*spin-off* Importance of Backward Compatibility Discussion

[almighty]

The only way Sony will be able to offer PS3 BC is to physically put Cell in PS4...

There's no x86 CPU can would manage to emulate Cell without slowing to a crawl.

They could even use the dedicated Cell in PS4 for the OS and I/O duties in a similar way to what Sony did with the PS1 hardware in PS2.

 

[jonabbey]

The only way Sony will be able to offer PS3 BC is to physically put Cell in PS4...

There's no x86 CPU can would manage to emulate Cell without slowing to a crawl.

They could even use the dedicated Cell in PS4 for the OS and I/O duties in a similar way to what Sony did with the PS1 hardware in PS2.

Which is why I said recompile. I would think that SPURS jobs could be recompiled and run on x86 cores if they're not too taxing..

 

[Persistantthug]

The only way Sony will be able to offer PS3 BC is to physically put Cell in PS4...

There's no x86 CPU can would manage to emulate Cell without slowing to a crawl.

They could even use the dedicated Cell in PS4 for the OS and I/O duties in a similar way to what Sony did with the PS1 hardware in PS2.

What else would be required?

Like, wouldn't XDR ram be required? What about the specific bus type?

Most of you guys are more versed/technical than I am, so I'm wondering what else would be required, hardware-wise, to hypothetically make the next Playstation PS3 backwards compatible.

 

[Shifty Geezer]

If the existing RAM is fast enough, XDR won't be necessary. Plug the Cell into the rumoured 192 GB/s GDDR5 and it'd have plenty of BW. I don't expect variation in memory timings to be any issue as the Cell is running from LS and prefetching everything.

 

[Brad Grenz]

It's what I've been saying all along. Put 8 SPEs on the APU die, emulate the PPE and GPU, use the SPE array for OS level audio/video/encoding/decoding/compression/decompression in PS4 games. Backwards compatibility with a concrete benefit for PS4 software.

 

[Shifty Geezer]

My only concern there is cost. That Cell likely won't be as economical as two or three custom hardware blocks designed specifically for the purpose. (quick research) 45nm Cell is 115 mm^2 and only 20 watts. If they produced a die shrink, it'd be pretty small and low power, and very versatile. I'd be in favour.

 

[upnorthsox]

A SPE at 28nm should be about 3mm^2 so 6 of them would be under 20mm^2 and under 10W.

 

[Shifty Geezer]

Plus everything else. You'll want a PPU for simplicity, you'll need the memory controller, yada yada. Regardless, it needs someone to be shrinking the Cell tech to 28 nm, and we've heard nothing like.

 

[Albofighter]

Maybe there is still time for them to shrink it? I wonder how long it would take. I guess if they're going to then it should start in the next few months but I get the feeling they won't bother after all they are going for a more simple off the shelf approach to ps4.

 

[jonabbey]

If they were going to bring SPE's forward, they'd have been planning it for years. That's not a last minute decision.

 

[3dilettante]

Cell's peak power numbers have improved, but the chips of the current console gen predate the big push for heavy gating and dynamic frequency/voltage adjustment.
The lack of modern power management would stand out, given how aggressive the rest of the system would likely be. However, adding it would be redesigning cores, not just shrinking them.

 

[upnorthsox]

Indeed, if you were adding an array of SPUs to a new SoC that'd be around for 8-10 yrs you would likely make quite a few changes to bring them up to date. Even if your primary target for their use was internal Sony WorldWide Studios, I don't think you could spend 20-25mm^2 of additional silicon more productively

That said, there are not any SPU's in the ps4.

 

[mrcorbo]

Was it bad? I had a launch PS3 and it was perfect. All my PS2 games work fine, and I never heard about anyone with a game that didn't work. It's later on when they switched to software BC in the newer models that it was very spotty (that's the one you mean right?).

Not sure if you were aware, but the EU never got consoles with full hardware BC as the EE was removed from the models that were shipped there as a cost-cutting measure. And they got to wait an extra 5 months for the privilege. Can't blame people for not being happy about that.

 

[patsu]

I don't know if Sony have enough resources to do b/c for PS4. I think it's important to maintain continuity and momentum.

Sony engineers proposed a few b/c possibilities in their patent filing.

e.g., http://www.freepatentsonline.com/20100312969.pdf, http://storage.siliconera.com/wordpress/wp-content/uploads/2010/09/WO2010095400A1.pdf

One of the early rumors I heard is that they will only offer select PS3 titles over Gaikai.

Frankly, if people are looking to upgraded b/c titles, it may be easier for third party devs to port their PC version over to PS4.

 

[Gubbi]

Seriously, drop BC (hardware and software) and let developers re-release remastered versions if they want for a reduced price.

Cheers

 

[patsu]

I wouldn't mind a PS3 add-on for the existing game library, say when my PS3 cops out.

 

[MrFox]

Not sure if you were aware, but the EU never got consoles with full hardware BC as the EE was removed from the models that were shipped there as a cost-cutting measure. And they got to wait an extra 5 months for the privilege. Can't blame people for not being happy about that.

Thanks, yes I completely forgot about the EU delay. I wonder what would have happened if they had offered 2 skus, kept a high end expensive one with BC. Europe is still the most successful PS3 region despite the delay and cheap BC. While US had a first launch and great BC, it's their worst region. Everything is backward.

 

[tuna]

Seriously, drop BC (hardware and software) and let developers re-release remastered versions if they want for a reduced price.

Cheers

I think I agree here!

 

[xexuxjy]

I don't built up a nice library of XBLA games that I'd be sad to see go.... would consider getting a BC peripheral box though if that was an option.

 

[Grall]

Seriously, drop BC (hardware and software) and let developers re-release remastered versions if they want for a reduced price.

It's a good idea, but only a pittance of the PS3 library would ever get ported over, with many good, mostly less-successful games left out in the cold.

Seeing how long it took to update Ico, Shadow of the Colossus and the previous God of War installments I wouldn't hold my breath for even a handful of new updated games. Wth all the special sauce hoops you need to jump through to get code to run smoothly on cell you'd need to rewrite large tracts of game code to make it run on a regular CPU, which takes time and costs money. Priority for that is probably going to be low.

BC is good for it lets you start running games on your system right away. It'd be no good if you had to wait months, possibly upwards of a year after launch while games are getting ported, Sony would get so much criticism it'd almost be no point in claiming BC at all.