|  The PlayStation 3 was released on November 11, 2006 in Japan, and on November 17, 2006 in the United States and Canada. It will be released in March, 2007 in Europe and Australasia. It is available in two initial configurations. Sony officially unveiled the PS3 to the public on May 16, 2005 during an E3 conference. A functional version of the console was not at E3 2005 or the Tokyo Game Show in September 2005, although at both events, demonstrations were held on devkits and comparable PC hardware, and video footage based on the predicted PlayStation 3 specifications was produced. It was not until E3 2006 that games were shown on actual PlayStation 3 systems. In preparation for launch, Sony demonstrated 27 playable PS3 titles during the Tokyo Game Show in September 2006 on final hardware. Sony also confirmed the PlayStation 3 will use Blu-ray discs as its media format. The discs can hold up to six times as much data as current-generation DVDs. It will also support CR-ROM, CD-RW, DVD, DVD-ROM, DVD-R, DVD+R formats. Sony also confirmed that the machine will be backward compatible all the way to the original PlayStation. It will also have slots for Memory Stick Duo, an SD slot, and a compact flash memory slot. It will also sport a slot for a detachable 2.5-inch HDD, somewhat similar to the Xbox 360's. Sony did not mention if the drive would be standard. Sony also laid out the technical specs of the device. The PlayStation 3 will feature the much-vaunted Cell processor, which will run at 3.2GHz, giving the whole system 2 teraflops of overall performance. It will sport 256MB XDR main RAM at 3.2GHz, and it will have 256MB of GDDR VRAM at 700MHz. Sony designed the PlayStation 3 to be more than just a video game console. It supports all kinds of digital entertainment and is basically a home-entertainment computer. This computer sports a specially designed CPU called the Cell processor. Sony, Toshiba and IBM worked together to develop the Cell processor. It's their answer to the growing trend toward multi-core processing, in which manufacturers place as many processors as possible onto one chip. The Cell processor is scalable for different performance needs. The one used in the PlayStation 3 crams 234 million transistors onto a single die. For comparison, one of the most powerful desktop PC CPUs available in 2005, the $1,000, dual-core Pentium Processor Extreme Edition, just barely breaks the 200-million-transistor mark. Playstation 3 specifications: CPU: Cell Processor PowerPC-base Core @3.2GHz - 1 VMX vector unit per core
- 512KB L2 cache
- 7 x SPE @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
GPU RSX @ 550MHz - 1.8 TFLOPS floating point Performance
- Full HD (up to 1080p) x 2 channels
- Multi-way programmable parallel Floating point shader pipelines
- Sound Dolby 5.1ch, DTS, LPCM, etc. (Cell-based processing)
MEMORY - 256MB XDR Main RAM @3.2GHz
- 256MB GDDR3 VRAM @700MHz
- System Bandwidth Main RAM-- 25.6GB/s
- VRAM--22.4GB/s
- RSX-- 20GB/s (write) + 15GB/s (read)
- SB2.5GB/s (write) + 2.5GB/s (read)
SYSTEM FLOATING POINT PERFORMANCE: STORAGE - HDD Detachable 2.5" HDD slot x 1
- I/O--USB Front x 4, Rear x 2 (USB2.0)
- Memory Stickstandard/Duo, PRO x 1
- SD standard/mini x 1
- CompactFlash(Type I, II) x 1
COMMUNICATION - Ethernet (10BASE-T, 100BASE-TX, 1000BASE-T) x 3 (input x 1 + output x 2)
- Wi-Fi IEEE 802.11 b/g
- Bluetooth--Bluetooth 2.0 (EDR)
- ControllerBluetooth (up to 7)
- USB 2.0 (wired)
- Wi-Fi (PSP)
- Network (over IP)
AV OUTPUT - Screen size 480i, 480p, 720p, 1080i, 1080p
- HDMI out x 2
- AV multi out x 1
- Digital out (optical) x 1
DISC MEDIA: CD, PlayStation CD-ROM, PlayStation2 CD-ROM, CD-DA, CD-DA (ROM), CD-R, CD-RW, SACD Hybrid (CD layer), SACD HD, DualDisc, DualDisc, PlayStation 2 DVD-ROM, PlayStation 3 DVD-ROM, DVD-ROM, DVD-R, DVD-RW, DVD+R, DVD+RW, Blu-ray Disc, PlayStation 3 BD-ROM, BD-ROM, BD
|
