IBM Puts the Power of Super Computing into Gaming

[Tommy J]

Wow, the Power of Super Computing into gaming. I'll give it to those IBM Folks. If I understand the article correctly this would make a P3 Player faster than computers that do # crunching for Nasa.


New computer chip unveiled
IBM teams with Sony, Toshiba to develop a product that will greatly boost computing power.

By BOB KEEFE
The Atlanta Journal-Constitution
Published on: 02/08/05
SAN FRANCISCO — IBM Corp. took the wraps off a new semiconductor Monday it describes as a "supercomputer on a chip" that promises to dramatically increase the computing power in video game systems, televisions and other consumer electronics.

At an engineering conference here Monday, semiconductor designers from IBM and partners Sony Group and Toshiba Corp. said their new so-called Cell processor has 10 times more computing power than traditional chips when it comes to some applications.


PAUL SAKUMA/AP
Jim Kahle, an IBM technology director, holds a new Cell Technology chip in San Francisco Monday. The microprocessor will power the next-generation PlayStation video game console.

"This really is a new era in performance," said Jim Kahle, an IBM fellow who oversaw the chip's design.

With other features that let it handle video and Internet applications, Sony and Toshiba are betting the Cell chip will give them an edge over personal computer makers in the ongoing battle to become digital entertainment hubs in consumers' living rooms.

The chip is capable of giving Sony's next-generation Playstation 3 game console the computing power equivalent to supercomputers used in high-end research projects.

With that sort of power, characters would appear in photo quality and move in real "human-time," Kahle said, instead of with short delays inherent in today's video games.

But just as importantly, the extra computing power could be used to help transform the game console into a home's primary source for delivering music, movies and Internet-based entertainment — all areas in which Sony has interests.

Toshiba has similar goals in mind when it starts putting the chips in some of its high-definition televisions beginning in 2006.

Sony, Toshiba and other electronics companies have been under increasing pressure from computer companies pushing new "media center" PCs that are designed to be digital media hubs for photos, video, audio and home computing tasks.

The Cell chip could help the electronics makers regain lost ground.

"This won't perform [traditional] PC-type functions ... but it could definitely be a challenge to the media center PCs," said Tom Starnes, an analyst with technology research company Gartner Inc.

A Cell-equipped game console would likely be substantially cheaper than a media center PC, Starnes said — probably selling for a few hundred dollars compared with a few thousand dollars for today's media center PCs.

Even in the expensive realm of chip design, the Cell chip has been a massive undertaking.

More than 400 engineers, primarily at IBM's semiconductor design center in Austin, Texas, have worked on the project since the three companies started collaborating on it in March 2001.

In all, the companies have spent more than $2 billion on the design and retrofitting chip factories in New York and Japan that are scheduled to start producing the chips later this year.

While Sony's Playstation 3 console and Toshiba's TVs will probably be the first devices with the new chips, the three companies will also be marketing them to other consumer electronics companies to recoup development and production costs.

The new Cell chips can support virtually every type of operating system, IBM claims. They also can be virtually linked to other Cell chips, increasing their performance potential even more.

The new chips are also unique in that they can have up to nine "cores," or processing units, allowing them to handle up to 10 different software operations at the same time.

In contrast, makers of personal computer chips are only starting to push into multicore processing — a technology that IBM pioneered.

[Dahak]

Isn't it already posted in gaming&computers?

[Ace Pace]

Yes, and the current one in G&C is the 2nd thread about the subject this month.

[Durandal]

Already posted in G&C.