PlayStation-Based Mobile Handset a Possibility

Speaking with Financial Times, Hideki Komiyama, president of Sony Ericsson, raised the possibility of a mobile handset based on PlayStation gaming. The company has been struggling to find an answer to current smartphones, and they plan to release three new models within the next year which run Symbian, Android, and Windows Mobile. Komiyama likened a PlayStation-related handset to the music-based Walkman handset and the camera-based Cybershot handset. Quoting the FT: "He expresses interest in Sony Ericsson carving out a niche for itself based on Sony's strength in gaming. He says a PlayStation mobile, building on the Walkman and Cybershot phones, 'could happen.'"

Comments

First Post

[Anonymous Coward]

Someone had to say it.

No, seriously though. This will end up being the new n-Gage, if the precident set by Sony's release of the PlayStation 3 is anything to go by.

*disclaimer* I am a Sony Fanperson.

Re:First Post

[_merlin]

Yeah, when will they realise that people don't want combo phone/other gadget devices? You want your phone the be light and have good battery life. Combining it with other devices makes it bigger and heavier, and using the other functionality drains the battery. You want your phone with you all the time, too, and the ergonomic characteristics that are desirable for a phone aren't suitable for other gadgets (and vice versa). Just look at the N-Gage for an example of why it's a bad idea.

Re:First Post

[lee1026]

Considering how well camera phones are doing, I really don't think the "just a phone" sentiment is really what is successful in the marketplace. The iphone did a lot, and it sold a lot. And what is the most popular apps on the iphone? Games. It is logical to think, therefore, that a good game playing cell phone would sell, and if it did not, it would not be because it have too many features.

Re:First Post

[Dan541]

Actually the iPhone sold well because it is an apple product. The phone itself sucks balls.

Re:First Post

[prayag]

It is logical to think, therefore, that a good game playing cell phone would sell, and if it did not, it would not be because it have too many features.

I agree with your point that there seems to be a good market for such phones, but I think you missed the point on "too many features". If its a well done phone, even if it has too many features people would use it just avoiding the features they don't want.

Re:First Post

[Anonymous Coward]

You're wrong.

Let me guess, you're thirty something, probably got your first cellphone in the past 1-2 years. Pay as you go, obviously.

Re:First Post

[_merlin]

Under 30, had a mobile phone for over a decade, was an early adopter of UMTS 3G (I had one of those huge first-generation NEC UMTS/GSM hybrid phones). I use my phone as a phone, and occasionally take a picture with it if I haven't got my camera with me. I occasionally use web/email on it, too, or use it as an HSDPA modem if I need the 'net on the go.

But I can see my phone is crap as a camera, web browser, game system, etc. The screen is too small to be a decent web browser or game system, the controls are designed for dialing a phone and navigating simple menus - not typing or playing games (which are at odds with each other, anyway). It's one of those Nokias with a Karl Zeiss lens on the camera, but it's still crap compared to my Casio compact camera (which itself isn't much bigger than the phone). Playing games or using the camera drains the battery. It's best to use it as a phone.

I have two Nintendo DS Lites, and I can say the DS is a good game system. The screens are bright and clear, the battery life is acceptable, and the controls are good for jabbing at with your thumbs. It would be horrible as a phone, though. The controls would be all wrong, it wouldn't fit in my pocket, etc. Jamming a phone into my compact camera would be a similarly bad idea.

It's cool to have additional functionality in a phone that can be used in a pinch when you don't have the real thing (games when I don't have the DS, camera when I don't have the Casio, web browser when I don't have a computer), but it should be designed primarily as a phone, or its usefulness as a phone will suffer, and trying to jam a phone into other devices would be a similar failure.

Re:First Post

[Anonymous Coward]

And what is the most popular apps on the iphone?

That should be "And what are the most popular apps on the iphone?"

HTH. HAND.

Re:First Post

[MoonBuggy]

There are plenty of 'just a phone' handsets out there. They work perfectly well, they're cheap and by definition they don't really need to be updated or redesigned - that's why they never make the news.

What do you expect the headlines to read? "Nokia 1100 still excellent basic phone, just like it was six years ago"?

Re:First Post

[Haoie]

Oddly enough, a camera bundled with a phone has become from high class to commonplace within a few years.

But the cams are still pretty low quality, as you'd expect when you multitask.

Re:First Post

[Anonymous Coward]

Speak for yourself. I want a portable device that can handle everything because it means less to carry around. If battery life becomes a serious problem, they will simply make better batteries or more power efficient hardware.

Re:First Post

[_merlin]

I want a portable device that can handle everything because it means less to carry around.

You mean a device that can handle everything that you specifically want, as other things would be useless bloat, right? Would you like the device to be bigger and more power-hungry because it contained an electronic compass, hybrid GPS/INS, pedometer, altimeter, and LED projector? I bet you think at least one of those things is a useless feature that you'd never use, but there's at least one person who wants it.

If battery life becomes a serious problem, they will simply make better batteries or more power efficient hardware.

The evidence is against you here. Feature-packed handsets have poor battery life. There's a limit to battery energy density that comes from the chemistry involved. They're unwilling to simply use bigger batteries, as people don't want bulkier devices.

The trouble is, it's all about compromise. You don't want the big, vibrant screen of a camera or game console in a phone because of size/power consumption. You don't want the multi-element lens of a camera in a phone because of size and fragility. You don't want game console controls on a phone because they're impractical for actually using it as a phone. You're better off just deciding which devices you're likely to need and carrying them.

Investment

[Anonymous Coward]

Me investing, or believing in this crap, could happen.

It won't.

But good luck with the "we don't have any real good plans but we may win because the one we just floated your direction is awesome. right?"

Good luck with your "plan" Sony Ericsson. All the other smartphones are killing you (hint: it's not because they have Playstation capability [they don't]). Just make sure I have to work extra hours to earn the thing. Then you'll surely win.

Hey, it could happen.

Re:Investment

[Anonymous Coward]

Me investing, or believing in this crap, could happen.

It probably has about as good of a chance of success as Duke Nukem Forever.

Which was just shitcanned! Muhahaha!

PlaystationPhone or PhonePlaystation?

[meist3r]

Sony is not exactly known for it's technological strategies in the last years. They sat heavy on their butt with overestimating the consumers need for a gaming platform/media system with the PS3 and unless they come up with a serious mobile strategy including software platform, app store, innovative applications and some incentive for customers to want to use their stuff I highly doubt this will make it that far. It's clearly aimed at countering the iPhone's growing stance as a mobile gaming platform but the iPhone has one important advantage: It's a platform not just a device. Sony has been building too many devices lately. Those don't sell too well on their own.

Re:PlaystationPhone or PhonePlaystation?

[R.Morton]

I don't know the DS and DSI are selling pretty well and they are just devices aren't they ?.

R.Morton

Re:PlaystationPhone or PhonePlaystation?

[AKAImBatman]

I think the point is that the DS and DSi are focused gaming devices whereas the PSP is an unfocused, be everything to everyone, "device". Which I don't think is an entirely fair criticism.

IMHO, the PSP is not a game console. It just sucks as a portable game console. By the time you get your game loaded, you're already at your bus stop. Not to mention that the games tend to have the long-gameplay sensibilities of a home console rather than a portable system. I won't even get into the portability comparisons between the PSP and DS games.

The PSP is almost focused as if it were a Playstation that you could take to a friend's house. Or a portable DVD player. Or an emulator. In fact, it focuses well on just about everything except being a portable game console. (Whoops.)

Oddly, the DSi has bridged the jack-of-all-trades barrier a bit itself. It is not only a portable game system, but it is also a camera, music player, and portable web browser. It seems to succeed at these things not because it was so well designed for them, but rather because they were grown out of its existing capabilities rather than made a central focus of the system. In many ways the DSi does these features worse than the PSP, but the users appear to be happier with them. (Anyone notice that there is a DSiCade for the browser, but no PSPCade?)

Sony lacks focus. That is their core business issue, and why the PS3 and PSP have not been competing as well as they should.

Re:PlaystationPhone or PhonePlaystation?

[R.Morton]

Actually to be fair I was not saying that the PSP was worse than the DS and DSI I was just saying do they not all fall in to the Devices catagory ?.

Hell I like all three of them ;), as a collector I appreciate the diffrences that all the handhelds bring to the history of gaming for better or worse.

becuase from these successes and failures comes more innovation in the gaming world and we can all appreciate that.

R.Morton

Re:PlaystationPhone or PhonePlaystation?

[MichaelSmith]

My seven year old son has a DS, and is doing his best to trick us into getting him a DSi.

The DS seems to be targeted at younger consumers. The older demographic for the PSP is smaller because a lot of people at that age just aren't into games any more.

I see a lot of girls my sons age with cute pink DS's. I can't imagine a girl buying a PSP. Thats half the market gone right there.

Re:PlaystationPhone or PhonePlaystation?

[KDR_11k]

Oh, the DS does have quite some appeal to older people as the sales of Cooking Navi show (18 million units!). It also appeals to children. I think if you add it all up the DS appeals to everyone but the graphics whores.

Re:PlaystationPhone or PhonePlaystation?

[meist3r]

I don't know the DS and DSI are selling pretty well and they are just devices aren't they ?

Well, you got me there. Maybe my definition wasn't clear enough. The difference between the iPhone, a potential PSPhone and the DS(i) is that the DS isn't "connected" in the sense that it doesn't have inherent networking capabilities that are designed to push apps. At least not that I'm aware of. The iPhone has spawned an entire eco-system of software around it and the PSPhone will have to do something quite similar to compete. The AppStore is undoubtably a profitable model and we have yet to see other mobile platforms of that magnitude and impact. The DSi is a very specialized device. I never said devices themselves wouldn't sell ... just that it's hard to compete against an entire platform infrastructure if you have "only" your device. On top of that the Nintendo model is very rigid and doesn't allow for much third party creative interaction and thus basically limits itself to be a device rather than a platform.

Re:PlaystationPhone or PhonePlaystation?

[RogueyWon]

Nintendo have ensured at a stroke that I will never pick up a DSi. They've region locked its software.

My morning commute isn't really handheld friendly (packed in like sardines on a short distance commuter train and then London Underground). The main use I get out of handhelds is when I travel, be it for business or personal reasons. And with the nature of my work, most of my business travel is to the States. I've always, therefore, kept a handheld (or several - I have a PSP and DS, which get around equal use) around for flights and for evenings stuck in crap hotels or conference centres in the middle of nowhere. The ability to buy games for my handhelds at either end of the journey is a sine qua non for me. In the past, it's not been much of an issue - handheld games were always region free. For Nintendo to now institute locking on the DSi just confirms my long standing suspicion that Nintendo's natural instinct is towards the kind of corporate ethics that would make even Sony and Microsoft blush (no mean feat), but that they've not previously been confident enough in their market position to give into this.

Re:PlaystationPhone or PhonePlaystation?

[AKAImBatman]

the DS isn't "connected" in the sense that it doesn't have inherent networking capabilities that are designed to push apps.

You mean the DSiShop channel? I don't see how it's any less integral than the iPhone's app store.

I do think Nintendo rushed the DSi to market. The hardware is fine, but there is absolutely zero software for it. There are no DSi enhanced or exclusive carts and the downloadable games are all ripped from other GBA and DS titles. (With the exception of WarioWare Snap, which is pretty much a tech-demo showing off the camera system.) However, things are unlikely to remain this way. Developers are already working with the DSi, and targeted games will be showing up soon. Mighty Flip Champs, for example, is expected to be a killer app for the online service.

Sooo... not quite sure where you're going with your argument?

Re:PlaystationPhone or PhonePlaystation?

[meist3r]

You mean the DSiShop channel? I don't see how it's any less integral than the iPhone's app store.

I am not really familiar with the offerings for the DS market but do they sell complete games over that shop? What about dedicated applications? What about third party apps? That's what I mean by "pushing" software. A service like XBLA or the PSN downloads can hardly be called a "software" store because it's merely a one-tier electronic distribution channel. The AppStore on the other hand is at least somewhat open to people to sell their "own" things.

Sooo... not quite sure where you're going with your argument?

I was originally trying to say that the DS doesn't have much "software" aside from games and some little gimmicky toy apps (forgive me if I'm worng I don't know the DS portfolio that well). To me the kind of apps that you need to be able to compete in a market with the iPhone are business apps and more "serious" application. Sure the iFart isn't far away from Smooth Moves but overall the DS as a software platform has very little to offer besides it intended purposes. The iPhone on the other hand (and I don't want to argue for the Apple model just saying that this has become the de factor standard) has a much broader variety of software available for it and that is why it is becoming more and more attractive for user and developers alike. Ultimately, there is little use designing spreadsheet software for the DS, is there.

Re:PlaystationPhone or PhonePlaystation?

[A12m0v]

I'm 23 and the DS appeals to me more than the PSP.

My younger brother (6 years old) has a PSP, and it appeals to him more.

Re:PlaystationPhone or PhonePlaystation?

[feepness]

By the time you get your game loaded, you're already at your bus stop. Not to mention that the games tend to have the long-gameplay sensibilities of a home console rather than a portable system. I won't even get into the portability comparisons between the PSP and DS games.

This is total FUD. While I've never been a fan of the UMD, the latest two revisions of the PSP, out for over two years now, have a caching ability which speeds up load times significantly.

Second, if you turn the PSP off and back on, you instantly resume from where you left off. If your buses actually move that fast let me know where you live, you are quite lucky.

Third, since you are obviously unfamiliar with the hardware, how can you expect to be familiar with the software? When was the last time you played a PSP game? Or are you making it up? There is all sorts of quick software able to appeal to any sensibility.

I recently had my old one stolen that I kept in the gym bag solely for watching movies on the treadmill. I looked high and low for a decent replacement with a high resolution, bright screen, and swappable storage. I ended up buying a used PSP 2001 for $90. Nearest thing I could find that still had a smaller and lower resolution screen was an iPod touch for ~$200.

I think people like you do a disservice to those around them by feeding your bias/ego by bashing things you know nothing about.

Re:PlaystationPhone or PhonePlaystation?

[feepness]

I recently had my old one stolen that I kept in the gym bag solely for watching movies on the treadmill. I looked high and low for a decent replacement with a high resolution, bright screen, and swappable storage. I ended up buying a used PSP 2001 for $90. Nearest thing I could find that still had a smaller and lower resolution screen was an iPod touch for ~$200.

BTW, that was movies off the memory stick. I never purchased a UMD movie.

Re:PlaystationPhone or PhonePlaystation?

[Khyber]

"By the time you get your game loaded, you're already at your bus stop."

Quit using the PSP-1000, then. And did you HONESTLY expect fast loading times off of a tiny-ass proprietary optical disc from first-gen? SERIOUSLY?

On the PSP-2000 and better, loading times jumped dramatically.

"Not to mention that the games tend to have the long-gameplay sensibilities of a home console rather than a portable system."

At least they got that part correct. You can't find QUALITY like that on a fucking home console any longer. At least it can be found SOMEWHERE. (150+ hours on Crisis Core for PSP vs 50 or so hours for any new RPG out there, minus Disgaea 3.) But then I'd assume you like wasting your money on short-lived games with very little staying power with the way you phrase your comment.

Now what I find amusing is they're looking at a playstation-based platform for a phone. Guys, you already have Skype built-in with your PSP-2000 and better.

I use it ALL THE TIME and iPhone fools are flabbergasted when they see me whip it out and make a phone call. "Hey, I don't pay a premium for this like you do with your iPhone. I pay $30/yr and that's that to make phone calls. You pay that monthly? Fool."

If you could just make a little CDMA or 3G stick that would work with the PSP for cellular calling then you'd be set. There is no need to go ahead and design anther piece of hardware. Tweak the shit you already have, Sony!

Re:PlaystationPhone or PhonePlaystation?

[dragonjujotu]

I'm 23, I have the DS and PSP. The PSP has become my mobile media player and the DS is my mobile gaming device. Once I get a DSi and/or a homebrew card, the only purpose I have for the PSP is finishing Tactics (again, but with new stuff) and Crisis Core, which isn't very engaging and I haven't played it in months...

Re:PlaystationPhone or PhonePlaystation?

[Dog-Cow]

You are an ass.

But then I'd assume you like wasting your money on short-lived games with very little staying power with the way you phrase your comment.

"Assume" is the correct word here, considering you are an ass. The GP meant that there aren't games geared toward a short play time. I don't know if that's true at all, but at least I know what he meant.

"Hey, I don't pay a premium for this like you do with your iPhone. I pay $30/yr and that's that to make phone calls. You pay that monthly? Fool."

I'd love to see you do that 40 miles out in the middle of nowhere like an iPhone user can. Oh right, you are too stupid to understand the difference between cellular and wifi access.

Re:PlaystationPhone or PhonePlaystation?

[Anonymous Coward]

The iPhone/Touch has a higher resolution than the PSP.

Re:PlaystationPhone or PhonePlaystation?

[drinkypoo]

They sat heavy on their butt with overestimating the consumers need for a gaming platform/media system with the PS3

No, they underestimated the customers' intelligence. Hard to do, but not impossible: they thought that they would buy it at practically any price because it said Sony on it, and they were wrong.

Re:PlaystationPhone or PhonePlaystation?

[Khyber]

Do you not realize that open wireless APs are UBIQUITOUS? I've picked up *MANY* driving through Arizona, in the middle of the desert. Especially in an open area like desert, that signal can go for much further distances than specification allows. I've picked up wifi directly from I-10, the nearest building being about a kilometer away. Yea, only one bar and sounded like a busted vinyl AND I had to hold it just outside of the car's window, but IT STILL WORKED. Most GAS STATIONS IN THE MIDDLE OF NOWHERE (population 5) HAVE WIRELESS.

The few spots where the PSP didn't work, guess what? My cell phone didn't work there, either.

Re:PlaystationPhone or PhonePlaystation?

[pnewhook]

Yea, only one bar and sounded like a busted vinyl AND I had to hold it just outside of the car's window, but IT STILL WORKED.

Your wifi sounds like busted vinyl? Do you know what wifi is? It seems you are confusing wifi with cellular as the parent post suggests.

Re:PlaystationPhone or PhonePlaystation?

[meist3r]

I kinda disagree. The 360 was rather expensive when it launched as well and boasted an equally compelling HD DVD drive at the time. Sony overestimated the "value" that Blu-Ray meant to people. Now it's just a part of the console and nobody actually cares for the PS3 as a player in the gamer community (it's a nice added bonus). The problem is the Xbox SKU evolved over time and made amends for the lack of features of one package with a lower pricepoint or more capacity as it became less attractive. The PS3 has been on a dead-set steady price and people just don't see why they would pay a 200$ premium for a video format they won't use and a console that can barely do anything better than the 360. Sony has locked itself into this with probably ridiculously high hardware manufacturing cost and a failed long-term strategy. I don't know that's so much a matter of intelligence on the customer side, I personally think it's a lack thereof on Sony's side.

Just to clarify, I don't own either. I'm one of those silly fools that is still waiting for the next Zelda for Wii and keeps playing mediocrity until then -no HD TV ... no need for a 400$ dust collector.

Re:PlaystationPhone or PhonePlaystation?

[drinkypoo]

The 360 was rather expensive when it launched as well

Not as expensive as the PS3 though

and boasted an equally compelling HD DVD drive at the time.

I would dispute the idea that it was equally compelling. I preferred HD-DVD but always bet on Blu-Ray. I own neither.

I'm one of those silly fools that is still waiting for the next Zelda for Wii and keeps playing mediocrity until then -no HD TV ... no need for a 400$ dust collector.

I only wish I knew why my Xbox and PS2 look great on my HDTV at 480p, but my Wii still looks like poop.

Hmm, that didn't come out right.

Re:PlaystationPhone or PhonePlaystation?

[meist3r]

I would dispute the idea that it was equally compelling. I preferred HD-DVD but always bet on Blu-Ray. I own neither.

Well, for a while there the entire market didn't know what it was going to be. Eventually Blu-Ray seemed to have been the one with the better gimmicky features and thus prevailed -two-three years ago I wouldn't have known which one would make it.

I only wish I knew why my Xbox and PS2 look great on my HDTV at 480p

To me the whole situation is a paradoxically recursive moebius-strip excuse. I don't own an HD TV therefore I don't own an HD console. I don't own an HD console therefore I don't own HD TV. I use a modded Xbox every day on my SD TV but I don't really miss 720p/1080p since most of the things I watch are rather poor quality (video encoding wise) in any case. I simply can't (don't want to) afford spending a thousand Euros on the kind of equipment I would need to enjoy myself using it. The cheapest TV I could live with is 700 and then I would have to buy a PS3 and several games and/or a 360 as well just to play the games I would want to play. That's easily 1500 right there. Sure I could save some money buying used games and stuff but I just don't wanna :p Until I catch a break at work and can put aside a grand to "waste" on entertainment gear I'm still pretty happy with what I got.

but my Wii still looks like poop.

Yeah, sad isn't it? Best selling system, longest history in the market and they can't get their feet into "proper" territory. I'm enjoying some of the games I bought for it but most of the stuff coming out is a joke considering the history Nintendo has as a game defining company (the video games making "game" that is). Like I wrote before. Basically I'm just waiting for the next Zelda. After that I think I will either ditch video games for good or spend more money than ever before. Right now, I think I'd put the money to better use.

Re:PlaystationPhone or PhonePlaystation?

[Khyber]

Apparently you've NEVER OWNED VINYL, otherwise you'd be able to equate static on a cell line with static in a VoIP call to a land line. Yes, there is static and popping/repeating, kinda like a vinyl with a groove across a couple of tracks will do. VoIP + weak signal = lag, pops, repeats, and static. Vinyl does all but one of those four things.

Re:PlaystationPhone or PhonePlaystation?

[pnewhook]

So let me get this straight. You'd rather hold your PSP out your car window and put up with shitty wifi reception and bad audio just so you can bitch about everyone else instead of getting a decent cell phone.

Get a grip and stop being such an ass.

I don't see it

[OrangeTide]

I fail to see a connection as why this strategy would be advantageous for the manufacturer or consumer.

(also, how annoying to post a reg-req'd article)

Re:I don't see it

[Anonymous Coward]

I fail to see why going to http://slashdot.org/ directs me to the RSS feed. Hulp plox?

Re:I don't see it

[Anonymous Coward]

I fail to see a connection as why this strategy would be advantageous for the manufacturer or consumer.

(also, how annoying to post a reg-req'd article)

Well you could port a killer application from the playstation to the mobile phone.
Imagine being able to play silent hill, dead space, god of war and gayniggers from outer space on your mobile phone.

Registration

[Anonymous Coward]

Registration not required

I like it

[Anonymous Coward]

I'm a pretty far cry from a console fanboy of any kind, but my experiences with the PSP OS has been nothing short of spectacular. The button usage makes total sense since we're all used to X being OK, circle being back, and triangle being a menu. It works well in games and it translates well to an OS, as proven by the Playstation OS. I'd still want a full hard keyboard though. Left and right triggers would be overkill, but having bumpers on all four corners would be shiny!

OOOOoohh

[nog_lorp]

Pee Ess Pee

The extended iPod

[G3ckoG33k]

"Actually the iPhone sold well because it is an apple product."

That is silly. Most of the people buying the iPhone, in terms of numbers, would probably be too young to have an idea of what is Apple Inc.

And, thy are definitely too young to realize about the Mac vs Wintel wars of two decades ago...

In fact, they might be more aware of Ubuntu versus Vista. But, to be honest, I don't think they even know of that.

They probably think of the iPhone as the mobile phone version of iPod, without realizing what is the name of the company behind it.

Re:The extended iPod

[Dogtanian]

Actually the iPhone sold well because it is an apple product. The phone itself sucks balls.

That is silly. Most of the people buying the iPhone, in terms of numbers, would probably be too young to have an idea of what is Apple Inc. [..] They probably think of the iPhone as the mobile phone version of iPod, without realizing what is the name of the company behind it.

That's pretty unlikely- I suspect that the vast majority certainly *do* "know" who Apple is. Yes, that's almost certainly via the success of the iPod, and it's quite probable that a significant number neither know nor care that Apple produces the Mac.

Still, however it got there, Apple is well-known and associated with fashionable technology.

While the majority of iPod/iPhone buyers almost certainly aren't as obsessed with Apple as the disproportionately vocal fanboy contingent, most of the potential audience will know Apple and associate them with "cool".

FWIW, I don't think that the iPhone sold solely because it was an Apple.

IMHO calling it a "phone" is also misleading. The iPhone is essentially a modern PDA with communications facilities; it's not really seen as such because PDAs fell out of favour a few years back and the iPhone arrived there via the phone route. But I suspect that had PDAs continued to sell and evolve, we'd have arrived in a similar place in 2009. No-one would buy the iPhone if it was simply just a phone, even a souped-up one with some nice tweaks.

Re:The extended iPod

[Xaoswolf]

No-one would buy the iPhone if it was simply just a phone, even a souped-up one with some nice tweaks.

which is why its the iPHONE, and not the iPDA. As a PDA it was missing half of what all the other PDA's had. Hell, lack of MMS and 3g, made it a pretty crappy phone also, but the apple logo made up for that...

As far as PDAs go, I work in the mobile industry. PDAs are still going strong.

Do we really need a specialist Playstation phone?

[saihung]

My Symbian phone is based on a successor architecture to the MIPS chip that was in the original PS1 and is an order of magnitude faster, which might simplify system emulation. If there were an official PS1 emulator for my phone (and that's what we're really talking about after all, isn't it?) I'd buy it. And since Sony already owns Connectix ...

Sony is a bunch of seperate companies

[Skuldo]

Sony Ericsson have said they wanted to make a PSP phone in the past, Sony Computer Entertainment have said no though.

Re:Sony is a bunch of seperate companies

[Khyber]

"Sony Computer Entertainment have said no though."

No. No way. Ever heard of this little program called Skype? Guess which Sony console it's on? The PSP. They already HAVE phone capabilities. Non-knowledgeable fools don't know this.

Hell the PSP has hardware for VIDEO CHAT. Let me see an iPhone properly designed for such a purpose. Hint: you won't, because of how the iPhone is designed.

Re:Sony is a bunch of seperate companies

[Dog-Cow]

Skype on PSP makes the PSP a phone just as much as games on iPhone make the iPhone a game console.

Mobile Cell CPU

[Doc Ruby]

The Playstation 3 runs on the Cell CPU, which an extremely powerful multiprocessing chip. It's also extremely high yield in manufacturing, because defective chips usually just lose one or more of the parallel DSPs, but otherwise work just great. Which makes each chip cheaper, since the expense of the whole manufacturing (and R&D) run is spread across a lot more chips sold, many of which are discarded in less efficient processes.

Mobile Cell chips could be simply the lower-grade chips with just one or a few DSPs working, but otherwise superfast (3.2GHz PPC, wicked fast bus, etc). They're programmed exactly the same as the higher grade Cells, because the Cell itself allocates however many DSPs are working. The dead DSPs don't even suck power.

And Linux already runs great on the Cell (as in Linux on Playstation), with the main OS on the PPC and multimedia offloaded to the DSPs.

I would love to see a Linux "PlayPhone" that runs the same SW as a PS3, as a desktop, as a server, etc, but with different features depending on the full complement of HW in the device.

Re:Mobile Cell CPU

[w0mprat]

Mobile Cell chips could be simply the lower-grade chips with just one or a few DSPs working, but otherwise superfast (3.2GHz PPC, wicked fast bus, etc).

You're forgetting just how much power cell processors chug down. Even with only 1 or 2 SPEs and a downclocked PPC core and a narrower slower bus you won't be anywhere near a 1-3 watt envelope that's tolerable in something you can hold in your hand (ie. 2 hour battery life at full load). Try more like 15watts for the most cut-down cell.

Sony is likely to not be reinventing the wheel too much. MIPS32 architecture which already works well in the PSP (which has two of these processors). We'll be something similar along those lines, with up to day specs of course. Unfortunatley sony will be needing some new silicon if they want to get cell-compatible technology into the phone.

Re:Mobile Cell CPU

[Doc Ruby]

Sadly, you are propbably right. I'm always optimistic about design win chances for Cell.

Do you happen to know how much power a full PS3 Cell (7 SPUs) draws?

Re:Mobile Cell CPU

[drinkypoo]

The Playstation 3 runs on the Cell CPU, which an extremely powerful multiprocessing chip. It's also extremely high yield in manufacturing, because defective chips usually just lose one or more of the parallel DSPs, but otherwise work just great.

O RLY? The real story is that the PS3's Cell processor has 7/8 of its theoretical performance, because the only way they could get yields up into the acceptable range was by disabling one PPE. This was not part of the original plan.

Mobile Cell chips could be simply the lower-grade chips with just one or a few DSPs working, but otherwise superfast (3.2GHz PPC, wicked fast bus, etc).

O RLY? Why this link? Because Cell TDP is 60-80 watts. Put that in a handheld and burn your fingers.

And Linux already runs great on the Cell (as in Linux on Playstation), with the main OS on the PPC and multimedia offloaded to the DSPs.

O RLY? No, Linux runs on the PPC and one of the SPEs, reducing the total number of usable SPEs to six. In your mythical cell-based handheld with less SPEs, there would be even less available.

Finally, the SPEs are not DSPs, they are vector processors.

In other words, sorry man, but your comment is 100% incorrect.

Re:Mobile Cell CPU

[Doc Ruby]

1: They do not disable the SPEs to increase yield. The manufacturing process loses one or more SPEs despite their best efforts, because the defects of any CPU manufacturing that usually take out the whole chip in the Cell instead take out only one of the 8 SPEs owing to the designed redundancy if the defect is on an SPE (other parts aren't redundant). A typical CPU would have lowered yield by that chip with even a single defect to it, but a Cell can survive up to 7 defects if they're all on SPEs, by blowing the fuses to a dead SPE when testing it at the end of manufacturing. This is a process that can tolerate the defects that come with CPU manufacturing by keeping chips in the yield that would previously have been discarded with a less redundant design, but in the Cell can be used even though one or more SPEs is unavailable. That approach is pretty novel, and widely misreported in oversimplified summaries.

2: As someone else in this thread mentioned, a Cell with a single SPE, like I suggested be used in a mobile device, would use only about 15W, not the full 60-80W. But you should have been able to figure that out since so many of the Cell's elements aren't being used, therefore not consuming power. BTW, it's the dissipated power that burns your hand, not the power consumed. If a chip consumed 80W but ran 100% efficient, it wouldn't heat up at all. The Cell, like any other CPU, is far from 100% power efficient, but it's not 0% efficient, either.

3: The PS3 Cell runs Linux on the PPE and any or all of the available SPEs. Though indeed the Linux PS3 runs under its Hypervisor dedicating one of the SPEs to managing the rest of the 6. So while apps have access to only 6 under Linux, the 7th is doing useful work that the apps don't have to do, therefore not negligible.

4: The SPEs are DSPs. They are optimized to process matrix multiplication as SIMD. which is what DSPs do. DSPs like the SPEs are also vector processors - the terms are not mutually exclusive.

The whole "Playstation-based mobile handset" is "mythical". The story we're discussing calls it a "possibility", and what I suggested was only a possibility itself. No one claimed it was an existing device.

Now, as the other response in this thread pointed out, Cell even with 1 SPE might not be good for a mobile, compared to other CPUs, because it still consumes a lot of power. But that has nothing to do with your complaints, which are 100% wrong.

It's pretty evident that you don't really know anything about the Cell, but are trying to disagree with me based on a hazy understanding of some poorly reported details of a novel architecture - and a hazy understanding of multiprocessing and DSP. You should know what you're talking about before disagreeing so disagreeably.

Re:Mobile Cell CPU

[drinkypoo]

1: They do not disable the SPEs to increase yield. History: Yields are horrible, Yields can be improved by disabling processing elements, yields have improved. If you can suggest another reason why yields improved, I'd like to see it.
As someone else in this thread mentioned, a Cell with a single SPE, like I suggested be used in a mobile device, would use only about 15W, not the full 60-80W. Probably false, without a process shrink, which would again threaten yields and raise costs. One PPE plus one SPE would almost certainly draw more than that. But there's no good way to know because no hard TDP numbers have ever been published. Also, what the hell are you trying to accomplish with a single SPE? That's just plain retarded. Are you not aware that MMX/SSE/etc functions are provided by a coprocessor? Congratulations, you've just reinvented the Pentium MMX. The only advantage of using a cell processor (which has been largely panned by game developers as being a major PITA) in the handheld goes away if you don't have all the SPEs, because you don't have PS3 compatibility. The Cell is a serious boondoggle in gaming. I can't help but continue to believe that it was designed for other purposes (perhaps military) and they decided to build a game console around it to try to recoup some of the cost.
BTW, it's the dissipated power that burns your hand, not the power consumed. If a chip consumed 80W but ran 100% efficient, it wouldn't heat up at all. Uh, and exactly how do you think that energy is dissipated? Free hint: The electrons don't just fly out into the aether.
The SPEs are DSPs Depends on how you define DSP, but we could argue about definitions all day; I hereby announce that I have no intention of doing so.
It's pretty evident that you don't really know anything about the Cell Snicker snort. It's pretty obvious that you got all defensive, but it doesn't make you right.

Re:Mobile Cell CPU

[Doc Ruby]

There's a brief discussion of Cell's "Design for Manufacturing" feature redundancy's effect on higher yields at the link from one of the Inquirer links you just included. But of course that redundancy isn't all that's required for high yields. They improved the rest of the process which increased the base yield.

What I'd accomplish with a Cell with 1 SPE would be a 3.4GHz PPC, a 20GFLOPS DSP, and a superfast bus, using a part that would be extremely cheap because its inclusion in the yields mean it would otherwise have been thrown out. The fact that a chip uses an onchip coprocessor as the MMX/SSE chips did, and indeed every x86 chip since the 80486 did, does not mean that it's a bad architecture. In fact, that demonstrates that it's a good architecture.

One advantage other than the CPU's native features would be the common development platform, as Linux runs on Cell and SPEs. Indeed, lots of the same SW would run on both the "desktop" (ie. PS3) Cell machine and a 1 SPE device, because most of the SW doesn't use the SPEs at all, but rather just the PPC. That cheaper and generic, even open, development platform, was one reason why Sony designed the Cell into the PS3. The PITA programming the Cell lies in its multiprocessor SPE architecture, which is unfamiliar and needs new techniques. A single SPE is not multiprocessor in that application tier, so doesn't present those problems.

Though indeed the Cell was not designed specifically for the PS3. It was designed as a whole class of new CPUs, the highest end ones for IBM workstations and servers (where they are also used today), but the lower ones in the increased yields ready to go into cheaper and less powerful equipment, like DVDs, big TVs, etc.

Not all the power supplied to a CPU is emitted as heat. Much, sometimes most, of the energy moves the chips electrons in an orderly fashion through the chip and out to the ground, not the disorderly motion that is dissipated heat.

See, there are reasonable answers to even the bad questions and wrong responses that you posed. I'm not defensive, I'm just correcting you. But since you haven't acknowledged even a single point you got wrong, though you got them all wrong, and you're getting even more insulting than your original obnoxious response, I'm not giving you any more free clues. It's obvious that you are interested in being aggressively wrong and obnoxious, and burrowing into your ignorance. I'm not wasting any more time depriving you of your sad little hobby.

Re:Mobile Cell CPU

[Burpmaster]

BTW, it's the dissipated power that burns your hand, not the power consumed. If a chip consumed 80W but ran 100% efficient, it wouldn't heat up at all. The Cell, like any other CPU, is far from 100% power efficient, but it's not 0% efficient, either.

YOU FAIL PHYSICS!

Energy efficiency is a measure of how much power went where you want vs how much power you consumed total. Such as with a light bulb, where it measures how much energy turned into light instead of heat. If you have a light bulb that turns 30% of the energy into light, then you have a 30% efficient light bulb... and a 70% efficient heater.

It doesn't make sense to talk about energy efficiency of a processor as a percentage. It only makes sense to talk about how much energy it consumes. Just where do you think the consumed power is going? Unless your processor is shooting out photons or radio waves or something like that, it is 100% efficient... at generating heat

Re:Do we really need a specialist Playstation phon

[forkazoo]

My Symbian phone is based on a successor architecture to the MIPS chip that was in the original PS1 and is an order of magnitude faster, which might simplify system emulation. If there were an official PS1 emulator for my phone (and that's what we're really talking about after all, isn't it?) I'd buy it. And since Sony already owns Connectix ...

No, they aren't really talking about "PlayStation" the device. They are talking about "PlayStation" the brand. Keeping to MIPS would potentially simplify porting things from PS1/PS2/PSP to the "PlayStation Phone," but I wouldn't be at all surprised to see a PlayStation Phone use an ARM CPU instead. It's pretty standard on phones these days.