Posted on 05/17/2005 1:24:45 PM PDT by Yossarian
LOS ANGELES--Today saw the second of the big three console makers announce its next-generation platform. At its pre-E3 press conference, Sony Computer Entertainment gave the world its first look at the PlayStation 3, as it is now officially called. While the device's price has not yet been set, its release window--spring 2006--has. Flanked by Sony Computer Entertainment America President and CEO Kaz Hirai, SCE head Ken Kutaragi introduced it as a "supercomputer for computer entertainment."
The name was not unexpected, since Sony had been running an extensive teaser-ad campaign prepping the public for the PlayStation 3. The company had laid a blanket of posters around the Los Angeles Convention Center, site of the Electronic Entertainment Expo (aka E3). Bus stalls and billboards around the convention center proclaimed "Prepare for Chang3" in the distinctive PlayStation font with partial shots of the Dual Shock controller's square-circle-triangle-X buttons.
Sony also confirmed the PlayStation 3 will use Blu-ray discs as its media format. The discs can hold up to six times as much data as current-generation DVDs. It will also support CR-ROM, CD-RW, DVD, DVD-ROM, DVD-R, DVD+R formats. Sony also confirmed that the machine will be backward compatible all the way to the original PlayStation. It will also have slots for Memory Stick Duo, an SD slot, and a compact flash memory slot. It will also sport a slot for a detachable 2.5-inch HDD, somewhat similar to the Xbox 360's. Sony did not mention if the drive would be standard.
Sony also laid out the technical specs of the device. The PlayStation 3 will feature the much-vaunted Cell processor, which will run at 3.2GHz, giving the whole system 2 teraflops of overall performance. It will sport 256MB XDR main RAM at 3.2GHz, and it will have 256MB of GDDR VRAM at 700MHz.
Sony also unveiled the PS3's graphics chip, the RSX "Reality Synthesizer," which is based on Nvidia technology. The GPU will be capable of 128bit pixel precision and 1080p resolution--some of the highest HD resolution around. The RSX also has 512MB of graphics render memory and is capable of 100 billion shader operations and 51 billion dot products per second. It also has more than 300 million transistors, larger than any processor commercially available today. It will be manufactured using the 90nm process, with eight layers of metal. The RSX is more powerful than two GeForce 6800 Ultra video cards, which would cost roughly $1,000 total if purchased today.
The PlayStation 3 will also sport some hefty multimedia features, such as video chat, Internet access, digital photo viewing, and digital audio and video. Speaking of video, Sony Computer Entertainment's chief technical officer Masa Chatani was on hand to show off the PS3's panoramic video functions. Since the console has two HD outputs, it is can be hooked up to two side-by-side HDTVs to projecting video in a 32:9 extra-widescreen format (think Cinemascope in your living room). Like a gigantic version of the Nintendo DS, the dual digital outputs also allow for an extended game display, with the action on one screen and either game information or video chat on the second.
Out of the box, the PS3 will have the capability to support seven Bluetooth controllers, which can be used for nearly 24 hours before they require charging. Later, pictures of the controllers themselves were released, showing their almost boomerang-like shape. It will also have six USB slots for peripherals: four up front and two in the back. As rumored, it will also have Wi-Fi connectivity to the PSP, which can be used as a remote screen and/or controller.
Dr. Richard Marx, the inventor of EyeToy, was on hand to show off the PS3's wireless HD IP Camera. The demo recalled rumors that the machine will have Minority Report-esque motion-sensing capabilities. Marx held two small cup-like objects in his hands, which moved the cups on the screen in real time.
To show off the PlayStation 3's graphical brawn, Sony showed several game demos, including an Unreal 3 engine show-off of what appeared to be Unreal Tournament 2007. In what must come as a relief to developers, Epic Games' Tim Sweeney was on hand to vouch for the PS3, saying it was "easy to program for" and that Epic had received its first PS3 hardware two months ago. He proved the tech demo was real-time by showing it again and by manipulating the camera and zooming in.
Sony also showed off several other tech demos. One was a next-gen remake of the famed "duck demo" first shown when the PlayStation 2 launched. Except this time, instead of one duck in a bathtub, the demo showed a whole flock of ducks milling about, as well as several toy battleships. Another demo showed grass and foliage growing while another showed Gran Turismo cars racing with Spider-Man swinging overhead. Speaking of Spider-Man, another demo showed highly detailed renders of Alfred Molina as Dr. Octopus recreated from the film Spider-Man 2.
However, Sweeney's words were only the beginning. Later, Sony trotted out a whole host of publishers that are backing the PlayStation 3. And in the process, it confirmed several games for the console. Hideo Kojima introduced Konami's Metal Gear Solid 4, Capcom showed off Devil May Cry 4, Namco unveiled Tekken 6, Polyphony Digital trotted out a fifth Gran Turismo, SCEE showed off the next Killzone, and Rockstar Games showed a new Western title.
EA President Larry Probst was also on hand to show off a demonstration of the next Fight Night game, which will presumably be called Fight Night Round 3. When one of the two fighters took a blow, his skin rippled realistically. Kudo Tsonoda from EA's Chicago studio was on hand, and said that the goal is to make the facial animation convey the amount of punishment a pugilist has suffered.
And still the games came. SCEE had three on display: A third Getaway, with an even seedier, nastier version of London; a new off-road racing game called Motor Storm from Evolution Studios; and a shooter called Heavenly Sword. Sega is readying Fifth Phantom Saga, and Bandai is prepping another Gundam game. Ubisoft is continuing to innovate in the first-person shooter field with an all-new IP named Killing Day. Koei enlightened the crowd with a demo of Ni-oh, a new martial-arts-themed brawler about Buddha's monk bodyguards. Incognito is developing a sequel to Warhawk, the acclaimed actioner for the original PlayStation.
However, one of the night's most impressive tech demos will likely be the most disappointing for fans of the Final Fantasy series. After showing some footage from the upcoming Final Fantasy XII for the PlayStation 2, Square Enix Yochi Wada showed a very impressive demo called "Final Fantasy VII: Technical Demo for PlayStation 3." The visually impressive demo showed a sequence of a cityscape, culminating with fan favorite Cloud jumping out of a train. However, Wada said the clip was "merely a sample" and Square Enix currently has no plans to release a remake of Final Fantasy VII for the PlayStation 3. However, he did say the series would arrive on the console in "some form."
Wada's presence at the PS3 launch was ironic, given that Microsoft announced Final Fantasy XI for the Xbox 360 just hours later. In fact, much of Sony's conference seemed designed to one-up the features of Microsoft's new console point by point.
Sony also emphasized that the PlayStation 3 would have similar online connectivity and services as the next generation of Xbox Live. Calling it "an always on, always connected device," Chatani said the PS3 would be constantly in touch with a "PlayStation World" network "fundamentally based on a on community, communication commerce, and content." He said that subscribers could "exchange unique characters and items through the network," much like Microsoft's Xbox Live Marketplace.
PLAYSTATION 3 SPECIFICATIONS
CPU: Cell Processor PowerPC-base Core @3.2GHz
--1 VMX vector unit per core
--512KB L2 cache
--7 x SPE @3.2GHz
--7 x 128b 128 SIMD GPRs
--7 x 256KB SRAM for SPE
--*1 of 8 SPEs reserved for redundancy
--Total floating point performance: 218 gigaflops
GPU RSX @ 550MHz
--1.8 TFLOPS floating point Performance
--Full HD (up to 1080p) x 2 channels
--Multi-way programmable parallel Floating point shader pipelines
--Sound Dolby 5.1ch, DTS, LPCM, etc. (Cell-based processing)
MEMORY
256MB XDR Main RAM @3.2GHz
256MB GDDR3 VRAM @700MHz
System Bandwidth Main RAM-- 25.6GB/s
VRAM--22.4GB/s
RSX-- 20GB/s (write) + 15GB/s (read)
SB2.5GB/s (write) + 2.5GB/s (read)
SYSTEM FLOATING POINT PERFORMANCE:
2 teraflops
STORAGE
--HDD Detachable 2.5" HDD slot x 1
--I/O--USB Front x 4, Rear x 2 (USB2.0)
--Memory Stickstandard/Duo, PRO x 1
--SD standard/mini x 1
--CompactFlash(Type I, II) x 1
COMMUNICATION
--Ethernet (10BASE-T, 100BASE-TX, 1000BASE-T) x 3 (input x 1 + output x 2)
--Wi-Fi IEEE 802.11 b/g
--Bluetooth--Bluetooth 2.0 (EDR)
--ControllerBluetooth (up to 7)
--USB 2.0 (wired)
--Wi-Fi (PSP)
--Network (over IP)
AV OUTPUT
Screen size 480i, 480p, 720p, 1080i, 1080p
HDMI out x 2
AV multi out x 1
Digital out (optical) x 1
DISC MEDIA
CD
PlayStation CD-ROM
PlayStation2 CD-ROM
CD-DA
CD-DA (ROM),
CD-R,
CD-RW
SACD Hybrid (CD layer),
SACD HD
DualDisc (audio side)
DualDisc (DVD side)
PlayStation 2 DVD-ROM
PlayStation 3 DVD-ROM
DVD-ROM
DVD-R
DVD-RW
DVD+R,
DVD+RW
Blu-ray Disc
PlayStation 3 BD-ROM
BD-ROM
BD
You and me both. :-)
(and the next gen XBox, Gamecube, PC etc. LOL!)
Does anyone know
which of the big companies
making game boxes
are the most open
to independent writers
bringing up programs
onto their hardware?
Do some make development
tools more readily
available than
others? Are there restrictive
fees for programmers?
Lots of good stuff coming!!!
actually they dont they are using a proprietary PowerPC processor. No cell processing going on.
What...damn!
You are right, but thats also my point too. Consoles have become a test bed market for new technologies in the computing world. Like right now it is known that both the ATI chipset on the new nintendo and the Nvidia on the new XBox are at least one generation ahead of current vid cards, they might be two generations ahead. Obviously you cannot and would not want to run a OS on a console because that would defeat there purpose of a dedicated gaming experience.
But some points I failed to mention earlier, and I think is hugely missed in PC vs Console arguments and that consoles are made for tv, if you hooked your pc up to your tv or hd system you still wont get the same quality as you would with a console because the rendering and resolutions will not work as well.
Plus I would rather sit on my tush and play a RPG on my tv kicked back in a recliner any day over hunched over my computer desk and play diablo or morrowind, fine games in themselves and more finely detailed than most console games, but man my a** hurts after too long playing on it.
ASUS First AGEIA Board Partner Supporting AGEIA PhysX Processor for Games
*******************************************
Tuesday May 17, 7:17 pm ET
ASUS is one of the world's largest and most successful manufacturers of motherboards, graphics cards and other computer hardware. The company has been at the forefront of emerging technologies for the PC since the founding of ASUS in 1989, and has won countless awards for innovation and quality. ASUS support for the AGEIA PhysX processor is another milestone for AGEIA in its meteoric rise in the games industry.
And:
Ageia's PPU is an important step...an interview
"Men", she says as she rolls her eyes.
And accomplish what? Effective killing and fantasy murder? Go to a bar to destroy your liver. Play a video game to destroy your mind. Eye candy, like regular candy is not good for you.
You do what you like to do and I will do what I like to do. If you hate vid games so much, why are you on this thread?
Good stuff! :-)
You are correct - the Nintendo only uses the IBM custom PowerPC. I was loose in my facts ;-)
To point out your wasting your life on crap! Call it Vidiot intervention!
I am not much of a gamer but that might be about to change, the tech going into gaming is just to cool, might have to get a play station 3.
In all actuality I am not either. LOL! But I do love the technology.
I did. Just last year I got a Gamecube and 2 Xboxes. SWEEEET!
I am gonna wait on the play station 3, the tech in it sounds far more advanced then anything on the market today. Meanwhile I'd get by with an occasional civ 3 on my PC.
I like the Xbox 360, but will wait years for it as I did with the new consoles I currently have. They develop more games, the prices always drop and the bugs are all taken care of over time.
Plus, the Wife doesn't give me, "The Look," for spending too much.
Hmm.... I use computers every day to study orbit and physics simulations. I am also studying how these can be virtually displayed. Gaming is encroaching into VR and I for one am fascinated. I also study and love the technology behind the games, such as the physics chip I alluded to earlier in the thread.
I have friends in Silicon Valley who were instrumental in developing both the personal gaming machines and the personal computer. Some of them were members of the original Homebrew Computer Club in Palo Alto. You can thank them for the computer you have today.
Did you know that the processor in the Nintendo 64 is a MIPS R4000?
From here: (also has a picture of the die)
http://www.mic-d.com/gallery/chips/mips4000.html
“The R4000 central processing unit core was MIPS Technologies' first 64-bit, super-pipelined endeavor with reduced instruction set computing (RISC) specifications. The processor operated at 5 volts and squeezed 1.1 million transistors onto 213 square millimeters of silicon substrate using 1.0-micron photolithography techniques. A later, further-miniaturized version supported 1.3 million transistors on a 165-square-millimeter die, featuring a 100 MHz clock speed and 8 Kbytes each of directly mapped input and data caches built with Harvard Architecture.”
The R4000 powered some SGI workstations. Don’t forget the Nintendo 64 is now two generations back in gaming platforms.
My life revolves around computers and very high technology. I live eat and breathe in a sea of silicon every day. For example, I personally hand carried the onboard flight computers for the Magellan Spacecraft between facilities when we were getting it ready for launch using the Space Shuttle. Silicon and RF is in my blood so to speak.
Every computer (non laptop or actual workstation) I own, I have built myself. You can bet your bottom dollar they beat the heck out of the average machine you will find in a store. Of course the SGI VME server I own I did not build. LOL!
So the bottom line is, am I wasting my life? Well let’s see:
I have worked in the US space program for years. Helped fly a spacecraft to another planet, some of my RF designs are still being used in various facilities, help teach kids about astrophysics (even though I have no kids myself), am a pilot, learned how to mountain climb (climbed the Grand Teton in Wyoming), taught classes, read thousands of books, play chess, helped defend this nation by serving in the armed forces when I was younger, Flown in the back seat of fighter jets (F4s), ran interplanetary spacecraft trajectory simulations when I was at JPL, sent the very first command to a satellite after achieving orbit form a Vandenberg launch, sat console for more than 5 launches, worked as a designer on our current space station, worked with SETI using a radio telescope I helped design (hence my screen name), can’t cook for crap LOL, hate yard work (why I don’t do it), but my bathrooms are spotless (clean freak LOL), sat on the edge of a working bathtub nuclear reactor watching the blue glow of the Cerenkov radiation coming from the core with my own eyes (we had the top off and all I had was distilled water between me and the nuclear core cranked up to 600 megawatt s), etc.
So the occasional game (and if you look at those titles you will not see lots of blood and guts games (except Halo and Fable)) is a nice diversion. I especially like GT4. I can drive cars I would never be able to in real life.
Still want to call me a vidiot?
Hee hee.
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