First Details About The CELL @ ISSCC

Originally posted by EviscerationX
Considering we\'re dealing with 90nm chips on 300mm wafers, it\'d be hard to judge how many will fit onto one of those [and how much it would cost them financially]. And 256GFLops on a chip isn\'t impressive? That\'s more than ten times the power of current PCs. What the f^ck do you guys want? I think they achieved the hype since the patent refers to 1TFLOP with 4 PEs. The CELL chip has 1 PE [Processing Unit]. 256GFLOPs*4 = 1TFLOP I\'d say that\'s pretty damn impressive.

Just knowing the CELL specs isn\'t going to give us the best impression, we need the PS3 specs as a whole with NVIDIA\'s GPU included.

There is still a year ahead before the PS3 is released.Current Pentiums are at 3.8 Ghz accprfing to the article.They arent very far to catch up.Also according to few articles other companies are already trying to do the same thing.
I am expecting something groundbraking.A patent no one can reach easily in just a few years.I wouldnt like my PS3 to beceomas as fast obsolete as my PS2
Also if I remember well originally they were planning higher teraflop calculations.I cant recall the numbers though.I could be wrong.But I think it was 500 or something

And the hype machine begins

Originally posted by Unicron!
There is still a year ahead before the PS3 is released.Current Pentiums are at 3.8 Ghz accprfing to the article.They arent very far to catch up.Also according to few articles other companies are already trying to do the same thing.
I am expecting something groundbraking.A patent no one can reach easily in just a few years.I wouldnt like my PS3 to beceomas as fast obsolete as my PS2
Also if I remember well originally they were planning higher teraflop calculations.I cant recall the numbers though.I could be wrong.But I think it was 500 or something

Well, the Cell (ONE Cell mind you) can still process 10 times the Gflops that current PC processors can. So it\'s not just a couple hundred MHz faster.

"Cell also appears to have an advantage in the number of transistors — 234 million compared with 125 million for today’s latest Pentium 4 chips. Traditional chip makers, however, have regularly doubled their number of transistors every 12 to 18 months.
http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/6929471/page/2/

"Intel, the world\'s largest microchip maker, said in a statement it would add two so-called dual-core products to its Pentium family of chips during the second quarter, including the Pentium processor Extreme Edition.

Dual- and multi-core products include two or more processors on a single chip of silicon. That speeds up computing, although software must be rewritten to take full advantage of the extra power.

Sony is expected to use Cell starting next year to build its much-anticipated Playstation 3 video system.

Intel\'s Pentium Extreme Edition also will include hyper-threading technology -- a separate technology Intel began offering three years ago.

With hyper-threading and dual cores, Intel chips can process four software calculations simultaneously by efficiently using resources that otherwise would sit idle.

The ability to process up to four software "threads" simultaneously gives computers the impression that it has four separate processors with which to process data. Multi-threading increases performance and responsiveness on demanding tasks."

and

Intel said it has more than 10 multi-core related projects under way

http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/6929388/

Currently the Cell chip seems like the best thing ever.But the reason why I am not so excited about it is because until the Cell is put into use in consumer products other competing companies could already have something similar.

[Evi]

Current Pentiums are at 3.8 Ghz accprfing to the article.They arent very far to catch up.Also according to few articles other companies are already trying to do the same thing.
I am expecting something groundbraking.

You do realize that GHz means jack shit when comparing 2 different systems? But obviosuly PCs will catch up eventually.

I agree
 But I compare just like how the article compares.You cant say for sure either since there is still some time untill we see the chip being used in products to actually know its superior performance compared to the chips that will be available till then
 Right now we only see number comparisons.Which is the only thing I see right now.
 I cant be impressed with numbers.I have to see actual performance

I disagree.

Imho Intel is hitting a dead end with the P4. Read this :

Arstechnica Cell article

The more I read about it becomes clear why Intel\'s dual core approach is a sort of desperate move to keep up with Moore\'s Law.

[Evi]

The more I read about it becomes clear why Intel\'s dual core approach is a sort of desperate move to keep up with Moore\'s Law.

I agree with that.

The beauty of CELL is its scalability and the imense bandwidth to memory and other chips (I\'m sure it\'s on one of the slides posted above).

I however have doubts we\'ll see a 4 CELL config in PS3 as the chips is quite big on the 90nm process and it\'s not confirmed 65nm is ready for full production.

If they do get to 65nm in time, I could see a dual CELL per die solution, incorporating 2 PPE with each 8 SPEs. That would give roughly 512 GFLOPs per die. If we\'ll see two of those in PS3 I think is unlikely, given heat restraints, launch frame and costs associated with it. I\'m still hoping though... a double dual CELL config would be nice and the 1 TFLOP figure amazing. Sadly, I somewhat doubt it. A 1 or 2 CELL setup seems more likely seeing that this should be well enough to leave MS in the dust...

The Arstech article actually makes some sense. No wonder those Prescotts NEED such large cache ; the friggin\' instruction pipeline is sooo damn large.

I\'m not saying Cell will replace or even be a threat to general desktop computing, but imho it\'ll set a gamesperformance standard.

Would anyone think Sony is gonna repeat the PS2 mistake of poor code libraries for developers ?

That\'s why they have Nvidia onboard. I think Nvidia\'s PS3 contribution will be alot more about development tools than some custom GPU design.  I think this might even be benificial to OpenGL2.0 as for game development. Ati still kinda rules pc gaming becuz of direct3d. Imagine a huge PS3 games library based on OpenGL2.0

What\'s MS gonna do ? Another BOX with off the shelf components ?

What\'s MS gonna do ? Another BOX with off the shelf components ?

no way dude !

1st step into MS design is the box. it\'s going to be 7inch high, 27 inch lenght,  and 16 inch width.

they plan to have some kind of super futuristic conept, a metalic gray box with flahing green stripes that turn into yellow when the console get\'s too hot.

the second step in the design is the "add-on". MS plan to have DVD playback, 29.99$ for the remote that will unlock it. there is also now for the 1st time (duh!)  full backward compatibility with the original xbox. Sinc e it\'s an emulation software though, you\'ll have to buy it seperatly and install it to the HD (still not decided if there will be a HD or removable highperformance memory stick).

anyway, it\'s friday and i need to have my 1st coffee, thx for listening. /yawn

[Evi]

they plan to have some kind of super futuristic conept, a metalic gray box with flahing green stripes that turn into yellow when the console get\'s too hot.

No