.
Just try enabling Physics if you have a single Gfx-Card, usually you will prefer scaled down effects running on the CPU and a smooth experience. I think we wont see a liberal use of "Compute Shaders" until CPU and GPU are tied together very closely.
Lots and lots of Android apps do run native code, Android off of ARM is probably not much of a starter at this point...Err, I thought everything is bytecode at the app-level (the ones you buy in the store)?
Fortunately developers do have access to the proprietary stuff, where performance matters for ARM talking about GCC is kind of irrelevant. The best ARM compiler is beating GCC by a margin as much as 2x in many apps. PS2 and PS1 are ancient history now and there are probably more devs experienced with the myriad of ARM devices than PSP.There are proprietary compilers for PSP aswell (and hence MIPS), just that I have no experience with them, but I expect them to trounce GCC aswell. I think we are talking about different groups of devs here, Im more concerned about the big game developers and not 2$ app developers.
And I dont see how it matters much, the overall system and libraries will be the big stuff to learn, not the assembly-code the compiler spits out.
Interesting. Is it lower numbers on the new part doing it?Err, Im not sure what you mean. the numbers are coremark 74K vs A8, the "new part" (1074K) is practically the same cores with some coherency-modules added - so perf/mhz should be the same or higher (addition of L2-Cache).

So for the 1074K all numbers I can come up with are:
74K - 2.5 coremarks/MHz From That link (http://blog.linleygroup.com/2010/04/arm-outmuscles-atom-on-benchmark.html)
1074Kf 0.36 mW/MHz (dualcore 40nm TSMC automated design, optimized for speed not powerdraw) Mips`Homepage (http://mips.com/products/cores/32-64-bit-cores/mips32-1074k/)

A8 has 2.4 coremarks/MHz and Im lacking power numbers.

Exophase

29-Sep-2010, 03:37

I wasnt talking bout 2 binaries, rather an embedded configuration file for the "PSP emulator" (game works with antialising and higher res so use that)... or some stricter conformance rules on new games so those enchantments work.

The only place I've seen such a thing really happen was GBC, and that was largely because of the design being such a one-off from the original. I still say, if you're going to put any effort into making new games designed for old hardware run on new hardware it'd be effort much better spent doing a version for the new hardware.

If you are talking bout something like "Compute Shaders", I think thats still way off to gain big traction. And even longer on Handhelds where absolute performance is not the only concern but power-efficiency too. eg. running physics on a GPU is fast, but not really efficient for the power used compared to a CPU - compared to how much more efficient a GPU is at shading pixels at the very least. Putting a good vector extension onchip only takes transistors (rather laughable die-space nowadays), which might not be used but is preferable to pushing data back and forth to the GPU if it can be used.
Just try enabling Physics if you have a single Gfx-Card, usually you will prefer scaled down effects running on the CPU and a smooth experience. I think we wont see a liberal use of "Compute Shaders" until CPU and GPU are tied together very closely.

I agree with you, but please consider the context in which I made the statement - nVidia believes in this sort of model, even for handhelds, and if they're the ones involved in graphics IP for PSP2 then they'll probably try to sell this - as is the case with them not including NEON on Tegra 2. The point I'm making is that if PSP2 is using an nVidia solution (like is currently rumored) they'll have a harder time emulating PSP due to not having VFP than due to not being MIPS.

I do think that for a handheld dedicating vector resources on the GPU and off the GPU on the level of PSP's VFPU is too excessive in terms of die space and power draw. Something on the level of NEON, if anything at all, is more appropriate. 3DS clearly doesn't believe in off-GPU vector processing, but that might be a bad example since they don't seem to believe in much in terms of CPU at all.

Err, I thought everything is bytecode at the app-level (the ones you buy in the store)?

No, Google did make native options available, and the better apps tend to use it. Probably because Google was too late in coming in making Dalvik's performance acceptable.

There are proprietary compilers for PSP aswell (and hence MIPS), just that I have no experience with them, but I expect them to trounce GCC aswell. I think we are talking about different groups of devs here, Im more concerned about the big game developers and not 2$ app developers.

We'll see - I just think that the ARM ISA has more to offer compilers than MIPS. I think it's kind of unfortunate that an academic ISA is being supported to this extent when it has pretty obvious deficiencies in the name of simplicity (allowing quick implementations to be made). But I might be overstating something merely from the perspective of someone who has had to write too much ASM in both.

And I dont see how it matters much, the overall system and libraries will be the big stuff to learn, not the assembly-code the compiler spits out.

We'll see; chances are the system development will be pretty standard. Not a lot of heavy OS interaction and pretty OGL like access to the GPU, like usual.

Err, Im not sure what you mean. the numbers are coremark 74K vs A8, the "new part" (1074K) is practically the same cores with some coherency-modules added - so perf/mhz should be the same or higher (addition of L2-Cache).

So for the 1074K all numbers I can come up with are:
74K - 2.5 coremarks/MHz From That link (http://blog.linleygroup.com/2010/04/arm-outmuscles-atom-on-benchmark.html)
1074Kf 0.36 mW/MHz (dualcore 40nm TSMC automated design, optimized for speed not powerdraw) Mips`Homepage (http://mips.com/products/cores/32-64-bit-cores/mips32-1074k/)

A8 has 2.4 coremarks/MHz and Im lacking power numbers.

How is a comparison vs A8 fair? Compare with A9, the faster architecture. Or do you think Sony can't use it for some reason?

Coremark runs in L1 cache. Adding L2 won't improve anything.

Laurent06

29-Sep-2010, 09:27

Fortunately developers do have access to the proprietary stuff, where performance matters for ARM talking about GCC is kind of irrelevant. The best ARM compiler is beating GCC by a margin as much as 2x in many apps.
First hand experience? Or are you just referring to the only public comparison I know of, the one from the FFmpeg guy?

Anyway my personal experience is that gcc 4.5 generates good code for ARM which, performance wise, is similar to a proprietary compiler. There are of course cases where the proprietary compiler will be significantly faster than gcc, but gcc will win as often.

Npl

29-Sep-2010, 14:37

The only place I've seen such a thing really happen was GBC, and that was largely because of the design being such a one-off from the original. I still say, if you're going to put any effort into making new games designed for old hardware run on new hardware it'd be effort much better spent doing a version for the new hardware.and if its not much effort other than testing the game on PSP2?
I agree with you, but please consider the context in which I made the statement - nVidia believes in this sort of model, even for handhelds, and if they're the ones involved in graphics IP for PSP2 then they'll probably try to sell this - as is the case with them not including NEON on Tegra 2. The point I'm making is that if PSP2 is using an nVidia solution (like is currently rumored) they'll have a harder time emulating PSP due to not having VFP than due to not being MIPS.Nvidia is not doing a "solution", Nvidia is providing their IP and Sony will manufacture it as they see fit. The GPU in PS3 is a custom tailored one with FlexIO, not because Nvidia already had some existing parts laying around but because Sony said "get us a part with FlexIO". I dont see how rumors and existing Socs play a big part in this.
I do think that for a handheld dedicating vector resources on the GPU and off the GPU on the level of PSP's VFPU is too excessive in terms of die space and power draw. Something on the level of NEON, if anything at all, is more appropriate. 3DS clearly doesn't believe in off-GPU vector processing, but that might be a bad example since they don't seem to believe in much in terms of CPU at all.I dont think diespace is the biggest concern, IMHO they are already pretty limited by powerdraw so that CPU+GPU will be rather small. Making the chip 1-2 mm^2 bigger probably isnt an issue - 3DS also gone (if rumors are true) into wasting diespace for 2 (relatively) slow CPUs instead of a single fast one.
I dunno, but a solid vector processing seems to be a logical thing to do if you make a device for media-processing.
No, Google did make native options available, and the better apps tend to use it. Probably because Google was too late in coming in making Dalvik's performance acceptable.Ok, dint knew that.
We'll see - I just think that the ARM ISA has more to offer compilers than MIPS. I think it's kind of unfortunate that an academic ISA is being supported to this extent when it has pretty obvious deficiencies in the name of simplicity (allowing quick implementations to be made). But I might be overstating something merely from the perspective of someone who has had to write too much ASM in both.thats the strangest use of the word "academic" I heard in a long time. :grin:
the RISC concept as whole was academic once, while MIPS went pretty much everywhere in the last 2 decades.
How is a comparison vs A8 fair? Compare with A9, the faster architecture. Or do you think Sony can't use it for some reason?

Coremark runs in L1 cache. Adding L2 won't improve anything.I dont disagree but please look at the context. I said that up to and including the Cortex A8, MIPS had parity or advantage in perf/watt.

Exophase

29-Sep-2010, 15:48

and if its not much effort other than testing the game on PSP2?

Sure, but if it doesn't pass the test? Of course, the real work is going to be on Sony to make these enhancements available, and they'd have to determine if it'll work enough of the time for vendors. If carefully engineered they can probably manage something, but Sony themselves would likely prefer vendors pushed new software that better sells the system.

Nvidia is not doing a "solution", Nvidia is providing their IP and Sony will manufacture it as they see fit. The GPU in PS3 is a custom tailored one with FlexIO, not because Nvidia already had some existing parts laying around but because Sony said "get us a part with FlexIO". I dont see how rumors and existing Socs play a big part in this.

Strictly speaking you don't know that, just because that's how it was on PS3 doesn't mean it'll be like that on PSP, assuming nVidia has a role to begin with - the rumors are specifically that it'll be "powered by Tegra", not "will contain nVidia GPU IP"

I dont think diespace is the biggest concern, IMHO they are already pretty limited by powerdraw so that CPU+GPU will be rather small. Making the chip 1-2 mm^2 bigger probably isnt an issue - 3DS also gone (if rumors are true) into wasting diespace for 2 (relatively) slow CPUs instead of a single fast one.
I dunno, but a solid vector processing seems to be a logical thing to do if you make a device for media-processing.

PSP's VFPU has got to be relatively huge (compared to the rest of the stuff on there) and it's definitely optimized for 3D. 3DS using two CPUs instead of a fast one is justifiable (in terms of power draw), Sony including a full blown VFPU over a weaker SIMD extension ISA, if anything at all, is a luxury that might not win them enough. Diespace isn't the biggest concern, but it does add cost for the manufacturer.

thats the strangest use of the word "academic" I heard in a long time. :grin:
the RISC concept as whole was academic once, while MIPS went pretty much everywhere in the last 2 decades.

What I'm trying to say is that MIPS overemphasized simplicity for implementation purposes, and while the "RISC concept" might have been academic altogether the more relevant details of specific ISAs generally were not, save MIPS. The instruction set encoding isn't very efficient and lacks basic things like any kind of register + register addressing, which every other RISC ISA I know of has.

I dont disagree but please look at the context. I said that up to and including the Cortex A8, MIPS had parity or advantage in perf/watt.

Yeah, my bad, I didn't even realize I said Cortex-A8 in the first place. I meant A9.

First hand experience? Or are you just referring to the only public comparison I know of, the one from the FFmpeg guy?

Anyway my personal experience is that gcc 4.5 generates good code for ARM which, performance wise, is similar to a proprietary compiler. There are of course cases where the proprietary compiler will be significantly faster than gcc, but gcc will win as often.

FFmpeg guy, but of course qualified by my mention of "as many as." My personal experience has continued to be that GCC is pretty easy to beat with hand-ASM in ARM, and it's pretty easy to see where it's deficient.

Do you have any comparisons that show GCC winning often?

Laurent06

29-Sep-2010, 16:29

FFmpeg guy, but of course qualified by my mention of "as many as."
The particular x2 speedup you mentionned is a failure of gcc to detect a widening multiplication (32b x 32b -> 64b) resulting in using 64b x 64b -> 64b. I've been told this has been fixed.

My personal experience has continued to be that GCC is pretty easy to beat with hand-ASM in ARM, and it's pretty easy to see where it's deficient.
Obviously a talented assembly programmer will always beat a C compiler, provided he's given enough time :wink:

Do you have any comparisons that show GCC winning often?
The end-user license agreement prohibits the publication of results.

Npl

29-Sep-2010, 17:02

Strictly speaking you don't know that, just because that's how it was on PS3 doesn't mean it'll be like that on PSP, assuming nVidia has a role to begin with - the rumors are specifically that it'll be "powered by Tegra", not "will contain nVidia GPU IP"rumors are just that, 3DS was supposed to have a tegra aswell, and the PSP2 having 4 SPUs. I dont think that there is any truth to it, because
I expect a MIPS based solution (feel free to ignore that)
I expect Sony to add fixed or programmable hardware for security
Sony manufactures most or all of their high-volume SoCs (in shared fabs), I dont think that will change.

But I wouldn't be surprised if the GPU-Core is quite similar to the one in Tegra.
What I'm trying to say is that MIPS overemphasized simplicity for implementation purposes, and while the "RISC concept" might have been academic altogether the more relevant details of specific ISAs generally were not, save MIPS. The instruction set encoding isn't very efficient and lacks basic things like any kind of register + register addressing, which every other RISC ISA I know of has.Yep, MIPS is probably the most "RISCiest" ISA architecture around, for the better or worse. But I think it has its merits aswell, given that it competes rather nicely even if you sometimes need an additional instruction over other architectures should tell you its no big issue. Personally I think the lack of PC-relative addressing and (long) jumps is annoying if you want to write PIC-code.

@Laurent06: given what I know gcc doesnt handles 8/16 bit variables well on architectures which only operate on 32bit, adding alot of unnecessary truncation instructions. I only have experience with gcc 4.3 & MIPS but the issue seems to sit pretty deeply.

Ailuros

30-Sep-2010, 08:03

rumors are just that, 3DS was supposed to have a tegra aswell, and the PSP2 having 4 SPUs. I dont think that there is any truth to it, because

I expect a MIPS based solution (feel free to ignore that)
I expect Sony to add fixed or programmable hardware for security
Sony manufactures most or all of their high-volume SoCs (in shared fabs), I dont think that will change.

No one can assure you that easily that NV was at some point of time negotiating with Nintendo, but I'm as certain as I can be that they were albeit it must have been quite a long time ago. "Off the record" it wasn't exactly that some folks could hide their pre-mature excitement.

No idea to the first two points and most likely right on spot for the last (which doesn't really take a crystal ball to guess).

But I wouldn't be surprised if the GPU-Core is quite similar to the one in Tegra.Each GPU-core might have a few similarities to the Tegra GPU (but only if you're willing to oversimplify things to a ridiculous level). However if you want to start seeking differences start with the fact that Tegra isn't tile based.

Yep, MIPS is probably the most "RISCiest" ISA architecture around, for the better or worse. But I think it has its merits aswell, given that it competes rather nicely even if you sometimes need an additional instruction over other architectures should tell you its no big issue. Personally I think the lack of PC-relative addressing and (long) jumps is annoying if you want to write PIC-code.Well for what it's worth both MIPS and IMG announced in the past a strategic alliance but it sounded in the end like something for a single deal with Sigma:

http://www.imgtec.com/Newsletters/with_imagination/issue8_10.pdf

Or maybe not:

Sandeep Vij, president and CEO, MIPS Technologies said “Imagination is a leading provider of embedded multimedia and communications IP and we are working closely with them to offer integrated solutions that will not only offer our customers best-in-breed choices and differentiated devices, but also fast SoC integration. The work we are doing with Imagination is creating some of the industry’s most innovative solutions for set-top boxes and beyond.”

http://technews.tmcnet.com/business-solutions/topics/business-solutions/articles/83162-mips-technologies-announces-strategic-alliance-with-imagination-technologies.htm

Exophase

30-Sep-2010, 08:40

Each GPU-core might have a few similarities to the Tegra GPU (but only if you're willing to oversimplify things to a ridiculous level). However if you want to start seeking differences start with the fact that Tegra isn't tile based.

What are you saying? That PSP is using SGX543MP4 like the original (now quite old) rumors claim, or that nVidia is doing a tiler for them now?

Because the most recent rumor from SA is that they're using something Tegra-derived. It's possible that this is slanted towards an opportunity for them to sling mud at nVidia (not sure how they feel about Sony), but it all seems about as credible as any of the other rumors, and more recent is more likely, especially if we're to believe that dev kits are circulating.

Granted, SGX543MP4 sounds impressive, a lot more so than something Tegra 2-like. Hopefully if nVidia is involved they're shooting for more a preview of a Tegra 3-like GPU, and that's a more substantial improvement over Tegra 2 than that was over the original Tegra.

The whole rumor of Nintendo originally using something Tegra 2 derived themselves seems credible given all the citations and the sighting of older 3DS boards that had "TEG2" in their part numbers. Which makes it all the more bizarre that Nintendo ended up with ARM11s. Maybe this was part of a knee-jerk reaction to an nVidia solution having higher than expected power numbers.

I do think right now nVidia needs some big console vendor win to help stay afloat. They could have made hundreds of millions on 3DS, that's a pretty hard loss.

Aeoniss

30-Sep-2010, 09:17

Well how are Nvidia-Sony relations currently?

Exophase

30-Sep-2010, 09:39

Probably better than nVidia's relationships were with Microsoft over the original XBox, at least.

max-pain

30-Sep-2010, 10:31

Isn't Sony moving away from MIPS? (PS2 IOP, etc)

http://www.qj.net/qjnet/playstation-3/ibm-talks-ps3-processor-backwards-compatibility.html

Sony is replacing all the Mips design points with Power design points.

Ailuros

30-Sep-2010, 11:14

What are you saying? That PSP is using SGX543MP4 like the original (now quite old) rumors claim, or that nVidia is doing a tiler for them now?

The first.

Because the most recent rumor from SA is that they're using something Tegra-derived. It's possible that this is slanted towards an opportunity for them to sling mud at nVidia (not sure how they feel about Sony), but it all seems about as credible as any of the other rumors, and more recent is more likely, especially if we're to believe that dev kits are circulating.I can't know what's in the heads of the SA authors, but if they heard at some stage that NV was working or hoping on a handheld console design win, they could have speculated upon the rest.

Granted, SGX543MP4 sounds impressive, a lot more so than something Tegra 2-like. Hopefully if nVidia is involved they're shooting for more a preview of a Tegra 3-like GPU, and that's a more substantial improvement over Tegra 2 than that was over the original Tegra.http://www.xbitlabs.com/news/multimedia/display/20100917121928_Sony_Starts_to_Supply_PSP2_to_Game_ Developers.html

Development of that SoC couldn't have started recently but several years ago. Then there's that link here:

http://www.imgtec.com/News/Release/index.asp?NewsID=412

Announced 2 years ago.

The whole rumor of Nintendo originally using something Tegra 2 derived themselves seems credible given all the citations and the sighting of older 3DS boards that had "TEG2" in their part numbers. Which makes it all the more bizarre that Nintendo ended up with ARM11s. Maybe this was part of a knee-jerk reaction to an nVidia solution having higher than expected power numbers.

I do think right now nVidia needs some big console vendor win to help stay afloat. They could have made hundreds of millions on 3DS, that's a pretty hard loss.Only real insiders and especially at NINTENDO can know what was really going on. Is the current 3DS a collection of IP licenses and Nintendo has contracted a manufacturer to build the SoC for them? If yes then if NV intended or wanted to sell them the entire SoC themselves I could think of a few very good reasons why Nintendo backed out hypothetically in the end if and whenever that happened.

In hindsight why would any console manufacturer would want to have anything but IP deals for consoles or in extension handheld consoles anyway? And even more important if for NVIDIA licensing RSX IP to SONY for the PS3 didn't necessarily hurt them after all, why would it be any different with a handheld console deal?

Any market needs obviously the right approach; if anyone should try an alternative approach it naturally could involve quite a few risks.

Well how are Nvidia-Sony relations currently?

I haven't heard anything about any problems between the two firms, but that wouldn't had stopped SONY to go for any other IP providing source if they felt they had something better on offer. If that "PSP2" ends up having a SGX543 MP then I wouldn't say that SONY made a wrong decision at all.

Exophase

30-Sep-2010, 15:35

The first.

I can't know what's in the heads of the SA authors, but if they heard at some stage that NV was working or hoping on a handheld console design win, they could have speculated upon the rest.

http://www.semiaccurate.com/2010/07/14/sonys-psp2-powered-nvidias-tegra-line/

Either PSP2 is using nVidia or someone who is otherwise credible is deliberately lying. There is no potential in this scenario for "Sony was considering nVidia at some point and the information got out", this is recent news. I do think the article makes a lot of assumptions (ie, "Tegra" is being provided, there are issues due to power consumption, etc), but it seems pretty evident that nVidia is contributing to PSP2, meaning they're supplying the GPU.

http://www.xbitlabs.com/news/multimedia/display/20100917121928_Sony_Starts_to_Supply_PSP2_to_Game_ Developers.html (http://www.xbitlabs.com/news/multimedia/display/20100917121928_Sony_Starts_to_Supply_PSP2_to_Game_ Developers.html)

Development of that SoC couldn't have started recently but several years ago. Then there's that link here:

http://www.imgtec.com/News/Release/index.asp?NewsID=412

Announced 2 years ago.

Why would PSP's current SoC have to have its GPU determind years ago when Nintendo was free to switch to PICA200 quite recently? The only actual new information from this is a claim from a developer that PSP2 will be "pretty powerful." That says next to nothing.

IMG's announcement is vague and could be referring to pretty much anything.

There's the usual rehashing of both the SGX543MP and Cell rumors, but the latter sounds particularly hard to swallow. The former would be nice but I'm not really convinced in light of the new nVidia information... Outside of that, isn't SGX543MP4 kind of a big sudden jump in power consumption for 3D? Wouldn't it be at least 4x over SGX540 at similar clocks? Not that that's really breaking the bank, since the SGX power numbers do seem really low, but it still seems like a big increase.

Ailuros

01-Oct-2010, 07:42

http://www.semiaccurate.com/2010/07/14/sonys-psp2-powered-nvidias-tegra-line/

Either PSP2 is using nVidia or someone who is otherwise credible is deliberately lying. There is no potential in this scenario for "Sony was considering nVidia at some point and the information got out", this is recent news. I do think the article makes a lot of assumptions (ie, "Tegra" is being provided, there are issues due to power consumption, etc), but it seems pretty evident that nVidia is contributing to PSP2, meaning they're supplying the GPU.

I'm willing to bet a good amount of money that there was never or will be any sign of Tegra in SONY's next generation handheld. I don't care where Charlie got that piece from and who and why is feeding him such nonsense (which he isn't really responsible for anyway), but here are a couple of questions regarding that entire story:

1. Why would SONY on God's green earth be interested in an "off the shelf" applications processor and not license IP? Because I can't read anything in that piece that suggests otherwise.

2. Regarding power consumption: perf/W aside the power consumption hints in that article sound like utter nonsense to me for Tegra2 with one single GPU core consisting of 2 FP24 PS ALUs, 2 VS units and 2 TMUs, while otherwise what has been proposed so far is a SGX543 4MP. That equals 4 GPU cores with 4 USC ALUs, 2 TMUs each. However you turn or twist it the latter scenario is going to burn more power overall even more so if it contains a quad core CPU too.

3. When console manufacturers investigate IP or whatever else for their future products they have a very specific performance target in combination with power consumption in mind. The ballpark between a T2 GPU and a SGX543 4MP is so big that either way I switch it it doesn't make sense. If we'd be talking about something like Tegra2 GPU vs. SGX535 or SGX540 things would be vastly different.

Why would PSP's current SoC have to have its GPU determind years ago when Nintendo was free to switch to PICA200 quite recently? The only actual new information from this is a claim from a developer that PSP2 will be "pretty powerful." That says next to nothing.What's recently exactly? If NV ever was in negotiations with Nintendo then it must have been several years ago and rumors about that collaboration were pestering around ever since. But there was never ever any other speculation or rumor outside that.

IMG's announcement is vague and could be referring to pretty much anything.I'm keen to hear all the possible scenarios. Remember that any possibility must have a very good reason for such a long term secrecy. And once we're at the secrecy point let's see why console manufacturers are so tight lipped about technology aspects of future projects and why it seems that Nintendo picked PICA on any hypothetical short notice.

There's the usual rehashing of both the SGX543MP and Cell rumors, but the latter sounds particularly hard to swallow. The former would be nice but I'm not really convinced in light of the new nVidia information... Outside of that, isn't SGX543MP4 kind of a big sudden jump in power consumption for 3D? Wouldn't it be at least 4x over SGX540 at similar clocks? Not that that's really breaking the bank, since the SGX power numbers do seem really low, but it still seems like a big increase.I can think of a VERY good reason why SONY would want such a jump: SGX54x 2MPs appearing in smart-phones sooner than many would expect. Under that light wouldn't you say that a hypothetical 4MP would place a handheld in a far better position especially as time goes by?

Since 540 has 8 z/stencil units after all and the 543/544's have over twice the ALU throughput, 4x sounds conservative.

I can't of course know what SONY has in mind exactly, but:

http://www.xbitlabs.com/news/multimedia/display/20100929222915_Nintendo_Reveals_Final_Specs_and_La unch_Dates_for_Nintendo_3DS.html

http://www.imgtec.com/News/Release/index.asp?NewsID=556

The high performance POWERVR SGX graphics acceleration cores are ideally suited to S3D graphics, either using single or multi-processor cores for resolutions up to full 1080P HD, and are capable of supporting all commonly used S3D formats such as frame sequential, side-by-side, top-bottom and interlaced.

The POWERVR SGX tile-based deferred rendering architecture is ideally suited to deal with the increased demands of S3D – which include twice the geometry processing workload and commensurate increases in fill/texturing workload.

NeoTechni

10-Oct-2010, 05:30

I agree, tegra always seemed unlikely.
Backwards compatibility seems like it'd be a high priority, especially after Go's failure.
At the very least, they'll want the ability to run everything on PSP's PSN store.
Though it defeats the point of BC when it only supports the extreme minority of both content and users.
Which makes UMD2/BLUMD seem all the more likely, especially since a gig of flash costs as much to make as a 50 GB bluray disc right now.

Aeoniss

26-Oct-2010, 17:33

Around the time of the Tokyo Game Show, Sony held a private meeting at its offices in Tokyo's Aoyama. The purpose was to show off the PSP2.

Several sources have confirmed to Kotaku that the PSP2 does have a previously rumored touch panel on the back of the hardware. The touch panel was described as looking like a big mouse trackpad. When Sony showed the PSP2, it did not provide concrete details regarding how the trackpad will be implemented in games and instead is leaving that to the discretion of game developers.

Sources also confirm to Kotaku that the handheld will have dual analog sticks. Sony's game controllers traditionally have dual analog sticks, but the current PSP model does not. Dual analog sticks would bring the PSP controls more in line with what gamers experience on Sony's home consoles.

The screen itself is not only sharper than the current PSP's, but about an inch larger. The larger screen means that the PSP2 will be larger as well. In the private meetings, Sony is touting the screen as "HD".

A larger PSP should not be that big of an issue for Sony — especially in a mobile environment with large tablets like the iPad. It also shows that Sony realizes it is no longer simply competing with Nintendo, but also Apple.

It is unclear whether this is the same handheld described by the Wall Street Journal. According to the paper, Sony is working on a device that mixes a game player, an e-book reader and a netbook computer.

In late September, there were also reports that the PSP2 hardware was in the hands of "numerous" developers.

Currently, the PSP2's hardware is not finalized, and Sony is having problems balancing battery, power and heat. There are apparently overheating issues, but Sony is, of course, aiming to have those issues corrected by the time the hardware is publicly shown.

Sony set the PSP2's goals (what Sony wants it to do), but is still tinkering with the portable's innards. The PSP2's tech specs are expected to change, meaning that things like chip size and processor size are variable. What's more, the hardware Sony showed was "temp hardware", so the final design is expected to change.

Apparently, Sony has privately shown two versions of the new PSP. One version slides open like the PSPgo, and another version is similar in shape to the regular PSP. These are prototypes, because Sony has yet to finalize the PSP2 hardware design.

Sources tell Kotaku that the PSP2's release window is fall 2011. Sony is not yet talking openly about the PSP2.

Sony did not offer a comment in time for publication.

Update: Sony replied, stating it did not comment on rumor or speculation.

http://kotaku.com/5672410/psp2-will-be-bigger-out-fall-2011-currently-overheating

Aeoniss

28-Oct-2010, 21:59

And another:

The Playstation Portable 2, rumored to have dual analog sticks, a bigger screen and touch controls, will also rival the Xbox 360 in processing power and ditch the UMD format, sources tell Kotaku.

Earlier this week multiple sources detailed meetings with Sony during the Tokyo Game Show about the long-rumored PSP2.

In those meetings about the portable, we were told, the device was shown to have a touch panel on the back of the system what looked like a mouse trackpad. The PSP2 also had dual analog sticks and a larger display which Sony touted as being "HD."

While the device was shown in two form-factors, one that looked like the PSPgo (seen above) and one that looked like the PSP, Sony told attendees that they have not yet settled on the final design for the system.

Since breaking the news earlier this week, a few more details have shaken loose about the device, which our sources have verified.

One of the key ones is that the PSP2 will not have a UMD drive. The UMD (Universal Media Disc) was launched in 2004 for use in the PSP. Initially, the format was used for movies, but slow sales of UMD films lead to studios dropping support for the format.

Sony's PSPgo is UMD-free version of the PSP, and sources tell Kotaku that the PSP2 will follow in the footsteps of that portable. Games will be stored on a Memory Stick, according to one source. Though we've also been told that Sony is still puzzling out what the final non-UMD storage solution will be for the PSP2.

We've also learned that the PSP2 will be a much more powerful gaming device with twice the RAM of the Xbox 360.

While we don't yet know all of the portable's system specifications, we have been told that the PSP2 will feature 1 GB of RAM. That's compared to the 64 MB of RAM the PSPgo and PSP 3000 have. Both of those portables use a MIPS R4000 CPU clocked at up to 333 MHz. By comparison the Xbox 360 has 512 MB of RAM and runs a 3.2 GHZ CPU.

The specs for the yet-to-be-released Nintendo 3DS haven't been officially detailed but we've heard it will be as powerful as the Nintendo Wii which features 64 MB of RAM, and a special processor clocked at 729 MHz.

It's starting to sound like someone at Sony is listening to the murmuring about the Playstation Portable and doing something to fix the issues some have with it. Dual analog sticks. No UMD. A bigger screen. More powerful tech. Touch controls. We're not hearing a single thing we don't like so far.
http://kotaku.com/5675525/psp2-will-ditch-the-umd-may-rival-xbox-360-in-horsepower

corduroygt

28-Oct-2010, 22:03

I don't know about any handheld rivaling the 360 in 2011, but it should be able to beat the wii.
Maybe they meant CPU-wise, which might be possible, but there is no way GPU-wise.

Exophase

28-Oct-2010, 22:23

Shifty Geezer

28-Oct-2010, 22:42

Exactly. Three 3.2GHz wide-SIMD dual-threaded cores is not going to see any competition in a handheld for years. I doubt even processing-per-pixel would be competitive at a much small resolution than 720p. Kotaku's sources are clearly dreaming.

tongue_of_colicab

28-Oct-2010, 23:18

I definitely don't see it happening CPU-wise either, even a quad core 1.5GHz Cortex-A9 + NEON can't be seen as competitive with a tri-core 3.2GHz Xenon, especially when considering SIMD capabilities. OoOE is great but it can't overcome those kinds of clock deltas. I really doubt you'd see that sort of Cortex-A9 in a 2011 handheld anyway.

When they say things like this, shouldn't they be read as: can look the same on a small screen instead of: Is just as fast? On a 5'' screen you won't need the same amount of detail to make something look as good as on a 50'' screen.

Exophase

29-Oct-2010, 01:26

I don't see that much about CPU usage that scales with resolution.

Aeoniss

29-Oct-2010, 01:34

I don't see that much about CPU usage that scales with resolution.

Well perhaps not directly.. But scale or lod surely. I mean on a smaller screen with a smaller resolution you wouldn't need to display or render as much. Obviously this is beneficial for the GPU but it also means less animations\physics(if any) etc that needs to be done CPU side.

As a whole wouldn't CPU load be directly related with total resolution to some extent?

Exophase

29-Oct-2010, 01:36

Well perhaps not directly.. But scale or lod surely. I mean on a smaller screen with a smaller resolution you wouldn't need to display or render as much. Obviously this is beneficial for the GPU but it also means less animations\physics(if any) etc that needs to be done CPU side.

That really doesn't work linearly. By that logic PC games should need much less detail because they're usually ran on displays that are much smaller than TV screens. The difference is that you sit much closer to a desktop monitor, and you hold a screen much closer to your face. "Retina Display" might be the point of diminishing returns, but that's nearly 720p.

So I guess when you have 66% of the same fillrate + at least the same geometry capabilities and image quality you can do 720p quality on a Retina display. Or 30% for 1020p quality. Current handheld technology is nowhere near this.

As a whole wouldn't CPU load be directly related with total resolution to some extent?

Why should it be?

Aeoniss

29-Oct-2010, 01:43

Hm.

NeoTechni

29-Oct-2010, 02:42

i agree with exophase
cpu wise it cant and wont be near 360

and the whole resolution point is moot, being an hd screen means its resolution is at least par with 720p

Aeoniss

29-Oct-2010, 05:08

Is that kind of resolution doable on a portable system? I'm assuming it isn't as big as conventional "tablets"..

Also I imagine that would be a bit of a strain on the hardware?

Exophase

29-Oct-2010, 05:15

iPhone 4 is 960x640 and smaller than PSP. It's ahead of the curve in the industry, but most other phones are at least 800x480.

The rumors are saying that PSP has a large screen that Sony is calling "HD", so if any of that is true I expect it to be of decent resolution.

Aeoniss

29-Oct-2010, 06:47

Well that's what I mean. Is it really 1280x720p?

That is to say, is that even doable on a handheld? I can't imagine it can fit a full 720p image.

Dr Evil

29-Oct-2010, 07:30

Well that's what I mean. Is it really 1280x720p?

That is to say, is that even doable on a handheld? I can't imagine it can fit a full 720p image.

Well if you can put a 960x640 pixels in a 3.5" display, then for a 4.5" or bigger it should be doable.

Shifty Geezer

29-Oct-2010, 09:29

I don't see that much about CPU usage that scales with resolution.The problem comes with the ill-defined term 'power'. More powerful by what measure. It could be a direct processing comparison, or a relative measure, in the same way I can say an ant is more powerful than a man because it can lift many times its body weight.

Resolution wise, if you Google smallest 720p screen you get things like this 5 incher (http://www.itechnews.net/2009/12/14/myracer-lisse-h10-hd-pmp-with-5-inch-720p-screen/) and this 4.3" 720p screen (http://www.engadget.com/2009/11/14/hallods-f43-mp4-player-packs-a-4-3-inch-720p-screen-outed-in-ja/). So they exist and it's likely PSP2's components will need to be able to fill that much screen estate, and I imagine HDMI out for play on a TV.

Lazy8s

29-Oct-2010, 10:49

Entropy

29-Oct-2010, 12:52

If Sony gives the GPU of the next portable PlayStation similar budgets for power consumption, heat dissipation, and die area as the first PSP's, a resulting Series5XT core won't be compared to anything but PS3's and X360's GPUs.

That budget still won't be anywhere near the 100W or so that the PS3 and X360 pulls at 45/40 nm.
Even if Sony waits until they can massproduce at a one step finer lithographic node (such as 2H of 2011 for launch before Christmas 2011), there is still no way that they can approach the PS3 and X360 in absolute performance terms. A factor of 50 or so in power draw is a rather large handicap.

However, as has been pointed out, by dropping polygon counts, lower the amount of debris rendered, perhaps lower the number of simultaneous on-screen opponents, being a bit less ambitious in areas where it's hard to notice such as shadow rendering, et cetera they can probably get subjectively relatively close to the current generation. Particularly so on a 4-5 inch screen.

But then again, I'm known to have low standards. :)

Exophase

29-Oct-2010, 15:41

However, as has been pointed out, by dropping polygon counts, lower the amount of debris rendered, perhaps lower the number of simultaneous on-screen opponents, being a bit less ambitious in areas where it's hard to notice such as shadow rendering, et cetera they can probably get subjectively relatively close to the current generation. Particularly so on a 4-5 inch screen.

But then again, I'm known to have low standards. :)

The real point from this is that typical gauging of image quality doesn't scale very linearly with resources. If you throw 10x more rendering effort at a scene you might get something that people on average only find 1.5x as good. But that 1.5x is still a big deal to people, and being on a smaller screen doesn't actually push it down that much, especially when you're lowering things like model count.

Xpuntar

30-Oct-2010, 16:21

Hmm, so by those rumors, PSP2 won't have dual screens?

NeoTechni

30-Oct-2010, 16:42

Hmm, so by those rumors, PSP2 won't have dual screens?

No, if anything it'll support displaying different images to its internal display and a connected one.

But even that I doubt.

wco81

30-Oct-2010, 18:07

At this point, performance isn't necessarily going to sell a PSP2. I really don't think anyone is looking for console performance on portable devices now.

What would probably be more useful is media playback and other features now available on smart phones, which can also play games. But the most popular smart phone games are simple so all the performance that's being talked about is overkill.

If a gamer these days is going to spend $200 or more on a handheld, when he may already have a smart phone, it's got to differentiate itself. Dedicated controls and console-like graphics aren't necessarily going to do it.

Smart phones now have these apps. which offer convenience on the go. It may be that now, even gamers are looking more for utility than entertainment, reserving their serious gaming time for the console.

PSP2 may not sell unless it is a converged device. And in the era of 99 cent games, they may have to seriously re-think the traditional games pricing/licensing model.

Exophase

30-Oct-2010, 20:56

It's hard to imagine console performance in handhelds not selling to someone. A large amount of 3DS's positive reception is due to its visuals; can we really say that they're at exactly the point where no one would be impressed by anything better?

But it's kind of hard to talk to people who keep insisting that phones have won the handheld gaming war and there's no more market for non-casual games on portables :/

tongue_of_colicab

30-Oct-2010, 23:25

Exophase

31-Oct-2010, 01:52

Anyone who things phones have, or will ever win the handheld gaming war just don't get it.

As for graphics, didn't the psp initially get the same reception? With every handheld Nintendo showed that it's not graphics that sell, its price, batterylife and games. Sure you will sell handhelds with good graphics alone but for the huge succes you need more than that.

Competitive factors are complex. One of the reasons Nintendo had an advantage is because they've always been ahead and thus had a lot of momentum with developers. PSP has done better against DS than any other handheld has done against Nintendo. Just getting their foot in the door competitively is a big step - for instance, MS didn't do that amazingly with the original XBox but they launched themselves and afaik have been doing better with XBox 360.

DS brought touch screen gaming to mainstream handhelds, which I think did a lot to make more appealing. The 3D hardware was pretty weak while the 2D hardware remained pretty strong, so consequently there was still a large focus on 2D games that cost less to develop, and 3D games that didn't cost that much comparatively.

With 3DS, on the other hand, their "gimmick" is the 3D display, which IMO won't be as big of a differentiator, especially if Sony does it too (although they'd get slammed for being copycats). It's the improved visuals that are stealing the show, and it's apparent that game companies are aiming for more console quality/higher budget games. So that gap is narrowed, but there's still a lot that can be done to edge out graphically.

Sony can also stand to not repeat other mistakes, like UMD.

Like usual, the biggest problem is going to be third party support, because right now 3DS has positively gobbled up the industry, in addition to having the usual tour de force that is Nintendo's first party lineup. Coming late to the game on this one is going to hurt Sony a lot; they gained a lot of ground by announcing PSP quite early.

NeoTechni

31-Oct-2010, 01:59

At this point, performance isn't necessarily going to sell a PSP2

Disagreed. It's why most people bought PSP in the first place. PSP2 is undoubtedly going to be many times more powerful than 3DS.

Entropy

31-Oct-2010, 10:48

The real point from this is that typical gauging of image quality doesn't scale very linearly with resources. If you throw 10x more rendering effort at a scene you might get something that people on average only find 1.5x as good. But that 1.5x is still a big deal to people, and being on a smaller screen doesn't actually push it down that much, especially when you're lowering things like model count.

I agree with everything above, with but a small change: "But that 1.5x is still a big deal to some people."

It's hard to imagine console performance in handhelds not selling to someone. A large amount of 3DS's positive reception is due to its visuals; can we really say that they're at exactly the point where no one would be impressed by anything better?

I don't think we can say that. Indeed I'm quite certain that quite a few people will be impressed by something better (I'm one). The question is rather how many, and what kind of financial investments does this group justify.

But it's kind of hard to talk to people who keep insisting that phones have won the handheld gaming war and there's no more market for non-casual games on portables :/
Well, I think it is hard to argue that the phones won't dominate handheld gaming in terms of volume.
Again, the question is rather what the handheld games consoles can do to differentiate themselves, and if the market is there to justify large development budgets for games exclusively targeting the platforms.
And those are non-trivial questions.

Nintendo offers two hardware selling points - 3D, and an ample supply of physical controls. (And is well positioned in terms of exclusive content.)
Sony seems to hedge their bets with a two pronged bid - the PSPhone, that offers physical gaming controls in addition to a phone, and the PSP2 that by the rumours aims for technological strength and physical gaming controls as its selling points.

I believe that Nintendo will have some degree of success, although I do believe that the price point of the 3DS will hurt it in terms of volume. It seems largely positioned outside the brain training and Nintendogs market window.

Sony is obviously unsure of which way the market will go and it will be very interesting to see if they actually release two competing platforms and if so, how the sales of those will pan out. Sony clearly doesn't know, and nor do I. The PSP2 could be a nice test case of how strong a sales driver technology still is in handheld gaming.

Brad Grenz

31-Oct-2010, 13:03

I am curious how PSP2 will be positioned. It could end up with a lot of the functionality of the iPad in a smaller form factor, (or a bigger iPod Touch) but with buttons. I think the idea that the PSP2 could be sold in two versions like the iPad, one wifi, and one with a cellular data option, is also very possible. So it could, like the PS3, be sold as a very powerful conversion device with a fully featured web browser, e-reader, HD video player (with hdmi out), possibly cameras, skype again, and something akin to an app store, plus big budget exclusive games and bluetooth controller support. That would be something really easy to extend the "It Only Does Everything" marketing to.

If Nintendo can get away with the $250 price point for the 3DS, Sony could easily slip the PSP2 in at $299, highlighting much better graphics and far more functionality.

NeoTechni

31-Oct-2010, 18:35

But it's kind of hard to talk to people who keep insisting that phones have won the handheld gaming war and there's no more market for non-casual games on portables :/

Agreed. Those people just hate gaming...

brain_stew

31-Oct-2010, 21:54

tongue_of_colicab

31-Oct-2010, 23:05

I agree. That is why is said if you want the huge succes you will need more/maybe not need high end graphics. Probably most people bought a psp because of the graphics. But if you want the nintendo succes with not only high hardware sales but also high software sales you need more than graphics. Just look at why nintendo handhelds where always so succesful over the competition. Battery life and games.

Exophase

31-Oct-2010, 23:39

MfA

01-Nov-2010, 07:27

Pushing more polygons just pales in the technological glitz department compared to stereoscopic 3D (which Sony itself is heavily pushing for non mobile markets).

Sony is fucked unless they go 3D, they won't be able to position for a higher end niche without it. More polygons? Nice, but it's still not auto-stereoscopic. A touch pad on the back? Seriously? That's a selling point? I think the touch pad is a direct response to the DS dual display and 3DS auto-stereoscopic display, trying to get more differentiation ... it's also the wrong response.

First and foremost the PSP2 should put the best images on the nicest looking screen, that's their niche ... not gimmicks.

rapso

01-Nov-2010, 10:14

Sony is fucked unless they go 3D, they won't be able to position for a higher end niche without it. More polygons? Nice, but it's still not auto-stereoscopic. A touch pad on the back? Seriously? That's a selling point? I think the touch pad is a direct response to the DS dual display and 3DS auto-stereoscopic display, trying to get more differentiation ... it's also the wrong response.Isn't it always like that with sony? "it does just everything... everything other devices can, but nothing special" and I feel sorry for sony. it's like they have no idea what's fun. I can imagin some high paid manager sitting around the table brainstorming some feature, because they have to, none that has any gamer spirit. And captain obvious has to slap them with a keyboard to make them create a PSP-phone. what was the PSP usp? it plays some awkward media (UMB) and u can't even connect it to your TV so u had to buy the movies twice.

I wonder how many decades it will take Sony to embed some "console" into their TVs. Probably after the next appleTV has an appstore for 5years they might realize it the opportunity they missed yet again.

MfA

01-Nov-2010, 12:16

You're turning my argument around.

I'm arguing that first and foremost they should do everything the other devices can just a little better, at least as far as the non gimmicks is concerned (I personally consider the DS second screen a gimmick, but not the stereoscopic screen on the 3DS). Doing something special is a secondary concern.

That's what you have to do if you want to beat an incumbent with a higher value product, you just can't afford to be objectively worse on something as important as the screen. If they were shooting to undercut Nintendo on pricing they might be able to get away without a stereoscopic display (although they would probably need gimmicks to sell it, such as the bottom touch pad). I seriously doubt they would do that though.

wco81

01-Nov-2010, 15:31

Well Sony sold over 60 million PSP units, its hard to imagine a scenario where the graphics of the system weren't a factor in some of those purchases.

Giving developers direct access to something like a SGX543MP4 should make the system the leader in mobile graphics for a good 3-4 years. Even with the vastly superior hardware, most iOS games still can't compete with PSP titles, so a nice piece of hardware like that should retain that USP for several years and yes, it does matter.

We'll see if Epic changes the economics of iOS gaming but likely not. People can be entertained or stretches of time with 99 cents games just as well as with $40-50 games while they're away from home.

At least that's what iOS games have conditioned some people to expect.

PSP came out with only one competitor, the DS/GBA. Now it's coming out against the 3DS and smart phones.

It's really going to have to knock people's socks off to get a lot of people to pony up over $200 and $50 for games when a lot of those people already paid $200 for smart phones and have a monthly bill of at least $60.

There will be a certain number of people who will spend the extra money. But a lot of people won't bother. They may decide to apply that $200+ towards consoles and console games instead or some other entertainment to complement the diversions they can get on their smart phones.

Sony could target people who don't have smart phones yet. But they'd be passing up ona lucrative, very fast-growing demographic.

rapso

01-Nov-2010, 17:03

...
ok, then we have different opinions. I don't think that doing everything other device do is enough, even if you do it better, because poeple will have a high price tag to pay for something that they kinda already own (e.g. when they have an iphone) but with "slightly more/better".
Being "better" meant in the past to offer better visuals and that was something that really improved the experience, you could have n-times the polycount on PS2 compared to PSX, and while poeple couldn't really understand just the number, they saw some games with way improved gfx and gameplay possibilities (e.g. GTA3).
So "better/faster" was quite an argument, but now that you can play your NFS, CoD... on all mobile platforms, having some more polys, some better shader, higher res screen and input-gimmick-devices that don't change the experience, is kind of just a check-list feeding.

I don't have an NDS, but I really consider to buy a 3DS, just for the sake of the 3d screen (and I hope there will be some homebrew for it).

I agree with you, that the PSP2 should do everything that all other device already do, but that's something mandatory, it's not like a feature that would make me buy it. Even if the PSP2 could play fullHD movies on the display and would have 3 cams pointing in every direction and the whole case would be covered by touch sensitive sensors and running android, it wouldn't be as much of an argument like just offering GT Mobile 2 at launch.

even from a programmer's point of view, I feel less and less excited. It sounds like it would have the usual mobile hardware, maybe more powerful for a year or two than iphones, but that's just a matter of time.

I hope sony has some secret ultimate feature that can compete with the 3DS.

NeoTechni

01-Nov-2010, 23:53

DS isn't successful because of battery life and it isn't successful because of how it attracted third parties, it's successful because of Nintendo branding and the sheer volume of high sellers they produce. You can't repeat that by making hardware decisions, you can only really repeat that by being Nintendo.

Agreed

Pushing more polygons just pales in the technological glitz department compared to stereoscopic 3D (which Sony itself is heavily pushing for non mobile markets).

Sony is fucked unless they go 3D

Agreed

and I feel sorry for sony. it's like they have no idea what's fun

Or you dont.

(UMB)

It helps if you actually learn it's name.
It's like when people ask the phone number for 911.

We'll see if Epic changes the economics of iOS gaming but likely not

The problem is, the better iphone game gaming gets, the worse it gets at being a phone or whatever else you want to use that precious battery life for. When I use the web browser on my ipod touch for example I can watch the battery life go down a percent a minute or so.

I really consider to buy a 3DS, just for the sake of the 3d screen

Agreed, hence why Sony needs it.

even from a programmer's point of view, I feel less and less excited. It sounds like it would have the usual mobile hardware, maybe more powerful for a year or two than iphones, but that's just a matter of time.

As a programmer, PSP2 has me a lot more excited. It will do a lot more for actual gaming being extremely power than 3DS will. Hell, 3DS is slightly weaker than PSP1!

iPhone probably will get more powerful given enough time. But there's that whole race-to-the-bottom pricing effect that developers hate. iPhone users have been trained to go for what, $2 average for games? You can't make Gran Turismo/God of War for $2. If you compare Ace Combat on PSP and iphone, the iphone one is a joke.

Aeoniss

02-Nov-2010, 01:44

How is the 3DS slightly inferior to the PSP1?

Exophase

02-Nov-2010, 02:30

Probably only going off of the rumors that it's 2x 266MHz ARM11 and comparing that straight to 333MHz MIPS. The GPU capabilities are probably better in any useful sense.

NeoTechni

02-Nov-2010, 04:39

Well I was including both 333 MHz processors as well.

That and only 64 MB of RAM/4 MB of VRAM. That's the same amount the slim PSP has.

http://www.edepot.com/reviews_sony_psp.html#PSP_Hardware

Aeoniss

02-Nov-2010, 08:32

Yes, but a slim PSP doesn't actually use all that memory for games.

So the PSP's single 333Mhz core is about equal to the 3DS (rumored) cpu? Jeez..

brain_stew

03-Nov-2010, 16:56

Th only reasonable measure by which a PSP is faster than the 3DS as far as I can see is CPU floating point, and considering the 3DS has quite beefy vertex shader hardware well I don't think its going to mean all that much. Fact is, we have launch 3DS software that absolutely blows away anything produced on the PSP in its entire lifespan, and really, that's what matters in the end.

Newer models of the PSP having an extra 32MB of RAM for UMD caching and web browsing counts for very little if games don't have direct access to it, and they don't.

Teasy

03-Nov-2010, 17:59

We also don't even know the full details of the CPU in 3DS. For instance does it have an L2 cache?, does it have an FPU?, ect. That could make quite a difference to performance (L2 cache especially).

Exophase

03-Nov-2010, 18:38

I'd be mildly shocked if they chose a 266MHz ARM11 that had L2 cache; also would be somewhat surprised if it didn't have an FPU.

wsippel

03-Nov-2010, 19:48

Well I was including both 333 MHz processors as well.

That and only 64 MB of RAM/4 MB of VRAM. That's the same amount the slim PSP has.

http://www.edepot.com/reviews_sony_psp.html#PSP_Hardware
ARM vs. MIPS, dual core vs. single core plus stripped coprocessor, apples vs. oranges. The PSP is also clocked at 222MHz by default. And as was already mentioned, developers only have access to 32MB of those 64MB RAM, and even then, they need to compensate for the slow as molasses mass storage.

Exophase

03-Nov-2010, 20:44

ARM vs. MIPS, dual core vs. single core plus stripped coprocessor, apples vs. oranges. The PSP is also clocked at 222MHz by default. And as was already mentioned, developers only have access to 32MB of those 64MB RAM, and even then, they need to compensate for the slow as molasses mass storage.

Assuming the 2x266MHz ARM11 reveal is correct, we still don't know if user code would be allowed on the second core. It isn't on the DS, afterall (or PSP, which I guess is what you implied by it being "stripped")

PSP having an earlier clocking restriction of 222MHz is irrelevant. Games have been allowed 333MHz for years. If Sony wanted to they could also update the firmware to allow trusted developers access to the second core and RAM used as UMD cache on the 2000+ models, but it's pretty late to try such a thing.

ARM vs MIPS is much less of a relevant comparison than the particular CPU architectures in question, ie ARM11 vs Allegrex. Both are single issue and execute most non-FPU instructions in one cycle, with the major exception being that ARM11 has branch prediction while Allegrex has delayed branches that always imply at least a 1-cycle additional stall (but the mispredict cost on ARM11 is much worse, and its predictor isn't that great). ARM11 also has a worse load-use latency of 2 cycles vs 1 cycle on Allegrex, and has an address generation interlock cycle. In other words, a longer/more complex pipeline and it pays for it. Oh, and I guess the 64-bit interfaces to icache and dcache helps sometimes too.

So while they're indeed different processors they're not exactly in two entirely different classes. IMO, ARM11's strengths are in its higher clock speeds, and unless it has lower power consumption at 266MHz I'd probably sooner go with an ARM9, because I doubt the ARM11 is much faster.

Simon F

04-Nov-2010, 00:38

ARM vs MIPS is much less of a relevant comparison than the particular CPU architectures in question, ie ARM11 vs Allegrex. Both are single issue and execute most non-FPU instructions in one cycle, with the major exception being that ARM11 has branch prediction while Allegrex has delayed branches that always imply at least a 1-cycle additional stall (but the mispredict cost on ARM11 is much worse, and its predictor isn't that great).
It's been a long time since I studied the MIPS architecture, but surely there is, in effect, only a 1-cycle "additional stall" if you don't have a useful instruction to put in the delay slot?

Exophase

04-Nov-2010, 00:45

It's been a long time since I studied the MIPS architecture, but surely there is, in effect, only a 1-cycle "additional stall" if you don't have a useful instruction to put in the delay slot?

Only for the original 5-stage pipeline in the first implementations. Again, MIPS is an instruction set, not a CPU design, which is precisely why mechanisms like delay slots aren't a great idea.

Teasy

04-Nov-2010, 13:35

Assuming the 2x266MHz ARM11 reveal is correct, we still don't know if user code would be allowed on the second core. It isn't on the DS, afterall (or PSP, which I guess is what you implied by it being "stripped")

The second core on the DS has always been a lower clocked cheaper CPU (in comparison to the main gaming CPU), same goes for Wii (Starlet). I'd be suprised if their isn't a lower clocked ARM7/9 in their with both ARM11 cores being used for games.

By the way, by stripped I think he's saying that the second CPU core in PSP isn't identical to the first, but instead a stripped down version. I'm not personally sure how true that is but that's how I read it (I think the second core has no FPU?, but I'm not sure about the specifics).

PSP having an earlier clocking restriction of 222MHz is irrelevant. Games have been allowed 333MHz for years. If Sony wanted to they could also update the firmware to allow trusted developers access to the second core and RAM used as UMD cache on the 2000+ models, but it's pretty late to try such a thing

I suppose they could create games that work in an enhanced mode on the newer models, they won't of course.

wsippel

04-Nov-2010, 13:47

Assuming the 2x266MHz ARM11 reveal is correct, we still don't know if user code would be allowed on the second core. It isn't on the DS, afterall (or PSP, which I guess is what you implied by it being "stripped")
I actually expect the 3DS to use a dual ARM11MPCore which developers have access to, as well as an additional ARM9 core for background tasks like Spotpass and Streetpass.

And the PSP Media Engine is not a full blown second CPU core, no matter if or how it's accessible. The VPU was removed, it has no access to the VRAM, and there's no cache coherency, just to name a few examples.

On the other hand, maybe the rumored 3DS specs are completely wrong. It seems to be proven now that there was, in fact, an early version of the 3DS devkit based on Tegra. Tegra uses ARM11MPCore. After Nintendo switched to DMP, they might have switched to a different CPU as well.

Exophase

04-Nov-2010, 14:57

The second core on the DS has always been a lower clocked cheaper CPU (in comparison to the main gaming CPU), same goes for Wii (Starlet). I'd be suprised if their isn't a lower clocked ARM7/9 in their with both ARM11 cores being used for games.

DS and DSi are the only Nintendo handhelds that have had second processors running auxiliary/interface code for the main game. I'm not familiar with Starlet, but is it programmable or does it just run off of a ROM?

By the way, by stripped I think he's saying that the second CPU core in PSP isn't identical to the first, but instead a stripped down version. I'm not personally sure how true that is but that's how I read it (I think the second core has no FPU?, but I'm not sure about the specifics).

There's no VFPU, but that's sort of moot given that chances are low that either 3DS CPU will have a vector coprocessor. Otherwise, it's the same basic architecture, clock speed, cache size, etc, and has a standard FPU.

I actually expect the 3DS to use a dual ARM11MPCore which developers have access to, as well as an additional ARM9 core for background tasks like Spotpass and Streetpass.

Sure, it's possible, and there are reasons to do it, but right now we just don't know.

And the PSP Media Engine is not a full blown second CPU core, no matter if or how it's accessible. The VPU was removed, it has no access to the VRAM, and there's no cache coherency, just to name a few examples.

None of those things have anything to do with whether or not something is a "full blown" CPU core. You don't know if 3DS will have a VFPU (it probably won't), you don't know if its VRAM will even be directly visible to either CPU much less both, and you don't even know if the L1 cache will be coherent between the two. Or maybe you're saying that it doesn't count because it's not symmetric and therefore you can't blindly issue threads to either agnostically?

On the other hand, maybe the rumored 3DS specs are completely wrong. It seems to be proven now that there was, in fact, an early version of the 3DS devkit based on Tegra. Tegra uses ARM11MPCore. After Nintendo switched to DMP, they might have switched to a different CPU as well.

The rumors were that it's based on Tegra 2, and the only verification we had was that the boards had a "TEG2" designator. Tegra 2 is a dual core Cortex-A9 design.

Simon F

04-Nov-2010, 15:46

Only for the original 5-stage pipeline in the first implementations.
Thanks - as I said it's been many years since I looked at MIPS devices, but I did do quite a bit of development on a TI DSP which had branches with 3 delay slots.

Again, MIPS is an instruction set, not a CPU design, which is precisely why mechanisms like delay slots aren't a great idea.
Initially, I was going to agree with you but, having thought more about it, I can't see that it is a problem to have an ISA that has, say, 1 delay-slot branches. In effect it is equivalent to any non-branch instruction having the option to also branch (based on an earlier instruction).

There is nothing, AFAICS, preventing an actual CPU then also implementing prediction and/or out-of-order instruction execution, and/or predication given sufficient silicon budget. <shrug>

Exophase

04-Nov-2010, 16:33

Thanks - as I said it's been many years since I looked at MIPS devices, but I did do quite a bit of development on a TI DSP which had branches with 3 delay slots.

Yeah, IIRC TI's TMS320C6x series DSPs have an amazing 5 delay slots. Real fun to code an 8-way VLIW like that, you could have dozens of instructions before the branch hits.

Initially, I was going to agree with you but, having thought more about it, I can't see that it is a problem to have an ISA that has, say, 1 delay-slot branches. In effect it is equivalent to any non-branch instruction having the option to also branch (based on an earlier instruction).

There is nothing, AFAICS, preventing an actual CPU then also implementing prediction and/or out-of-order instruction execution, and/or predication given sufficient silicon budget. <shrug>

Delay slots are good when the alternative is an unavoidable cost per branch, but they're not exactly without consequence. If you can't fill them that's a wasted cycle and adds to code size, and a lot of the time they can't be filled. Platforms with annulment like SPARC could potentially avoid this, but it'd be complex to make them behave like anything more than delay slot branches with an implicit NOP placed.

Another annoyance with delay slots is that they make exception handling trickier, for both hardware and software. On SPARC you have to go through a ritual of restoring both the PC and next PC. The C6x is so heavily delay slotted that you pretty much have to turn off interrupts when using code that isn't intentionally heavily crippled to be interrupt safe.

Theoretically it may be possible to perform branch prediction based on the most recent modification to whatever the branch can decide on (usually flags), which would let you get the same sorts of benefits delay slots provide. Of course this requires the ability to not set flags on ALU operations. The only processors I know of that do this are PowerPCs, but there are probably others.

Npl

04-Nov-2010, 17:02

Delay slots are good when the alternative is an unavoidable cost per branch, but they're not exactly without consequence. If you can't fill them that's a wasted cycle and adds to code size, and a lot of the time they can't be filled. Platforms with annulment like SPARC could potentially avoid this, but it'd be complex to make them behave like anything more than delay slot branches with an implicit NOP placed.Anecdotal evidence, but I havent had much problem filling branch delay-slots (MIPS) :lol:
It might be a problem if you want absolute smallest code-size, but otherwise you typically have something usefull to do after unrolling a loop once or fitting a instruction that might be useless in one branch but doesnt do any other harm.

I think its a rather simplistic way of OoO, and has a benefit aslong the implementation isnt faster than the architectural delay slot(s) (unlikely that executing branches will ever have less latency than 1 clockcycle). Even if you have an OoO CPU, there are times where its behind in fetching - so detecting a branch early can help there too.

Another annoyance with delay slots is that they make exception handling trickier, for both hardware and software. On SPARC you have to go through a ritual of restoring both the PC and next PC. The C6x is so heavily delay slotted that you pretty much have to turn off interrupts when using code that isn't intentionally heavily crippled to be interrupt safe.Yeah this is the most annoying issue.

Teasy

04-Nov-2010, 17:21

DS and DSi are the only Nintendo handhelds that have had second processors running auxiliary/interface code for the main game. I'm not familiar with Starlet, but is it programmable or does it just run off of a ROM?

Well GameBoy didn't really have any need for a second processor due to the fact there was no interface outside of the game itself. Ever since Nintendo started creating handhelds/consoles with basic OS's (DS/Wii) they've used a second lower clocked CPU to run them.

Starlet is an ARM9 CPU (243Mhz AFAIK) inside Wii's GPU, I'm no Wii dev so I don't know much about the CPU, but it seems its similar in prupose/use to the second CPU in the DS.

Exophase

04-Nov-2010, 18:35

Well GameBoy didn't really have any need for a second processor due to the fact there was no interface outside of the game itself. Ever since Nintendo started creating handhelds/consoles with basic OS's (DS/Wii) they've used a second lower clocked CPU to run them.

Starlet is an ARM9 CPU (243Mhz AFAIK) inside Wii's GPU, I'm no Wii dev so I don't know much about the CPU, but it seems its similar in prupose/use to the second CPU in the DS.

DS games don't run what I could consider an OS, regardless of Nintendo's terminology. Just some peripheral abstraction libraries. Starlet is more or less the same, although it also does security. I don't know what you mean by interface outside of the game itself, do you mean hardware abstraction?

Probably the biggest reason why DS has an ARM7 is to execute GBA games on. From there it made sense to incorporate it into other aspects of the design. The situation on Wii is kind of in reverse - they use another CPU + glue logic to abstract the new peripherals away from the Broadway chip, so it can work without running code on it in Gamecube mode.

Teasy

04-Nov-2010, 21:02

DS games don't run what I could consider an OS, regardless of Nintendo's terminology. Just some peripheral abstraction libraries. Starlet is more or less the same, although it also does security. I don't know what you mean by interface outside of the game itself, do you mean hardware abstraction?

Probably the biggest reason why DS has an ARM7 is to execute GBA games on. From there it made sense to incorporate it into other aspects of the design. The situation on Wii is kind of in reverse - they use another CPU + glue logic to abstract the new peripherals away from the Broadway chip, so it can work without running code on it in Gamecube mode.

No doubt backwards compatibility was a big reason for it. Just saying that recently Nintendo seems to like using an additional lower clocked CPU in their system designs and I wouldn't be suprised if 3DS includes one. Perhaps a 133Mhz ARM9 for DS backward compatibility, which will also do any other grunt work for the system outside of gaming.

I agree of course that DS's interface isn't really an OS, I did say basic though and that was a big understatement :)

fehu

17-Nov-2010, 21:41

http://www.blogcdn.com/www.engadget.com/media/2010/11/psp2-dev-kit-rumor-rm-eng.jpg

Aeoniss

18-Nov-2010, 07:12

I've heard this isn't the final version, merely a placeholder kit.

Notably that the final release will not have a slider.

Edit: Well I may have misunderstood him so JK for now.

ltcommander.data

19-Jan-2011, 07:22

http://www.engadget.com/2011/01/19/bloomberg-sony-psp2-to-debut-next-week-playstation-phone-at-mw/

Well the wait is supposedly nearly over. Bloomberg is reporting that the PSP2 will be announced next week and the Playstation Phone next month. I'll be interested to see how Sony intends to play them off each other. Will they be cannibalizing each other or does Sony actually expect people to buy both? If the performance and controls are decent in the Playstation Phone will the PSP2 really be necessary for most customers? I guess the only issue is battery life on a gaming phone, but then people may well rather carry a spare battery than a whole other device.

ToTTenTranz

19-Jan-2011, 09:37

tangey

19-Jan-2011, 11:18

One is Sony, the other is Sony Ericsson, which are entirely different companies, and it appears that the platforms are not related in anyway.

The rumoured rear mounted touch controls on the PSP2 would be a differientator.

Its hard to gauge the 3DS 3D effect, in terms of whether the experience is great or just transient. I think doing glassless 3D (and making that the core selling point) is as much a gamble as not doing 3D in many ways. If 3DS 3D works and its generally really well received then PSP2 will have a harder time, the converse is also true.

19-Jan-2011, 11:40

IMHO the PSP2 only needs a larger 3D screen than 3DS and better processing hardware. Neither are really hard to find nowadays. Sharp has been shipping 3.7" 840*480 3D Screens for a while and the rumoured SGX543MP4 should be way faster than PICA200 (not to mention the dual ARM11 266MHz).

But the PSP2 needs to have a 3D screen, or the novelty-halo from the 3DS will certainly take most of the market (and Sony may be spending too much money on a portable console that may never really take off).

I prefer larger screen than having to settle for smaller 3D screen. If we look at the sales of DS XL, there are market for larger size portable gaming.

But yeah, if the 3DS takes off, Sony will be in far second place again.

From what I heard they kept the similar form factor as the current PSP. Not sure about UMD, probably not gonna be in PSP2, so there should be more room for battery and cooling. It'll be interesting never the less.

Shifty Geezer

19-Jan-2011, 12:18

Its hard to gauge the 3DS 3D effect, in terms of whether the experience is great or just transient.Does't matter if it's enough of a novelty for people to buy. If the only handheld with 3D photography, it'll garner enough attention from that alone to swing sales in its favour. Considering Sony's 3D push, they'd be insane not to incorporate 3D in PSP2 and integrate it into their Sony 3d environment of TVs, portable, and PS3, allowing 3D capture on PSP2 and playback on PS3 which recently got a 3D photo browser update. given the backside touchpad, they won't have the issues of 3D + touchscreen that make touch and 3D a supposedly non-ideal mix.

To me 3D on PSP2 seems an essential if Sony aren't going to miss out once again on the Big Thing. Which also to me means PSP2 won't feature a 3D screen!

If actually going the 3D route though, are there any mobile chips that are specifying any hardware 3D optimisation techniques, or is it all too early and left to developers to work out their own solutions? At least PSP2 should have programmability advantages to enable suitable cheats as needed, where DS would be stuck with full rendering both cameras as I understand it.

tangey

19-Jan-2011, 14:01

Does't matter if it's enough of a novelty for people to buy. If the only handheld with 3D photography, it'll garner enough attention from that alone to swing sales in its favour.

I understand what you are saying, but given that there is at least 6 months between 3DS and PSP2 launches (if there is any truth in the rumours), then if the 3DS "experience" is not a lasting one, or there are visual difficulties, or whatever issues the 3D might bring up,that realisation will be apparent just as the PSP2 is launching to the benefit of the PSP2 , and if there are no issues, then PSP2 without 3D is launching "old tech", to its detriment.

Arwin

19-Jan-2011, 16:29

I also think it is pretty difficult to tell at this point whether or not the PSP2 will feature 3D to be honest. The touch screen on the back gives me the impression that it might, but otherwise no idea and it is anyone's guess. I'm not even sure what I'd want personally. I think I would like to have 3D on it personally, and if they can find a way to output 3D from the PS3 onto that as well that could be a nice bonus.

As using the original PSP for watching TV shows was really great (in fact, the PSP is still my device of choice for this purpose, and the fact that I can lock the controls without locking the screen so my son can watch something on it without accidentally cancelling it is a huge bonus - I miss this on the iPhone), I think I could definitely appreciate being able to see 3D movies and such on the PSP2.

The question is what the sacrifice would be - what if a non-3D screen would look waaaay better for 2D content and you could get an awesome high-res oled display or whatever instead? Would it be s worthwhile trade-off in favor of supporting 3D?

wco81

19-Jan-2011, 16:48

If 3DS is $250 as announced, what is the PSP2 pricing going to be?

Latest smart phones are $200 upfront. Of course, it comes with an expensive contract, at least in the US. But if people are going to pay for mobile service, then it's kind of a sunk cost anyways.

This year the competition in the tablet space will heat up and 7-inch tablets from mainstream manufacturers may trend downwards towards the expected PSP2 price band ($200-300).

Of course PSP2 will outperform any other mobile device at launch so a number of people may be willing to pay a premium (though probably a smaller number than the number who bought the PSP at launch, given all the smart phone competition).

But in a year or two after the PSP2 platform has been locked, other mobile devices may match or exceed PSP2 performance.

ToTTenTranz

19-Jan-2011, 16:53

The question is what the sacrifice would be - what if a non-3D screen would look waaaay better for 2D content and you could get an awesome high-res oled display or whatever instead? Would it be s worthwhile trade-off in favor of supporting 3D?

IMHO, for market success in 2011 -> 2018(?), mediocre 3D >> superb 2D.

We're probably talking about a market of ~95% 3D games and maybe some 5% 2D vectorized games here. Picture quality won't be as important as the auto-stereoscopic 3D gimmick.

Of course, a minimum standard must be met (too much ghosting could hamper the device's popularity, as it did with PSP-1000), but viewing angles and color reproduction shouldn't be decisive factors with a game-oriented device.

Shifty Geezer

20-Jan-2011, 11:41

I understand what you are saying, but given that there is at least 6 months between 3DS and PSP2 launches (if there is any truth in the rumours), then if the 3DS "experience" is not a lasting one, or there are visual difficulties, or whatever issues the 3D might bring up,that realisation will be apparent just as the PSP2 is launching to the benefit of the PSP2 , and if there are no issues, then PSP2 without 3D is launching "old tech", to its detriment.There can't be too many visual difficulties as we have other 3D screens out and about. Glasses based solutions don't go down well, but 3DS reviews are generally positive about the 3D experience. 3D may add nothing to the experience - I felt I preferred Pixar's Up! in 2D over 3D - but it'll be the chief selling point. How could you launch a new handheld without an outdated (even if perfectly functional) screen type, and keep that for 5 years as the world around you goes 3D? Too much of a gamble. If 3D sucks, it can be disabled on a 3D screen, but if you don't have a 3D screen, you can't add 3D support. Hedging one's bets, I'd stick in 3D, jumping on the bandwagon (a bandwagon Sony is producing itself!) and making sure I'd not get left behind.

Shifty Geezer

20-Jan-2011, 11:45

But in a year or two after the PSP2 platform has been locked, other mobile devices may match or exceed PSP2 performance.That doesn't matter if the software library, something unique to handhelds, is strong enough. PS3 is still selling despite PC hardware eclipsing it because you can't get it's game experience on better hardware. DS is still selling despite being eclipsed by every other mobile device out there, but there's nowhere else to play Layton and DQ and Nintendogs. A new mobile phone 3 years of PSP2 could be faster, and could have a GT clone and a LBP clone and whatever, but it won't have those titles which is what gamers are looking for.

The hardware is most important at launch as it defines the future capabilities of the platform, but as the platform gets older it's the software that sustains it. This is different to mobiles where hardware is everything because the software is the same between devices and targeted, I presume, at lowest common denominators during development such that the latest, greatest mobile won't necessarily be able to outperform in software what a 2-3 year old handheld can do.

ToTTenTranz

20-Jan-2011, 12:04

That doesn't matter if the software library, something unique to handhelds, is strong enough. PS3 is still selling despite PC hardware eclipsing it because you can't get it's game experience on better hardware. DS is still selling despite being eclipsed by every other mobile device out there, but there's nowhere else to play Layton and DQ and Nintendogs. A new mobile phone 3 years of PSP2 could be faster, and could have a GT clone and a LBP clone and whatever, but it won't have those titles which is what gamers are looking for.

The hardware is most important at launch as it defines the future capabilities of the platform, but as the platform gets older it's the software that sustains it. This is different to mobiles where hardware is everything because the software is the same between devices and targeted, I presume, at lowest common denominators during development such that the latest, greatest mobile won't necessarily be able to outperform in software what a 2-3 year old handheld can do.

IMHO during 201x, 3D won't be an optional feature, it'll quickly become a standard feature (like wifi and touchscreens nowadays) for mid to high-end portable devices.

The PSP2 lacking a 3D will sever its ties to a feature that will most likely define the decade, or at least the next 5 years.