Circa when the PS3 was announced, the Cell was a radical departure from anything on the market. The very first dual core processors in the world, the Athlon x2 and the Pentium D, were released in May , the same month that the PS3 was announced at E3. This allowed for a degree of flexibility when it came to, say, budgeting for a higher resolution texture. The SPEs Synergistic Processing Elements are what made Cell unique and, of course, what made it uniquely challenging for game developers to work with.
The SPEs were a set of 8 further streamlined processor cores, with limitations such as not feature cache and not having branch prediction. As a result, there was an emphasis on writing code optimized for high single-threaded performance.
This was great if you were rocking a Core 2 Duo or an Xbox , with its 3 3. Oftentimes, developers simply opted to make minimal use of the SPEs, offloading most of the processing load to the single PPE. One only needs to take a look at the visual jump from Uncharted 1 to The Last of Us. This was obviously problematic from a performance viewpoint. While multiplats generally fared poorly on PS3, first-party titles were another matter, offering better visual fidelity and scope than most exclusives on the Xbox A studio like Naughty Dog, with greater experience working with the harder and better accessibility to Sony itself were able to wring the most out of the SPEs over time.
Environmental effects look more detailed, higher resolution textures were now being accomodated anyone remembers this tree from Uncharted 2? In many ways, the optimization implemented during the later days of the PS3 CELL processor set the benchmark for future PS4 development framework and tools.
Then, Uncharted 3 we got way more efficient. The RSX. This chip also contains the ports used to broadcast raw audio signals to the TV. This is very similar to the architecture the original Xbox adopted back in the day. So, while it still remains an obscure piece of silicon, it does a superior job consolidating many interfaces and protocols, both external i.
USB, Ethernet, etc and internal i. Furthermore, the southbridge implements encryption algorithms to protect the communication between standard protocols in a seamless way, such as the Hard Drive data. Thanks to wide the adoption of Bluetooth technology, wired controls are now a thing of the past. This comes at the expense of the haptic feedback Rumble , however. A year later, Sony surprised players with the Dualshock 3 , which restored the haptic motor. Having mentioned the PS2 chips, I guess this is my cue to talk about backwards compatibility of the Playstation 3 once in for all.
In the case of game saves, initially, users had to acquire a memory card adaptor, but once a new software update landed, Memory Cards are now emulated as disk images stored in the hard disk, while Magic Gate the encryption system is handled seamlessly by one SPU.
All in all, thanks to this setup, the PS3 runs PS2 games at an impressive compatibility rate. On top of all, you can take advantage of new features that come with the new console wireless control, HDMI interface, lack of memory cards. Throughout the lifecycle of the PS3, Sony slowly trimmed PS2-only chips from the PS3 motherboard to the point backwards compatibility was solely software-emulated with greater limitations, such as only running PS2 games purchased from their online store.
Because Sony never replaced the PS2 chipset like it previously did with the PS1 hardware inside the PS2 , it makes you wonder about the technical and executive rationale behind this. Personally, I believe pure software emulation is the most feasible option in the long term due to its scalability, customisation, and independence from proprietary hardware.
But of course, this takes more effort to implement accurately, as the ongoing development of PCSX2 by a volunteer-driven community demonstrates please note the latter emulator only runs on x86 PCs, however. We are not over talking about compatibility just yet! It may surprise you that Sony also allowed users to run a subset of Playstation Portable games as well. Though emulation was carried out completely with software, just like the PS2 compatibility in later models.
Now that home consoles have become powerful multimedia hubs, a more convoluted operating system will be needed to provide users with more services and games with a thicker layer of abstraction. All of these, while keeping security and performance up to the task. Before we dive into details, I need to mention the different modes of operation in Cell.
Furthermore, its modes also affect the design of any operating system running within Cell - not just the one Sony developed for this console. In other words, Cell executes programs in two modes:. This can be activated after uploading a program to any SPE and ensures that the processor is not tampered with while the sensible code i.
As I said before, the OS is quite complex. To recall the previous article, the OS is made of multiple modules. Some modules have more privilege access than others kernel module vs.
The operating system, throughout its lifecycle, will call upon many modules, some of them will have more privilege than others. With all being said, where is all this data stored? From the general user perspective, there are only two visible mediums: Blu-ray discs for games and a Hard Disk for saves.
Well, there are a few more, so we are now going to take a look at every one of them! IBM provides this space is to save any company not just Sony from having to manually implement obfuscation methods to protect their boot code, as off-the-shelf components are not always prepared for bespoken needs.
Well, here is where most of the operating system resides. As a consequence, some files had to be moved elsewhere. This includes:. The debuting 2. As a consequence, whenever the user swaps out the hard drive, the console asks for an update file to re-install GameOS into the disk. Certain user data can be backed up using a USB stick and then moved to another console if needed, though this process re-formats the newer console before copying the old data. The first two options follow the file system layout implemented in NOR models, while the third one stores everything in the eMMC including user data and follows the NAND layout to store system files.
I assume this is just a trick to save costs, as it recycles the same Southbridge from the other variants. As a consequence, the user can fully utilise the hard drive, though the empty space in eMMC is now left to waste.
Note that this process only drastically changed once after hackers cracked it. The PPU, having loaded vsh , grants the user control through a graphical user interface, which manifests itself with an iconic orchestral splash sound followed by the XMB menu. Thus, Sony retaliated by issuing security updates in their hardware and software.
Are you getting tired from all this theory? Let me switch to something everyone can actually see: The Visual Shell. Many of them related to multimedia i. Additionally, since this is a home console that might be shared by multiple members, XMB supports multiple users , where each one may use a different Playstation Network account and store separate user data purchased games and saves. Finally, the inclusion of a hard drive is a relief for the veterans that in the past were obliged to buy expensive proprietary storage Memory Stick Pro Duo whenever they ran out of space.
Impressively enough, not every app bundled with this console had self-interest goals. With the advent of distributed computing and the capabilities of Cell for data science projects, Stanford University joined hands with Sony to enable Playstation 3 owners to contribute to medical research. Folding home was an application installed in every Playstation 3 that, once opened by the user, connected to a central server and ran protein simulations.
Moreover, the app was also allowed to run in the background during off-peak times. In the end, Folding home and Sony retired the app in and the former lives on on other platforms. This is my personal opinion, but I enjoy reading about projects that make global contributions using the capabilities of distributed computing, as opposed to the never-ending sensational articles wining about cryptocurrency mining.
Thus, Sony took this idea forward and added an option in XMB to install a secondary operating system [61]. So, the user just need to fill the new partition with an OS.
Consequently, many Linux distributions i. Ubuntu and Fedora added the PS3 as another possible target to install it on.
You may consider this a spiritual successor to Linux for PS2. Consequently, resulting Linux distribution resort to software rendering all graphics are drawn by Cell and then stream the frame-buffer to the RSX for display. Sharing the same fate of Folding home, OtherOS was eventually removed in a subsequent update, but due to different causes mainly related to security.
Shortly afterwards, OtherOS was unofficially restored thanks to software exploits and reverse engineering efforts. At the moment, OtherOS is available if the user installs a custom firmware.
Rebe publishes his progress on his Youtube channel and relies on voluntary donations to continue his work [66]. PUP files which packages all the new OS binaries.
As this console amalgamates technology from various companies, including products already commercialised in other markets i. Finally, it bundled a fork of Eclipse IDE. Now, what about Sony? Well, similarly to their PSP SDK , they shipped hardware devkits many variants with different sizes and enhancements and a software package made of compilers, libraries and debuggers that used Visual Studio and later as an IDE [68]. In the end, it was a fun experiment that helped me learn more about the development environment.
Instead of spending time and money developing a game from the ground up, why not buy the codebase of other companies and build the game on top of that? This is what game studios like Epic Games envisioned [71]. Apart from selling popular game titles such as Unreal Tournament 3 , the studio licensed a stripped-down version without the assets to other developers.
In a nutshell, game engines take care of all the fundamental areas physics, lighting, etc so developers only have to add their custom content scripts, textures, models, sounds, etc. Game engine licensing is not a new business model, but due to the challenging environment of the PS3, they eventually became another attractive option for development. So, here I describe the official distribution mechanisms available for PS3 games. For this new console, the Blu-Ray disc was chosen.
The Blu-ray, as the name indicates, is a new optical disc format that delivered higher storage density thanks to the use of blue light diodes [73] , as opposed to red diodes used with DVDs. Since blue light has a shorter wavelength than red light, more information pits and lands can be squashed together in the same space [74].
The Blu-ray data format responds to many needs by different industries: high definition film, digital rights management DRM , region locking, a new file system and even a runtime environment for Java programs [75].
In the case of the video-game industry, retail games for Playstation 3 were distributed in 25 GB or 50 GB Blu-ray discs with copy protection. These are read by a 2x drive reaching speeds of up to 8. While launch titles execute from the disc, later games copied part of their assets to the Hard Drive to increase reading speeds.
Nevertheless, the game disc is always needed to kickstart the game. These are also downloaded and installed in the same way, but use the bundled emulators to work. In fact, PS2 classics invoke the same unaccelerated software emulator independently whether the PS3 models contain the PS2 chipset [79]! I guess this is the closing chapter for hardware-based emulation in the PS3.
Through its lifecycle, its user interface has been revamped a few times to reflect what I suppose was a global demand for more fancy user interfaces. Playstation Network enabled users to create a personal account and assign an avatar, then use that new digital persona to do multiplayer gaming, message and other social interactions.
Users can also earn trophies if they complete a certain event in a game, and these then show up in the online profile as in some form of medal of honour to intimidate rivals and gain the respect of friends, I think. Last but not least, just like having an updatable operating system, games are updated too. Updates install in the hard drive and work similarly to a layered file system. If you want to know an overview of how Sony carried out that, you are in for a treat.
In , after three quiet years in the hacking scene, the community took a turn for the best. George Hotz, a hacker known for previously unlocking the first iPhone model a. He then published his exploit along with a short summary in his blog [86]. The attack works by breaking the integrity of such table to be able to write over it, and then use that privilege to modify the entries to grant the current program access to every corner in memory.
Hotz exploit then proceeds to request more blocks so the Hypervisor extends its table with more entries, and the process continues until an entry of the hash table overlaps the memory location of the block that was supposed to deallocate.
Since the hash table kept the old entry granting the user access to that address, the hypervisor ends up giving the user access to modify a hash table entry! Thus, the exploit amends the entry to extend access to all memory space. While this exploit required a Linux-running-under-OtherOS environment, it was a huge step towards further reverse-engineering and research projects, since hackers were now able to investigate critical areas of the system that were originally unaccessible.
You would think that this would deter hackers from continuing their work, but it just gave them more reasons to speed it up. All of this at the dismay of Sony, who will soon take the legal route to block sales of that product.
The user would then have to press the power button and shortly after, the eject button. Behind the scenes, this dongle carries out a huge amount of work, which can be divided into two groups [88] :.
This product was subsequently reversed-engineered by other communities and shortly after, open-source clones appeared i. PS Groove which removed many restrictions for instance, users could now unplug the device after the exploit finishes. Some forks were even deployed on a Texas Instruments calculator [90].
In any case, Sony acted quickly with software update 3. Before I finally talk about the grand prize of the PS3 homebrew scene, let me describe to you a couple of methods that were developed around the same time:. Just like the PSP saga, the initial exploits required a lot of effort and could be easily patched by Sony, thereby resulting in a disadvantageous cat-and-mouse game.
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