似乎持續到2008年底。

所以某軟軟公司付的一億五千萬美金差不多買派拉蒙的片子只發給HD-DVD市場一年半….之後應該就恢復雙跨吧。
這種逆天(市場現況)而行的行為已經開始引發不滿了。比方說這次影響到Shrek the Third和Transformer，所以某馬可貝好像在放話不做Transformer2….好吧，頂多換人XD
然後史蒂芬史匹柏大神也不受限制…. 對HD-DVD而言，最糟的情況就是這樣只買到一堆電視影集，比較好的情況就是盡量多綁到幾片大作就賺。
外加上次本田雅一提到SONY與松下策反環球失利，看來某公司真的燒很多錢….

只能說BD和HD-DVD普及速度越拖越慢，大家就寧可繼續看DVD、或者是對其他載體(比方說IPTV)越有利，而主推IPTV的360當然是受益者。

—-
老實說，現在比較關心的是BANDAI…. 卡到一堆動畫沒辦法BD化就不妙。_A_

[EDIT]
本田雅一剛好這時候發HD媒體相關第二篇。
http://www.watch.impress.co.jp/av/docs/20070823/avt013.htm

這兩天La Fonera PLUS到貨。
因為散熱問題解決，和La Fonera比起來比較讓人放心開整天….

有可能會把主力從WL-500g家族移到FON上…. 目前考慮把WL-500g拿去當WDS使用，詳細等待測試。
至於FON….大概會封印吧。orz

http://www.watch.impress.co.jp/av/docs/20070820/fixstars.htm
http://cell.fixstars.com/products/rt_ir01.html

軟體運作平台為Windows XP。
PS3作為以Ethernet連接的DSP box般的輔助硬體，
主要運算(及時8ch FFT)以PS3上的CELL為主執行，
軟體本身為PS3的開機光碟，只需要打開電源，
使用者不需要操作PS3。

可以透過即時的音響分析來設定錄音室、車用音響的喇叭配備。
4ch 96KHz的狀況下即時測量用的sample file仍然可以長達2.6秒。
同理，2ch 192KHz、8ch 48KHz為同等spec。

定價207,000日圓。

安裝概略圖：

於是，第一個把PS3當成超強力DSP box的專業應用軟體出爐了。

A rumor is going about the Official EU Playstation forums about what firmware 2.0 will include.

“Presently, 64MB of XDR RAM, 32MB of GDDR3 VRAM, and the entire 7th SPU are always reserved for the XMB even during games. Firmware 2.0 will reduce the memory usage to 32MB of XDR and NO GDDR3. XMB will still run on the 7th SPU but the 7th SPU wont be reserved, other things can be run on the SPU besides the XMB.”

一口氣空出64MB，其實光這已經很神奇了。

Firmware 2.0 will have in-game XMB.

Not all of the icons will be available on the XMB during a game.

Under ‘Friends’ there will be ‘Block List’, ‘Add a Freind’, ‘Players Met’, ‘Message Box’, and all of your friends. Your friends’ avatars will not show in-game in order to conserve memory.

Under ‘Network’ there will be ‘Download Management’.

Under ‘Game’ there will be the disk icon with the title under it. Seelecting this will prompt you for quitting the game.

The ‘Video’ column will not appear.

Under ‘Music’ there will be all of your sound files. You can play any of them and they will continue to play after you exit the in-game XMB. You will not be able to delete any of your songs in-game.

The ‘Photo’ column will not appear.

Under ‘Setteings’ there will be:
-‘Game Settings’ wich will include ‘PS/PS2 Upscaler’ settings and ‘PS/PS2 Smoothing’ settings.
-‘System Settings’ wich will include a new subsetting called ‘Turn Off the System’.
-‘Date and Time Settings’ wich will include all the normal features.
-‘Accessory Settings’ wich will include all the normal features.
-‘Display Settings’ wich will include everything except ‘Video Output Settings’.
-‘Sound Settings’ will unclude everything except ‘Audio Output Settings’.

The ‘Users’ column will not appear.

上面看起來很好，不過不過我開始擔心影音需求的資源緊縮了….orz
當然神奇度是另外一回事。要說先前的96MB大半是保留其實沒用到我還有點驚訝。那本來到底是想做啥….

好吧，如果AV相關功能改成硬碟內安裝的話我可以接受…._A_

—
http://thevideogamingreport.blogspot.com/2007/08/ps3-update-v200-info-rumour.html
這邊刊載了一些額外的資訊：

• 1. v2.00 will have updated drivers for its built-in internet browser, for updated flash player functionality and other stuff related to the browser.

我可以希望支援nicovideo嗎XD
還有Flash本身最好支援GPU硬體加速….

• 2. his beta/final build of v2.00 consisted of 2 different downloads – one containing Home, and one without it. this results in the Home software having it’s own section in the XMB. Current Beta version are downloaded from the store and are booted from the game section of the XMB. It was mentioned though, that Home has been accessed this way since v1.54 and not to expect Home to actually be released until after v2.10 or v2.20. Kinks are being worked out involving the Home/XMB menu design/access. His group is mainly ironing out

所以這幾版都在準備引入Home就是了？但是最近好像還沒看到幾款遊戲有打算對應Home啊。到時候它的matchmaking功能真的能用？

• 3. Anonymous mentioned that there would be no in-game XMB access yet, although the group that he is currently operating with have actually sent this idea, as well as other ideas, to their dept heads. Aside from known bug issues, he also gets to send his higher-ups thoughts/opinions/ideas to improve software. But he hasn’t heard of any response from anyone yet about this feature other than that, so far, it is not in his final build.

in-game XMB access其實需要用的東西不外兩項：一項customize soundtrack、一項 instant messaging，如果BGdownload也能作用的話那是不錯，不過其實這不見得要作成在in-game XMB可以monitor。所以確實想好要做啥好節省記憶體空間吧。

• 4. Icons for movies/games can now move while other media types are currently being accessed.

這段看不懂。

• 5. Security is being worked on. You can password protect individual files on your HDD including movies, photos and pictures by pressing triangle to access the options menu. he did state though that this does not appear to be anywhere finished yet, and not to expect it for the v2.00 update, but cool info none the less.

我比較擔心各個帳號需不需要自行分開備份資料….說真的，因為PSN的分區，現在一般應該是一人多帳號比較多，如果每個帳號都這樣分容量佔空間的話，那硬碟有多少都不夠用。

總之對XMB的進展方向有點擔憂。日本國內是很多AV-user的樣子，所以通常比較關切AV功能(個人也不例外)，但是歐美的user好像就傾向把PS3當成純Game Console….平井好像也不太喜歡遊戲之外的方向，這真是讓人感覺不妙。

總之，如果能空出這麼多主記憶體容量(總計64MB)，應該是真的有刪去OS的某些功能。

根據後藤大叔在7/18這篇整理，SCE有開始針對PS3的通用處理推廣路線進行修正，所以這邊考慮會被刪去的功能可能與通用處理的OS元件有關，也就是可能刪去Hypervisior。前面提到第七個SPE有條件釋放看起來也有印證到這一點。

http://pc.watch.impress.co.jp/docs/2007/0718/kaigai373.htm
仕切り直しに入ったPLAYSTATION 3戦略の今後

Hypervisior在PS3的作用內主要是用於同時雙OS運作，畢竟當初本來打算預載Linux；不過現在我們都很清楚PS3並沒有預載Linux，只有XMB而已，而且在Linux下的限制也相當多(比方說Linux下RSX半殘)，使得大部分廠商沒有花太多精神在上面。

考慮最近即將推出的Cell Computing Board的推出，目前CELL + RSX的通用運算推廣工作，可能完全交給Cell Computing Board來執行，PS3上的Linux運用範圍的擴展可能就到現在的程度為止了。如果確定是刪去Hypervisior的話，提供同時雙OS進行多工運作的機會也變得微乎其微。

當然，從一開始PS3就不曾以這種模式運作過，考慮256MB容量對遊戲和桌面應用都仍嫌少(因為對手的spec之故)的狀況，或許對這種半調子的環境也不太需要執著。認真想想切換式開機也沒什麼不好的，說不定還可以藉此開放RSX的Linux環境下使用呢。

只是怕犧牲的不只是Hypervisior提供的雙重開機而已….比方說，既然沒有打算負擔高可信度的通用運算能力，那麼硬體的可信度也可以降低，先前SONY人員提出的平均損壞率0.2%的數字，應該就不至於繼續勉力維持，而可能拉到PS2相同的程度（約2%）。當然這會反映在成本上，並且很可能帶來降價的機會。

總之，這是個PS3的轉戾點….

閃光放很大Blog

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　　　　　「ＳＡＧＡＭＩＹＡ」にて。

閃光被害討論

「インタビュー写真集」是嗎….
這個interview，是那個閃光電視訪談嗎….

—–
會不會太過份了….orz

http://www.gameplayer.com.au/Home/PREVIEWS/PREVIEWGAME/tabid/1484/Default.aspx?CID=bb1443ed-30f8-4eb2-b212-8926111caf49&v7Pager=3
所以Splinter Cell : Conviction沒辦法在PS3上發售。

但是在此同時，8/14號，三個PNNL的專家在DDJ發表了一篇文章。
http://www.ddj.com/hpc-high-performance-computing/197801624?pgno=1
Programming the Cell Processor
It may be tricky, but the performance gains are worth the effort

最佳化之後，單顆CELL的性能達到了Woodcrest的22倍，單顆SPE的性能最高可以達到1.4 ~ 4.75倍，足以和256顆CPU的BlueGene/L對抗….

好吧，程式碼變成20倍長了。XD

總之，人家用的演算法是BFS。 _A_
還附上完整的optimize guide….

原文：Some techniques (loop unrolling, function inlining, SIMDization) are familiar; others (bulk synchronous parallelization, DMA traffic scheduling, overlapping of computation and transfers) are less so.

[EDIT]基本上，目前問到的結果，Splinter Cell系列完全只使用PPE和RSX。

PS3 games list & SPE usages
http://www.neogaf.com/forum/showthread.php?p=7598043
整串
http://www.neogaf.com/forum/showpost.php?p=7598043&postcount=1
單篇

持續更新中。

http://www-01.ibm.com/chips/techlib/techlib.nsf/techdocs/AF7832F379790768872572D10047E52B
http://www-01.ibm.com/chips/techlib/techlib.nsf/techdocs/AF7832F379790768872572D10047E52B/$file/CellBE_HIG_65nm_v1.01_8Jun2007.pdf

Cell Broadband Engine
CMOS SOI 65 nm
Hardware Initialization Guide

page 209.
E.11 DDR2 support

所以其實是RAMBUS提供了一個XDR轉DDR2的translator chip，每個translator支援128bit，連接到32bit的XDR controller上，總寬度是256bit。
在這個前提下，CELL支援到最大16GB的DDR2記憶體(double bank)，每個channel定址到33bit。(XDR下提供到35bit)
使用ch DDR2-800時最大頻寬與使用XDR 3.2GHz時相同，為25.6GB/s。

這樣看來LANL RoadRunner需要的大容量記憶體支援並不是真的靠作兩個版本的CELL來解決….其實這種作法也比較符合IBM目前在高階市場的需要啦。
而以原理來說，初代CELL”應該”也可以透過這個晶片支援DDR2；不過在舊版的Initialization Guide裡面並沒有DDR2如何支援的詳細資料，只有提及DDR2的容量，所以當時可能只有計畫，還沒有實作好….

總之，如果CELL Computing Board也用這種方式提供DDR2支援的話，那要擴充容量相對來說就比較簡單了。

CELL 舊版 HIG(2006年9月)
http://www-01.ibm.com/chips/techlib/techlib.nsf/techdocs/BD3F1F4C3DB32C7487257142006131BC

話說這份PDF是6月8日釋出的，這或許可以代表65nm版CELL確實的完成時期….

—-
而現在回去看RoadRunner的文件，就會看出許多端倪。

http://www.lanl.gov/orgs/hpc/roadrunner/pdfs/sc06rrbriefing.pdf
RoadRunner設計上是每4個Dual-Core Opteron配上4個CELL-Blade，兩邊各32GB memory。
即8個Opteron-Cores搭上8個Cell，每個Opteron都搭上一個CELL，並且各自搭載4GB Memory。

也就是說，其實RoadRunner的原始目的，是希望有個Opteron-Core + 8個SPE的CPU存在….
或者是說用Opteron來取代PPE，這樣講可能比較直接。_A_

http://www.lanl.gov/orgs/hpc/roadrunner/pdfs/rrsummary.pdf
裡面提到了提供Hybrid computing 的 SDK3.0提供時間是07年後半、Phase3實際完成時間是08年前半。
此時所有系統都會採用eDP CELL來建置，可以穩定地提供1PetaFlops的Linpack，來支援LANL的核武模擬作業。(從64-ways增長到1000-ways)

SDK 3.0的重點有：(page9)

ALF & libSPE [PPE-SPE互動]
• Computational Library (ALF w/ IBM)
– Task & work block queuing & management
– Streaming & user-defined data partitioning
– Process management
– Error handling

DaCS or OpenMPI [Opteron-CELL/PPE互動]
• Communication Library (DaCS w/ IBM)
– Data movement & synchronization
– Process management & synchronization
– Topology description
– Error handling
– First implementation may leverage OpenMPI

• Longer term
– ALF & DaCS support in tools
– ALF from Opteron ⇒ Cell directly
– Compilers supporting some of this

話說RR雖然持續如火如荼地進行中，不過過去其實有很多人對HPC的觀念都是
「有很多老程式」、「要加速現有的code」，不過CELL/GPGPU之類的方案都需要幾乎重新coding，這會帶來多少衝擊，其實可以看遊戲界現在的狀況就知道。
HPC市場真的能平安過渡過去嗎？這又是個值得觀察的問題了。

http://blog.xuite.net/sokayha/diary/12673870
水瀨兄的”用過雙螢幕會上癮”。

沒錯，用過會上癮。

雙螢幕同好會。持續招募中。(oi

http://www.ps3fanboy.com/2007/08/14/call-of-duty-4-on-the-ps3-run-at-60fps-with-full-aa/
Call of Duty 4 on the PS3 runs at 60FPS with full AA

One of the developers behind the sexy looking FPS has recently shot-down the rumor that COD4 on the PS3 would run at a sad Madden-like 30FPS with little to no anti-aliasing, versus the 360 version which has already been confirmed to run at 60FPS with AA.
「對不起那些痛恨PS3人士了，我們已經為「對PS3有愛的玩家」在PS3版本中實現了60FPS和抗鋸齒。」

我只能說這翻譯GJ…. XD
和AI做不起來的Ubisoft相比，又有其他developer覺醒了嗎XD

然後EA也替自己找理由：
EA Explains Why Madden Sucks on PS3

In the case of the next-generation consoles, many publishers have been developing titles for the Xbox 360 for over 3 1/2 years while everyone who publishes now for the PlayStation 3 with the exception of Sony has been developing for the PlayStation 3 for only a little over one full year. The differences in the overall knowledge of the hardware is vastly different for both consoles and…it is very difficult to get it right the first time.

3年半和1年未滿…. _A_

—-

[EDIT]
http://www.cod4forums.com/index.php?showtopic=220
有人丟pre-beta screenshot的對比出來了，看起來PS3版多那麼一點點細節?

http://www.develop-conference.com/developconference/schedule_at_a_glance.shtml?view=day&daycode=8

Deferred Rendering in Killzone 2

Next generation gaming brought high resolutions, very complex environments and large textures to our living rooms. With virtually every asset being inflated, it’s hard to use traditional forward rendering and hope for rich, dynamic environments with extensive dynamic lighting. Deferred rendering, on the other hand, has been traditionally described as a nice technique for rendering of scenes with many dynamic lights, that unfortunately suffers from fill-rate problems and lack of anti-aliasing and very few games that use it were published.

In this talk, we will discuss our approach to face this challenge and how we designed a deferred rendering engine that uses multi-sampled anti-aliasing (MSAA). We will give in-depth description of each individual stage of our real-time rendering pipeline and the main ingredients of our lighting, post-processing and data management. We’ll show how we utilize PS3’s SPUs for fast rendering of a large set of primitives, parallel processing of geometry and computation of indirect lighting. We will also describe our optimizations of the lighting and our parallel split (cascaded) shadow map algorithm for faster and stable MSAA output.

http://www.develop-conference.com/developconference/downloads/vwsection/Deferred%20Rendering%20in%20Killzone.pdf

其實說起來Deferred Rendering已經不是什麼了不起的東西。
KZ2用Deferred Rendering的時候最大的問題看起來像是G-buffer並不便宜，有36MB….
而且KZ2的SPE雖然有用到四個，但是和繪圖相關的主要都是在display list產生上，還有一些Image-Based Lighting的資料產生。

SPU Usage
> We use SPU a lot during rendering
> Display list generation
>> Main display list
>> Lights and Shadow Maps
>> Forward rendering
> Scene graph traversal / visibility culling
> Skinning
> Triangle trimming
> IBL generation
> Particles

所以從這篇來看，KZ2實在是非常善用美術可做的事情來彌補RSX的不足….
不過他們正在檢討Ambient Occlusion和Dynamic Radiosity，也許有計畫利用Enlighten那一類的技術？

—-
每次遇到這種題目，我就會想，如果頻寬/容量條件完全相同的狀況下，改用G8x到底能表現比G7x好多少？
除了晶片本身之外，其他部份的成本不能大幅度改變之故，考慮的記憶體頻寬主要是靠原來的128bit GDDR3和FlexIO，總共25.6GB/s + 5GB/s雙向 + 15GB/s 下行 + 10GB/s上行，容量也限制在256MB + 256MB。

如果有G8x的TCP結構，可能KZ2不需要用到Deferred Rendering…. 因為console不能換硬體，這點特別的痛。
但是如果要維持peak performance的話，可能要作到3 ~ 4TCP的規模，電晶體數量可能會衝到500M….這樣真的值得嗎？