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Sony Considers Outsourcing Cell Production

Posted by Zonk on from the get-on-up-get-on-out dept.

Gamasutra reports on comments from the Sony home office, where executives are considering plans to outsource production of the expensive/complicated Cell chips that power the PS3. Executive deputy president Yutaka Nakagawa is quoted in a Reuters report, saying that when the PS2 launched there just weren't other companies to turn to. With the chip market better-developed in 2007, there are third parties Sony is now considering to take on the task of advancing/producing the Cell. Outsourcing could also help financially with their beleaguered semiconductor division. The next move for the Cell is to 45 nanometer manufacturing, from the 90/65 the company is currently using. This scale change could not only help with profits, but may eventually make dropping the price on the PlayStation 3 an easier pill to swallow.

7 of 70 comments (clear)

  1. Re:Yeah well by __aaclcg7560 · · Score: 4, Funny

    There's a serious shortage of these systems, dispite the price.

    Dude, haven't you heard? There's no PS3 shortage.

  2. The real sucess by GiovanniZero · · Score: 3, Interesting
    It remains to be seen whether or not the PS3 will catch on or not but the really success for sony may be the cell processor it self. It's been seeing use out side of gaming almost as much as it has in.

    Wouldn't it be funny if Sony became a direct competitor to Intel and AMD? Next gen PCs could run on cell processors!

    I don't really care as long as something gets us out of the x86 rut.

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  3. For sure by Bullfish · · Score: 3, Funny

    This will help them with their profits and make the PS3 more saleable, provided of course that people realize the Wii is just a fad and the 360 is never ever going to be as good as the PS3, regardless of its spiffy games like Gears of War.

    Just wait until next year!

    BTW: I am being sarcastic!

    1. Re:For sure by LWATCDR · · Score: 3, Insightful

      "The ps3 has a lot more potential than the xbox360."
      I am not so sure about that anymore.
      The XBox360 is much easier to program than the PS/3. History is filled with lots of systems that in theory where very powerful but where too hard to program. The Intel 860 and the Itanium are two great examples. Some of the massively parallel super computers like the Thinking Machine where also a tough machine to get the most out of.
      There is potential and there is potential. If the programmer can't use it then it is useless.

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  4. Re:90/65nm? by GiovanniZero · · Score: 5, Informative

    The 90nm was the first version and they started doing 65nm production. You can read about it on wikipedia's entry on cell processors

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  5. Re:IBM? by Wesley+Felter · · Score: 3, Informative

    Some Cells are made by IBM and some are made by Sony/Toshiba.

  6. Re:About Time by DrEldarion · · Score: 3, Insightful

    Problems to solve, in order of priority for the company:

    I'd say that NONE of those matter. There is one, and only one, thing that is making the PS3 sales so low - the games. The only must-have game out right now is Resistance, and not everyone likes FPS games. Once they start getting some more games out, the sales will follow, regardless of price, regardless of online experience (which isn't bad considering it's free), etc.