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Well, If you look at both the PS5 and XBox One X, both of them are running customized AMD SoC's. But basically, that's just a AMD APU. If my memory serves me c

Well, If you look at both the PS5 and XBox One X, both of them are running customized AMD SoC's. But basically, that's just a AMD APU. If my memory serves me correctly, the PS3 for comparison had a custom Cell CPU which was used for supercomputer clusters. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/PlayStation_3_cluster https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/PlayStation_3_cluster So they must have had some kind of edge compared to normal PCs.

tehbeard 5y ago
The cell CPU was something like a dual core with 6 additional, specialised stream processors. I think the closest analogue might be a a CPU with a few cuda cores on the die? It didn't work too well from my understanding, difficult to develop anything that could make use of those streaming cores that was worth it over a traditional multicore chip with more cores. Useful for scientific community though. If anyone knows what the spe cores were used for in games, I'd be very interested to know.
- dagmx 5y ago
  The Cell was a single primary CPu core, with seven SPU (technically eight with one disabled) cores. The SPU cores were basically used heavily for any background data processing that might align well with what GPU compute is used for today.
  - Nursie 5y ago
    The primary core either had a twin or some sort of SMT going on, it presented to linux as two cores.
- ricardobeat 5y ago
  My understanding is that each SPE core was individually assigned to physics, lighting, AI and other tasks, as tools for developing multi-threaded code were not that common at the time. The Last of Us is supposed to be one of the very few that actually used all cores.
- _kbh_ 5y ago
  Heres a bunch of PDF's and presentations from Sony first party studios. Naughty Dog - Uncharted - Pages 33 - 39, 49, 54 - https://github.com/hww/game_programmer_reading/raw/master/nd/Naughty-Dog-GDC08-UNCHARTED-Tech.pdf https://github.com/hww/game_programmer_reading/raw/master/nd... Gorilla Games - KillZone 2 SPU Case Study - All of it - https://ubm-twvideo01.s3.amazonaws.com/o1/vault/gdc09/slides/GDC2009-vdLeeuw-KZ2SPUsCaseStudy.pdf https://ubm-twvideo01.s3.amazonaws.com/o1/vault/gdc09/slides... Insomniac Games - Insomniac’s SPU Best Practices Hard-won lessons we’re applying to a 3rd generation PS3 title Slides 46 - 48 https://www.slideserve.com/aldona/insomniac-s-spu-best-practices-hard-won-lessons-we-re-applying-to-a-3rd-generation-ps3-title https://www.slideserve.com/aldona/insomniac-s-spu-best-pract...
rbanffy 5y ago
> had some kind of edge compared to normal PCs. They did, but the Cell SPUs were hard to program and that edge quickly eroded as the Cell proved to be a dead end and x86 CPUs continued to evolve.
- agent327 5y ago
  It was the GPUs that evolved, not the CPUs. The original PS3 design didn't have a dedicated GPU (but, I believe, two Cells instead, one being dedicated to graphics rendering). A GPU was added as it became obvious that this design had a massive advantage over the Cell design.
  - rbanffy 5y ago
    > It was the GPUs that evolved, not the CPUs. That's not quite true. Every architecture iteration brought an increase in IPC, while every process improvement allowed for higher clocks and lower power dissipation. It's true that GPUs evolved a lot more - but that's mostly by getting bigger, wider, and having wider, faster pipes to its own RAM and the shared PCIe bus, as well as bigger heatsinks and fans.

tehbeard 5y ago

The cell CPU was something like a dual core with 6 additional, specialised stream processors. I think the closest analogue might be a a CPU with a few cuda cores on the die? It didn't work too well from my understanding, difficult to develop anything that could make use of those streaming cores that was worth it over a traditional multicore chip with more cores. Useful for scientific community though. If anyone knows what the spe cores were used for in games, I'd be very interested to know.

dagmx 5y ago
The Cell was a single primary CPu core, with seven SPU (technically eight with one disabled) cores. The SPU cores were basically used heavily for any background data processing that might align well with what GPU compute is used for today.
- Nursie 5y ago
  The primary core either had a twin or some sort of SMT going on, it presented to linux as two cores.
ricardobeat 5y ago
My understanding is that each SPE core was individually assigned to physics, lighting, AI and other tasks, as tools for developing multi-threaded code were not that common at the time. The Last of Us is supposed to be one of the very few that actually used all cores.
_kbh_ 5y ago
Heres a bunch of PDF's and presentations from Sony first party studios. Naughty Dog - Uncharted - Pages 33 - 39, 49, 54 - https://github.com/hww/game_programmer_reading/raw/master/nd/Naughty-Dog-GDC08-UNCHARTED-Tech.pdf https://github.com/hww/game_programmer_reading/raw/master/nd... Gorilla Games - KillZone 2 SPU Case Study - All of it - https://ubm-twvideo01.s3.amazonaws.com/o1/vault/gdc09/slides/GDC2009-vdLeeuw-KZ2SPUsCaseStudy.pdf https://ubm-twvideo01.s3.amazonaws.com/o1/vault/gdc09/slides... Insomniac Games - Insomniac’s SPU Best Practices Hard-won lessons we’re applying to a 3rd generation PS3 title Slides 46 - 48 https://www.slideserve.com/aldona/insomniac-s-spu-best-practices-hard-won-lessons-we-re-applying-to-a-3rd-generation-ps3-title https://www.slideserve.com/aldona/insomniac-s-spu-best-pract...

rbanffy 5y ago

> had some kind of edge compared to normal PCs. They did, but the Cell SPUs were hard to program and that edge quickly eroded as the Cell proved to be a dead end and x86 CPUs continued to evolve.

agent327 5y ago
It was the GPUs that evolved, not the CPUs. The original PS3 design didn't have a dedicated GPU (but, I believe, two Cells instead, one being dedicated to graphics rendering). A GPU was added as it became obvious that this design had a massive advantage over the Cell design.
- rbanffy 5y ago
  > It was the GPUs that evolved, not the CPUs. That's not quite true. Every architecture iteration brought an increase in IPC, while every process improvement allowed for higher clocks and lower power dissipation. It's true that GPUs evolved a lot more - but that's mostly by getting bigger, wider, and having wider, faster pipes to its own RAM and the shared PCIe bus, as well as bigger heatsinks and fans.