So PowerPC is dead you say?

[Digiman]

So how comes IBM's AI machine called Watson which outsmarted the two best champions on Jeopardy TV show uses Power7 not x86 architecture?

youtube video

If only an IBM engineer was a nostalgic Amigan with a dream to out do Wintel at least technically.....

[Digiman]

They're 2800 used :-P

My point was wouldn't it be awesome if a group of IBM engineers looked at getting AROS PPC/OS4 to run on that CPU in their spare time.

(yeah never going to happen)

[Digiman]

If they are abandoning the PPC/Cell combo, and I'd bet they are, it's because their partners pulled out of Cell development. So they're faced with either:
1) paying for a new CPU to be developed,
2) paying for further development of the Cell and marrying it to either a newer PPC core or another ISA,
3) or they can take an off the shelf CPU/Mobo/GPU and come within a few percentage either side of their competitors whilst saving a HUGE (billions dollars) amount of money.

I think they've chosen route #3 because finally someone slightly less insane is at the helm at Sony.

Nothing to do with ease/difficulty of Cell software development or anything either, I think it's purely a logical choice based on monetary needs.

Andy

Trouble is if Xenon and CELL CPUsaren't used in their future replacements then backwards compatibility will costly via 100% software emulation of PS3 and Xbox360.

For the record Power7 is massively capable but priced as a high end server CPU. As others have said IBM sold the consumer computer division to Lenovo.

It was all tongue in cheek. If you really do want a fast 3.2ghz PPC CPU get IBM to sell you a batch of Xenon CPUs :crazy:

[Digiman]

But yes, by all means, please go ahead and approach IBM with a request to buy that CPU that will be custom built exclusively for Nintendo, for use in a new desktop Amiga motherboard. Or the custom made PPC chip they did for the Microsoft's Xbox 360. Then please report back here what their response was. I think I know what the answer will be (most likely a two letter word beginning with N and ending with O, followed by several other two-letter words in a row, each beginning with H and ending with A).

Then build your custom design desktop motherboard using it. If you start now, and put in half a million in cash, you might have a product ready in three years or so (read: yet another computer generation has passed). After that, maybe Amigakit can collect pre-orders here on amiga.org, so you can start producing it in batches of 50 units. Heck, chances are that even the A1X1K will be competitive in price.

Is this really your view of a viable, sustainable future for the platform? If "no", then why are we discussing console CPU's as if they had any relevance for Amiga's future?

1. IBM are 100% at liberty to sell Xenon. Why? Because Sony were furious and had IBM not made it available and 100% independent of Microsoft's Xbox they would have ended up either paying billions in court to Sony or Microsoft paying Sony commission on Xbox360s sold. If you have the cash IBM can use it within a project of your choosing.

2. Your average Computer Science PHd student could design a motherboard for off the shelf DRAM/Xenon/GPU as a single year project. A woman invented the ARM cpu and students designed the Amstrad and BBC Micros you do know that yes? Difficult for us but not impossible for a talented post graduate. We are talking replicating known published Xbox360 motherboard schematics.

[Digiman]

Microsoft, as they own the rights.

This is an urban legend, because Xenon is basically a modified main core from Cell (which was co-funded by Toshiba and Sony) IBM designed a suitable CPU using research funded by Sony/Toshiba which following legal threats IBM have to sell per unit to Microsoft as a customer and Xenon made an inventory item.

This is confirmed years ago by both a 360 games company and a PS3 development studio.

[Digiman]

Hahahahahhaahahahah! :roflmao: PS3 and Xbox360 are stone age compared to even mid range computers now... Software emulation won't be an issue

-edit- Hell, we can even do full 30fps H.264 decoding in JavaScript on a web browser now... Something unthinkable 6 years ago!!

1. every shared memory graphics type laptop (ie under £1000) can't play a single Directx 9c game like Battlefield 2 half a decade ago and just crashes out, and your average PC World £400 tower barely does Crysis in XGA @ 15fps.

2. You may be able to decode 1080p video using Intel I3 2100k for peanuts BUT people buy £150-200 consoles to play 1080p GAMES at 30-60FPS

3. Emulating a 3.2GHZ CELL CPU / Xenon CPU via an i7 or Phenom II @ 3.4GHZ is NEVER going to happen for the same reason the starscream 68k emulator is not 1:1mhz on emulated:host CPU performance