CES 2006 - Day 3: Playstation 3, Quarter-size Hard Drives, SED and lots of TVs
by Anand Lal Shimpi & Manveer Wasson on January 9, 2006 1:25 AM EST- Posted in
- Trade Shows
Playstation 3 at CES
The closest you could get to a Playstation 3 at CES was behind a revolving glass case that showed off the unit in all three colors (silver, white and black).
The design doesn't seem to have changed at all since we first saw it back at E3.
It's not too surprising to see that Sony now explicitly mentions that the controller is a conceptual design only, given the incredible amount of backlash its unveiling generated.
A video very similar to what was played at E3 was running nearby, but nothing in the video particularly caught our eye as something new.
The one demo that was new however was a Blu-ray demonstration using the PS3. The demo was of software decoded Blu-ray playback driven by the PS3's Cell processor. However the content was MPEG-2 encoded and not H.264, which means that the task of decoding is not nearly as CPU intensive as it could be. One thing we have been very curious about is how well the PS3's Cell processor will be able to handle full bitrate H.264 decoding. Without a doubt NVIDIA's RSX GPU will offload some of the decoding, however it remains to be seen if Cell is enough to decode a full 40Mbps Blu-ray stream without dropping frames.
To put things in perspective, NVIDIA told us that with their current H.264 decode acceleration coupled with the fastest CPUs today they can handle around a 25Mbps H.264 stream.
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Clauzii - Monday, January 9, 2006 - link
Also here - to me it actually looks at it started happening after the last WindowsUpdate I had (4days ago - WMF-Fix?)Also IE6+XP SP2
BladeVenom - Monday, January 9, 2006 - link
Screw Blue-ray discs, Sony can keep their DRM, and rootkits. I think I'll get Samsung's "Hyper DVD." Then I'll just wait till HD-DVD is cracked before I switch to a new format.GTMan - Monday, January 9, 2006 - link
There is a 0.85" drive with a nearly identically sized drive beside it that is 1.8". Number must be wrong. Also one is 4 GB and the other is 80 GB. Maybe that should have been 8 GB.Tanclearas - Monday, January 9, 2006 - link
Ok. What exactly is so great about the iPod interface? I have used it, and many other MP3 players, and fail to see how the iPod interface is so much better than most other players on the market. In fact, I have never understood why people believe the iPod is so different or so much better than a lot of its competitors. It wasn't the first, nor do I think it is "the best". I don't think I've seen any player that I could classify as "the best". Most seem to have all of the appropriate capabilities, with buttons/controls laid out in an effective way.The only thing I can say is that I have indeed used some players that had poor designs or build quality. In that regard, the iPod is better than some players out there, but is Apple building some sort of brand loyalty by secretly including some narcotic drug that gets delivered via the ear buds?
Questar - Monday, January 9, 2006 - link
Define "best".I define best as easiest to use, no manual reading required.
Tanclearas - Tuesday, January 10, 2006 - link
So buttons labelled with the standard icons for Play, Pause, Stop, Skip Forward, Skip Back, Rewind, Fast Forward, and a jog dial or D-Pad for menu navigation are too complicated for you? I've seen several designs like that. Others try to "copy" Apple's circular layout, and that is where many of the poor models that I mentioned fail. In some of those "copies", they use poor quality buttons, or the buttons are just too small.Come to think of it, Apple's touch-sensitive circle is more annoying than helpful.
AnnihilatorX - Monday, January 9, 2006 - link
SED, LED LCD, OLED, PlasmaNot mentioning glassesless 3D displays. Too much is going on
Typo in Last bit:
"some piece of mind to those still holding on to their older analog sets."
piece -> peace
Aquila76 - Monday, January 9, 2006 - link
Rmember when buying a TV was solely size based?'I'd like a 32" TV please.'
'OK, here are some by Samsung, Toshiba, etc.'
Now it's like trying to choose regular, free-range, organic, etc. at the grocery.
I JUST WANT TV AND STEAK PEOPLE!!!!
oneils - Thursday, January 12, 2006 - link
Lol! Since I'm the youngest guy in the office, I inevitably get asked all sorts of techie questions. One of my colleagues asked for advice on purchasing an HDTV. I looked at cnet.com's guide to HDTV and was blown away. Where have a I been these past two-three years? I had no idea how many options there were: plasma; edtv; lcd; crt rear projection; lcd rear projection...and probably a couple I am missing.I had no idea what to tell him, other than to stick to major brands (sony, samsung, panasonic etc...). I no my way around computers (I build my own rigs), but I only have a 36" CRT SDTV and was completely lost when I ventured into HDTV territory.
Aquila76 - Monday, January 9, 2006 - link
Anybody able to use the forums today? I was able to log in, but when I try to go to any forums I've commented in, I get this (both Firefox and IE):Server Error in '/' Application.
Column 'vchlicensekey' does not belong to table qGetLicenses.
Description: An unhandled exception occurred during the execution of the current web request. Please review the stack trace for more information about the error and where it originated in the code.
Exception Details: System.ArgumentException: Column 'vchlicensekey' does not belong to table qGetLicenses.
Source Error:
An unhandled exception was generated during the execution of the current web request. Information regarding the origin and location of the exception can be identified using the exception stack trace below.
Stack Trace:
[ArgumentException: Column 'vchlicensekey' does not belong to table qGetLicenses.]
System.Data.DataRow.get_Item(String columnName) +121
FuseTalk.API.InitialiseKeys() +324
FuseTalk.API..ctor(String c) +237
FuseTalkNet.Forum.Page_Load(Object sender, EventArgs e) +351
System.EventHandler.Invoke(Object sender, EventArgs e) +0
System.Web.UI.Control.OnLoad(EventArgs e) +67
System.Web.UI.Control.LoadRecursive() +35
System.Web.UI.Page.ProcessRequestMain() +750
Version Information: Microsoft .NET Framework Version:1.1.4322.2032; ASP.NET Version:1.1.4322.2032