PS3 hypotheticals thread

[archangelmorph]

Yes but by all acounts the ps3 wont have a 90m unit lead over the other consoles like the ps2 had. Actually it will fall further behind than even the ps1 . Some estimates put it at only 20-30m over microsoft. Which means they would have lost 2/3rds their lead over ms in a single generation .

We still don't know if bluray will take off and replace dvd either. Its only beaten hd dvd , the sleeping giant is still kinda napping waiting for bluray to start pecking at its heels

Yes but that's a battle that it would only take time & increasing HDTV penetration to fight comfortably.. Sure DD might start to come in as a new contender in the short term but there's clearly a long way to go for network infrastructure in <insert non-US country/state/region here> to grow enough to support the amount of bandwidth required for largescale DD usage for HD content..

 

[rekator]

Basically every camera and mobile phone got video recording capabilities these days and quite a few people like to edit films for their family or YouTube, so yeah I think there is a market.

Not saying Sony will do this, but I don´t think it´s that far-fetched as you make it sound.

It's not video editor… it's more video "cut and paste"… and all the Home-video DVD and HDD recorders got this…
So Sony don't need to make a special SKU, they just need to sell a USB product… may be the Play TV got the good entries for this.

But if you want video editor, you need a good software, Sony got Vegas (not really a casual software) but they can try to make a iMovie-like version for PS3.

And my opinion about a new wonderfull SKU PS3… Not interested me, but more looking for a slim PS Three at 200€… may be for Christmass 2009.

 

[Freak'n Big Panda]

What your opinion if Sony release new PS3 SKU with

-45nm Cell processor @ 3.2 GHz
-65nm RSX @625MHz with 16ROP and 256bit GDDR3 interfaced.
-1GB XDR DRAM @ 3.2GHz
-512MB GDDR3 @ 1400MHz
-4X/2X BD+RW-Drive

cost around 700 USD.

The new SKU may use as Video Editiong workstation or Game Editor Tools.
How about the cost above for you all? Too expensive or fair price.

I wouldn't buy it, nobody would buy it actually. It would seriously confuse consumers and would undoubtedly be a complete failure.

 

[Blackraven]

What your opinion if Sony release new PS3 SKU with

-45nm Cell processor @ 3.2 GHz
-65nm RSX @625MHz with 16ROP and 256bit GDDR3 interfaced.
-1GB XDR DRAM @ 3.2GHz
-512MB GDDR3 @ 1400MHz
-4X/2X BD+RW-Drive

cost around 700 USD.

The new SKU may use as Video Editiong workstation or Game Editor Tools.
How about the cost above for you all? Too expensive or fair price.

You make it sound like this going to be another Japan-only PSX:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/PSX_(DVR)

 

[patsu]

Repurpose it for commercial use... like a Blu-ray movie tester or something

 

[almighty]

If they implemented 2 and 4, plus doubled the GDDR3 bus width to 256bit. Plus added another 8 ROPs, then it would almost equal a 7900GTX

IMO it already rivals a 7900 GTX, its a closed box system so it will optomised to hell and back. A 7900GTX will never be as optomised as RSX is so for the most part it would mainly go to waste. Now if the 7900GTX was in PS3 then it would be different :smile:

 

[Shifty Geezer]

Commerce wouldn't want a trumped up PS3. Any high-spec 'PS3' needs to be an actual workstation/PC like system. Think Mac (Mini?) with keyboard and mouse as standard and a boot to Linux by default. But in all likelihood a PC Cell plugin board packaged with the right software would receive more interest.

 

[ex0du5]

It would be a very big mistake. One thing is, you DO NOT alienate the userbase that bought the PS3 first. The extra RAM/performance would be useless to game developers, as they would need to develop for the lowest common denominator.

If you want to see what happens when the release something like this, see: Sony PSX. It was a massive failure in Japan when it released a few years back.

 

[Neb]

IMO it already rivals a 7900 GTX, its a closed box system so it will optomised to hell and back. A 7900GTX will never be as optomised as RSX is so for the most part it would mainly go to waste. Now if the 7900GTX was in PS3 then it would be different :smile:

I doubt being in a closed box would help achieve 2xROP's perfomance and 2xVRAM bandwidth perfomance!

By games out now both multi platform and exclusives, the 7900GTX's advantage is crystal clear. But it is getting way offtopic now! :smile:

 

[patsu]

Commerce wouldn't want a trumped up PS3. Any high-spec 'PS3' needs to be an actual workstation/PC like system. Think Mac (Mini?) with keyboard and mouse as standard and a boot to Linux by default. But in all likelihood a PC Cell plugin board packaged with the right software would receive more interest.

That's why I said repurpose. It will require some more (re)packaging work. I am thinking in terms of appliances and specialized equipments instead of a daughter board. e.g., A closed, single-purpose secure appliance, some sort of specialized test tools for validating Blu-ray movies, home media storage system (with advanced media search and playback capability), etc. Once prices come down further, they may have more options to play.

For now, only PS3 is needed.

 

[eastmen]

Yes but that's a battle that it would only take time & increasing HDTV penetration to fight comfortably.. Sure DD might start to come in as a new contender in the short term but there's clearly a long way to go for network infrastructure in <insert non-US country/state/region here> to grow enough to support the amount of bandwidth required for largescale DD usage for HD content..

that isn't really true by itself.

Any number of formats could take dvd's spot. More specificly many formats could take parts of dvd's market share and leave bluray at a smaller market share than dvd had.

Personaly I would love to see a flash based medium come outby the end of the decade with small players the size of a cell phone for my high def content.

Discs are so huge and bulky and are easily destroyed . Not to mention that a flash based solution can allways grow and they can use sizes tha ttheyn eed. Of course its still way to expensive , but in a couple years that might not be true. 8 gig sd cards were $80-90 bucks 7 months ago and are $30 ish now. You can buy a 32 gig flash drive for less than a 16 gig drive was 6 months ago. If things keep up like we can have huge amounts of space on thumb drives and I much rather have a bunch of thumb drives with my movies on them than discs .

 

[woundingchaney]

that isn't really true by itself.

Any number of formats could take dvd's spot. More specificly many formats could take parts of dvd's market share and leave bluray at a smaller market share than dvd had.

Personaly I would love to see a flash based medium come outby the end of the decade with small players the size of a cell phone for my high def content.

Discs are so huge and bulky and are easily destroyed . Not to mention that a flash based solution can allways grow and they can use sizes tha ttheyn eed. Of course its still way to expensive , but in a couple years that might not be true. 8 gig sd cards were $80-90 bucks 7 months ago and are $30 ish now. You can buy a 32 gig flash drive for less than a 16 gig drive was 6 months ago. If things keep up like we can have huge amounts of space on thumb drives and I much rather have a bunch of thumb drives with my movies on them than discs .

What is the average life span of a flash drive?? For some reason I was thinking it wasnt all that impressive.

 

[Shifty Geezer]

...I much rather have a bunch of thumb drives with my movies on them than discs .

Little thumb cards would be cool, but they're more readily lost than bulky discs! Plus discs aren't easily broken - you have to mistreat them And it's more the cases that are bulky. You can fit ~300 movies into a drawer if you ditch the cases and use a disc folder. Think how big UMD cases are relative to UMDs, and you can be sure movies on flash sticks would still have oversized cases where the publisher wants to add advertising material and content information.

 

[pjbliverpool]

IMO it already rivals a 7900 GTX, its a closed box system so it will optomised to hell and back. A 7900GTX will never be as optomised as RSX is so for the most part it would mainly go to waste. Now if the 7900GTX was in PS3 then it would be different :smile:

Not really, if you take the same game/basic code base and port it to the PC its going to run faster on 7900. Afterall, all the optimisations done for RSX would transfer straight over to the 7900's even faster architecture.

Cell + RSX could change things in some areas though.

 

[Shifty Geezer]

Not really, if you take the same game/basic code base and port it to the PC its going to run faster on 7900.

But you can't port over the code. The PC requires you to use a library (DX or OGL), which locks out a lot of the optimizations you can do. Even lean API's have quite a restrictive overhead by comparison. API's are there to make things easier (or handle different hardware configs) and aren't focussed on allowing you to really max the system. That's the advantage of the closed-box system and being able to hit the metal, and why lesser hardware can match and outperform superior hardware.

 

[pjbliverpool]

But you can't port over the code. The PC requires you to use a library (DX or OGL), which locks out a lot of the optimizations you can do. Even lean API's have quite a restrictive overhead by comparison. API's are there to make things easier (or handle different hardware configs) and aren't focussed on allowing you to really max the system. That's the advantage of the closed-box system and being able to hit the metal, and why lesser hardware can match and outperform superior hardware.

Still, without help from Cell I don't see any way RSX could overcome a 160% fill rate advantage, 150% memory bandwidth advantage, 256MB more graphics memory, and a 30% shader and texturing advantage if the PC version of the game was well coded.

I'm sure its possible to do a lot, but not that much. Not if all reasonable optimisations were made to the PC code were possible.

 

[eastmen]

What is the average life span of a flash drive?? For some reason I was thinking it wasnt all that impressive.

not sure but i have a 32 meg sd card from a very old camera ,I belive I got it in 2001 . So we are at 7 years or so for that sd card and I've used it to take pictures and transfer them alot more than I've watched any dvd movie i've owned. Even if its only 1 thousand plays , how many people have watched a dvd they own 1 thousand times ? The best Ican come up with is zoolander which might be getting close to 40 replays .

Little thumb cards would be cool, but they're more readily lost than bulky discs! Plus discs aren't easily broken - you have to mistreat them And it's more the cases that are bulky. You can fit ~300 movies into a drawer if you ditch the cases and use a disc folder. Think how big UMD cases are relative to UMDs, and you can be sure movies on flash sticks would still have oversized cases where the publisher wants to add advertising material and content information.

I've had blurays come scratched and unplayable in the case (robocop i'm looking at you) Also its my understanding that the hardcoating on the bd's make it impossible to resurface and fix them. I have plenty of dvds that wont play anymore due to them getting scratched. Even my earliest flash drive which was 64 megs still works .

I think the great thing is that they can use a really fast interface like usb 2 or perhaps faster and they can let the rest of the tech evolve. They can also leave a certian amount of space left over for downloadable items like new trailers or new audio commentarys . You also have the added bonus of being able to use a flash drive to put your own downloaded content on it . So not only can they deliver new south park epsiodes through stores but also through the internet . The bet thing is the size of the unit. It would be small enough that it fit in your tv or a small player the size of perhaps a hardrive or a wallet. You'd also be able to use it on the go as a zune or ipod would only need a usb port .

 

[Mintmaster]

Blu-Ray was a risky, but ultimatly very smart move by Sony. The PS3's increasing popularity, especially here in the UK is IMO almost completely attributable to its BR drive. Hell, even though i'm a PC gamer with a 360 that barely gets touched, I have toyed with getting one for the BR drive alone.

What are you comparing this to? A PS3 with a DVD-drive released at the same time and same price? Of course the current BR version looks great.

If PS3 came out a year earlier without BR at $400, though, it wouldn't need "increasing popularity", as it would have sold like crazy from the get-go. 360 wouldn't stand a chance. XBox was manhandled by PS2 even though it had superior hardware and equal or lower pricing. Why would anything change this generation?

The only reason 360 has such a solid footing this gen is that it went basically two years without any competition. If you take away the install base (i.e. the knowledge that your friends have 360s) and the price advantage, what reason is there to buy a 360 instead of a BR-less PS3? Halo? My guess is that HD console sales would be 80:20 in favour of the PS3, and once again MS would struggle to acquire meaningful exclusives.

 

[pjbliverpool]

What are you comparing this to? A PS3 with a DVD-drive released at the same time and same price? Of course the current BR version looks great.

If PS3 came out a year earlier without BR at $400, though, it wouldn't need "increasing popularity", as it would have sold like crazy from the get-go. 360 wouldn't stand a chance. XBox was manhandled by PS2 even though it had superior hardware and equal or lower pricing. Why would anything change this generation?

The only reason 360 has such a solid footing this gen is that it went basically two years without any competition. If you take away the install base (i.e. the knowledge that your friends have 360s) and the price advantage, what reason is there to buy a 360 instead of a BR-less PS3? Halo? My guess is that HD console sales would be 80:20 in favour of the PS3, and once again MS would struggle to acquire meaningful exclusives.

Yep, I agree with that but then the question becomes was the PS3, and specifically Cell ready to launch a year earlier?

Even if it was though, I still think Sony made the right move waiting to include BR because that will have had a major contributuon in winning the format war over HD-DVD.

 

[eastmen]

Yep, I agree with that but then the question becomes was the PS3, and specifically Cell ready to launch a year earlier?

Even if it was though, I still think Sony made the right move waiting to include BR because that will have had a major contributuon in winning the format war over HD-DVD.

I believe sony had final dev kits out to developers before ms did . So i think it could have easily launched. The huge diode shortage is what stoped it