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Playstation 2 Specs
CerebusUS was the first to send specs for Sony's unveiled Playstation 2. Currently, Wired is also carrying some interesting information regarding the new machine as well. Some of the more tasty highlights include a confirmed 55 million polys/second, 128-bit CPU, along with a FPU and two floating point vector units. Total: 5 billion floating-point calcs per second. 500 mips with compiler optimization. /me wipes drool from face.
I think with the strength the PS-X is still showing, unless a MAJOR upset to the console industry happens this year, that Sony should wait 'till 2000 to release the new PS-X...
:)
(My reasoning being that when they do release it, it'll be another 4yrs or so before they release yet another, and I'd rather wait another year with the current one to have the new one be that much better. Sorry Dreamcast.
-Hobart
I want one :)
If these suckers are backwards compat. with the original PSX's they will be killers. As for being an N64 killer, its not even in the same league. This thing is slated to compete with Nintendo's system which will come out in 2001 and Dreamcast.
-AC
I doubt we'll see backwards compatability. This is an entirely different CPU. Unless they include an emulator in ROM, it won't happen. Of course, I've been wrong before, so...
From the wired article...
However, Sony Computer Entertainment
America, which markets the PlayStation in the
United States, refused to confirm or deny plans
for the chip.
"This is a forum to announce new technologies,
and we haven't made any public announcements
about the next generation of the PlayStation,"
said spokeswoman Molly Smith.
But what about the games? I don't care how many polygons/sec it can do. They can take their Crash Bandicoot, Final Fantasy, and Ridge Racer and stuff it. Until there are some games out that wow me, there is nothing to drool over. Now Zelda Ocarina of Time is a game.
Hmmmmmmmmmmmmmm?????
The P5+ x86es have 64bit busses (external) and 128 bit (internal) busses. This does not make them 64 bit or 128bit.
The normal measure of bittage is the pointer size. Alpha has a 64bit pointer (although current alphas only use 48bits of it).
Generally a processor's other regs will be the same size as pointer, so their size is an okay measure too..
The sony cpu is certantly *NOT* a 128 bit cpu.
This is complete BS. If you use the right code a PII/400 is capible of 2400mips. That doesn't mean it ever does that on a real app.
I thought Quake3 Arena was using Bezier curves?
-thomas
Hey , im reading this in a park bench on my
lap top, BREATHING the fresh air as I type...
MORONS
good points. this approach is what nuon is trying to do only in a different way. they want to make nuon enhanced dvd players and sneak dvd based games in via trojan horse style marketing. sony may try to create a game console that doubles as a dvd player. i think its a chicken and the egg game. i'll lay money on sony being able to pull it off because of their brand recognition in both gaming and consumer electronics. but iirc, the japanese playstation will playback mpeg2 while the us version does not. just because somebody *can* do something doesn't mean they *will*, especially if it comes down to money.
btw nuon used to be vmlabs' projectx. more info at http://www.nuon-tech.com/.
So, for reference, how many polygons/sec can the original PSX generate? Same for the N64 and DreamCast. And how do the amount of effects differ for the systems?
Hmm, call me old fashioned, but I like to think
of a processor's "bit-width" as the width of it's
ALU -- hence 6502 => 8-bit, 68000 => 16-bit,
i386 / ARM etc => 32-bit, and Alpha => 64-bit.
And let's not belittle the idea of sticking 2 32-
bit processors together; they *could* (ie.
probably) out-perform a single 64-bit CPU!
Sony is for girls/loosers who get impressed by
looks and know nothing about hi-fi.
(FD)Trinitron is cool, though.
I still like the idea of a playstation card,
put all that graphics processing power in a card
that acts as a regular openGL accelerator in your computer or with some small provided emulation software plays playstation games stuck in your cd rom. with it making use of the cdrom, sound card, and other hardware you already have, and the ability to put whatever else is needed on the installed card, the emulator would need to do so little and you could play playstation games on your 166Mhz something-or-other. Plus have a fine 3d card for other pc softare.
They state 5 billion floating point ops per second. Only the Alphas can do that (unless you are running quad Xeons and your software supports SMP well). The polygon rate can be matched by high-end workstations from the likes of intergraph but these are not your typical PCs.
So unless you are running a TDZ-2000 workstation or a new Alpha-based workstaion you will not see anything close to this level of 3D performance.
the map maker specifies a bezier curve, but the game engine approximates it to a polygon.
at least thats what i read
i hear it does it very well too.
Actually, I hear tell that NFS 4 next month will
have car damage...
And that has much licensing involved.
Go figure. Shrug.
Why do I doubt this... If I remember correctly, the Voodoo3 (most expensive version) can only push 8 million triangles (according to 3dfx). Then again, this without textures, lighting, and the triangles are one pixel in size. That is how they give these unrealistic benchmarks. However, 55 million??? 55 million pixels per second sounds more like it.
5.5x10^7 / (640x480) = 180 fps. Sounds reasonable for the benchmarks they often do.
dvd decoder = mpeg2 decoder, in the purest sense...
500 mips with compiler optimizations, eh?
That's nothing.
All you need to do is find the fastest executing (in terms of CPI) and most pipelineable instructions, and throw them in a loop so that's all it's executing, and boom, peak MIPS.
Whoops, i think i just wrote down what all CPU makers do when they quote MIPS figures.
This is because MIPS is such a good performance metric.
Does anyone here even think about what MIPS really is?
It's Millions of instructions per second (duh).
Notice it doesn't say WHAT instructions.
MIPS is more dependent on what instructions you are executing, and how many of those instructions you can do per clock, than anything else.
In fact, that's basically what it is.
When you see a MIPS figure, usually it's taken from a "program" that is a simple loop with 1 clock instructions that (assuming we are on a CPU that can issue more than one instruction per clock) can all be issued at the same time.
Not yer normal program.
Who the fuck cares about MIPS?
The fact that sega announced a FIRM date for their
dreamcast is much more important than sony announcing when they might launch a new system.
It is going to be 9/9/99 quite a long time before the playstaion II is out. I kept trying submit the story, but no one seems to care. This makes me sick!!! It is almost enough to make me stop reading slashdot!!!!! Why is it that everyone thinks sega=sucks? Sega is one of the best video game companies in the world.
Don't forget about motorola and ibm's G4 and G5 (end of 2000 i think).
Think about it, if the hardware isn't announced yet (and Sony hasn't even said that this is going to be in the PSX2 yet), then it's unlikely that a new machine would hit the market before developers had time (two years) to make games for it!
I'm not up on the significance of the hardware specs but...how well could this system work with HDTV?
I understand the tradeoffs, but drool over the generational leap in image quality as much as anything else.
If you have a geometry processor that is creating the polygons "on the fly" you don't need the memory buffers to store all the polygons all at once. For example, when rasterizing a beziar surface for a particular frame the geometry processor could be spewing out tons polygons and passing them off directly to the rendering engine without ever storing them back to main memory. So, one beziar surface defined in a scene with a modest amount of data could amount to a huge (maybe hundreds of thousands) of polygons when it is rasterized.
although i don't get to use it as much as i did when i was in college, it served its purpose well as a cheap reliable game system. I bought it in 95 and it still can play any game put out for it. no need to upgrade the cpu or video card ever. i got tired of needing a pII and voodoo to play games. why should i spend $200 for a video card when i can get an entire system for $149. sure graphics are better on a high end pc but they are unable to play the latest games a year after their out. that said for those of you dying to get a playstation2 keep in mind it will probably be 6 months to a year for any decent games to come out for it.
I guess I don't get it. It seems to me they are sucking the cocks of all the companies that port games to the pc -- as they should. Also, I believe that windows ce will be on certain cd's -- not in the rom. This will probably mean that most good games won't have anything to do with windows. They will probably use Sega's own os which is supposed to be 25% faster anyway. All this means is that there will be tons of 3rd party games for the dreamcast. I guess sega learned something from sony.
Your confusing the issue.
I meant they don't say what instructions were executing in the loop that gave them the 500mips figure.
In theory, an UltraSparc will can do 3 (or was that 4) instructions per clock cycle. However, it takes a fucking badass compiler to be able to schedule it properly, as well as the right kind of code.
Usually, you'll only have the right code/good enough scheduling to get the processor to do 2 (or was that 3) per clock.
The point, of course, is that if Sun posted a MIPS figure, you can bet it would be a figure based on running a program that contained a simple loop that consisted of the right instructions, scheduled properly, so that the processor was hitting it's peak (if it's possible).
That figure will be about 30-40% (It's 33% straight on calculations, but this isn't taking into account how many clocks each instruction takes at all, which instructions can schedule together, stalls,etc. This would make it much larger percentage) higher than what you'd get on a normal program.
At the very least.
we will hopefully have this performance on PC with the new Bit Boys 3D core Glaze 3D in Q3-99
www.glaze3d.com
They should definately take the time to test it, but as for when they release it, the sooner the better. If the Dreamcast takes off like it did in Japan (despite the problems they've been having) Sony would be seriously hurt by any delays as people go out and buy the Dreamcast. Sony won't be able to compete if they are too far behind. Nintendo is already going to be screwed by their poor marketing decisions with the N64 and the new system they are developing currently (which we won't be seeing for another 3-4 years). Playstation has already caused themselves enough trouble by not properly designing the PSX2 the first time, they shouldn't hurt themselves further by sitting on the new design.
If you don't agree feel free to email me at: Aaron Seigo
Windows does exist on the Dreamcast, but it is often easier and better to bypass windows, which is (thankfully) possible on the Dreamcast. So if a game pushes the system, it is likely its not running in windows. Besides, I think if a system has good games and runs smoothly (which the Dreamcast does) it doesn't really matter which operating system runs its network/internet functions.
Aaron Seigo
I think I just had this conversation with someone recently. Todays PCs are not made to perform in the same way. CONSOLES ARE DESIGNED SPECIFICALLY TO RUN GAMES! I can not emphasize this enough. That's why console games will always be better than PC games when the system is first released. Even though a console may have a slower clock speed and less RAM, it will still run games faster and with a higher frame rate than your standard PC. Plus they are a hell of a lot cheaper ($250 vs. $2500). A PC has to run operations to make sure all the hardware and software runs properly for a variety of functions. And even if your PC were capable of doing what the Playstation 2 can do, it won't have the same games as the PC anyway. Emulation most likely won't work as well as actually owning the system, so that isn't really an option. Personally I'll just buy the system and use the PC for other thing which might not require quite as much processing power and hardware support. I don't need to go and spend $3500 to $10000 on a computer so that I can play games when I can get better games on a console for $250.
Aaron Seigo
Sony hasn't actually said thay would release it with a DVD Drive. Last I checked they were still using the same CD format as Sega. Sega is making a DVD expansion to the Dreamcast, however.
Zelda was only a mediocre game at best. It wasn't graphically all that impressive, the story sucked, and the game played just like any other N64 3D game (except you couldn't jump). It's psudo 3D and not all that inovative. Crash Bandicoot was a better game and I wasn't all that thrilled by that either.I'm sorry, but Zelda was just the last in a long line of disappointments for the N64. That game has confirmed for me once and for all that the N64 is a completely worthless system. All of their games are either meciocre or they just outright suck and the system is so limited, both because of Nintendo policy and hardware limitations, that it is almost impossible to write a decent game for the system.
Actually, the next Need for Speed game will feature car damage. Gran Turisimo at the moment really pushes the Playstation, but that probably isn't the reason for the lack of car damage. Lets face it, it isn't as easy to drive a simulated car as it is a real one. The lack of damage makes it easier for people to play. That way they dont have to worry about wrecking and losing the race and can concentrate on speed and sliding. People just like to drive fast and not have to worry about damage (in Japan anyway and that's what really matters).
I seriously doubt it would have a 2x drive considering they want to compete with sega's 16x drive. Plus computers can't handle what these new systems can handle. People keep spouting emulation, but it just is not all that viable an option. First off that is pirating games, it is illegal to emulate GAMES. Emulators are supposed to be for learning and design, not free gaming. Then there is the problem of emulation itself. It requires a lot more processing power to emulate a game since it has to use software to simulate differences in both software and hardware. Plus emulators take a lot of time to fully develope. It wasn't until recently that a decent PSX emulator was even released. Up until now, most emulators could only run a select few games and they would run slow and often the effects aren't completely supported. I would prefer to just own the system to waiting for PCs to become powerful enough to support an emulator and them spend a few thousand dollars to emulate a system. That's totally insane.
What are you talking about? Have you seen what the original Playstation runs on. The RAM is not really the major issue with a console. The original Playstation only had 2MB system RAM and 1MB video RAM. I think the PSX2 can handle it on 32MB (assuming it even needs that much) and however much video RAM they give it.
Nintendo lost Square because Square wants to make movies, not video games.
Not that I like defending Intel, but the Pentium family of processors executes 3 instructions per clock cycle (mmm...superscalar).
Just a quibble. Carry on.
Brock Arnason
M.Eng. Physics
United Bank of Switzerland
Dreamcast is going to run WindowsCE...
I heard it the other day. Just one more thing for microsoft to ruin. I've never seen a Sega machine crash... There's always a first time for everything.
Oh boy, I'm sure we'll hear about this someday in the future if Sony hasn't realised it yet.
I guess I didn't understand your post. I thought
the psx was pretty much the first console for sony.
I could be wrong -- would someone please give me a revised
history of the console's of sony? Sega has been
selling consoles in the US since the master system
in the mid to late 80's. Before that they made
arcade machines and games for other consoles.
I meant to say that Sega learned that a console's
success is proportional to the number of games ported to it.
I am sorry if I wasn't clear.
- A.P.
--
"One World, One Web, One Program" - Microsoft Promotional Ad
"Remember when the U.S. had a drug problem, and then we declared a War On Drugs, and now you can't buy drugs anymore?"
No matter how fast these things get, they're going to keep looking like crap as long as the output device is a standard television.
..will it run *BSD or Linux? ;>
Posted by Scott Francis[Mechaman]:
There are, but none can play games yet. The closest one is SSEmu, and all it can do is play music off the CDs(and the author stopped work on it several months ago). The main reason is that there isn't much interest in the "scene" for the Saturn, which is a shame, since it was capable of keeping up (especially in 2D) with the PSX. Most of the good games were import-only, evidence that Sega still has no idea how to market. However, there has been some more interest(someone was developing a C core for the SH2), so we may get something eventually.
I wanna play Sakura Taisen now...
I think the Jaguar used to claim to be a 64-bit system, because it had two 32-bit CPUs running in parallel. Does that mean an SMP PII x 4 system is actually a 128-bit system? I don't think so...
So how do you define the bit-width of a CPU?
I am thinking that the maximum width of the CPU's accumulator register is the defining characteristic.
6502 - A, 8 bits
286 - AX, 16 bits
386 - EAX, 32 bits
--Threed
Where is bittedness defined? Are we to let marketing define our CPUs for us? Does the IEEE have a standard definition for the bittedness of a CPU?
I've always taken it as granted that most registers in a given CPU will be the size of the accumulator, and that defines the CPU's bittedness. It bugs me that a lot of the marketing hype for these games is based on FALSE claims of inflated bittedness.
Console system people can go ahead and say their system is twice as fast, or has more games, or can do X ammount of polys per second, but they'd best be able to back up their claims.
I looked at the IEEE briefs about the CPUs that were detailed (which is what led to this story), and not a single one claimed to be "128-bit". So I conclude that someone at Sony is blowing smoke. I bet it's a marketer. An engineer would know better.
--Threed
If Intel keeps making such miniscule advances in CPU technology, it might be 18 months instead of 6-12 months after the Playstation2 debut before we have a fully usable emulator. Damn.
Personally, I'm waiting for Mortal Death Kill Street Fighter Kombat Carnage 8000. With secret boss charachter Rob Malda. With the world's first bowling ball fatality.
Actually, the jaguar claimed it was a 64 bit machine because of its "Tom and Jerry" custom processors. It was not a fully 64 bit machine, but the parts of it that necessitated 64 bit processing were given those capabilities. It had essentially 3 processors. There was a 68000 that controlled the direction the code was to be processed, and it pushed the code to one of the two graphics processors (Tom and Jerry). As you know, the 68000 is a 32 bit processor, but it was just a controller really, and it didn't need the 64 bit capabilities for the job it was assigned.
Just because a machine isn't 64 bit across the board doesn't mean it isn't a 64 bit machine. It was 64 bits where needed.
Large print giveth, and the small print taketh away
Jaguar FAQ By Robert Jung (Last update 3/31/1999)
l
... Where the system
... The 68000 is like a manager who does no real work, but tells
http://www.classicgaming.com/museum/jaguar.shtm
Q. Was the Jaguar really a 64-bit system?
A. The question is hard to resolve, largely because the definition of what
constitutes an "N-bit" system has not been set. Of the five processors in
the Jaguar, only the object processor and the blitter are "true" 64-bit
components. Because the blitter and the object processor are in the Tom
chip, by extension Tom is a 64-bit chip. Furthermore, the Jaguar also used
a 64-bit memory architecture, according to Jez San of Argonaut Software.
Some say the Jaguar should be considered a 32-bit system, as that is the
maximum register size in the programmable processors (the 68000, the
graphics processor, and the DMA sound processor). Others say the Jaguar
can be considered a 64-bit system, because 64-bit components are used, and
the GPU can access 64 bits of data if required. Again, the lack of an
agreed-upon definition serves to complicate the issue.
According to Jaguar designer John Mathieson, "Jaguar has a 64-bit memory
interface to get a high bandwidth out of cheap DRAM.
needs to be 64 bit then it is 64 bit, so the Object Processor, which takes
data from DRAM and builds the display is 64 bit; and the blitter, which
does all the 3D rendering, screen clearing, and pixel shuffling, is 64 bit.
Where the system does not need to be 64 bit, it isn't. There is no point
in a 64 bit address space in a games console! 3D calculations and audio
processing do not generally use 64-bit numbers, so there would be no
advantage to 64 bit processors for this.
"Jaguar has the data shifting power of a 64 bit system, which is what
matters for games, so can reasonably be considered a 64 bit system. But
that doesn't mean it has to be 64 bits throughout."
For the record, the opinion of most third party developers and observers
is that the Jaguar is indeed a 64-bit system. The emphasis is on the word
"system"; while not every component is 64 bits, the Jaguar architecture, as
a COMPLETE SYSTEM, is.
Q. The Jaguar used a 68000. Isn't that the CPU?
A. Again, quoting from Jaguar designer John Mathieson, "It may be the CPU in
the sense that it's the centre of operation, and boot-straps the machine,
and starts everything else going; however, it is not the centre of Jaguar's
power.
everybody else what to do."
And...
"Atari were keen to use a 68K family device, and we looked closely at
various members. We did actually build a couple of 68030 versions of the
early beta developers systems, and for a while were going to use a 68020.
However, this turned out too expensive. We also considered the possibility
of no [Motorola 680x0 chip] at all. I always felt it was important to have
some normal processor, to give developers a warm feeling when they start.
The 68K is inexpensive and does that job well. I maintain that it's only
there to read the joysticks."
Q. How could a graphics processor be the CPU?
A. The 64-bit custom graphics chip was a good general purpose RISC unit, but
it had been optimized for graphics work. Developers were free to specify
which processor(s) to use in a program, as desired.
Large print giveth, and the small print taketh away
Yes, for now it beats the specs of a PC, but so did the original PSX when it came out. Soon after, if not before this thing comes out, PC's will be able to do render just as many Polys. And they STILL don't compare to the flexibility of a PC. And please not another 2x drive. Now as someone previously mentioned, if these things will double as a DVD player, and they cost 300 or less, I will get one for sure.
Do not meddle in the affairs of sysadmins, for they are subtle, and quick to anger.
Your PC don't even come close. The PC's available when this console comes out should be superior to it, but right now there is nothing that even comes close. In the article it says that the PSX-2 can do 55 million polygons a second with no effects or 13 million polygons a second with lighting, fog, and bezier curves. The Voodoo3, which isn't available until early summer will do 8 million polygons a second and has no hardware support for bezier curves.
See my Home Theater
Everyone is entitled to his opinion, but Parasite Eve?
It was an extremely short game with some decent movies. While FF7 is has some annoying moments, it has the advantage of more non-linearity in the story, and longer, more varied play.
"L'IT c'est moi!"
It still costs a tenth of the money, and requires no set-up.
For me, the reason PCs will always beat consoles, is the lack of a keyboard and mouse. Just try playing Quake with a joypad...
"Be nice, veer left, and never stop thinking" Iain Banks - Walking On Glass
What PSX 2.0 really needs is an SVGA output, so that you could plug it into a monitor and get high-res output. Think of it - if you have a TV, it will output NTSC. Or, you could put it next to your PC, and plug it into your monitor. Then you could run those games at 1024x768. Of course, it could be a configuration nightmare.
--
Timur "too sexy for my code" Tabi, timur@tabi.org, http://www.tabi.org
Hey I bet this would have the horsepower to play Gran Tourismo and simulate car damage. (A key feature in any good two player driving game where my friends are concerned...)
I agree totally. (Except for the Zelda comment; I don't have an N64) Maybe it's my taste in games. I like strategy, RPG, and the occassional 3D shooter. All of these are done best on a computer. (Red Alert or Quake with a joypad?? I don't think so) All the console games of these types are either more fluff and eyecandy than substance, (Final Fantasy) or they suffer from horrid play control. (Quake, Red Alert) Until they start putting out better games, I'm just not interested.
(Now all the Square zealots will probably flame me for making fun of FF7, the interactive movie with a pathetic D&D novel style plot)
Scott Banwart
---
Better to stay silent, and let people think
you're an idiot than to open your mouth and
Actually the jag has both 32 and 64 bit processors. Many arguments about the "64-bittedness" of the machine have followed. Whatever you call it, it's still a fun little machine. :-)
Backwards compatibility is a minus point for the manufacturer. Consoles are generally sold at a loss, subsidised by the licensing fees from games (and profits from games published directly by the manufacturer). It is in the manufacturer's best interest to have customers replace their old games rather than continuing to play them. I don't think a small increase in early hardware sales due to the attraction of backwards compatibility outweighs the reduced games sales.
Backwards compatibility is a minus point for the manufacturer. Consoles are generally sold at a loss, subsidised by the licensing fees from games (and profits from games published directly by the manufacturer). It is in the manufacturer's best interest to have customers replace their old games rather than continuing to play them. I don't think a small increase in early hardware sales due to the attraction of backwards compatibility outweighs the reduction in games sales.
Backwards compatibility is a minus point for the manufacturer. Consoles are generally sold at a loss, subsidised by the licensing fees from games (and profits from games published directly by the manufacturer). It is in the manufacturer's best interest to have customers replace their old games rather than continuing to play them. I don't think a small increase in early hardware sales due to the attraction of backwards compatibility outweighs the reduction in games sales.
I expect that Sony will do the first step for us - namely, porting egcs.
OK, I'm extremely pleased to see what Sony's putting under the hood, but my two biggest questions are left unanswered: 1.Will Sony have the marketing saavy to take the obviously available step, since the system will likely be DVD-ROM based and as we now also know, will include a decoder? I hope so. In 1984, Nintendo was able to completely saturate what was thought at the time to be a dry market, the home video game system, by marketing their NES as an "entertainment system." If the next Sony console could double as a DVD player, much the same as today's PSX can double as a CD player and even a Video CD player (with an accessory), it would roll out the red carpet for it to waltz into every living room in the US, after all it would be optimal timing, the US is still catching on to DVD... 2. Will Sony give gamers the one feature they've been crying out for since the Atari 7800 in 1985? Backwards compatibility! Come on Sony, a DVD-ROM drive will read those old PSX games, and there's a huge market full of them. Imagine the boost the new system would get at launch from kids being able to play hundreds of games already in rental stores and their own collections! And even if they just ran in soft emulation, it sounds like the new machine would have plenty of horsepower left over. Sony has dominated the market for over 3 years now, and they've obviously stil got the ball. Now let's see them run with it. SAVE THE BATS -Khyron
How many megs does it take to describe/display 55 million polys(just the data, excluding textures, effects, AI, etc)? Ill bet a whole lot more then will be in a console(at least in the near future). Heck, even a million takes up a lot, then throw in textures, movement routines, AI, special effects, and what not, all in a max of 32mb ram(my high end estimate) and id say youd get a max of 3 to 5 mil(probably WAY over on this guess) with some effects on. This is totally a HYPE machine.
:)
Do you think they can release this for under $200 with DVD, 32mb ram, this processor, and all the other stuff? Doubt it. And what about the development enviroment? Sure, the WinCE based Dreamcast is in with MS, but it sure does make those PC games eiaser to port
My bet on the PSX2.
Arrives winter 2000 in japan(unless they already have a TON of games done, which I doubt), 2001 in the US
it will have a total of 32mb ram
DVD
retail--$250
"Stuff... In my home!? NEVER!" - Zim on Invader Zim
"I want the toilet seat!" - Little Dog on Two Stupid Dogs
Oh yeah, the actual poly count for the machine will be 4 to 6 mil(but truly overinflated by maketing). Its not how much it could do that counts, it how much it will...
(ancient 3d artist zen proverb)
"Stuff... In my home!? NEVER!" - Zim on Invader Zim
"I want the toilet seat!" - Little Dog on Two Stupid Dogs
You missed the point. Be it one polygon duplicated 55 million times or 55 million different polygons, it still takes ram to store the coordinate data, and its still 55 million polygons. The question is "How much". I know I can get a one million polygon model going in formZ, but it takes a boatload of ram. I just want a good ram/polygon ratio(ie, if it had a total of 32mb ram for just model data, how many poly could actually be stored in ram to be worked on).
"Stuff... In my home!? NEVER!" - Zim on Invader Zim
"I want the toilet seat!" - Little Dog on Two Stupid Dogs
Humm, two vector engines, 128 bits, all kinds of "extras" on chip. Sounds like a cross between a G4 Alti-vec and a Cyrix MediaGX. Has Sony been making deals?
Oh, yes, and remember with dedicated hardware, it's much easier to reach target polygon speeds. That's why voodoo is so much faster for video than slapping another pentium into your system. (Even dedicated on the video card. I mean, ever heard of such a monstor? Can you say room heater? Good god. I'd hate to see a PIII quad-processor system, dual monitors {if you can find two damn cards that work together, like a mac} with those kind of video cards in them. The case would glow cherry-red.)
Yet I ramble off subject, and make two subjects.
But... Colaboration? Any ideas?
I love my computer -- You make me feel alright (Bad Religion)
It does say what instructions - Dhrystones 2.1 - not the best benchmark in the world, but still very commonly used for embedded processors.
At 55 fps, that's 1 million poly/frame. For tessellated polygons, the average is 1 vertex / poly. Using floats, that's 3*4 bytes / poly. Add another 4 for color / texture map coords and I get 16 MB.
But this is beside the point. As the article say, with this much vector floating point power, you use some for the rendering and the rest elsewhere - physics, fogging etc.
Do you think it will be embraced as widely as the PSX was?
(first?)
BIG HINT TO SONY:
Instead of suing connectix, hire them!
Its very obvious that this fellow has never looked at a game that was released outside the US. Nintendo Power must be his favorite rag. Everyone knows the US developed console games suck. Only around 10% of the Japanese developed games make it to the US. Most of the remaining 90% are awesome games that obviously the Japanese fear the US market doesn't have the good taste to buy. BTW, with the exception to Mario, RUSH and Zelda, all N64 games suck. I would rather take a well developed PSX game (R-Type Delta, FF8, Metal Gear Solid) over an overrated N64 game anyday.
Boy are you misinformed...CE is not part of the Dreamcast's ROM set. The hardware is mearly capable of running CE. The Dream Passport CD for using your Dreamcast as a WebTV has a bootable version of CE. Belive me Sega is not paying $150 per machine for the CE licence included on that disk. So far none of the games released use CE. Besides all manufacturers spend to include CE on their PalmPCs is about $35 max.
Sweet. Is anyone planning to port Linux to PlayStation? I mean, that's some fast and cheap hardware. Visions of a Beowolf cluster of PlayStations... :)
Isn't that like saying that a pentium w/ a 64bit video card is a 64bit system? After all, pentiums had a 64bit memory bus, and your video card performance is very important in system performance for games and other things of the sort. Or hell, let's have a dual pentium and a 128bit video card. It doesn't work like that.
-matt
When is the Emulator Coming out for this one? ;)
You missed it. John Goodman already delivered a bowling ball fatality to Flea and his nihilist buddies in "The Big Lebowski."
Sigh, true Art is always ahead of it's time...
Did anyone else notice that this name has been reserved :)
The US release date would be in 2000 - that's been established.
Yes, I would love to see a PSX2 Real Soon Now, given the Dreamcast - but Sony is playing it cool and very wisely too.
Just plain brilliant.
I swear by MacOS X. Although I use to swear *at* MacOS 9...
(heading to the trenches now...)
Jason Dufair
"Those who know don't have the words to tell
Jason Dufair
"Those who know don't have the words to tell
and the ones with the words don't know too w
The hardware is subsidized.
$150?
Horse shit. I am guessing the license is under $50
I think the note that one FPU is for "behaviors" along with the phrase "emotion engine" is very interesting. It suggests that AI may be a serious focus for this console.
A lot of lipservice has been paid to improving game AI but when push comes to shove, R&D effort and CPU cycles go to the graphics engine. Dedicating a functional unit to this task may mean that someone is going to put their money where their mouth is.
Nuff said.
senzuri
FYI, my Dreamcast has never locked up! It's beautiful!
senzuri
Zelda?
What's that? Mario wearing different clothes? Or Banja Kazooe (sic) wearing different clothes?
What a sham.
senzuri
Sonic Adventure doesn't push it? Okaaaay....
I've heard that Playstation 2 also has a solid metal covering for the prevention of moding. Is this rumor?
Also, why is Sony going to all this effort to make this fast technology. I don't even think there is a TV out there that supports 180 fps. Or am I wrong?
-Brainless
Sony should take whatever company is making those ridiculous VAIO's and have thenm talk to the playstation folks. Then have them talk to AMD. Mix all of that together and what would you get. A playstation with upgradable sound and video cards. A normal speed CD ROM possibly even a DVD player. with a chance to put some reall processinig power in there.
That's all there is to it!!!! End of story. Get to it Sony!!! and whatever you do, stay away from INTEL, PLEASE, they don't know what the hell they are doing and when they will be doing it.
Technology's a battle between companies producing more idiot-proof systems and nature producing bigger and better idiots
or an Apple IIc for that matter!!!
Technology's a battle between companies producing more idiot-proof systems and nature producing bigger and better idiots
The window next to my computer is open partially. Does that count for anything???
Technology's a battle between companies producing more idiot-proof systems and nature producing bigger and better idiots
N64 will never be able to top FF7 or FF8 for that matter with anything that they release (note that they never release on time). cough cough all of the zelda's cough cough. Shit FF8 just did 2.21 million copies on its release date on Thursday in Japan. Let's see Nintendo even attempt that. Without any of the third party companies that put them where they are today.
Long live Playstation
Technology's a battle between companies producing more idiot-proof systems and nature producing bigger and better idiots
Everyone seems to be drooling and gettin' all woody over this. Sure, it sounds cool, and the games would be fun but sheesh.. go outside and get some fresh air once in a while :-)
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I think that the AC missed the gist of the post. Oh well... no loss :-)
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Nascar has car damage.. and those are Ford's, Chevy's, and Pontiac's.. more or less :-) Granted they aren't street models...
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