[wellylug] YDL and PS3

[David Antliff]

On 04/01/2008, Jethro Carr <jethro.carr at jethrocarr.com> wrote:
> Basicly: The cell processor is really, really powerful IF the
> application is written to use the SPEs. It also requires that the
> program uses the SPEs in the write way, the SPEs are best designed to do
> vectorised floating point math, so programs that require this sort of
> math (such as 3D games and physics engines) will gain a huge performance
> boost.

Which is why, up until this point, the PS3 has essentially failed as a
games platform. Why invest massive cost attempting to utilise the SPEs
when you can simply develop for the adequate Xbox 360 with the
possibility of a relatively easier PC port down the track? The PS3
software development path is a dead end right from the start.

It remains to be seen how well the SPEs are utilised in future
applications and games.

It would be interesting to consider an SPE peripheral card (say, PCI
express) mass-produced and marketed for the PC-gaming crowd, that uses
the same API as the PS3 SPE set. It would make the PS3 a more
attractive development platform, but I have my doubts anyone would buy
them without current titles. It's the same chicken-egg problem that
Sony has yet to solve with the PS3 alone.

I think the unified shader architecture on the Nvidia 8xxx series has
a lot more going for it. Each of those shaders (of which there are 128
on the 8800 GTX) can be programmed to do far more than just graphics
ops. They are a bit like SPEs, only there's 128 of them on a single
video card...

-- 
David.