IBM's Cell: Not Just For the PS3

Big B

Big B

HWF Godfather
IBM isn't keeping their multi-core Cell processor in Sony's upcoming Playstation 3. If you can swing $19,000, you can snag a dual processor Cell blade, as CNet reports.

An IBM representative wouldn't say how much the blades cost, but a customer announcement said they run $18,995 each. The systems, announced Tuesday, are expected to be available Sept. 29, with a $1,950 InfiniBand high-speed network option arriving Oct. 27, IBM said.

Mark that under "Things I'd love to have just to play with."
 
oh man just a thought but what if IBM broke back into the pc business and started getting together with mainboard developers and OS's and released a cell for desktop use. 8 cores at 3.2Ghz that would be wicked.
 
Yeah, but the Cell isn't x86-based, which is what Intel and AMD's CPU's both center around. Intel tried to bring a new architecture in with the Itanium (aka 'Itanic'), but it was too soon. IBM is huge, but I think they'd be very hard pressed to get the Cell to push x86 out of the way. It's not a matter of if IBM has the funds or not to keep going with promotion, its a matter of if the public is going to jump on it. Getting the necessary software and driver support is huge, let alone the OS.
Secondly, at this point, IBM isn't making any indication that Cell will be targeted at the desktop at all. With an near $19,000 asking price for the base model of a cell processor, it seems like you'd be lucky to find a Cell desktop under 10k.
 
yes very true, i didn't think about it not being and x86 derivative. I think the price would fall though, maybe somethine around 4 or 5k then it would be more in the range of an apple machine, which people obviously buy. Anyways just my thoughts.
 
Wow, you'd think if they can build a $500 console with the Cell they'd at least plan to make a X86 compatable version sometime in the furture for a similar price
 
It's not that simple. Changing it to an x86 design would change the CPU itself. If I remember correctly, the Cell design is a new architecture. If not that, it's much closer to the PowerPC (what Macs used to run). Additionally, Sony is buying in bulk, not to mention taking a loss on the sales anyway. IBM has made no indication that they're even considering the desktop market, and I'm sure they have good reasons.
 
I can definatley under stand that but the PS3 costs $500 because of the combined total of the blueray drive, processor, gpu and additional electronics and connectivity features. It's probably doesn't cost much more than $250 for the Cell alone. I realize it's would require a lot of work and time to create a X86 compatable version but there's a massive difference between $250ish and $1900. Seems a bit inflated.
 
They're also referring to blade servers, which are designed to combine as much processing power into a small case. You'd have, say, 10 blades, in a rackmount case, and each may have 2 CPU's. As we've seen with laptops and other small computers, a smaller size does ask extra.
3rd, the current target for these blade servers is a limited market "...good for high-performance computing tasks such as seismic research, encryption, digital image rendering and military surveillance..."
That also will add to the cost.
4th; I don't believe that IBM has a competitor for the Cell, so, basically, they can wheel and deal how they want.
5th; the article doesn't state the full specs of the blades, so depending on what the features are, that could also contribute to the cost.
 
Good points B, I guess I'm seeing what you're getting at now. But I still wish they could bring it down to the consumer level.
 
Intel sorta tried to make a change away from x86 with the Itainium, but that simply didn't pan out. It's a good design, but to move to that, you'd need to have an entire industry switch over. Pretty much every desktop is x86-based, despite that it's not the best architecture---so I've been told by the elite working uber geeks.
 
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