PS3 internals

[dangerose]

All those fancy caps everyone was ogling over? Yeah, NOT CHEAP. The number of PCBs they are using is also high. I think you are underestimating the cost of that board design with all high end components. It looks closer to a design used for high end analysis than production consumer hardware.

The rumors were that Sony was running into significant design issues with the PS3 and started pulling people from all over the company to fix things with a cost isn't an issue philosophy, and it certainly is reflected in the design and component selection.

FWIW, I think they are underestimating the cost of the heatsink/fan design as well.

Aaron Spink
speaking for myself inc.

Thanks for the analysis but i disagree with this.

All Playstations are hailed as a mark of engineering beauty. I heard of more PDA failing than PSP shipped at half the supply. Playstations have great reliability outside the random optical DRE, and you can prevent DRE by putting effort to maintain dust congestion. Same goes with Nintendo hardware.

Consoles should not die of PCB components failure. I am not sure if we should be forgiving and encourage that kind of shoddy work...

 

[Deleted member 7537]

I've heard some things about the ps3, some people said that the bus that uses RSX to get to the XDR memory is not enough to carry textures as big as 360 does, so the 360 textures looks much better, is this true? why?

Thnkx.

 

[aaronspink]

Thanks for the analysis but i disagree with this.

All Playstations are hailed as a mark of engineering beauty. I heard of more PDA failing than PSP shipped at half the supply. Playstations have great reliability outside the random optical DRE, and you can prevent DRE by putting effort to maintain dust congestion. Same goes with Nintendo hardware.

Consoles should not die of PCB components failure. I am not sure if we should be forgiving and encourage that kind of shoddy work...

And they don't die often of PCB components failure. The cost of the components that sony uses has little to do with their life expectency. The primary motivation factor with the high end caps is likely two pronged.

1) they needed flat board components for their cooling solution to work
2) they needed enhanced margins to meet increased tightness on the tolerances for CV in order to get a marginal yield improvement.

And I would hope you've heard of more PDA failures than PSP failures. PDAs have outsold PSPs 100 to 1.

So far there is no evidence that any past Sony console or other electronics equipment has enhanced reliability than any other console or electronics equipment.

As a data point, I know of server with higher reliability than any console ever shipped. And they didn't use exotic flat cap technology to get it.

Aaron Spink
speaking for myself inc.

 

[deathkiller]

And I would hope you've heard of more PDA failures than PSP failures. PDAs have outsold PSPs 100 to 1.

More like 1 to 1, 15 millon PDAs shipped last year VS 15 millon PSP shipped last year. Obiously there is more PDAs in total since they had been sold for a long time.
http://digital-lifestyles.info/display_page.asp?section=platforms&id=2447
http://www.scei.co.jp/corporate/data/bizdatapsp_e.html

 

[RobertR1]

Sony doesnt use cheap components.

You must not have had much experience with their DVD players then........

 

[patsu]

Welp... what are we talking about here ? As far as PS3 is concerned, it is quiet, has no overheat problem, uses < 200W, packed with hardware features and an internal PSU. Looks like a champ to me. Only problem so far is the missing/off-limit scaler(s) for games.

The proof is in the pudding. Whether it's low cost or expensive, look at the return rate.

 

[RobertR1]

Welp... what are we talking about here ? As far as PS3 is concerned, it is quiet, has no overheat problem, uses < 200W, packed with hardware features and an internal PSU. Looks like a champ to me. Only problem so far is the missing/off-limit scaler(s) for games.

The proof is in the pudding. Whether it's low cost or expensive, look at the return rate.

You brought up their TV's and I brought up their DVD players. Now if we're back to talking about the PS3, I'd have to say, wait and see. The next few months should be quite telling. Only 1 of 3 things can happen:

1. minimal rate of failure
2. average/acceptable rate of failure
3. above average rate of failure

 

[-tkf-]

And they don't die often of PCB components failure.
Aaron Spink
speaking for myself inc.

Isn´t the XBOX 360 doing exatly this? The Playstation problems always seem to have their roots in the optical drives which must be one of the hardest parts to build so it doesn´t break.

 

[London Geezer]

You brought up their TV's and I brought up their DVD players. Now if we're back to talking about the PS3, I'd have to say, wait and see. The next few months should be quite telling. Only 1 of 3 things can happen:

1. minimal rate of failure
2. average/acceptable rate of failure
3. above average rate of failure

Well we have heard of people with PS3's overheating and locking up, but really, they are very very very few. So far, none of the horror stories we had with other launches.

 

[pascal]

You must not have had much experience with their DVD players then........

I have one DVP-NS325 :smile2:

 

[pipo]

Well we have heard of people with PS3's [strike]overheating and locking up,[/strike] but really, they are very very very few.

Fixed that for you.

 

[patsu]

You brought up their TV's and I brought up their DVD players.

Read the thread again. People brought up TV encoder chip (and that was not me ) because they were talking about the expensive components and scaling function on PS3.

 

[Deleted member 7537]

I've heard some things about the ps3, some people said that the bus that uses RSX to get to the XDR memory is not enough to carry textures as big as 360 does, so the 360 textures looks much better, is this true? why?

Thnkx.

Could anyone answer me, plz?

 

[Shifty Geezer]

It's way more complicated then that. RSX has more total BW for textures (GDDR + XDR, 45 BG/s versus XB360's 22 GB/s), but the framebuffer operations will consume a lot of that depending on rendering techniques employed. And that's ignoring BW consumed with other tasks.

 

[nAo]

And that's ignoring BW consumed with other tasks.

Yep..on both consoles

 

[London Geezer]

Well we have heard of people with PS3's [strike]overheating and locking up[/strike], but really, they are very very very few.

Fixed that for you.

Hehehe good one!

 

[hey69]

so that makes me special right

 

[Planet]

RSX has more total BW for textures (GDDR + XDR, 45 BG/s versus XB360's 22 GB/s)

I take the 45 Bold Grins per second!

 

[Deepak]

So any official confirmation if RSX runs at 500 MHz? Or is it like PSP, 500-550 MHz?

 

[Shifty Geezer]

I think the fact that Sony have declined to release RSX's clock speed is official confirmation enough