PS Business Briefing 2006 March official info

[hey69]

(I'm sure everyone has at least 3 lower-capacity 2.5" HDDs around there home...),

you are joking right ? a 3.5inch harddrive i can understand but a laptop harddrive?

 

[pipo]

Unlike with Xbox Live, licensees will be able to connect their own game servers to the PSNP.

I'm pretty sure MS opened up ages ago. It was one of the things EA required.

Also, by the looks of Sony's sheets (FWIW) it looks like it will be a step down in terms of 'always online'. But it's a bit shady, like the HDD.

Edit - sheets: http://www.beyond3d.com/forum/showpost.php?p=719324&postcount=255

Note remark: 'All functions available for online titles' - sounds like the old Live implementation

 

[Shifty Geezer]

you are joking right ?

Yes I don't think those old 2-8 GB 3.5" HDDs that we do all have lying around would be very useful though.

 

[V3]

you are joking right ? a 3.5inch harddrive i can understand but a laptop harddrive?

Don't you have unuse laptop lying around that you can salvage the HDD ?

 

[V3]

Would that get rid of that 128-bit bus bottleneck? Or does replacing the GDDR-3 with XDRAM imply they'd had to use a wider bus?

I doubt they decided to ditch GDDR3, but its possible. Going all XDR just make more sense from production stand point. It will reduce cost in the long run, and its good that your supply is not tied to popular memory type like GDDR3, which used in PC and X360.

Performance wise, 128 bit XDR would probably offer higher bandwidth than GDDR3.

 

[Titanio]

Kutaragi says the backward compatibility solution is very expensive for them but they are commited to do it.

Gamespot's translation of his comments seems to suggest a more hardware-centric solution, also:

"the PS3 will feature backwards compatibility with PS and PS2 games from day one."

"I'm emphasizing this because, from what I hear, there are some platforms that haven't been able to completely do this," he said. "It's costly in terms of hardware, but we'd rather [invest] firmly on compatibility from the beginning, rather than to have issues later on."

There are some other interesting comments in that article, if anyone missed it:

http://www.gamespot.com/news/6146007.html

They also mention, interestingly, that PS3 will be able to transpose its screen onto PSP over wifi or USB, and vice versa. Which might open up the possibility of playing back UMD movies on your TV, or even playing PSP games on your TV (if the LAN lag was tolerable?)?

I know that, now explain to me the part where Kutaragi was being coherent. I think I missed it...

Connectivity to the network brings a realtime element to games. It brings a "live" sense to games ("Xbox Live" is so named for similar reasons), interacting with others and and a world that persists whether you're there or not. Hence the fourth dimension, time.

Also, regarding Klee's mention of the RAM upgrade, I don't see that mentioned anywhere else. I also don't think Klee is currently working in the industry, so he's not really an "insider" as such.

 

[nintenho]

Connectivity to the network brings a realtime element to games. It brings a "live" sense to games ("Xbox Live" is so named for similar reasons), interacting with others and and a world that persists whether you're there or not. Hence the fourth dimension, time.

People can be subtle about coherency, buy words can't. It seems like Kutaragi is just sesationalizing what mmo games are like. They aren't for everybody and especially not for gamers who aren't willing to be serious about it and dedicate the time. There's also the challenge of making games include this in them somehow. Also, the developers have to then worry about servers and network code and whatever else is required to make this possible.

 

[Gubbi]

and its good that your supply is not tied to popular memory type like GDDR3, which used in PC and X360.

Yeah, we don't want economies of scale and multiple suppliers to drive down cost, do we ?

Cheers

 

[Titanio]

People can be subtle about coherency, buy words can't. It seems like Kutaragi is just sesationalizing what mmo games are like. They aren't for everybody and especially not for gamers who aren't willing to be serious about it and dedicate the time. There's also the challenge of making games include this in them somehow. Also, the developers have to then worry about servers and network code and whatever else is required to make this possible.

nintenho, no offense, but you just seem to be getting on Kutaragi's wick for no reason at all. What he's talking about here is nothing crazy or nothing new - he's basically just talking about online gaming, and how it changes the concept of time in a game from one that is local to that game, to one that is consistent with the real world. It's not a major deal, games have done this for quite a while. Kutaragi's visions of where that'll eventually go might be more pie-in-the-sky than some others, but the immediately realisable goal of simply networked gaming is nothing new or off the wall.

 

[nintenho]

nintenho, no offense, but you just seem to be getting on Kutaragi's wick for no reason at all. What he's talking about here is nothing crazy or nothing new - he's basically just talking about online gaming, and how it changes the concept of time in a game from one that is local to that game, to one that is consistent with the real world. It's not a major deal, games have done this for quite a while. Kutaragi's visions of where that'll eventually go might be more pie-in-the-sky than some others, but the immediately realisable goal of simply networked gaming is nothing new or off the wall.

Well, if I sound paranoid it's because the guy always pulls everybodys leg. I remember him saying things like that the PS3 is 1,000 times more powerful then the PS2......that would have been actually kind of funny if it wasn't for the IBM guys next to him when he told the reporters that shaking their heads in disgust. He's just a real stooge..........

.........yeah, huh?

Edit: For the record, somebody gave me negative rep for this post saying that I was making things up. I honestly thought that that everything I said was Sony's plan. Like, a bunch of their games having an online functionality. Am I too clueless or just too graceless? Either way I'm pissed....

 

[V3]

Yeah, we don't want economies of scale and multiple suppliers to drive down cost, do we ?

Cheers

Using half XDR and half GDDR3 ? Economic of scale would be easier with all XDR or all GDDR3. Beside with 1 million/month production, economic of scale is already achieved.

There are multiple suppliers for XDR too.

For Playstation business, supply is easier to control compare to demand for components.

 

[Titanio]

Well, if I sound paranoid it's because the guy always pulls everybodys leg. I remember him saying things like that the PS3 is 1,000 times more powerful then the PS2......that would have been actually kind of funny if it wasn't for the IBM guys next to him when he told the reporters that shaking their heads in disgust. He's just a real stooge..........










.........yeah, huh?

no, huh. Nobody at IBM was "shaking their heads in disgust" at Kutaragi, I can assure you that much. The whole "PS3 is 1000x PS2" was a goal, pretty obviously given that it was mentioned as far back as 2001. I remember Sony's CTO at the time even prefacing that comment, saying "we have this pretty crazy goal" - but of course most outlets didn't report that. If we wanted to get really picky about it, though, I'm sure code could be written for PS3 that might run at 60fps, which if you tried to run on PS2 unchanged, might run at a tiny fraction of that..like, say, 0.06fps).

Anyway, we're getting off track. Stop over analysing everything Kutaragi says, he has a visionary outlook on most things, and thusfar it's been far more of an asset to his business than a liability. I'm glad someone's still dreaming.

 

[liolio]

i agree it's nice to see a guy who still dream, but i think lots of devs are pasionated by their work and dream for what they will be able to do.
Anyway i don't like too much guy who plays with others dreams...
KK is good at communication, nice for an ingenier so ...

 

[nintenho]

no, huh. Nobody at IBM was "shaking their heads in disgust" at Kutaragi, I can assure you that much. The whole "PS3 is 1000x PS2" was a goal, pretty obviously given that it was mentioned as far back as 2001. I remember Sony's CTO at the time even prefacing that comment, saying "we have this pretty crazy goal" - but of course most outlets didn't report that. If we wanted to get really picky about it, though, I'm sure code could be written for PS3 that might run at 60fps, which if you tried to run on PS2 unchanged, might run at a tiny fraction of that..like, say, 0.06fps).

Anyway, we're getting off track. Stop over analysing everything Kutaragi says, he has a visionary outlook on most things, and thusfar it's been far more of an asset to his business than a liability. I'm glad someone's still dreaming.

I'm not overanalysing what he says. 1,000 is a number, right? I expect the PS3 to only be around 30-35 times more powerful then the PS2. Why would I care if PS3 can add double digit numbers 1,000 times faster when the real-world performance for a game is probably going to be about 3% of what he leads people to believe? In conclusion......


........hot topic is not punk rock...........m'kay?

 

[Titanio]

I'm not overanalysing what he says. 1,000 is a number, right? I expect the PS3 to only be around 30-35 times more powerful then the PS2.

The CPU is on paper 35x more powerful in floating point. In real terms I'd expect it to be more powerful than that in some tasks, even (in the same way we've seen Cell outperform much more robust CPU's than PS2's by a greater margin than just its FP performance would suggest). Add in the GPU..

real-world performance for a game is probably going to be about 3% of what he leads people to believe?

You think real-world performance will be 3% of peak?

This is where I stop engaging you in conversation, I'm sorry to say Good luck!

 

[London Geezer]

Nintendwhore,
You're kinda missing the point here.

I'm sure there should be lots and lots of situations where a PS3 application runs at 60fps but only .01fps on a PS2 - if it could run at all. Lots of bump mapping, lots of polygons, crazy physics and animation, higher resolution... All these things add up.
Of course 1000 is just a number, and it was just a goal, nothing more nothing less.

 

[liolio]

i agree with titanio, the gpu alone use a fucking efficient architecture (i believe slightly tweak 7600/7900 but not really the point ), the ppe alone should very efficient (console devs only know in order cpu...)
Yes, SPE will take time to really take avantage.
3% is bashing IBM, Sony, Toshiba ingeniers fuckin' hard lol.
Nintenho your a tought guy

 

[Phil]

"a number without a context/meaning attached to it, is meaningless"

Can we please drop this silly overanalysis now?

 

[nintenho]

You think real-world performance will be 3% of peak?

This is where I stop engaging you in conversation, I'm sorry to say Good luck!

-_-
it's the best way I could think of mentioning that 30-35 times means 3% of 1,000.

I'll shut up now, I have -7 reputation points (from a previous whole 3!) due to the things I said in this thread.

 

[rabidrabbit]

Is 4D now the new Emotion Engine?
Should I be disappointed if PS3 does not take me to the 4th dimension, just as I was sad because PS2 did not make me love in the mornings.