Xbox 2 is an IBM & SGI supercomputer

[mosys]

this was good read, even if somewhat unprofessional. The Inquirer made
an article out of some letter they recieved about Xbox 2. basicly what
it's saying is, Xbox 2 will be sort of like an IBM supercomputer, with
SGI-based supercomputer / visualization system graphics (from ATI)

some choice parts from the article:

quote:

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Now let's put the pieces all together. Microsoft has chosen IBM, a long
time maker of mainframes and supercomputers to manufacture the XBOX 2's
CPU...a variant of the Power4 CPU known as the G5. It is high performance
and highly efficient, and thus much cooler than any X-86 chip which allows a
multi-CPU design to be put into a much smaller form factor than a comparable
multi X-86 design. The G5 has embedded in it a Vector Math unit which
processes multimedia instructions much like Intel's SSE instructions.

----------------------------------------------------------------------------
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quote:
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The GPU will also employ technology culled from the world of mainframes
and supercomputers such as dynamic logic for much higher performance and
vector math processing like the G5's Altivec multimedia units. Plus the
Fast14 process allows for this much higher performance of dynamic logic
without the once associated heat buildup. Once again, an important design
criteria when building a small form factor console. Helping to make the new
ATI Fast14 GPU that much cooler will be the Black Diamond low-K dielectric
insulating process that ATI and its foundry partner TSMC uses.
----------------------------------------------------------------------------
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quote:
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Without a doubt the Xbox 2 will be the world's first consumer
supercomputer ever. Everything about it reeks of supercomputer....Multiple
Power4/G5 RISC CPU's processing in parallel and employing vector math
processing. Those CPU's designed by supercomputer manufacturer IBM. Graphics
processor employing dynamic logic and vector math processing from the world
of supercomputers, manufactured by ATI which is now primarily run by ex-SGI
engineers, again a manufacturer of supercomputers. Can't wait until someone
hacks into it and installs 64 bit Linux. Can you imagine a Beowulf Cluster
built of multiple Xbox 2s ?!!!
_____________________________________________________________


http://www.theinquirer.net/?article=14050


my take on this is:

In terms of floating point performance and graphics muscle, the Xbox 2
should outdo a 16-pipe SGI InfiniteReality2 or IR3 machine from the late
1990s.

Even Silicon Graphics themselves have turned to ATI for the highend
Onyx4 UltimateVision systems, which will employ upto -32- ATI R3XX VPU
cores.

I am guessing Xbox 2 should have at least 5-10 times the graphics muscle
of a R300 / Radeon 9700. or perhaps 3-4 times that of the upcoming R420.

 

[Rolf]

this was good read, even if somewhat unprofessional.
<SNIP>
I am guessing Xbox 2 should have at least 5-10 times the graphics muscle
of a R300 / Radeon 9700. or perhaps 3-4 times that of the upcoming R420.


Yes But can it make you a cup of coffee on those long nights when playing

Midtown Madness 3 Live against the best and the worst.

I don't think so

Jud

 

[Andrew]

this was good read, even if somewhat unprofessional. The Inquirer made
an article out of some letter they recieved about Xbox 2. basicly what
it's saying is, Xbox 2 will be sort of like an IBM supercomputer, with
SGI-based supercomputer / visualization system graphics (from ATI)

The hype surounding the PS2 said that would be a "supercomputer". That
was as much BS as this is.

 

[Martin Francis]

this was good read, even if somewhat unprofessional. The Inquirer made
an article out of some letter they recieved about Xbox 2. basicly what
it's saying is, Xbox 2 will be sort of like an IBM supercomputer, with
SGI-based supercomputer / visualization system graphics (from ATI)

Such a shame it will boil down to a bunch of pretty games with little
substance and no replay value...

 

[Tommy Stenberg]

So, we are supposed to believe Microsofts hype, but not Sonys? We heard it
all before. We won't fall for it again. I couldn't care less how powerful a
console is. Okay, I DO care, but only to a certain extent. What good is
perfect hardware if there are noone to utilize it and turn it into great
games? I'm hoping the Xbox 2 will have good games, and have a few times
better power than the Xbox (if it didn't, what's the use of upgrading to an
Xbox 2?).

The hardware companies only hype their machines with hightech terms and
specs. I'm waiting to see the games, THEN and only then can I be impressed
(if there's something to be impressed by).

Tommy

 

[hg]

Actually, every performance enhancing feature of modern processors have
evolved from supercomputer CPU design in one way or another. That's why I
laughed at that Inquirer story when I read it early this morning.
Besides, if I were seller of the future Xbox 2 i would be more worried about
the rumour that it has no backwards compatibility with the first Xbox. I
suppose microsoft think there aren't enough good games so why bother?

 

[Phil]

The hype surounding the PS2 said that would be a "supercomputer". That
was as much BS as this is.

NO technically it was a super computer then as far as the law was
concerned and that could've caused problems for Sony had said
regulations not been updated.

 

[Andrew]

NO technically it was a super computer then as far as the law was
concerned and that could've caused problems for Sony had said
regulations not been updated.

What is the definition of supercomputer then? It was less powerful
than my PC was when it was released, and my PC isn't within 1% of a
real supercomputers processing power.

 

[xTenn]

Andrew <spamtrap@localhost> wrote in message

NO technically it was a super computer then as far as the law was
concerned and that could've caused problems for Sony had said
regulations not been updated.

Get Real. If that was the case then every NVidia and ATI graphics card
available at the time (2000) would have been a supercomputer. You are
propagating more of the Sony propaganda machine bs. There are SOOOOO many
reasons why a single PS2 game console would not be considered one, common
sense not the least thereof.

There has been an attempt (at NCSA at that) to create what would qualify a
supercomputer from PS2 shells, but it takes 70 (yes, 70) consoles to
qualify. For the record, it takes less PCs to reach the same threshold.
The major reason the PS2 was used is because of the Linux kit (which
thankfully allows access to the vector units) and cheap hardware, NOT
because of extremely powerful hardware.

There are quite a few good resources on the web about super computing, not
the worse of which is from the projects here at the University of Tennessee
and Oak Ridge National Laboratories - but then you are probably not familar
with BLAS or LAPACK, are you? At least check out the LINPACK tests on
common computing hardware to become familiar with how things really rank
from a simplistic linear equation standpoint. Check out this PDF if the
topic of performance interests you WITHOUT the hype:

http://www.netlib.org/benchmark/performance.pdf

 

[Jonathan]

I think we all know what any new console is going to be like - crap
apart from one or two good games, which typically outshine and outlast
almost everything for at least the first year. It takes so long to
manufacture a really good game, as the power and complexity increases,
(depending also on the quality of the API) that by the time the really
cool stuff appears, everyone is talking about the next console. And
so the cycle continues...

As for the graphics, they will appear pants in a few years compared to
what's coming, and the Supercomputers of the day will be far superior
by the time the technology trickles down to the console market for
199.99.

Me, I'll wait until things have settled before I jump.

 

[Rolf]

But Like I asked...

Can it make you a cup of coffee on those long nights when playing
Midtown Madness 3 Live against the best and the worst.

I don't think so

Jud

 

[kevin getting]

Get Real. If that was the case then every NVidia and ATI graphics card
available at the time (2000) would have been a supercomputer. You are
propagating more of the Sony propaganda machine bs. There are SOOOOO many
reasons why a single PS2 game console would not be considered one, common
sense not the least thereof.

The vector units in the PS2 are fully programable, though lack in
performance compared to modern video cards. However, modern video cards
are not as programable as the vector units on a PS2. This puts the vector
units on the PS2 as a general purpose CPU side, thus falling under
regulations of the time.

There is a library that accesses video card hardware for general purpose
use. This is a recent developement and it requires Radeon 9500 class or
GeforceFX class hardware to be usefull. The ATI and nVidia cards around
2000 lacked the necessary programability.

http://graphics.stanford.edu/projects/brookgpu

There has been an attempt (at NCSA at that) to create what would qualify a
supercomputer from PS2 shells, but it takes 70 (yes, 70) consoles to
qualify. For the record, it takes less PCs to reach the same threshold.
The major reason the PS2 was used is because of the Linux kit (which
thankfully allows access to the vector units) and cheap hardware, NOT
because of extremely powerful hardware.

The reason for the choice of PS2's was that its vector units were well
suited for processing task and the hardware was cheap. A PS2 by itself
isn't that powerful but when clustered, they can be an expense yet useful
tool. This holds true to most systems that are used as the basis for
large clusters.

There are quite a few good resources on the web about super computing, not
the worse of which is from the projects here at the University of Tennessee
and Oak Ridge National Laboratories - but then you are probably not familar
with BLAS or LAPACK, are you? At least check out the LINPACK tests on
common computing hardware to become familiar with how things really rank
from a simplistic linear equation standpoint. Check out this PDF if the
topic of performance interests you WITHOUT the hype:

http://www.netlib.org/benchmark/performance.pdf

The whole hype of the PS2 being a super computer stems from the US rather
ancient definition. Apple had a few ads proclaiming the same thing
when their G4 systems first appeared. Needless to say, US regulations
have since been updated. If you want to see what real super computers
were doing back in 2000, check out the link below.

http://www.top500.org

 

[kevin getting]

What is the definition of supercomputer then? It was less powerful
than my PC was when it was released, and my PC isn't within 1% of a
real supercomputers processing power.

For video games, yes, the PS2 was less powerful than a high end PC of its
time. However, its the programable vector units on the PS2 that gets
added to its overall processing power that allowed it to become a 'super
computer'. PC video cards of that era were not programable enough to
factored into overall computing power. A system only has to breach 1
GFLOP of power to claim the title of super computer in 2000.

 

[Benjamin Gawert]

NO technically it was a super computer then as far as the law was
concerned and that could've caused problems for Sony had said
regulations not been updated.

Good joke! What was the GFLOPS/s rate of game consoles like PS2, Xbox and
Xbox2?

I just bought two smaller and older Supercomputers (one 32-CPU HP V2500 and
one 32-CPU HP V2500) which do 56,23GFLOPS/s and 72,64GFLOPS/s with their
current configuration. I yet have to see any Game console coming even close
to these numbers.

And from what I know the PS2-Cluster wasn't made of PS2's because they are
so powerful but because of the low price of the Linux version of the PS2. It
even wasn't meant to be a production unit but just an experimental system.

Benjamin

 

[xTenn]

On Tue, 10 Feb 2004, xTenn wrote:

<snip>

You took everything I said and just restated it - are you a consultant?

 

[Phil]

Good joke! What was the GFLOPS/s rate of game consoles like PS2, Xbox and
Xbox2?

I just bought two smaller and older Supercomputers (one 32-CPU HP V2500 and
one 32-CPU HP V2500) which do 56,23GFLOPS/s and 72,64GFLOPS/s with their
current configuration. I yet have to see any Game console coming even close
to these numbers.

And from what I know the PS2-Cluster wasn't made of PS2's because they are
so powerful but because of the low price of the Linux version of the PS2. It
even wasn't meant to be a production unit but just an experimental system.

Benjamin

Perhaps it had more to do w/ linking multiple PS2s together than
anything and also as I recall said import/export regulation was
extremely outdated at the time.

 

[Benjamin Gawert]

Perhaps it had more to do w/ linking multiple PS2s together than
anything and also as I recall said import/export regulation was
extremely outdated at the time.

These export regulations were (and still are) stupid at best. A single PS2
never qualified as a supercomputer. Limiting the export of a cluster of slow
computers which consists of multiple slow computers is idiotic since You can
build a cluster of almost everything.

But since the PS2 was and still is produced in Asia all this doesn't matter.

Benjamin

 

[Per Ekman]

Good joke! What was the GFLOPS/s rate of game consoles like PS2, Xbox and
Xbox2?

The PS2 does 6.2GFLOPS (single precision) which was quite impressive
at the time (and still is if you ask me). And IIRC the export
restrictions specified systems with more than 1GFLOPS as a
supercomputer.

I just bought two smaller and older Supercomputers (one 32-CPU HP V2500 and
one 32-CPU HP V2500) which do 56,23GFLOPS/s and 72,64GFLOPS/s with their
current configuration. I yet have to see any Game console coming even close
to these numbers.

If your application is trivially parallelizable, fits in 32MB and
single precision is enough, you'd get an awful lot of FLOPS for your
money. The problem is getting the data in and out of the consoles. It
never had a chance of becoming a general purpose HPC system, no matter
what people said, but I can see the attraction for certain users.

*p

 

[MS]

Good joke! What was the GFLOPS/s rate of game consoles like PS2, Xbox and
Xbox2?

Well, you should learn how to read:

"The Xbox has 80 Gigaflops of computing power. That's equivalent to the
power found in a Cray C94 supercomputer."

http://www.nvidia.com/page/console.html

Any other questions?

 

[Andrew]

"The Xbox has 80 Gigaflops of computing power. That's equivalent to the
power found in a Cray C94 supercomputer."

http://www.nvidia.com/page/console.html

Any other questions?

Why do companies and research establishments spend millions on *real*
supercomputers when they could buy an XBox for $200? In fact, they
could get a high end PC, which is a lot more powerful than the XBox
hardware, and by your rationale that would be the most powerful
computer in the world.