Sony To Use PS2 Chip In Flat-Screen TVs

Thanks to GameSpot for its news story reporting that Sony is intending to use the PlayStation 2's CPU chip in a flat-screen TV that will be released in Japan this fall. According to the story: "Sony plans to take advantage of the PS2 chip's CG capabilities to create a high-quality graphical user interface (GUI) for the flat-screen TV [apparently similar to the PSX's DVR menu in style], which will allow smooth and easy control in navigating the TV's menu." There's no indication of any game-like functions for the TV, but: "The release of the new flat-screen TV can also be considered as the prelude to Sony's next-generation electronic products, some of which are expected to operate using the PS3's Cell chip when they are released in 2006."

Comments

Linux?

[mungeh]

I wonder if they'll release a hard drive and linux pack to go with it?

Re:Well done Sony..

[C32]

RTFA (Read the fine article)..

They will be using a PS2 CHIP, not an entire PS2 with drive assembly, to drive on screen menus.. IE 3d graphics buzzing around when you want to change the channel :)
This is NOT for playing games or dvds.

IMO a very smart move by sony; use the economies of scale for their old-tech, one-chip PS2's to differentiate their other consumer goods..
All LCDS and plasmas are more or less identical anyway, so cabinet design and OSD quality will be key factors in TV purchasing...

Re:Well done Sony..

[blueZhift]

I concur. Given the money they've invested in chip development, it's good to see that they are getting the most out of it. That can only mean good things for gamers too as economies of scale further push down the cost of manufacture which usually means less cost for the consumer. It'll be interesting to see if once the PS3 makes its debut, if Sony will later release slimmed down, sexed up version of the PS2 maybe a PSTwo...

Can we get one of these in my cable box?

[Jerf]

Can we get one of these in my cable box? I can't believe it is two thousand fucking four and it takes upwards of three seconds for my cable box to register even the simplest of keypresses. I could program a damn Commodore 64 to be more responsive than that.

Comcast wonders why nobody seems to want their video on demand. I'll tell you why: Because even to scan their free stuff, you have to dedicate five minutes of your time, laboriously cursoring here, waiting for the cursor to get there, waiting, waiting, cursoring to the next thing, waiting, waiting, waiting, and hesitantly pushing the "action" button, and waiting, waiting, only to find you had one more cursor action queued up and waiting, waiting for it to take effect, waiting, waiting, waiting for the action to take effect on the wrong screen, pressing "back" too many times in frustration, and finally finding yourself back at the normal TV view, only to start this all again... except, maybe not.

My first-generation TiVo sometimes annoys me (I think the later ones are a lot more responsive), but I still love it. My cable box is utterly unusable. With one of these chips in there it would improve the user experience... well, almost infinitely since right now the user experience is effectively "zero".

Re:Can we get one of these in my cable box?

[Detritus]

From what I've read, the problem isn't really the cable box, it's the way they designed the system. Your cable box is like a web browser, making requests for data to the cable company's servers. The delays that you see are a combination of slow communication links and slow servers. Your TIVO is much faster because it caches all its data locally.