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PlayStation 3 HDD to Ship With Linux

Posted by Zonk on Fri Jun 10, 2005 10:34 AM
from the penguin-in-every-hard-drive dept.
Software Entertainment Games Linux
timtwobuck writes "Gamespot.com is reporting that Ken Kutaragi, president of Sony Computer Entertainment, has disclosed in an interview that PlayStation 3 will natively run Linux. In fact, it will come bundled with it, if you purchase the HDD peripheral." From the article: "But while Linux would require a hard drive to run on, Kutaragi told Impress PC Watch, 'We're not going to equip [the PS3 with] a HDD by default, because no matter how much [capacity] we put in it, it won't be enough.' It was unclear whether he was referring to the previously known fact that the PS3 would not have an internal hard drive or whether he was indicating that the device would not come with the external 2.5-inch detachable HDD outlined in the specs revealed at E3."
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[+] Linux and the Coming Consoles 73 comments
eldavojohn writes "Despite reports from the CEO that the PS3 will ship with Linux, LinuxDevices is now saying that it won't. Also, despite a rumor that the Wii will have Linux, the originator of the rumor has revealed himself to be a prankster. This won't stop you from putting Yellow Dog on the PS3 or running WiiLi, a live Linux CD for the Wii."
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  • Not suprising. (Score:4, Insightful)

    by mindaktiviti (630001) on Friday June 10 2005, @10:37AM (#12780227)
    This is not suprising. Of course they wouldn't ship it with Windows, they don't want to fund their direct competitor!
    • The money is made with the hardware (in PS3 case), not directly with the software...

      And unless they buy a copy from india (1$), I don't think they will change the price of the PS3 just to include Windows.

      • Re:Not suprising. (Score:4, Insightful)

        by mindaktiviti (630001) on Friday June 10 2005, @10:43AM (#12780296)
        Yes, but they wouldn't even buy it from India. They wouldn't even put it in if they got it for free, simply because Microsoft = XBox = competitor.
        • They also worked with Toshiba on the Cell processor. And in another camp, they're in direct competition with guess who? Yup, Toshiba in that whole Blu-Ray vs HD-DVD spectacle.

    • Re:Not suprising. (Score:5, Interesting)

      by Spy Hunter (317220) * on Friday June 10 2005, @10:47AM (#12780341) Journal
      What are you talking about? This is very surprising. It doesn't have to come with a PC OS at all. Listen to this quote: "It will become completely open if we equip it with Linux, and programmers will be able to do anything with it." This is a total about-face from the normal attitude console makers have, which is "we control the hardware, we control the software, and you can't do anything we don't like with it or we'll sue you."

      Of course, no matter what exact words are coming out of Kutaragi's mouth, I'm sure what he *really* means is closer to the second statement. But it's interesting that they are trying to position the PS3 as a real computer, not just a game console. If they really do equip it with Linux and provide dev tools, they won't be able to control the resulting flood of hacks, emulators, media center applications, indie games, and the like.

      • Re:Not suprising. (Score:5, Insightful)

        by Trigun (685027) <evil@evile[ ]re.ath.cx ['mpi' in gap]> on Friday June 10 2005, @11:15AM (#12780634)
        You mean they won't be able to contol the desire for everyone to have this machine, instead of buying their competitors product? They won't have to worry about people poking around their bios and reverse engineering it, because there would only be one reason to do that? They won't be able to handle the heaps of praise placed upon them from the open source community?

        Damn, this looks like a bad move on their part.
      • I was thinking how they could still retain enough control so that they still make butt loads of money.

        But the more I thought about it the more putting linux on the PS3 makes sense.
        • It costs them very little to develop a distro for the PS3
        • This gets them around the console tax in Europe(like they tried and failed to do with YaBasic on the PS2)
        • Big game programming companies will still need Sony's PS3 SDK for at least the first several years
        • Once non-Sony dev kits are good enough, they will be making mone
      • it is not surprising for anyone in the EU because "computers" and "toys" attract different import duties. Anyone who bought an original playstation 2 in the UK got a programming language with the console so that Sony could say that it was a computer and not a toy; i.e. it was user programmable. I don't think they got away with it in the end and the folks who got Linux to work on the PS2 have saved Sony a lot of effort to prove it is a computer,

        TFA alludes to this when Kutaragi says "...So even though we'

        • If this were the case, then the PS2 would have been subject to countless hacks

          The Linux on PS/2 had some serious limitations. It didn't run on the raw hardware, it ran on a bit of an abstraction layer, that enforced some limitations, like no DVD playing, as I understand it. I saw a presentation by the one of the guys who made the compute cluster out of PS2s [uiuc.edu] and he said that the access checks in that abstraction layer seriously slowed down certain operations.

          Making games for PS3 Linux will probably have

            • ... but I doubt 3rd party Linux aps are a short term goal or the reason for putting Linux on the HD ...

              I probably missed the point in a previous post you made, but what are your thoughts on why they decided to put Linux on the HD?

              While it is possible Sony has a developer that is working on an app that uses Linux based app they that want for the PS3;

              a scenario I find more plausable is Sony has some custom app they are developing and want to run it on Linux (no licensing fees to MS), and HDD is an easy w
  • If it's running linux, do you think that the open source nature will help with emulation programs? What about running other emulators on the PS3? Perhaps that was part of Sony's strategy. Hell, it might even run WINE fairly well.

    • Re:Open source? (Score:4, Insightful)

      by iapetus (24050) on Friday June 10 2005, @10:39AM (#12780244) Homepage
      No. WINE is not an emulator, Cell is not an x86 chip.
      • But it is possible QEMU could be ported, and Transitive almost certainly would be willing to work with sony on this.... their stuff has been used for PS2 games before along with Cedega.
        So wine could work using either of these options.

    • Re:Open source? (Score:4, Interesting)

      by LWATCDR (28044) on Friday June 10 2005, @10:45AM (#12780327) Homepage Journal
      Well you could not run JUST Wine. You would need Wine with a cpu emulator or a JIT compiler.
      The other issue will be the tool chain. Can you get a compiler for the Cell? Most emulators do not do a lot of FP so the Cells will probably not be used much for the lower end emulators.
      The compiler/tool chain is going to be critical. GCC for what I have seen is not very good at vectors. For a lot of Cell development a compiler the can generate vector code will be extermly useful if not vital. Maybe Intel and or IBM could help out GCC in that area?
    • It couldn't run wine nativly , but could it run Mac on linux
  • what's the state of linux bluetooth support (for bluetooth keyboard and mouse) ?

    • Re:Linux bluetoooth support ? (Score:4, Informative)

      by FauxPasIII (75900) on Friday June 10 2005, @10:41AM (#12780268)
      Stable but wonky interface, in my experience. You have to manually poke it to get it to attach to a
      new device, and at least on my belkin parts you have to manually switch crypto off and then back on.
      Oh, and anybody in the world can listen in on your keypress events, but that's not a Linux thing,
      that's an auto-selected 4 numeral PIN thing ;)
    • Very good, it works great with Ubuntu and Debian as long as you can deal with setting up some things by hand (ie: editing /etc/default/bluez-utils and some files in /etc/bluetooth/)

      You'll also need to setup HIDD and after the drivers and bluez-util init script has been ran just run "hidd --connect ".

      For bluetooth keyboards you'll need another keyboard around to type a pin in. then type the pin into your new bluetooth keyboard to pair it.

      It takes me about 5 minutes at worst these days to get a new blueto
    • Check out http://www.bluez.org/ [bluez.org]. I use an apple bluetooth keyboard with my debian system without any kernel patches and it runs overall pretty well (although there are a few glitches). By the time the PS3 comes out I have confidence that it will be completely smooth.

  • Not listening to anything re HDD (Score:5, Interesting)

    by Yoje (140707) on Friday June 10 2005, @10:39AM (#12780238)
    After the whole fiasco that Sony had with the NA release of HDD (delaying it by years, promising it would do things it never did, then abandoning it completely with the PS2 redesign after being on market less than a year), I'm not beliving anything Sony says about PS3, HDD specs or otherwise, until it is physically at the store available for purchase.

    Personally, I think it would be a mistake that they not include an HDD with the console, but considering the rumoured cost of the PS3, it is probably doubtful that it will include one at launch.
      • What's the point of a hard drive in a console? Put in CD. Play.

        And wait, because loading all of the code, maps, textures, etc. takes a long time. With a HDD, a game can cache this stuff, allow downloadable content and patches, etc.

        Lots of small, handheld devices use hard drives, why is it a stretch to make it a standard console component? It wouldn't need to have much capacity, and with a quick glance at pricewatch, it seems that 20GB 3.5" drives are less than $30, which is less than 10% of what the co

  • Any more middle-aged geeks out there... (Score:3, Funny)

    by pandrijeczko (588093) on Friday June 10 2005, @10:41AM (#12780267)
    ...fancy buying a PS3 and joining my "Emacs Exterminators" online editing clan?

    We're gonna *TAKE DOWN* those vi fanboys!

  • Seriously, why? It's not like the addition of Linux on the hard drive is going to garner any more sales of the product.

    Why not just let those people who really want to download Linux and run it on their PS3 (all, what, a couple of thousand maybe, if that?) to do that and spend your corporate time and effort into something else?

    Hell, I'm all for adoption of other operating systems, but I really can't work out what advantages this is going to give anyone - save for about 10 minutes of downloading and tra

    • Seriously, why? It's not like the addition of Linux on the hard drive is going to garner any more sales of the product.

      What makes you think that is true?

      To start with, some fringe people WILL buy the device if it supports Linux, that may otherwise have bought soemthing else.

      Now consider the whole XBox hacking scene with stuff like media player and the like. If in the next round the PS3 supports Linux with no hacks, then where are the people working on those projects going to go? Probably the PS3.

      Then
  • I have to go to work, so I'll keep this short;

    YES! OMG YES!!!! This is a dream come true. Thank you Sony. Thank you IBM. WTF is this in the Games section? This is big news for a sub set of geeks. This will be the largest installed base linux has, on interesting hardware.

  • Won't be enough? (Score:5, Insightful)

    by MBraynard (653724) on Friday June 10 2005, @10:43AM (#12780290) Journal
    'We're not going to equip [the PS3 with] a HDD by default, because no matter how much [capacity] we put in it, it won't be enough.'

    Nonesense. Never came close to filling up the 8gig on my Xbox, but every game I've played has made use of the HD because they KNOW it will be there.

    Of course, since the HD is optional with the PS3, devs will have to assume that it will not be there to reach a wider installed base. PS3 has just made developing for their system more difficult by releasing two products - ones with HDs and ones without.

    Even just a small 4gig drive might have been helpful and inexpensive.

    • Re:Won't be enough? (Score:5, Funny)

      by Johnny5000 (451029) on Friday June 10 2005, @10:51AM (#12780396) Homepage Journal
      We're not going to equip [the PS3 with] a HDD by default, because no matter how much [capacity] we put in it, it won't be enough.

      I think what he really meant to say was:

      We're not going to equip [the PS3 with] a HDD by default, because no matter how much [money we make on the PS3] it won't be enough [when we can make a bit more by milking extra money out of customers for a HDD]

      • Re:Won't be enough? (Score:4, Informative)

        by hollismb (817357) on Friday June 10 2005, @10:58AM (#12780467) Homepage
        Wrong. You're basing that off really old rumors that turned out not to be true. Microsoft is shipping all XBOX 360s with a 20 Gig HD, included in the box. It's removable to be upgradable and portable so you can take your data/saves/music with you to use on other XBOX 360s though.

  • Good strategy (Score:3, Insightful)

    by killtherat (177924) on Friday June 10 2005, @10:43AM (#12780305)
    It's a good marketing play. It just shifted my preference toward PS3 and away from Xbox360. The ability to use Linux on a system with some rather exotic symmetrical processors, and play all previous PS titles. Right now, all Xbox 360 has going for it is the promise of Halo 3.

  • obligitory.... (Score:3, Funny)

    by zxnos (813588) <zxnoss@gmail.com> on Friday June 10 2005, @10:45AM (#12780323)
    ...yes, but does it run windows?

    ;P

  • Windows or Mac on PS3! (Score:5, Insightful)

    by inkdesign (7389) on Friday June 10 2005, @10:46AM (#12780333)
    Other PC Operating Systems can run too, such as Windows and Tiger (Max OS X 10.4), if the publishers want [them] to do so. That happening seems so far-fetched to me that its very mention undermines the believability of anything else said in the article. That said, it is good to hear Sony will continue to support linux on PlayStation.

  • ps3 as pc? (Score:5, Insightful)

    by rawmule (744495) on Friday June 10 2005, @10:46AM (#12780335)
    This announcement makes me wonder if Sony is positioning ps3 as a general purpose pc replacement. If the HDD includes not only the kernel but a windowing environment(KDE, gnome, etc...), I could see more than a few people using ps3 as thier primary web/email/office box. Assuming that it has keyboard/mouse support, the ps3 has more than enough power to handle normal pc usage.

  • Huh? (Score:3, Interesting)

    by CaymanIslandCarpedie (868408) on Friday June 10 2005, @10:51AM (#12780387) Journal
    Can anyone understand what this guy is saying? It seems like everything he says he says the opposite like 2 seconds later!

    "We're not going to equip [the PS3 with] an HDD by default."

    "So in order to declare that the PS3 is a computer, I think we'll have [the PS3's HDD] preinstalled with Linux as a bonus."

    Basically he wants to have PS3 seen as a computer not just a game machine. OK, fine. He says to do this it will need as OS (Linux) to be installed on the HDD. OK, fine. But PS3 won't ship with a HDD. OK, .. but...I thought...WTF!

  • Optional Hard Drive? (Score:5, Insightful)

    by LordBodak (561365) * <msmoulton@@@iname...com> on Friday June 10 2005, @10:53AM (#12780417) Homepage Journal
    Terrible move by Sony. Developers ignored the PS2 hard drive because the installed base was so low, and I'm sure PS3 will be the same way.

    • I couldn't agree more. Besides the cost implications of having the HD come standard, I'm sure that Sony feels that the reception of the ps3 by the media and gamer community was so much greater than Xbox360 that they could safely take the hit in perception and still wind up a winner. An expensive gamble. I'd agree that ps3 probably has more buzz... but not THAT much more buzz.

      You can almost hear the sound of mass high-fiving coming from Redmond. Not only does do they have the HD advantage, but ther

  • MythTV (Score:5, Insightful)

    by Erwos (553607) on Friday June 10 2005, @11:15AM (#12780625)
    If this is true, and they write some reasonable accelerated X drivers, they've more or less sold me on the PS3. Why?

    One reason: MythTV frontend. It's hard to justify spending $350 on a console. Spending $350-$400 on a console that replaces a $250-$300 mini-ITX box... that's much easier to justify. You gotta figure that MythTV will be ported pretty fast to it, if the video and audio drivers are reasonable. I also rather like the idea of using MythGame to emulate other systems - really makes for an all-in-one entertainment system.

    X-BOX 360 was definitely a competitor for my cash and home media network, but I just can't bring myself to deal with MCE. For all its benefits (easy setup, well-supported), it has niggling annoyances (lack of friendly open formats, multiple tuner issues, proprietary extenders).

    -Erwos

  • This guy doesn't appear to know shit... (Score:3, Insightful)

    by jondt (870495) on Friday June 10 2005, @11:34AM (#12780863)
    KK: Linux is legacy, but it will be a start.
    Legacy? Riiight. No Linux fanboy here, but I know bullshit when I see it.

    In the case of the Cell, operation systems are applications.
    Wah?

    The kernel will be running on the Cell, and multiple OSes will be running on top of that as applications.
    Bah?

    Of course, the PS3 can run Linux. If Linux can run, so can Lindows.
    Comparing kernels to distros here. Despite the fact that the latter is built upon the former.

    Other PC Operating Systems can run too, such as Windows and Tiger (Max OS X 10.4), if the publishers want [them] to do so.
    But the odds of Microsoft or Apple doing so are zero. So why say it?

    I'm sure the guys clever. But he's not technical in the slightest.

  • The built in games? (Score:3, Funny)

    by saskboy (600063) on Friday June 10 2005, @12:08PM (#12781205) Homepage Journal
    Does this mean that the default games for the PS3 will include Tux Racer, and Penguin Hunt?

    • Re:Spelling please?: Kutaragi (Score:5, Informative)

      by Heian-794 (834234) on Friday June 10 2005, @10:49AM (#12780364) Homepage
      The fun-packed grammar and spelling nazi show can be followed by the Useless Japanese Trivia show:

      Ken Kutaragi -- in Japanese, v'½--Ç-Ø OE', is one of those lucky fellows with a four-character surname. You can go for years among Japanese people and never meet such a person; it's like having a European-language surname that starts with "X". There are even web sites devoted to listing up all the 4+ character surnames.

      And that was Useless Japanese Name Trivia for today!

      • Re:Spelling please?: Kutaragi (Score:5, Interesting)

        by kahei (466208) on Friday June 10 2005, @11:54AM (#12781071) Homepage

        I call your bluff -- ' v'½--Ç-Ø OE',' isn't a name at all! In other news, Slashdot (perhaps unsurprisingly) isn't very multilingual.

        However, I did once know a Japanese lady whose family name was 'kyuuraku' as in 'long-lasting pleasure'.

        I think it's one of those names awarded to artists and craftsmen way back when... they're getting pretty rare now.

        There's a list of 4-character names here:
        http://www.ipc.shizuoka.ac.jp/~jjksiro/4moji.html [shizuoka.ac.jp] ...but it doesn't have Katuragi, so there must be more.

    • Yeah, I'm sure all the applications written will be 100% safe, polished and complete. No chance of installing trojans, bots, malware etc... Great fucking idea until the most massive DDOS ever hits the country, all coming from comprimised linux/PS3 zombies.

      The irony will be tragic.

    • Re:PS2 Linux (Score:5, Interesting)

      by hazee (728152) on Friday June 10 2005, @11:26AM (#12780782)
      PS2 Linux was a disaster. First, it was ludicrously expensive - considering you were paying for a free OS. Then there was the whole fiasco about suitable displays - you could only play games on a TV, but only use Linux on a monitor (and one with a "Sync on green" facility too). And finally, they crippled access to all the interesting bits of the system too for good measure.

      If that was their idea of opening up the system, then I don't hold out much hope for Linux on PS3.
    • I think Nintendo will manage to stick around, because no matter what the kids want these days or will in the future, there's lots of non-kids with disposable income.

      I'm over my blood and gore phase, but I still like games. I'm guessing I'll be playing games for the rest of my life, and I'm interested in new and fun things. If Nintendo keeps producing good stuff, I'll keep buying it. And I think a good number of people will too.
          • Just the other day I was ship-watching at a really noisy location with my foul-mouthed friend in the Navy and I said "HEY, YOU *$&%, IS THAT A DESTROYER?" and he yelled back "NO, CARRIER! *#&$!"

            i'm so ashamed to have done that...

    • Re:Opening the door for game pirates? (Score:4, Insightful)

      by m50d (797211) on Friday June 10 2005, @12:25PM (#12781387) Homepage Journal
      On the serious side, this is probably what sony wants to avoid. A lot of people were devoted to hacking the current consoles to run linux on them - and incidentally opened it up for piracy along the way. If it runs linux from day 1 there will be less people working to crack it. Won't hurt the big piracy orgs, but could stop a few of the smaller ones.

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