Microsoft?s Xbox 2 Architecture Unveiled

[Ness]

Originally posted by: Jigga
Jeebus, how much will three of these custom POWER 976 chips cost ALONE!!?? I'd imagine that's $300 AT LEAST (assuming chips are priced $100 each in quantities of 1000 on the spot market.)

Those prices reflect current times.

This thing is expected in 3+ years. 3 years ago, Athlon XPs were just breaking into the market at about $200-$250 for a XP 1600. Now one of those can be had for about 40 bucks.

 

[Smolek]

While a few things have changed since this revision, it is VERY VERY close to the current form of the xbox successor and given that there is at least 18 months to launch prices should be on line with the $300-$400 price point by then.

 

[RaynorWolfcastle]

Originally posted by: Smolek
While a few things have changed since this revision, it is VERY VERY close to the current form of the xbox successor and given that there is at least 18 months to launch prices should be on line with the $300-$400 price point by then.

Umm...
ok, let's see the fastest G5 is currently running at 2 GHz. Assuming frequency doubling roughly every 18 months and saying that XBox next comes out in 24 months, we get that the top end G5 derivative will be some running at 5 GHz. So a 3.5 GHz core will be a middle of the road chip since it runs 70% of the top end. To put this in perspective it will be to the rough equivalent of 2.4 GHz P4 to today's top end.

Consider that the cheapest P4 (2.66 GHz) runs $163 per chip in 1K trays. So to put that in perspective, for a premium (ie not budget) CPU we'd be looking at $300+ for CPUs alone if they used 3 CPUs.

Now even assuming IBM goes multi-core, that's a very aggressive target to be aiming for; especially considering, that CPU frequency hasn't been scaling anywhere near double/18 months in the past year.

I'd say it'll end up being something like what happened with the original XBox. They'll target the hardware very aggressively and scale it back to meet their pricepoint/yield rates as they approach the deadline.

This is all pure speculation btw, it is possible that MS and IBM will actually pull it off. If they do, I'd bet they'll be using something like a single tri-core CPU, not 3 discrete CPUs.

 

[TuxDave]

Originally posted by: RaynorWolfcastle

Originally posted by: Smolek
While a few things have changed since this revision, it is VERY VERY close to the current form of the xbox successor and given that there is at least 18 months to launch prices should be on line with the $300-$400 price point by then.

Umm...
ok, let's see the fastest G5 is currently running at 2 GHz. Assuming frequency doubling roughly every 18 months and saying that XBox next comes out in 24 months, we get that the top end G5 derivative will be some running at 5 GHz. So a 3.5 GHz core will be a middle of the road chip since it runs 70% of the top end. To put this in perspective it will be to the rough equivalent of 2.4 GHz P4 to today's top end.

Consider that the cheapest P4 (2.66 GHz) runs $163 per chip in 1K trays. So to put that in perspective, for a premium (ie not budget) CPU we'd be looking at $300+ for CPUs alone if they used 3 CPUs.

Now even assuming IBM goes multi-core, that's a very aggressive target to be aiming for; especially considering, that CPU frequency hasn't been scaling anywhere near double/18 months in the past year.

I'd say it'll end up being something like what happened with the original XBox. They'll target the hardware very aggressively and scale it back to meet their pricepoint/yield rates as they approach the deadline.

This is all pure speculation btw, it is possible that MS and IBM will actually pull it off. If they do, I'd bet they'll be using something like a single tri-core CPU, not 3 discrete CPUs.

A single tri-core high end CPU? I honestly don't see how you could get the necessary amount of pins on one die package let alone package the whole damn thing. Look how many pins a single core AMD 64 chip has.

 

[Passions]

Don't hate. Congratulate!

 

[RaynorWolfcastle]

Originally posted by: TuxDave
A single tri-core high end CPU? I honestly don't see how you could get the necessary amount of pins on one die package let alone package the whole damn thing. Look how many pins a single core AMD 64 chip has.

It's already been done for 4 dual-cored CPUs in a server environment, by IBM!
:shocked: <- click me

 

[Anubis]

you know initial specs on the PS3 said it woudl be 100x faster then a 3GHz Pentium 4

ill beleive it when i see it

 

[lowlevel]

n/m misread the previous post. :beer:

 

[Mallow]

Hrm... wonder what the cost and storage changes will be.

 

[conjur]

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[Bassyhead]

looks interesting, hopefully wont be too expensive.