E3 2005 -- a-z everything goes here

[cpt_azad]

Keep all E3 related stuff in here, better to keep it in one thread done all over the place.



Off-topic replies will be removed!

[{I}{K}{E}]

Will make it a sticky when I notice that more people will post/reply about the E3

[S!X]

Whats E3?

[GepperRankins]

it's where anyone who's anyone in gaming comes to show off their wares for the coming year or two. we will most likely see in the next week more of the xbox360, ps3 and revolution than the rest of the whole year put together

[asmithz]

Engadget & Joystiq’s live coverage of Sony’s PlayStation 3 launch

Posted May 16, 2005, 6:14 PM ET by Ryan Block
Related entries: Gaming, Home Entertainment, PlayStation 2, PlayStation 3

PlayStation 3



Hey everyone, we’re at Sony’s press event in Culver City to cover their unveiling of the PlayStation 3 this afternoon. Things are just getting started, to stay tuned for our comprehensive live coverage on Engadget and Joystiq!

Update: the parking lot ordeal was harrowing — they almost didn’t let us in! It was a mob scene out there. Some journos were so desparate to get in that they went through all sorts of contortions for the gatekeepers. Check this lady out. That’s a pushup with one foot above her head.
PS3 Contortionist



Ouch.


The presentation started with a little game history. “PlayStation 2 defined digital enterainment…. PlayStation Portable, the next revolution!” The chest thumping was accompanied by thumping speakers.

First up: Kaz Hirai. “Are you guys excited about E3?” The audience barely cheered, so he had to try again. C’mon, show us the goods, then we’ll be excited… maybe.

He does the numbers: 190 million units of hardware, 2 billion units of software. He does the backwards compatibility thing. These are the Sony strengths, so he reminds the audience that these are the goods that Microsoft can’t match.


Queue pointless interlude of flashy CGI graphics (not sure what that was for).

Ken Kutaragi introduced, and he proceeds to give the audience another lesson on the history of the PlayStation consoles. From “Real-time 3D-CG” to “Emotion Engine.” He confirms backwards compatibility of the PlayStation 3, eliciting the first audience applause since he took the stage.

Cut to a video of an IBM dude woodenly reading from a teleprompter (his eyes dart quickly left-to-right) about the cell processor system. “Even though at times it seemed like an impossible journey, the entire team overcame impossible challenges to meet the goals…. We are very excited to look forward to see all the entertainment this chip will help create.”

Highly technical performance overview given, including the following slides:



ps3 floating point calculations

Sony’s let go of the final specs and shots of the PlayStation 3. Here you go!

• It will support Blu-ray (obviously), DVD±R/W, CD-R/RW
  
• Backwards compatible with the PlayStation 2 and original Playstation
• One 3.2GHz Cell processor—total system performance rated at 2.18 teraflops (uh, that’s actually about twice what Microsoft is claiming the Xbox 360 will do); it will have 256MB system RAM 3.2GHz, and 256MB GDDR VRAM at 700MHz
• The nVidia graphics will be called the RSX (”Reality Synthesizer”), and will trump the Xbox 360 with 1080p (yes, that’s a p) graphics support.
  
• Memory Stick Duo slot, and very surprisingly, an SD and CF slots
  
• Bluetooth support with up to seven wireless controllers
  
• Six USB system ports

PlayStation 3

[GepperRankins]

looks pretty there

[Shiranai_Baka]

What are teraflops?

"The nVidia graphics will be called the RSX (”Reality Synthesizer”), and will trump the Xbox 360 with 1080p (yes, that’s a p) graphics support."

and whats 1080p?

[GepperRankins]

the resolution on HDTV (hi definition)

i think it's measured in hieght so it's something like 1400x1080 i think anyway :unsure

[asmithz]

theres another view of the PS3

Thats not even the same thing, and has been proven fake.

Originally Posted by yattaman from ps2nfo.com
Those pictures have been floating around for months. They are clearly amateurish, fan produced concepts. The supposed PS3 unit itself is based upon a Sony Blue-Ray concept recorder shown over a year ago at a Japanese electronics show.

[asmithz]

What are teraflops?

"The nVidia graphics will be called the RSX (”Reality Synthesizer”), and will trump the Xbox 360 with 1080p (yes, that’s a p) graphics support."

and whats 1080p?

In computing, FLOPS is an abbreviation of floating point operations per second. This is used as a measure of a computer's performance, especially in fields of scientific calculations that make heavy use of floating point calculations. (Note: a hertz is a cycle (or operation) per second. Compare to MIPS -- million instructions per second)

Computing devices exhibit an enormous range of performance levels in floating-point applications, so it makes sense to introduce larger units than the FLOPS. The standard SI prefixes can be used for this purpose, resulting in such units as the megaFLOPS (MFLOPS, 106 FLOPS), the gigaFLOPS (GFLOPS, 109 FLOPS), the teraFLOPS (TFLOPS, 1012 FLOPS), and the petaFLOPS (PFLOPS, 1015 FLOPS).

Think of it as a way to measure how many operations it can run per second. Roughly.

For scaler/processor manufacturers, it generally means that you can drive a display device at higher frequency than the typical HDTV display (which is generally not very demanding). A scaler that can upconvert to 1080p signal normally supports variety of other resolutions in between to match the native (or golden) resolution of the display used for optimal image quality.

Digital displays come in all resolution flavors, the most commonly used are:

1280x720
1280x768
1366x768
1400x788
1280x1024
1400x1050
1600x1200

Number means the resolution and p for progressive, i for interlaced.