GPU's have a lot of units that do exactly the same thing in parallel. They can crunch a lot of data, but only if its very parallel and easy to split up. They don't work well with a single instruction stream with one set of data.
CPU's are much more general purpose. They handle branches and conditional code much better, for example, but are limited to working on a few points of data at a time. Extensions like MMX and SSE enhance the parallel ability of the CPU, but not to the same extent as a GPU.
If a police officer gets shot, I'm pretty sure he's going to be walking a little different. And not want to put in a password or anything before trying to shoot back.
There really is a limit to how many useful buttons you can put on a mouse. My MX-700 has scroll up/down keys and a Task-switch butons.
How often do I use them? Never.
They're set apart from the main two buttons so much that I can't reach them easily, especially the task switching (it is about the same place as my second knuckle).
I like a lot of buttons. I use my back/forward and middle buttons a lot, but they're minimal distance away from my fingers. More buttons are great, but more buttons = more finger movement.
The point is that the side-processors will not be anywhere similar. The Sony's SPU's can even handle branches, if I remember right.
When the underlying core is that different, I can't imagine that ANY developer libraries will be similar, especially since the people developping them will be working against each other.
For example, AI code (lots of conditionals and branches) could work on a side processor of the 360, but not the PS3. The graphics will probably be easy to port, but other threaded thigns like AI and physics won't be so easy to port to other systems.
You like playing games with AI? How about Physics? Multiple objects moving at the same time?
From a production perspective, processors used to be of the form "What can we fit into the transistors we have?" to what it is now, "How can we use all the transistors we have?"
Dual core works better on PC's, that's obvious. You ALWAYS have at least two threads (OS + Program). Console games are starting to go the same route though. Think if you have two cores, you could use one JUST to handle interrupts from the user input. There's multiple threads everywhere, just have to think about it.
Yes, to a non-coder. But even a cursory glances at the articles on the architectures over at www.arstechnica.com should show you just how different the underlying graphics processes are. 8 highly parallel processors and a single core coordinating them (PS3), or 6 identical general purpose cores.
Have fun writing ANYTHING that will run on both of those without rewriting a lot of the low level stuff.
From the article:
"But NHK is familiar with long-term projects: it began developing the HDTV standard in 1964, and the first high-definition content arrived only in 1982."
And HDTV is finally filtering down to the masses, 40 years later. They're not just defining random specs, they're defining them for decades later down the road when people can support the bandwidth.
Slashdot Mirror
GPU's have a lot of units that do exactly the same thing in parallel. They can crunch a lot of data, but only if its very parallel and easy to split up. They don't work well with a single instruction stream with one set of data.
CPU's are much more general purpose. They handle branches and conditional code much better, for example, but are limited to working on a few points of data at a time. Extensions like MMX and SSE enhance the parallel ability of the CPU, but not to the same extent as a GPU.
Well.. seriously... for a gun?
If a police officer gets shot, I'm pretty sure he's going to be walking a little different. And not want to put in a password or anything before trying to shoot back.
There really is a limit to how many useful buttons you can put on a mouse. My MX-700 has scroll up/down keys and a Task-switch butons.
How often do I use them? Never.
They're set apart from the main two buttons so much that I can't reach them easily, especially the task switching (it is about the same place as my second knuckle).
I like a lot of buttons. I use my back/forward and middle buttons a lot, but they're minimal distance away from my fingers. More buttons are great, but more buttons = more finger movement.
The point is that the side-processors will not be anywhere similar. The Sony's SPU's can even handle branches, if I remember right.
When the underlying core is that different, I can't imagine that ANY developer libraries will be similar, especially since the people developping them will be working against each other.
For example, AI code (lots of conditionals and branches) could work on a side processor of the 360, but not the PS3. The graphics will probably be easy to port, but other threaded thigns like AI and physics won't be so easy to port to other systems.
You like playing games with AI? How about Physics? Multiple objects moving at the same time?
From a production perspective, processors used to be of the form "What can we fit into the transistors we have?" to what it is now, "How can we use all the transistors we have?"
Dual core works better on PC's, that's obvious. You ALWAYS have at least two threads (OS + Program). Console games are starting to go the same route though. Think if you have two cores, you could use one JUST to handle interrupts from the user input. There's multiple threads everywhere, just have to think about it.
Yes, to a non-coder. But even a cursory glances at the articles on the architectures over at www.arstechnica.com should show you just how different the underlying graphics processes are. 8 highly parallel processors and a single core coordinating them (PS3), or 6 identical general purpose cores. Have fun writing ANYTHING that will run on both of those without rewriting a lot of the low level stuff.
Last time i checked, the Nerf modding community was going pretty strong.
I've seen old, and relatively newer guns, modded to insane degrees, such as adding a CO2 cartridge so you don't have to pull back on the thing.
to hide a Little Person inside one of these things? Baron Kempelen got away with such a scheme for quite a while... The Turk
From the article: "But NHK is familiar with long-term projects: it began developing the HDTV standard in 1964, and the first high-definition content arrived only in 1982." And HDTV is finally filtering down to the masses, 40 years later. They're not just defining random specs, they're defining them for decades later down the road when people can support the bandwidth.