CPU Speculation time! IBM stops Cell prodn, PS4 will use Intel?

Do you think consoles will aim for upgradability? with the ability to swap out a processor/GPU for a more powerfuller one? After all, if each console is sold at a loss, charging 300+ for an upgraade every few years plus then the possibility of different cases. It would save quite abit rather than having to redevelop. How much do you think tesselation will play? The360 used it, I microsoft will try to utilise full DX11.

 

O---kay, wouldn't that make it a pc then?

But aside from that I couldn't possibly see Sony approaching Intel as they like to have a certain degree of ownership/control that Intel would most likely unwilling to provide.

 

essentially yes, but consoles are heading that way anyway. Next it'll be able to make your dinner due to the heat produced from microwave radiation......Sorry, been listening to my gran too much >.>

 

No they're not. The whole point of consoles is to make things easier. Removing the CPU and/or GPU from a cramped, plasticky case, installing the new expensive hardware and applying the relevant thermal paste and heatsinks isn't most people's idea of "easy". Not to mention the fact it will cause all sorts of warranty problems, and the homogeneous nature of console hardware is one of its main strengths, so any games that are developed later on wouldn't even be able to take advantage of the more powerful hardware as they'll always have to be based around the lowest common denominator (i.e. the least powerful hardware). Consoles have become a more popular gaming platform that PCs for a reason: they're not PCs.

Consoles will always be considered as 'white goods', where upgrading just meaning buying the next iteration and/or its competitor 5 years down the line.

 

I was thinking that they have Tegra. That, and all the back and forth on the Nvidia x86 rumor makes me wonder if they have a general purpose computing platform they are playing with in the R&D lab that is fast enough for something like a console. But this is total speculation on my part. Still, with a physics unit, and a good GPU, they don't need a CPU for too much, and I wonder what could be offloaded to shaders via CUDA or if fermi could handle those tasks. I think it will depend on the emerging software engines though. I remember Sega betting on 2D with the Saturn and missing the 3D boat entirely. We could see a repeat if Sony is loosing touch with the industry.

That would be wonderful as it was a great architecture, but it can't happen. Currently, HP has the IP to the Alpha, but are also invested heavily in Itanium which the Alpha was a competitor to. So HP has tried make sure Alpha staus dead and will be forgotten

I wish I had saved the statistic I read years ago, and could get a modernized version. The gist of it is that console 'accessories' do not sell very well when compared to the base console's install base.
Real world proof includes the Sega CD/Mega CD, Sega 32x, and N64 memory pack are what I can think of off the top of my head. I think there were some upgrades for the Saturn, there was the NIC/HDD adapter for the PS2, and I think the 3DO was built around the idea of upgrade-ability, but the insane price tag scared most people off.
They just did not cove the install base well enough for developers to use the upgrades, or caused outright confusion

So it seems that the best way to ensure someone has the right hardware in their console to play a game is to have a box that is physically different, with a different name that takes specific media.

Lets face it, if a gamer really wants to read system specs to see if their platform can run it, they'd get a PC.

 

Something from D-Wave maybe? or to soon?