nVidia building the PS3 GPU in its "entirety"

[DeanoC]

in this coming cycle, process technology and the massive amount of R&D behind PS3 is probably going to show us a more pronounced difference between PC and console.

What like the billion dollars NVIDIA have spend in RnD in the last 5 years (Some of which will help PS3 of course).

Sony have outspent the combined RnD budgets of MS, Intel, AMD, ATI, etc?

Sorry but lots of money gets spend on research in PC land. Its just spread out among N companys.

 

[Vince]

Sorry but lots of money gets spend on research in PC land. Its just spread out among N companys.

Which is exactly his point, N companies aren't responcible for a single IC or a single system. I don't think it's to much of a stretch to see that investment into Sony's single device/architecture outstrips the others significantly.

 

[Megadrive1988]

I have no doubt the PC will be around as will PC gaming, in 5 years. it just might shrink a bit more though, as the console industry grows ever larger.


what I am hoping for though, is a competitive computing (not console) platform based on Cell, maybe based on modified PS3 components, seperate from Mac, that competes with Wintel & Winamd PCs

Cell based workstations. Cell based desktop computers. maybe that will replace Mac. or maybe not. but regardless, something that competes with PCs, something that is upgradable every 2 years or so. less often than PCs but more often than console.

something along the lines of Commodore AMIGA in the USA & Europe or Sharp X680X0 and Fujitsu FM Towns in Japan. these computing/gaming platforms were superior in almost every aspect to PCs of their time. I'd like to see something modern, based on CELL, or even some other architecture if not CELL. something that addresses the weakness of PCs.
yet also has its strengths. something that also takes from the best of the console industry (fixed or semi-fixed platform)..

 

[Dave Baumann]

Well, according to what you've stated it can be a fundimental difference in computing directions. I do believe you previously stated:

I said that hardware designed to a specific task can be more effective than generalised hardware (something that has been a common theme). In the case of bus both are looking at addressing fairly common needs of making high bandwidth upstream and downsteam interfaces.

I do question your last comment though, lets wait 3 months and revisit it. Graphic vendors control the 3D specific IP, which is why they're sought, but they don't have the bleeding-edge process technology and ability to manufacture the parts which is what will ultimately bound preformance in todays world which is increasingly computation and bandwith bound.

The will generally aquire soon after if they don't have it immediately. ATI have 90nm silicon running inhouse now and I suspect they will have 80nm next year and 65 in 2006 - even if they aren't on the same process at the point in time the console vendors (actually, specifically Sony in this case), they will not be that far behind.

A PC today is a CPU + GPU. The FLOPs come from the GPU on a PC not the CPU.

How much does it cost?

Actual ASIC cost for a highend graphics processor is in the order of $150 (with revenues for the IHV), the rest of it is board BOM and vendor profits.

The PC industry has given them the freedom to innvovate, something that wouldn't be possible along in the consumer industry

What kind of Pravda is this ?

Unless you are looking at a different industry than I am I would say it’s a simple truth. With the demise of SGI, and others like them, the PC vendors are becoming, if not already are, the single most prolific driving force in 3D – they are the only force in the PC space, they are the pixel generators for the entire next generation console industry, they are rapidly increasing their presence in the mobile phone company, PC’s with ATI/NVIDIA hardware are becoming more frequent in arcade environments, ATI and NVIDIA hardware are used by high end rendering / visualisation / simulation companies, they are used more frequently in television and film companies and they are increasingly becoming more important in the off-line rendering processes. The only way they have achieved this is by generating the $1-2Billion (and increasing) revenues from the PC market – it simply didn’t happen from the consumer space and now the consumer space is increasingly turning to them.

The PC sector with its focus on backward-compatibility with previous architectures and the other components which the GPU interacts with, with a dominant API that proceeds out of the complete control of the hardware vendors (MS seems to switch, every once in a while, who its favorite IHV is and this is seen in the DirectX evolution and which IHV influenced it and the other adapting and trying to beat the competition at their own game)...

Again, MS don’t, and can’t just stamp their authority on things – this is generated from the directions all the vendors are looking towards anyway; that’s why MS have talked about DX Next for the past two years but only recently finalised on Rev 1.0 of the specification.

Also, in PCs high-end parts which is where you expect performance and new features to appear ship in very limited quanities and developers, who cater to the lowest common denominator, will not take full advantage of what these architecture expose for a good while (in most cases).

ATI sold 4 Million 9700’s alone, that’s before we look at the countless millions of 9800’s on top of that – it is actually a bit of a fallacy. Many titles are constrained more by the performance of current console on a wide variety of graphics cards; the $70 board that NVIDIA have just released has a roughly equivalent rendering power as the Xbox.

 

[Vince]

I said that hardware designed to a specific task can be more effective than generalised hardware (something that has been a common theme). In the case of bus both are looking at addressing fairly common needs of making high bandwidth upstream and downsteam interfaces.

Uh, reread the conversation.

I do question your last comment though, lets wait 3 months and revisit it. Graphic vendors control the 3D specific IP, which is why they're sought, but they don't have the bleeding-edge process technology and ability to manufacture the parts which is what will ultimately bound preformance in todays world which is increasingly computation and bandwith bound.

The will generally aquire soon after if they don't have it immediately. ATI have 90nm silicon running inhouse now and I suspect they will have 80nm next year and 65 in 2006 - even if they aren't on the same process at the point in time the console vendors (actually, specifically Sony in this case), they will not be that far behind.

Sony had 90nm shipping last fall, they have a bleeding-edge 90nm SoC shipping in Japan and from what I've heard have recieved back 65nm SOI samples which are running in house. I suspect their announcement of 45nm was correct and we can expect that in 2006.

And their far enough behind to fuck them due to the [fixed] launch window. This isn't going to be close, but think as you wish. Things are inevitable at this point.

PS. The PC marketplace isn't driving 3D, the userbase of high-end accelerators isn't expanding at a rate that's even close to Consoles. 4M 9700's compared with 75M PS2s -- that countless millions better be alot. Lets cut the shit, the PC isn't the future for the 3D firms... Jen-Hsun just said as much in his conference when he stated they'e targeting the high-volume markets on their quest to be be a 5-10 billion dollar company.

 

[Megadrive1988]

DaveBaumann wrote:

With the demise of SGI, and others like them, the PC vendors are becoming, if not already are, the single most prolific driving force in 3D – they are the only force in the PC space, they are the pixel generators for the entire next generation console industry, they are rapidly increasing their presence in the mobile phone company, PC’s with ATI/NVIDIA hardware are becoming more frequent in arcade environments, ATI and NVIDIA hardware are used by high end rendering / visualisation / simulation companies, they are used more frequently in television and film companies and they are increasingly becoming more important in the off-line rendering processes. The only way they have achieved this is by generating the $1-2Billion (and increasing) revenues from the PC market – it simply didn’t happen from the consumer space and now the consumer space is increasingly turning to them.

I find no fault with these statements, generally speakng.


Vince wrote:

Sony had 90nm shipping last fall, they have a bleeding-edge 90nm SoC shipping in Japan and from what I've heard have recieved back 65nm SOI samples which are running in house. I suspect their announcement of 45nm was correct and we can expect that in 2006.

btw Vince, what are the chances that PS3 will launch on 45 nm since you mentioned 2006 ?

 

[Vince]

None, people underestimated the PS3 timetable.

 

[one]

Unless you are looking at a different industry than I am I would say it’s a simple truth. With the demise of SGI, and others like them, the PC vendors are becoming, if not already are, the single most prolific driving force in 3D – they are the only force in the PC space, they are the pixel generators for the entire next generation console industry, they are rapidly increasing their presence in the mobile phone company, PC’s with ATI/NVIDIA hardware are becoming more frequent in arcade environments, ATI and NVIDIA hardware are used by high end rendering / visualisation / simulation companies, they are used more frequently in television and film companies and they are increasingly becoming more important in the off-line rendering processes. The only way they have achieved this is by generating the $1-2Billion (and increasing) revenues from the PC market – it simply didn’t happen from the consumer space and now the consumer space is increasingly turning to them.

So they became the today's form by M&A. Buying talents from SGI and other failed companies. Just like Microsoft buying their way. It's just market economy at work. Once they have become such form, they try to become something much more than a PC component provider. Are they still the champions of the PC architecture? When this discussion started, 'x86-centric' was mentioned, and I supposed it mainly suggested Wintel rather than component vendors. Is it correct?

 

[Jov]

Take a look at major IHVs roadmaps. You'll probably have at least dual-core solutions in desktop PCs before the first next-gen console hits retail. SMP with special interconnection schemes has been a common sight in workstation/server markets for years.

True, SMP has been around for years, but its also have not taken off compared to upping the GHz of the x86. It remained in the mid to high-end servers where price is 2nd to performance.

Now Chip and Server vendors are pushing massive multicore on a chip, or system on chip solutions as pushing the Hz is more costly for the value returned. Why just go faster when you can go wider, large [load], smarter, etc?

Cell is in the same shift in paradigm, where you're not just relying on a fat CPU, but instead simpler, but faster units to share the load in a distributed environment. SMP is still poor in distribution of [granular] load as the work units are too heavy/large per core.

You can say Cell and Sun Niagara are evolutions of SMP, but the revolution is bringing these solutions to a cost effect level where it can be use where x86 implementations are norm. That said software will be the key for their success as it’s always been the case.

 

[Dave Baumann]

Sony had 90nm shipping last fall, they have a bleeding-edge 90nm SoC shipping in Japan and from what I've heard have recieved back 65nm SOI samples which are running in house. I suspect their announcement of 45nm was correct and we can expect that in 2006.

And a year’s difference isn’t that great when you look at the lifecycle of the consoles.

PS. The PC marketplace isn't driving 3D, the userbase of high-end accelerators isn't expanding at a rate that's even close to Consoles. 4M 9700's compared with 75M PS2s -- that countless millions better be alot. Lets cut the shit, the PC isn't the future for the 3D firms... Jen-Hsun just said as much in his conference when he stated they'e targeting the high-volume markets on their quest to be be a 5-10 billion dollar company.

Both ATI and NVIDIA are itching to get into consumer land more and more because that’s the lucrative end of the market, but the simple fact is that it’s the PC market that has enabled them to develop and innovate to such a point that their offerings are attractive to even those that could produce consumer 3D graphics before. Realistically, with the fixed time spans for consoles, it will still be the PC market that is the major driver for constant change and development because that market will demand better graphics when it is cost effective to produce it; the only other market that will have a similar rate of change for the time being will be the handheld mobile/phone market, but this is low end revenues comparatively and that can’t afford a rate of development (and they’ll mainly just be retracing the steps that already have with PC graphics for the past several years).

 

[Panajev2001a]

The PC model tends also to prefer ease of implementation and ease of backward-compatibility to performance (compatibility in general takes a front-seat compared to performance) as indicated once again by the industry as they chose the slowest of the three standards proposed for PCI-Express 2.0 (5.0 Gbps).

What makes sense from a performance/cost standpoint is adopted. That is what Dave already pointed out ("And, no, its not "finally" PCI Express, its "currently" PCI Express."). There is currently little need for a (imaginary) 100Gbps bus architecture.

What makes sense for "who" ?

It is a big body that decided the new specs and there is more than a couple of vendors who are not happy about the decisions (including nVIDIA which was pushing for faster PCI-Express 2.0 speeds than 5.0 Gbps as they want to get ready for 10 Gbps Ethernet and new SCSI and SATA speeds).

So, since you'll now getl a PS3 with a GPU that is designed from the ground up to solve a spefic problem without any need to adhere to an all-purpose ISA such as Cell, you should be a happy camper *takes cover*

I'll get a GPU whose designed to fit in the CELL platform and not to be compatible with every fricking PC hardware, tons of different motherboards, etc...

Closed environments like consoles do have their advantages: as I said, if the manufacturing vollume is good enough (and in the case of all three next-generation consoles I think it will be) then PC vendors can take risks and push in volume parts that will take longer to arrive and be utilized in the PC market (when they approach the common denominator staus in terms of performance and features more). PRogramming-wise, you have to worry about different hardwares compatibility less and can push the target platform more.

 

[darkblu]

The PC industry has given them the freedom to innvovate, something that wouldn't be possible along in the consumer industry

What kind of Pravda is this ?

<snip>

ok, apparently there are two mindsets expressed here:

people of the first mindset think PC industry (a synergism for both its hw and sw) is thriving and flourishing, and all other consumer computing sectors can only hope to be like the PC sector. they have their resons for that.

people of the other mindset, in contrast, see the PC industry as a well-entranched behemoth, hardly providing any innovation, and hence falling badly behind the price/performance curve of the day. which may not be necessarily bad for those few entrenched PC IHV/ISV's, but is clearly bad for both the consumer and any (small) innovative players on the market.

and the reason i'm saying this is not to beat a dead horse, but rather to hint at the prospect that the dead horse' beating won't stop any time soon, pardon any possible lack of eloquence on my side.

 

[V3]

The next gneration game console will consist of 2 devices that Sony has talked about. One of them is the Cell microprocessor....the second device that will be a companion device to it is the graphics processor and the graphics processor will also be the image processor and there's all kinds of exciting features that will(?) come out. It's based on the next gneration GPU technology and our expectation is to try and put it into production this year. Our next generation GPU has been in development for quite some time as you'd imagine and is something that's near completion.

After finally listening to JH, at this point my thinking is that NV GPU will be integrated into Cell. So I won't be suprised if that's what happend. Who knows it might be on a single chip too.

Like this: 64b Power - Synergistic Processors - NV GPU on one chip.

 

[Vince]

Sony had 90nm shipping last fall, they have a bleeding-edge 90nm SoC shipping in Japan and from what I've heard have recieved back 65nm SOI samples which are running in house. I suspect their announcement of 45nm was correct and we can expect that in 2006.

And a year’s difference isn’t that great when you look at the lifecycle of the consoles.

Are you serious in alot of your responces? A years worth of difference (one lithography generation) in launch window is equivalent to an economically sustainable 2X increase in logic budget for the 5 year fixed cycle over the competition. It's HUGE.

PS. Say whatever you want about the PC as a platform, defend it for some bizzare reason with arguments about what it's done yesterday, the proof is in the numbers and where they money is tomorrow.

PPS. It was quite elequent darkblu.

 

[Qroach]

Are you serious in alot of your responces? A year difference in launch window is equivalent to an economically sustainable 2X increase in logic budget for a 5 year fixed cycle over the competition.

We'll all see if that matters to any of the consumers. Unless they can see a drastic difference in the end result, a 2 times budget in logic won't equate to anything a customer will care about. Even if I doubt it will be 2 times.

 

[V3]

Even if I doubt it will be 2 times.

It has to be anyway, if not how in the world ATI gonna expect MS to manufacture that graphic chip for Xbox 2 ?

 

[Qroach]

ATI isn't manufacturing the graphics chip for X2.

 

[V3]

ATI isn't manufacturing the graphics chip for X2.

That beside the point and you know it.

 

[Jov]

2.3x the current top-of-the-line due to current fabbing and process size, but when fabbing at 65nm/SOI/Lo-K/etc... they might have more room to up the GHz.

If the Cell BE ~ 4.6+ GHz, then the GPU will likely be 1/4 (worst) ~ 1/2 (best) that speed.

So your telling me they are going to go from 400mhz to possible 2.3 ghz while making the gpu even bigger than it currently is all the while going from a drop of 110nm to 65nm .

Find it hard to believe.

Did anyone expect Cell to be 4.6+GHz? Especially given the top G5 [PPC] is only 2.5GHz.

 

[Qroach]

hmmm I guess there's a reason people "in the know" on the hardware can't stand comments like that. Anyway...