PlayStation 3

From Sega Retro

The PlayStation 3 (PS3) (Japanese: プレイステーション3) is Sony's seventh generation era video game console in the market-leading PlayStation series. The PlayStation 3 is slated for release in 2006. Specifically, Sony representatives have informed video game store clerks to expect a North American shipment in Summer 2006, more narrowly defined as "somewhere between June and September." It is the successor to the PlayStation 2 and will mainly compete against the Nintendo Revolution and Xbox 360. Sony has announced that the PS3 will be backward compatible with earlier PS1 and PS2 games. At the moment, little more is known in public about the PS3 apart from its hardware specifications and reports that it will be based on open APIs for game development.

History

The PS3 was officially unveiled on May 16, 2005, by Sony during the E3 conference, where the console was first shown to the public. A functional version of the console was not at E3 or the Tokyo Game Show in September 2005, although some demonstrations were held on devkits and videos of soon-to-be released games created to run on systems with the same specs as the PS3 were presented, such as Metal Gear Solid 4 and Killzone 3.

Cost and release date

The system's retail price is not known. Sony president and "father of the PlayStation" Ken Kutaragi points out "It'll be expensive" and "I'm aware that with all these technologies, the PS3 can't be offered at a price that's targeted towards households. I think everyone can still buy it if they wanted to," said Kutaragi to a mostly Japanese crowd. "But we're aiming for consumers throughout the world. So we're going to have to do our best [in containing the price]". In contrast Kazuo Hirai, president of Sony Computer Entertainment America, says the PS3 will not be expensive and that it will be competitively priced against the Xbox 360.

In the same magazine, Ken Kutaragi was interviewed, and expressed little concern over the PS3's possibly high launch price, believing that customers would be willing to pay extra for a superior product, as they had in the past for the original PlayStation (¥39,800 vs. 12,500 for the Super Nintendo Entertainment System).

Sony office press releases indicate a 2006 launch. Sony Blu-Ray standalone players are to be released early summer. It is likely that standalone players will be released prior to PS3.

Manufacturing costs

Merrill Lynch Japan estimates the PS3 manufacturing costs at 54,000 yen (U.S. $494) to make, not including labor, and its selling price at $399. For the consumer this means one should be able to buy a PlayStation 3 at a lower price than its actual manufacturing cost. Although manufacturing costs for Blu-Ray and the cell are unknown, it is safe to say like all new systems, they will lose money from the first year. The nature of pricing in the video game industry is to sell the hardware at a loss, at least initially, and then recoup the losses from game sales and developer licensing.

Hardware specifications

A simple comparison of the system architectures appears to indicate that the floating point capability of the PS3 is estimated to be greater than that of the Xbox 360. This comparison is based on the theoretical combined floating point capacity of the Cell microprocessor and the RSX GPU in the PS3 compared to the combined capacity of the Xenon CPU and Xenos GPU in the Xbox 360. The amount of completely programmable floating point capacity afforded by the Cell microprocessor is higher than the Xbox 360's CPU, while the floating-point performance of the two systems' GPUs, which are designed specifically for graphics rendering tasks, are somewhat closer to parity. These comparisons are based on estimates of theoretical maximum performance. Real-world performance for both systems will naturally be less, and the specifications of the PS3 may undergo major changes before the system is launched..

According to a press release by Sony at the May 16, 2005, E3 Conference, the specifications of the PlaySt ation 3 are as follows.

Central processing unit

3.2 GHz Cell processor:

  • 1 PPE core (PowerPC-derived)
    • 32 KB L1 cache
    • 512 KB L2 cache
    • A VMX vector unit with 32x128bit vector registers (IBM's branding for AltiVec)
    • Two hardware threads
  • 7 used SPEs (Synergistic Processing Elements) vector processing cores
    • 256 KB SRAM local memory for each SPE
    • 128×128-bit SIMD general purpose register files
    • 4 Integer units
    • 4 Floating point units
    • 25.6 GFLOPS (billion floating point operations per second)
    • 25.6 GOPS (billion integer operations per second)
  • 218 GFLOPS theoretical (billion floating point operations per second)
  • 218 GOPS total (billion integer operations per second)
  • 25.2 billion shader operations per second (100 billion with GPU)
  • 234 million transistors
  • 213 million available transistors due to the one disabled SPE
  • 2.3 MB SRAM total (512 KB L2 cache and 1.79 MB SPE local memory)

Graphics processing unit

Custom "RSX" or "Reality Synthesizer" design co-developed by NVIDIA and Sony:

  • Clocked at 550 MHz
  • 1.8 TFLOPS (trillion floating point operations per second)
  • Full high definition output (up to 1080p) x 2 channels
  • Multi-way programmable parallel floating point shader pipelines
  • 136 shader operations per clock
  • 74.8 billion shader operations per second (100 billion with CPU)
  • 33 billion dot products per second (51 billion dot products with CPU)
  • 128-bit pixel precision offers rendering of scenes with [[high dynamic range imaging

NVidia CEO Jen-Hsun Huang stated during Sony's pre-show press conference at E3 2005 that the RSX will be more powerful than two GeForce 6800 Ultra video cards combined. Nvidia has stated that the RSX will have a lot in common with the G70 architecture used in NVidia's GeForce 7 Series GPUs which were introduced in June of 2005. Since the G70 is also capable of carrying out 136 shader operations per clock, the RSX is expected to feature the same number of parallel pixel and vertex shader pipelines as the G70 (NVidia's top-of-the-line GeForce 7800 GTX 512 currently contains 24 pixel and 8 vertex pipelines), and clocked similarly to Nvidia's highest end PC GPU based on G70 (with speculation that the RSX chip will be reworked using the new G71 architecture topping 650-700 MHz) (again, the 7800 GTX 512 is clocked at 550 MHz, which is equivalent to the 550 MHz announced for the RSX). This places the clockspeed for both the 7800 GTX 512 and the RSX at approximately 28% faster than the 256 MB 7800 GTX. Clockspeed does not however indicate the performance of the GPU as ATI X1800 is also 20% faster than Nvidia 7800 but has similiar game performance. An Nvidia spokesperson was quoted in "Playstation Magazine" that the RSX shares alot of inner workings with Nvidia 7800 which is based on G70 architecture. Nvidia 7800 GTX 512 MB was released a couple of months after this statement so it's believed to be a comparison between the RSX and the 7800 GTX 256 MB not the 7800 GTX 512 MB which is 30% faster.

Memory

  • 256 MB Rambus XDR DRAM clocked at CPU die speed (3.2 GHz)
  • 256 MB GDDR3]] VRAM clocked at 700 MHz

Theoretical system bandwidth

  • 25.6 GB/s GPU to XDR DRAM: 64 bits × 3.2 GHz
  • 22.4 GB/s GPU to GDDR-3 VRAM: 128 bits × 700 MHz × 2 accesses per clock cycle (one per edge)
  • 35 GB/s GPU to CPU (Aggregated 20 GB/s (write), 15 GB/s (read))
  • 5 GB/s System Bus (Aggregated 2.5 GB/s upstream and downstream)
  • 300 GB/s Cell EIB
  • 76.8 GB/s Cell FlexIO Bus (44.8 GB/s outbound, 32 GB/s inbound)

Since the RSX is connected to the XDR DRAM and GDDR3 RAM similar to a Turbo Cached GPU it can access both memory locations at the exact same time. This gives the RSX an effective 48GB/s when sending data to/from GPU and RAM.

Overall floating-point capability

In a slide show at their E3 conference, Sony presented the "CPU floating point capability" of the PlayStation 3's Cell CPU, and compared it to other CPUs. The presentation shows that one PS3 Cell CPU alone is capable of 218 GFLOPS, compared to the Xbox 360's Xenon CPU's 1 15 GFLOPS. In their official press release, the same statistic regarding the PS3 as a whole was reported to be over 2.1 TFLOPS. The figures are likely rounded estimations. It was unclear how these numbers were exactly calculated, possibly based on addition of the floating point capabilities of the processing units in the Cell central processing unit and those of the RSX graphics processing unit. The performance statistics given for the PS3 and XBox 360 in Sony's presentation were based on the theoretical maximum performance of the systems. Inevitably, real-world performance for both systems will be lower. Additionally, programmers may find it difficult, initially, to optimize their game engines to make the best use of the highly parallel architectures of both systems, further reducing real-world performance.

According to an in-depth report compiled by IBM, the theoretical peak performance of a single SPE is 25.6 GFLOPS. The seven SPEs in the PS3, in addition to the VMX unit in the PPE, would yield a total combined single-precision floating point performance of 218 GFLOPS (the same figure quoted by Sony). It should be noted that this figure is an estimate based on ideal, 100% efficient operation of the processor. The floating-point capacity of the PS3 will significantly exceed that of the XBox 360, although it should be noted that Microsoft's console, due to its 3 symmetric fully featured processor cores (which are very similar to the Cell's PPE), may fare better on dynamically branching code, like that used for artificial intelligence.

It should also be noted that floating-point performance is a single-dimensional metric for comparing computers, and that many other considerations (including integer performance, memory size and bandwidth, etc.) determine the "overall" performance of a computer system. Floating point calculations are very important for graphics, multimedia, and game physics, but considerably less important for other tasks like artificial intelligence.

Finally, whether the PS3's advantage in floating-point performance will be readily apparent in games depends entirely on whether developers are able to effectively make use of the system's unique architecture.

Audio/video output

Sound

Storage

  • Blu-ray Disc: PlayStation 3 BD-ROM, BD-Video, BD-ROM, BD-R, BD-RE, BD-RW.
  • DVD: PlayStation 2 DVD-ROM, PlayStation 3 DVD-ROM, DVD-Video, DVD-ROM, DVD-R, DVD-RW, DVD+R, DVD+RW
  • CD: PlayStation CD-ROM, PlayStation 2 CD-ROM, CD-DA, CD-DA (ROM), CD-R, CD-RW, SACD, SACD Hybrid (CD layer) SACD HD
  • Detachable 2.5" hard drive with Linux pre-installed. Optional but not required for most games.
  • Memory Stick standard/Duo and standard/mini slots
  • CompactFlash Type I and II slot
  • SD/MMC slot for mp3s, ogg vorbis, nokia music, and aacs -- please reference this, link these, and capitalize them properly before removing this

Physical dimensions

  • 32 cm (L) x 24 cm (W) x 8 cm (H)

Communications

  • Three Gigabit Ethernet ports (Sony has indicated that because of cost reduction there is a possibility that the PlayStation 3 may act only as an accessory interface and hub and perhaps not as a router, as originally planned.)
  • IEEE 802.11g Wi-Fi
  • Bluetooth 2.0
  • USB 2.0 (four front and two rear ports)

Controller

SCEI's press release indicates that controller connectivity to the PlayStation 3 can be provided via:

  • 802.11g Wi-Fi. Integrated for mesh networking and connectivity with the PlayStation Portable
  • TCP/IP networking (wired ethernet)
  • USB 2.0 (wired)
  • Bluetooth 2.0 (u

p to 7 controllers)

The design of the controller has been likened to a boomerang or a banana by many observers (or even less flattering likenesses). However, some suggest that the controller, while a little un-traditional in contrast to the DualShock and DualShock 2 controllers, might provide adequate comfort for extended hours of play. According to the Japanese video game publication Famitsu, Sony Computer Entertainment chief technical officer Masayuki Chatani said that the controller design is a "prototype, so there could be some small adjustments."

In an interview with Edge, SCEE's Chris Deering echoed these statements by describing the E3 controller as "just a design study". Some people pointed that the controller bears a similar resemblance to the old Alps Interactive 3rd party controller which was originally made for the PlayStation.

Unconfirmed reports suggest that the PS3 may in fact support the older DualShock 2 controllers, however, this is thought to be true due to the PlayStation 3 striving to attain backwards compatibility. The number of ports to support such backward compatibility would most likely be limited to one, although this is also an unconfirmed rumour. The PS3's specifications, and E3 display units, don't support DualShock controller ports. Though Sony itself had previously admitted at this past E3 that the controller design for their PlayStation 3 console was not finalized, GameSpot believes any purported changes will not be substantial. Their downplays concerning a rumor suggesting Sony would unveil a revamped PS3 controller at the Consumer Electronics Show in January 2006 were sound, as the controller was not shown in any form during the event.

Miscellaneous

  • The ability for the PlayStation Portable to connect to the PlayStation 3 as a video-enabled controller.
  • Two simultaneous High-definition television streams for use on a title screen for a HD Blu-ray Movie.
  • High-definition IP video conferencing.
  • EyeToy interactive reality game.
  • EyeToy voice command recognition.
  • EyeToy virtual object manipulation.
  • Digital photograph display (JPEG).
  • MP3 and ATRAC download and playback.
  • Simultaneous World Wide Web access and gameplay.
  • Hub/Home Ethernet Gaming Network.
  • Parental Controls
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