According to an official Justification Review Document, the U.S. Department of Defense has ordered 2200 PlayStation 3 consoles in an effort to expand their supercomputer.
The current supercomputer has 336 PS3s arrayed in a cluster, all running a Linux operating system. The consoles have Cell microprocessors, and offer the best value for devices that can be used in the supercomputer.
The systems purchased are 160GB “fat” PS3s because they can run alternate operating systems, unlike the slim PS3s which cannot.
BoingBoing adds: “In the document, it is pointed out that a 1U server with two 3.2GHz cell processors can cost $8,000, while two Sony PS3s cost about $600. This is justified even though the PS3-spec chips deliver 150GFLOPS of performance compared to 200GFLOPS of a standard 3.2GHz IBM Cell microprocessor.”
Result for: cell processor
Toshiba Corp.’s first television to feature the Cell processor (also used with the PlayStation 3 console) is on track for its intended release this year. The product is to hit the Japanese market first in Q4 2009. The company first promised a Cell-based TV in 2007 and then showed off a prototype at CES 2008 in Las Vegas.
Toshiba said it uses the Cell processor to provide exceptionally high-quality video playback, picture upscaling and picture-in-picture (PIP) functionality capable to extend to dozens of channels simultaneously.
Masaaki Oosumi, President of Toshiba’s Digital Media Network Company, confirmed that the TV with market under the company’s Regza brand, and it will be the company’s flagship model. He likened the impact of the Cell telly’s appearance to the arrival of color television, but did admit it will be pricey.
The Cell Regza TV would have a native resolution of 3820×2160. Full specifications are expected to be released shortly.
Result for: cell processor
According to a new Siliconera report, Sony has patented a new method that would allow the Cell processor of the PlayStation 3 to fully emulate the Emotion Engine, bringing full backwards compatibility for PSX and PS2 games.
The patent was filed in December of last year, and Spencer Yip adds: “Figure 2 from the patent is a schematic drawing of how the system works. Figure 3A is a drawing of the PlayStation 2’s chipset. Figure 3B is the emotion engine. Figure 4 is where the whole story gets interesting!”It’s ‘an example of a host system based on a cell processor that may be configured to emulate the target system.’ The target is figure 3B, the Emotion Engine.” (Source and pictures at the end of the article)
Although the patent may end up being nothing, but it could also possibly mean that a new hardware model may include the backwards compatibility, possibly even the oft rumored PS3 Slim.
We will certainly keep you updated.
Siliconera report with original pics:
