IBM will provide its PowerPC microprocessor technology and is expected to combine several other chips into one or two core chips for the next Xbox. This would most likely include graphics chip technology from ATI Technologies of Canada, which in August won the contract from Nvidia, of the US.
I feel all gooshy! When the MS/ATi-IP deal was announced, I thought it would be good for them to grab IBM to fab the chip over TSMC, as they could lean on IBM's innovations over, say, TSMC's, and figure that if they had IBM designing the processor as well they could benefit all over the board by letting their engineers get the innards all working towards more efficiency. They could do the same with Intel, only I figured they might not enjoy the low price/performance ratio Intel chips tend to give off, and I figured IBM would be more capable working the with higher-end GPU tech. (But hey, Intel seems to be working with ATi with the Longhorn age in mind as well. Hehe...)
On the prospect of a Fall 2004 launch, though, I don't discount anything, but I think that would be COMPLETE insanity! First off, it doesn't give nearly enough time to the IBM engineers as they'd want to coordinate the system, and a three-year full console generation in particular just seems loony. I also can't IMAGINE how they'd get a 2004 system using completely opposite architecture (ATi over nVidia, IBM over Intel) to play current Xbox games, which means either the DITCH backwards-compatability (which is painful enough but would be compounded by a very short initial lifespan) or stick their current hardware in as well. (Turning it into an even more hideous money sink, or forcing the consumers to blow extra money to basically buy an Xbox.) And if CELL lives up to even 1/4 of what people theorize, it would easily trump a rush-job of THIS year's hardware. R500 in ANY form is showing up in Q4 2004 as an OPTIMUM situation, and likely in extreme high end first with mainstream cards to follow a few months after, but the Xbox wants to launch at the same time...?
To support a volume launch, MS would have to be making the units NOW, not signing contracts.
MS may WANT to beat Sony to market, but I can't even remotely see them doing that with the Xbox2 unless they produce a real shithole, or the PS3 gets very delayed. (Maybe both.
) On the whole, I imagine MS wants to go into this very much prepared, and unless they, IBM, and ATi have make totally mature designs ALREADY, that just isn't going to happen until they give them time. Plenty of time. Heck, unless MS has been spending a lot of time and effort to program new libraries and support DirectX on the PowerPC already, they need a ton of time themselves. The Xbox is a nice machine, but I'm sure there are still many things they wish they could have spent more time on that got sacrificed in the rush-job.
Basically, either these companies have pulled off the product-secrecy coup of ALL TIME (at which point I will bow down in worship and even Steve Jobs will be forced to give a standing ovation), or we are talking about the same timetables as always. Myself, I assume they're planning on a first-half 2006 launch and are assuming Sony won't be able to meet their proposed timetables so they'll launch head-to-head. Still might rush some things, but it would be a much more mature and coordinated design, they would be able to afford putting better components in, and developers would actually have time to DEVELOP games! Hehe...
Two additional personal points of pondering, though... Who else thinks MS wanted to work with IBM also to lean on their networking skills and abilities to combine with Microsoft's own to push the online specturm? And thinking about it... Are we getting DirectX on the PowerPC...? What might this imply for the future of Mac gaming?
