Cell Processor

[dadada486]

The Cell CPU like the split-RAM arrangement for the PS3 requires a lot of bottom-up development. This is why even good multiplats on the PS3 still don't look at good as exclusives. Why else would a machine that so flawlessly handles Uncharted, Killzone 3 and GOW3 only does an okay job with games like BF3, Arkam City etc. a year later?!

[UNCHARTED9444]

@ NewLynxChannel he say 9 core on the Cell Processor at 4:24 on this video is if u go to the links under the video too they say 9 core too, so idk what the Cell Processor had no more lol

[NewLynxChannel]

@UNCHARTED9444 The link under the video is user generated content. He could have written it's a 200-core there. As for the guy in the video, if he says Cell is a 9-core processor, he's an idiot. The SPEs have different instruction sets, no direct access to system memory, no threads, no cache and no data pattern predictors. Therefore, THEY ARE NOT CORES.

[UNCHARTED9444]

i don't get this people say the cell cpu had 8spu but IBM say its had 9core so who right lol

[NewLynxChannel]

@UNCHARTED9444 Where does IBM say it has 9 cores? I want to see it.

Because I've already read IBM's documentation about CBEA and it always mentions 1 PPE (core) and 8 SPEs.

[kingcoapa]

How many people still thinkin the "CELL" processor have 9 PP cores, it has only 1 power processor and 8 Spu´s(1 locked on ps3 for XMB ). the capabilities are for poligons and rendering Maps, with the advantage of spu´s applied on more data flow for specfic tasks like sound decoding, calculations of motion capture, IA on enemies, as programer they can add more elemnent on game but only few games takes advantage of that...sorry for my lousy english but this is my poor opinion.

[NewLynxChannel]

@kingcoapa Just a correction, out of the 8 SPEs, one is reserved for XMB as you said, and another is disabled to increase manufacturing yields, leaving only six for games.

[quangluu96]

so u mean Cell is like i7 quad core???.......but idk why if Cell is really fast then why does pc games got much better graphics i try to compare some games seeing that ps3.... bf bc2 is like running low and medium compare to pc. i think its that the graphic card in the ps3

[ViciousDave4Life]

How the hell did they get Mac OS X on a Cell is what I want to know?!

[Protoking]

PS3 gpu suck so bad the Cell has to use the SPE's to do vertex work.

[ptuku]

@Protoking yep and unchartedd 2 looks way better than any xbox360 game ever :P

[AlienHybridX]

xbox 360 is the biggest pile of garbage i've seen produced how's that sum it up for you xbots ?

the cell processor hasn't been taped to its full potential and its capable on its own to render graphics just as well as a gpu take uncharted 2 for example

the ps3 will have a better library of games in the long run vs the xbox 360 especially exclusives which at the top of my head i can name about 5-6 good exclusives

[clanpsi]

lrn 2 English

[NiGhtMarEs0nWax]

actually the ps3 cell based processor is faster than an IBM general purpose cpu.

[TheMayor5000]

How many ghz

[oc5nsli341nforce4]

My 9800gt does 504 gflop and my 2400pro when oced does 52 gflop. But those aren't cpus bummer :(

[huflungpu90]

lol ps3 can do 2 teraflops lets see u get a pc do that for that means the ps3 can handle 2000 gflop lol your pc is a fail

[oc5nsli341nforce4]

A quad gpu setup can out perform a 25million dollar super computer.

[HellMuTx]

HAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHA what software uses all 4 at the same time? :P only means you can run itunes, crysis, messenger and internet explorer (for cheats) at the same time so yep 25 million dollar cant do this hahahahaha

[oc5nsli341nforce4]

You stupid twat ever hear about CUDA or GPGPU for accelerating specifically written code that can take advantage of the parallel processing capabilities of modern gpus. So go back to your newt box and leave advanced computing to those who actually know what they are talking about. Piff even your beloved CELL BE is used in Blizzard servers and can be bought by any one as a AIB that can be dumped in any pc with a 16x pci-e slot.

[HellMuTx]

No I havent and no im not gonna go google it right now just to seem smart like your stupid ass hahahahaha good luck out performing the 25 million dollar computer well maybe youre right maybe it is a 25 million computer..... from the 80's hahahahahahahaaha I'll wait for your angry and insulting reply as all of geeks and ignorant people do always when google dont give them answers lol

[HellMuTx]

and just 1 thing when did I say I loved cell? hahahaha

[ps4real000]

cell outperforms x86 cpu's x10 at f@h stats. and ps3 is the ONLY system that reached 1 petaflop milestone at folding.

[ps4real000]

@ renger6002:

then why cell outperforms pc cpu's x10 at f@h stats?

[bign3ck]

Cell was sonys biggest mistake and has cost them many exclusives.

[negative00001]

CPU: Cell Processor PowerPC-base Core @3.2GHz

1 VMX vector unit per core 512KB L2 cache

7 x SPE Each Running at 3.2GHz

7 x 128b 128 SIMD GPRs

7 x 256KB SRAM for SPE

*1 of 8 SPEs reserved for redundancy

Total floating point performance: 218 gigaflops

[renger6002]

the CEll unit currently in the PS3 can in no shape or form outperform the current PC CPUs.

Tboninator is right, an SPE does not equal a PPE. in the PS3 two SPEs are reserved, and the rest are

[negative00001]

You don't know what you are talking about the cell can run ten times faster then the average PC. It has 8 Synergistic Processing Elements (SPE), so it's like saying it has 8 individual CPUs. Each SPE can perform task individually at the same time, so is multitasking to the max. No game to date has taken advantage of the power of the Cell processor and that is because developers don't yet know how to create games to take advantage of the Cell Processor.

[someone1sarge]

well they got the ps3 with the cell processor

[bign3ck]

there are no cell programmers, no one knows how to code for Cell, and no one wants to learn! Why should they learn to code for a one off processor, its sony who should learn and pass that on to developers. Valve has already stated that it will cease game production on PS3 because Cell is pointless headache for games and costs him too much to work on.

[aPSExclusiveGamer]

That was a BS stance that just showed how lazy they are, NOW however, because their are more PS3 owners, they can not ignore the market and they have commented recently that they have changed their stance and that they will be making games for the PS3. Game designers are beginning to recognize the power of the cell, and are making exclusive titles for the PS3 because of it, and are starting to develop first on the PS3 which makes it easier to develop for the 360, look it up. So up yours.

[BorkaBonum]

So developers are closing in to realise the potential about the Cell and PlayStation 3? Haven't that old rumor been passing the Internet since launch? If developers is realising the potential, then why don't we see an increase in the interest from investors (/developers) and why do we still see so many exclusives going multi-system?

Ofcourse that is also due to Microsoft, but being able to snatch exclusives this far into the process in this quanitity is certainly speaking against Sony.

[aPSExclusiveGamer]

OMFG! Did you not read my comment? Valve has recently changed their stance and will be releasing games for the PS3 (look it up) , probably all multi-platform. One thing you need to understand is that next gen games, in this current economy, take a lot of money to produce, and that is the main reason that their are so many multi-platform games, because in doing so the devs open their game to be purchases by a lot more people than if it was just an exclusive for one platform.

[aPSExclusiveGamer]

The only two reasons that Microsoft gets exclusives from third/second party devs, is because 1. the devs are too lazy to learn how to program for the PS3 and/or 2. they are paid off by Microsoft. WE DO SEE AN INCREASE OF INTEREST FOR THE PS3 FROM DEVS. Look at MGS4 and LBP, where they are using almost all of the memory storage of Blu-Ray, which means that they can not release those games on the 360, because then they would need to make 6-7 DVDs per game, which is just not realistic.

[aPSExclusiveGamer]

Blu-Ray can hold so much more content,which means more value for your 60 bucks.A dev from Rock Star has actually commented that if GTA4 was a PS3 exclusive, they could have put more stuff,a bigger story,and a much bigger Liberty City.Because of the Cell and the RSX,the PS3 can handle 60 player battles online and 8 player co op with Resistance,it can have 256 players shooting it out online with MAG.My last point:Go look up how many more exclusives are coming for the PS3 compared to the 360.

[BorkaBonum]

All of which you mentioned is not up to the medium or the hardware but is strictly software.

The future of the PlayStation 3 exclusives looks grim, I know. Sony even lost Tekken *recently*.

Please don't mentioned Resistence 2, it's just Haze but yet another time - and "M.A.G." haven't been shown more than a CGN trailer, so at this point it's like for Xbox 360 fans to preach about how cool Halo "four" is going to be.

[aPSExclusiveGamer]

I'm sorry,but you do not even make sense at all.Stop being ignorant.Resistance 2 is not Haze at all,in fact R2 will be a candidate for Game of the Year,look up the previews.If you look at the CG trailer of killzone2,and look how the game is shaping up to look like it in both graphics and feel,than I am going to say MAG will be the same.I know Zipper and I trust them to bring an awesome online tactical shooter.The future of the PS3 exclu. looks grim? Please... Look it up, last thing i have to say

[BorkaBonum]

Resistence 2 is Haze just another time - extreme hype over a poor game. Is it a candidate for "Game of the Year"? According to who? I've not seen any press actually believing Resistence 2 is nothing but a buff from an already quite flat formula.

How many exclusives will the PlayStation 3 get next year? How many will Xbox 360 get next year? Give me a report on that and combine it with the already existent library and you'll take those words back.

[aPSExclusiveGamer]

I really dont care what you think,in fact I dont know why I am wasting my time.You are just a stubborn,jealous,and ignorant Xbot.I dont care if you have the last word.All I know is that I have great exclusive titles to look forward to (Socom:Confrontation,LittleBig­Planet,

Resistance2,KillZone2,etc.etc.­) with free online,life with PS,Home,etc. etc.and bluray while you fn stupid xbots get Gears2,looks exactly like the first one,stupid no replay value Fable 2, and the Red Ring of Death.

[BorkaBonum]

Hahaa, it's kinda sickening how you call me ignorant and "jealous" when I'm providing you with the facts here. You're living in the bubble of hype Sony has provided - look at things in the big picture and the bubble will burst.

Yeah, Xbox 360 gets Gears of War 2, the successor of one of the most praised shooter since Halo. This while PlayStation 3 get the mighty Killzone 2, the successor to a game having a hard time kicking above mediocre by the press.

Go cry some more.

[iamgig9876]

@tazss159 they were about to make it exclusive but because of the shitty 360 selling mor at the time greed destroed it

[servet80]

@rocstar gave us shity looking gta4 and rdr . wake up from ur dream

[Timesplitter95]

lol you seem to making an argument eerywere you go face you love microsoft you would kiss there butt lol

[BorkaBonum]

Seems like you're so horny on me you keep following me around.

[abz3751678]

go back to your mums basement asshole

[BorkaBonum]

Seriously, you could get two months worth of plotting a nice angry comment and that's the best you got?

-"go back to your mums basement asshole"

That's just sickens my how you lack the ability to rant, even. Take your hormone malfunctions and get back here once your balls has dropped.

[k001k1dzm4n14]

what the fuck, thers more xbox 360 owners, dumbass

[animewatcher5]

@negative00001 But now that Uncharted 2 has came out for PS3, and Uncharted 3 right around the corner, Naughty Dog said that it was the first time anyone has taken full advantage of the PS3's cell processor, and it shows. BIG TIME.

[amartinez97]

@animewatcher5 Do you think Killzone 3 and Crysis 2 take full advantage of the Cell Processor?

[animewatcher5]

@amartinez97 It depends. Naughty Dog's been working with Sony and the Playstation console since Playstation first came out, and has been making exclusive games for it. Killzone 3 is made by a much newer company that hasn't worked with Playstation before the PS3. One things for sure: they will take much more usage than any multiplatform company out there so we can expect a lot from Killzone 3. As for Crysis 2, it's a multiplatform game so I'm not sure whether they'll make good usage of the cell.

[amartinez97]

@animewatcher5 True dat, but Gorrial games made the first killzone for PS2 so they do have pre PS3 experiance.

[Frankazami]

Can the Wii do that? Hell to the no!

[jreastla]

this is not jim kahle

[guitarazn90210]

they designed it to be in a game console type system? then wats with all that crap with the cell being a waste of everybody's time and shouldn't b 4 gaming?

[Tamacracker]

They're JEALOUS FAGGOTS... that's why they're hating on the ultimate machine. They can't even fathom wtf this guy is talkin about. Any true gamer who knows technology, KNOWS that the PS3 and especially any machine that uses Cell processing power is more powerful than any machine. It's basically having 8 computers in one all running at the same time doin different things.

[konoha100]

The Cell BE is a multi-media processor, but it is optimized for gaming purposes; the Cell is VERY powerful, but the problem is that it is difficult to work with, so it's taking game developers awhile to familiarize themselves with how to best take advantage of it's processing abilities.

[BorkaBonum]

The Cell is very weak, actually. The Core-Per-Core power is the most important aspect of a processor, if the core-per-core performance is slower than a other model (see: every single desktop processor) the performance needs to come from somewhere else. In history this was compensated with frequencies (such as with Intel P4, PD) but the Cell is slow even there and relies on the quantity of cores - which is a insignificant choice, it's expensive, slow and generally just dumb.

[konoha100]

Yeah you're right, that's probably why it was used to build the fastest computer in the world, Roadrunner, with a hybrid design consisting of a total of 6912 Opteron processors and 12960 Cell processors, each 30 times more powerful than an Opteron.

[BorkaBonum]

Why do all kids mention the computer? Give the Cell an application such as a game and it's insuperior to any standard desktop processor at date due to the weak-core-per-core performance. And no, a Cell Processor is not 30 times faster a Optereon today, that's complete bullshit from someone who just sip up the numbers from the always-as-objective Sony sheets.

[konoha100]

If the Cell sucks at gaming then why did they put it in a fucking gaming console?

Not a rhetorical question, I'm actually wondering why..

[BorkaBonum]

Remember what Sonys ambithions with the PlayStation 3 was - to construct a on-the-paper machine of wonders. They did the same mistake so many manufactors did back in their days, they built a technical marvel resulting in absolute failure.

Sony was probably naive enough to believe developers would like to spend extra money and time on a costum processor archentecture only for the PlayStation 3 - while the PC and Xbox had similiar hardware design to make things easier.

[konoha100]

bad move I guess, hope they'll think things through with the ps4..

[untseac]

Actually this is partially correct. There are programs which perform better with single cores while others don't. The main problem is that parallel programs are much harder to develop and that makes most of programs slow in multi-core processors like a cell processor. Parallel programming difficulties are being considered in the present time. Hopefully we'll see better results in the future. Remember that increasing single core processor frequency is now unfeasible.

[AscendedSaiyan3]

The Cell is very weak at sucking ass. You can fit 4 SPEs in the space of a traditional single core offering from AMD/Intel. Each SPE is capable of 25.6GFLOPS. Intel multicore chips are just passing that, now, for the entire chip! If programmed for properly, they can basically handle whatever an AMD/Intel chip can handle. 3.2GHz a high frequency to run at, but is can operate at 5GHz+ @90nm. At 45nm, it can reach up to about 7GHz. One SPE is much faster at FFT for gaming than ANY single core.

[BorkaBonum]

IF the Cell was as awesome as you preach about, atleast in the theory, wouldn't IBM improved it and thrown it into the market, hmmm? The IBM Cell got canceled for further development after Sony and Toshiba got their products, all they've done since then it trim it a bit.

Overall it IS a Multimedia processor, you can find the IBM Cell on a PCI-module for $120 to act as more muscles for the multimedia editors on the personal market.

[AscendedSaiyan3]

I'm not preaching anything. You are preaching that it doesn't do with all the REAL WORLD tests says it can. However, we have the world's 1st PetaFLOPS+ and most energy efficient supercomputer at LANL because of the Cell. They aren't using multimedia applications. One can't be logical and try to dismiss the PROVEN power.

They stopped development on Cell because there roadmap already goes up to 36 cores(@45nm) and the Cell is meant to work in concert with other Cell CPUs. 4 core Cell PCI are $280

[NerdInHisShoe]

Even if we go by "core for core" performance (which is a flawed metric), the Cell processor is still faster in many tasks. Code I wrote for Cell is over 4 times faster on 1 SPE when compared to 1 core on a 3GHz Core 2 Duo. For many compute-intensive tasks, Cell is far better than any Intel offering. It has a ton more available bandwith, a larger register file, and far more useful instructions.

[makkertje]

Hmm, so the Cell processor is running MAc OS X? I always wondered if Apple maintains compatibility with the new PowerPC/Cell chips now they switched to Intel chips. Jobs said they want to have processor neutrality, so what does that mean NOW?

[ScrayXXI]

32 Gigaflops? Right...

[sk827015]

hi, ohh damm that thing is goint to run for mac

i wanted for PC !!!!!

[YoungBreezyBaby]

Cell has only been in one playstation console and that is the current PS3.

[hardkoregamer1981]

its 9 cores he didnt make a mistake its a upgraded version of a processor seen in the last two playstation consoles ibm have been involed with playstation since they entered the game console industry go look it up if you think im wrong

[vicZeta]

Cell has one PPE(Power Processor Element) *Not power pc based* , instead of it is a fairly stripped down redesigned RISC processor , but capable of running PowerPC binary code(Runs OS to admin the other SPEs). The other 8 SPE(as the original design stated)-Synergistic Processor Elements-. Are brand new design - only in a kind- RISC processors optimized raw data processing,data streaming and vectorial calculations. The one used in PS3 will have only 7 SPEs. None of Cell elements support OOO.

[cgman2]

main 3.2Ghz core and 7 other cores in the PS3

[cgman2]

Theirs a main big core and 8 addition cores the PS3 has some of the additional cores dissabled to improve production yield.

[Skatox]

Great vudei!!!!

[nawfuck]

the ps3 was sonys idea to bring their movies into the gaming world, thats why they put a supercomputer into the ps3, that is the only reason, and more enemies, and smarter enemies, and its happening even in the first 7 monts as seen in killzone 2

[Joelm940]

"9 Cores?" I think he got his facts missed up about IBM. 1st of all, The cell has 8 cores, one is in charge the other 7 cores. Also it was Sony, IBM, and Toshiba who joined together in order to develop the cell processor.

[nawfuck]

there are 9 processors on the cell, the other 2 sony believes are not needed, please dont speak things you dont know about

[skrapp]

It does have 9 he made it. look it up

[enjoypolo]

yeah well he meant SPEs ... (even though commercial products have 8)

[hardkoregamer1981]

@enjoypolo no he did not he was quite clear on his answer that cell is 9 cores per a processor chip in playstation 3 & in blade server towers so acept it & move on noob!

[EimlanzerChannel]

@hardkoregamer1981 Calling the SPEs "cores" is nothing but a marketing move. A SPE is nothing like a usual processor, therefore it shouldn't be considered one. And even if you want to use that misleading term, one of the SPEs is disabled on the PS3, which leaves just eight "cores".

[NerdInHisShoe]

@EimlanzerChannel Why isn't an SPE a core? Its a separate processor on the same chip. It has its own set of registers, execution units, memory controller.. The only real difference is that it uses DMA commands if it needs to access system RAM.

[canlasboy]

The einstein just said the cell has "9 cores."

[walter0bz]

The cell is by far the most interesting processor around at the moment ... it's RISC re-invented.

[enjoypolo]

yeah but this is old dude, IBM showed some new rendering some months ago straight on the PS3, its huge (because PS3 won't let Linux use RSX :( ) Demo running on Linux

[dwarfer777]

is that rendering from cpu only??

[yourtubeyourass21]

Now my question is how powerful this cell processor really is, how long it would take the developers to harness 100% of the cell processor in the ps3??? Prob more then likely never.

[yourtubeyourass21]

my dad said it looked very interesting. The caculation on the ps3 takes in 6 months whereas fastest supercomputers take at least 30 years. All I got to say aint modern technology wonderful.

[yourtubeyourass21]

My dad told me something very interesting this morning that he saw on the news for like a 10 seconds or so, Something about the power of the cell processor. If they link so many ps3 cell processors together for medical science purposes, it would take the cell processor 6 months instead of like at least 30 years on the fastest supercomputers on the face on the planet. Like I said My dad only caught this on the news for a very quick brief.

[videoslacker]

The Cell BE is designed purely for streaming and heavy number crunching, and video games and high performance computing offer that. However, general purpose computing is a whole another matter and does not require a huge amount of processing power.

[MrHairyNutz]

if intel or amd cant use this becuz its not a pc cpu then can you use this for a graphics card?

[enjoypolo]

well, it hasn't realy 9 " cores " . It has 8 SPE + 1 core. But you're saying that you've already worked with Cell CPU already ? that's pretty cool.

[hardkoregamer1981]

@enjoypolo ibm knows their own product your a moron to argue with ibm's own information & understanding of the cell processor.

[nikamota]

Cell has been designed for use in game consoles aswell as other applications.For those who claim that Cell isnt suited to games..well..ask the guy who made the chip.

[DudeParallel]

Also for those saying that Cell doensn't contain 9 cores,IT HAS!

This came straight from the creators mouths!

Stupid kid bashing Cell because he read Major Nelsons "oh-so brilliant" analysis of Cell...

Cell is a revolution in processors.

I've been programming and researching development with Cell and its an extremely flexible processor.

[nikamota]

The Cell.."we designed this to go into game console type systems.."

For those who claim that the Cell processor is not suited to games or console environments..one of the chief designers of Cell says otherwise.

[rbow]

...and I'm a PC.

[Sebbe666]

ps3

[enjoypolo]

Well, the Cell CPU isn't like "General" CPU's like Athlon of Intel. It's used for special tasks like 3D, Video Decompression and things. For that kind of task, it rox. But for the general improvement, i don't think it's gunna be a revolutionary thing ... and I don't think we can get this for our PCs ... The Cell processor Architecture is PPC and not x86 like we have.(Not compatible with basic computers)

[BlackTigerAP]

We definately need Windows for Cell, I think MS already has such project in some "secret chamber". we'll see."

[SilentKiller01]

lol shoot