The 8th SPE.

[Pozer]

Anyone think it's possible that 5-6 years from now there maybe a game that uses the 8th SPE. I mean at a time when ps3 games are maxxed technically and cell yields are incredibly high and possibly cell chips on the market with a faulty SPE account for about 1%?

Just seeing how every last bit of performance was squeezed out of the ps2 ala God Of War. I know friends with launch PS2 that coiuldn't play heavy streaming based games like gta:sa.I just think it will be too tempting in 2010-2011.

On the same token I could see MS going back on HDDVD based games if 95% of the 360 market has internal HDDVD players in 2010-11

just a thought.

 

[BRiT]

No. The 8th SPE in a PS3 will likely always be disabled at the hardware chip level and thus no way for developer's software to get at it.

 

[SOcean2forever]

No. The 8th SPE in a PS3 will likely always be disabled at the hardware chip level and thus no way for developer's software to get at it.

So you're not sure then too are you? You just confirmed the topic creator's speculation with your speculation --> it is possible...

 

[Carl B]

It's not possible, the answer is no.

 

[Rolf N]

Customers with "only" 7 working SPEs would go out with torches and pitchforks. Won't happen. It's just a 14% theoretical peak performance increase anyway.

 

[BRiT]

So you're not sure then too are you? You just confirmed the topic creator's speculation with your speculation --> it is possible...

No. I am certain. The Ps3 ******s really need to stop dreaming.

What I was indicating is that it may not always be disabled in the actual chip itself; it may be disabled from the PS3's firmware/bios. In either case, it will not be available at the software level.

 

[22psi]

Hmmm this got me to thinking about the 360 Fall update which supposedly will unlock 1080p. Since they can do this via software update then does that mean some hardware within the 360 itself is inabled right now?

 

[Rangers]

Once the 8th SPE is enabled, it will definitly end the system wars once and for all. Microsoft will be forced to surrender immediatly versus Kutaragi's devious hidden trojan horse. The 8th SPE will finally allow the necessary power for real time ray tracing.

j/k/
________
Live sex webshows

 

[Pozer]

No. I am certain. The Ps3 ******s really need to stop dreaming.

What I was indicating is that it may not always be disabled in the actual chip itself; it may be disabled from the PS3's firmware/bios. In either case, it will not be available at the software level.

Actually, Im much more of an xbot than anything. Happy 360 owner and possible ps3 owner at some point in the future. I also was never speculating this would be common practice but something some whacky Japanese dev might do years down the road if there was access to it. It was more specualtion that if in 2011 98% of all ps3s had 8 functioning SPEs would sony allow it to keep its tech competitive. 14% might sound small now, but 14% on the ps2 right now would give some top tier ps2 devs a jump for joy. Anyway it was just something I thought about.

 

[Carl B]

By 2011 no doubt Sony could enable 8 SPEs on nearly every Cell they fab, but that's not what rules this out as impossible. What rules it out is that all future PS3 software will need to be able to run on all iterations of the hardware, and this is why as far as PS3 is concerned, that single SPE will always be masked off.

 

[Pozer]

Hmmm this got me to thinking about the 360 Fall update which supposedly will unlock 1080p. Since they can do this via software update then does that mean some hardware within the 360 itself is inabled right now?

Yeah I always expected to have to get a newer revision 360 to get 1080p native res on my TV. Interesting how that played out. VGA over 360 ftw , Come to think of it the 360 component output almost seems downright horrid from what Ive seen anyway on friends TVs. Now that I think about it my xbox1 seemed to have poor TV out quality compared to ps2. Like the colors were more muted, maybe its just me. I need to stop thinking out loud people think Im in love with Sony which is far from reality.

 

[Pozer]

By 2011 no doubt Sony could enable 8 SPEs on nearly every Cell they fab, but that's not what rules this out as impossible. What rules it out is that all future PS3 software will need to be able to run on all iterations of the hardware, and this is why as far as PS3 is concerned, that single SPE will always be masked off.

True but how many ps3's made in the first 6 months will be still running in 2011. I doubt many 360 made in the first 6 months will be. This gens systems (minus wii) seems to produce more heat than any other console gen in history and heat will degrade the units over time. It's just a factor of the increased competition like the PC graphics casrd wars.

 

[Sankari]

When you open the 8th SPE, it opens up a blackhole and sucks the universe in, thats atleast Ken's plan if PS3 launch fails.

 

[TrungGap]

Come to think of it the 360 component output almost seems downright horrid from what Ive seen anyway on friends TVs. Now that I think about it my xbox1 seemed to have poor TV out quality compared to ps2. Like the colors were more muted, maybe its just me. I need to stop thinking out loud people think Im in love with Sony which is far from reality.

Hmm, must be just you... Is your friend 360 setup correctly? Is the switch set to HD and dashboard set to resolution of your TV. You might want to have check to see whether his TV scaler or the 360 scaler is better. I find that the MS HD component cable is of good quality. I can tell you, some of the third party cables are down right nasty, but I'm sure you heard it all before.

I find that both xbox1 and PS2 tv outputs (composite) suck comparision to the Dreamcast. Somehow, the Dreamcast image is sharp and detailed. Whereas the xbox1 and PS2 is a little fuzzy. Of course I'm a little bias here...Between the PS2 and xbox1, I found if you're using quality cables, it's pretty much identical (as far as signal quality).

 

[gokickrocks]

I could see the 8th spe being opened for OS use only

 

[Pozer]

Hmm, must be just you... Is your friend 360 setup correctly? Is the switch set to HD and dashboard set to resolution of your TV. You might want to have check to see whether his TV scaler or the 360 scaler is better. I find that the MS HD component cable is of good quality. I can tell you, some of the third party cables are down right nasty, but I'm sure you heard it all before.

I find that both xbox1 and PS2 tv outputs (composite) suck comparision to the Dreamcast. Somehow, the Dreamcast image is sharp and detailed. Whereas the xbox1 and PS2 is a little fuzzy. Of course I'm a little bias here...Between the PS2 and xbox1, I found if you're using quality cables, it's pretty much identical (as far as signal quality).

One of my friends has a upper end Samsung 720p 32"lcd with the ms compoent cables and set to 720p. Although he has never tweaked his set. I noticed 360 IQ looks alot more 'fuzzy' and the colors look more 'bleh' than my 1080p lcd over the MS VGA adapted set to 1280x720. The clarity over VGA is almost like the difference of going from composite to component on a SDTV to me. I even own the monster component cables but I find VGA looks alot better. I awlays chalked it up to my set have poor quality component hookups. But when i was reading a preview of a game being shown outputted on ps3 next to the 360 version both over component and the ps3 looking sharper and more vivd it got my wheels a turning.
It's very subjetive but I always found ps2 to output better color and more stable image than xbox1. Both my DCs broke when i tried playing NES roms on them years ago.. I can't remember .

 

[ERP]

There is at least one difference on PS3 output vs 360 output.
One outputs 0 at 0 IRE and the other at 7.5 IRE, so given the same image they will look different.

FWIW This was true of PS2 and Xbox 1, but this time the vendors have reversed positions.
7.5 is the broadcast standard for SDTV, I'm not sure what the what the HDTV broadcast standard is.

 

[DuckThor Evil]

I need to stop thinking out loud.

What a marvellous conclusion! Seriously activating the 8th spe and making games to reguire it while there are consoles with only 7 is borderline grazy talk. They didn't disable one just to enable it again 2 months after launch. It's for cost reduction and I'm sure it's not supposed to affect only the very first units.

 

[deathkiller]

The chances are the same as games using the 64 shaders units of Xenos, 0%.

They may allow to use the 8 SPUs for linux PS3's unoficial apps, I don't think that they will disable it at hardware level.

 

[TurnDragoZeroV2G]

The chances are the same as games using the 64 shaders units of Xenos, 0%.

Redundancy is well under a full array.

Edit: Here