Emulation Arrives On the PS3 169
YokimaSun writes "Following the recent exploit that allows you to jailbreak your PS3, the homebrew community have now breached the console with the first homebrew game, which is the classic Pong. Also released is the first emulator for the system in the shape of a SNES Emulator great for those 16-bit games. Finally drk||Raziel, the coder of the Dreamcast Emulator NullDC, has posted screenshots of his Dreamcast emulator working on the PS3 (albeit at a very early stage). The PS3 is building up to be the Dream Console for emulation."
Well, is this a good thing? (Score:5, Funny)
Re:Well, is this a good thing? (Score:5, Informative)
Nope, I'm sure Sony's upper management is thrilled to see that homebrew is being created using their leaked SDK. This guarantees that PS3 homebrew is and always will be illegal, and therefore can never be legitimate in the grand scheme of things. Sony will be free to legally threaten any homebrew communities.
People, this is the wrong way to go. It will just end up like the Xbox1, whose homebrew scene was underground (except for linux-based stuff). Not a good plan. Instant satisfaction (using Sony's leaked tools instead of writing your own) only works in the short term. This can be fixed, but only if people care instead of going for the quick and dirty way.
We already have a perfectly good port of Linux to the PS3, capable of replacing lv2 while gaining RSX/3D funcionality thanks to the new exploits. How about we concentrate on getting that to work instead of illegally using Sony's OS and tools?
Plus, nobody really knows how Sony's software ecosystem works yet. For all we know, at one point, all users who have ever installed a homebrew pkg (even if they update later) will have their consoles permanently banned from PSN.
Re:Well, is this a good thing? (Score:5, Insightful)
PSN is already a moot point.
Sony mooted themselves when they decided to remove the other OS feature. I did not apply that nor I will never apply another update from them to my PS3. As you can imagine, that also means I won't be buying any more new games for it either.
Good Job Sony!
Bottom line, MY HARDWARE, I paid for it. Deal.
When the day comes that I can use all the hardware without it, I will HAPPILY remove all traces of the sony OS from my machine. With the way things are going it won't be too much longer.
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"This guarantees that PS3 homebrew is and always will be illegal,"
It does no such thing!
It guarantees that current homebrew is illegal, sure. But it in no way precludes the developing of a real free SDK in the future.
"We already have a perfectly good port of Linux to the PS3, capable of replacing lv2 while gaining RSX/3D funcionality thanks to the new exploits"
Errr, well, it's not capable of replacing anything at present, unless you've heard some stuff in the last couple of days that I missed, because AFAIC
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In practice and in my experience, it does. Examples: On the Xbox1, after the ripped SDK became the defacto homebrew platform, OpenXDK never took off. On the Wii, after libogc became the defacto homebrew platform (while its author hid the fact that most of it was decompiled from the Nintendo SDK, which came to light when it was too late), nobody cared to make a legal replacement.
Once people become accustomed to using inherently illegal but convenient software, it is extremely hard to ga
Re:Well, is this a good thing? (Score:4, Interesting)
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"We already have a perfectly good port of Linux to the PS3, capable of replacing lv2 while gaining RSX/3D funcionality thanks to the new exploits."
Nope, RSX is still locked. We need Ring1 or Ring0 access to get there, and half of the commands haven't even been figured out.
There's only so much a direct trace signal replication can do when you don't understand the fine details of the underlying protection system.
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Of course RSX is unlocked, otherwise games wouldn't be able to access it. I'm not proposing reenabling the old locked-down OtherOS support, but rather simply replacing lv2 with Linux. The underlying hypvervisor API is the same. There are few differences between OtherOS and GameOS other than what you're running as lv2 (Linux or GameOS) and what lv1 will let you do (RSX and flash and the like, or not).
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People, this is the wrong way to go. It will just end up like the Xbox1, whose homebrew scene was underground (except for linux-based stuff). Not a good plan.
It worked out GREAT on Xbox. Nobody ever got in trouble for using the SDK and yet XPort and Team XBMC were able to release a significant volume of software and keep it updated. I do think Sony is more assholish than Microsoft Entertainment, though; they might actually stoop to suing their customers. They know there's plenty of Sony fanboys out there to take their place in line to buy a PSn.
Plus, nobody really knows how Sony's software ecosystem works yet. For all we know, at one point, all users who have ever installed a homebrew pkg (even if they update later) will have their consoles permanently banned from PSN.
Early adopters will suffer. Those of us who will only buy a PS3 when they are outdated rejoice. I won't care if the con
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Early adopters will suffer. Those of us who will only buy a PS3 when they are outdated rejoice.
In this case, I expect it to go in the other direction. By the time the device is obsolete, anyone who wasn't an early(or earlier, at least) adopter is stuck on the used market that doesn't come with all the holes for homebrew closed up and system crippled. They did the same thing to the PSP.
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http://www.ps3-hacks.com/2010/09/08/open-source-ps3-tool-chain-released/ [ps3-hacks.com]
So, what was that about PS3 homebrew always being illegal because it uses Sony's leaked SDK? Or are you saying that because some of it does, especially right now because there's not a *mature* tool chain yet, that any future homebrew created without using Sony's SDK will somehow also be using Sony's SDK even though it isn't?
Re:Well, is this a good thing? (Score:5, Informative)
They didn't take anything out, they just disabled it. lv1 is the same under GameOS and OtherOS, except with less limitations. Theoretically, you can use the psjailbreak exploit to make a Linux bootloader that replaces lv2, and enjoy the old OtherOS Linux with little to no modifications, plus the capability to use the RSX.
We're working on it.
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They can only ban you if you perform persistent modifications or connect while using invasive temporary modifications. Right now, hypothetically loading Linux from the PSJailbreak exploit will not make any permanent changes and should not affect your chances of being banned on PSN in the future (if you choose to update, or if you perform some other hack to avoid the update, assuming said hack is not detectable). Meanwhile, installing custom pkgs is basically guaranteed to make Sony notice you.
Better be safe
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Of course they are. There is no open SDK available for the GameOS APIs, nor is there likely to be one for quite a while, if at all. And as far as I know there is no .pkg file packer yet either.
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As far as I'm aware, no one was threatened, other than those actually sending Xbox SDKs.
Developers, developers, developers, Developers!
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Yup, similarly to the DS homebrew scene. IIRC the libdns homebrew library had parts which were ripped of the original nintendo SDK... of course people just turned a blind eye on that
It's a subject of some debate. The Xbox homebrew scene, as I understand it, used files directly copied from a leaked Xbox SDK. libnds uses some code that is more or less directly translated from disassembled DS SDK code (though you can get most of the same code from dumped games anyway); some feel that this is morally / legally equivalent to just copying the files.
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The thing is that this _is_ a great demonstration of the PS3's versatility or more specifically a hacked PS3's versatility. Just a few months ago, we would have all shrugged this off as something that they could have done under Linux far more easily, but now, it is enough to really pique one's interest. Linux on PS3 was really a great idea, give the people a fair slice of the freeom they want without exposing the platform to piracy. I think it contributed to the PS3's unhacked status for so long, since in g
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I am absolutely certain that Sony's upper management is absolutely thrilled at yet another demonstration of their brainchild's incredible versatility.
Sony's product-level managers, maybe, but Sony's UPPER management? I'd be willing to bet many of them don't even know what a PS3 is.
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if the system wasn't setup to make money from games but from the console, I'd agree with you.
I wasn't actually being serious.
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Screwmaster: "I wasn't actually being serious."
We could tell by your handle.
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I wasn't actually being serious.
Should have used <sarcasm> tags for those that need them.
I suppose. I'm rarely accused of being too subtle, however,
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I never would have guessed that from your username :-)
Although if you work in the metal fastener business, I apologize for the joke.
Ha ... I get that a lot, and yes I was, so don't worry about it.
Re:Well, is this a good thing? (Score:4, Informative)
You were being sarcastic, but actually they should be.
And similarly, the RIAA and the record labels should have been thrilled when Napster went online, and positively orgasmic when Justin Frankel released Gnutella. But they weren't, and for the same reason: they are all control freaks, and it doesn't matter if easing up a little might actually make more money. Control comes first.
Sweet. Maybe we can get PS2 emulation next... (Score:2)
Sony, in their infinite wisdom, didn't create PS3's that can read PS2 game discs.
Wouldn't it be funny if, in order to play your favorite PS2 games on your PS3, you have to first rip your PS2 disks?
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Wouldn't it be funny if, in order to play your favorite PS2 games on your PS3, you have to first rip your PS2 disks?
I'd call it "poetic justice."
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"Sony, in their infinite wisdom, didn't create PS3's that can read PS2 game discs." Well they did for a short time, until they realized that people actually liked being able to play their old games and new ones on the same system. Then they stopped making them capable with PS2 games.
One reason I don't like Sony (one of many.) Unfortunately, Nintendo and Microsoft are also on my shit list, which makes it hard to make a decision.
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The first generation played PS2 disks perfectly, the second quite well and subsequent generations not at all. Though honestly, since there are now some very good PS3 titles at cheap prices, it becomes less and less relevant, this is Sony's thinking also I believe.
I have a backwards compatible PS3 and I think I last put a PS2 disk in there maybe two years ago, the scope of the current generation just allows for so much more in a game and my sense of nostalgia is not strong enough to persuade me to turn back
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Meh. I can't play the modern games, because the 3D moving thing gives me a headache. But I love retro games like Robotron, Joust, Centipede, etc. No, I wouldn't buy a console just for those, but I bought my daughter a PS3 and I'd like to be able to play all those arcade classics they've released over the years for the PS1 and PS2. My daughter has Ass
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What's interesting about the first generation models as well is that they actually have a full PS2 inside them. When the wireless DualShock controllers came out originally, I got one from Japan 6 months early and the rumble feature worked with every PS2 game. The first gen also works with USB to PS2 adaptors(Guitar Hero and so on). The original two machines also as a result can play PS1 games. The latter software emulation PS2 models work 50% for PS1 and 75% for PS2.
It's a shame that they don't support
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It's a shame that they don't support it any more, because PS2 titles are plentiful and cheap. And often better than the PS3 in game-play.
It's a shame, perhaps, but good for business. People have "x" minutes per unit time to spend playing games, and they'd rather you be playing a current release so you can get tired of it and buy the next big thing.
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Sony, in their infinite wisdom, didn't create PS3's that can read PS2 game discs.
My PS3 reads and plays PS2 games quite well, actually: 60 GB PS3 [newegg.com]
The original 20 GB units would play PS2 games also.
Could be tricky (Score:4, Informative)
The PS2 is a bitch to emulate because its processor and video processor are so strange. It doesn't even work all that great on high end modern PCs. Emulation incurs heavy overhead anyhow, but the more different the platforms, the harder it is. That's why PC on PC virtualization is so fast. You literally "virtualize" as in run most things natively, so you achieve high speeds.
Now maybe the Cell happens to be well designed for emulation the EE and VUs, but I kinda doubt it. If it were easy to do, I'd have thought Sony would do it to increase compatibility and keep people happy. Also the Cell's power seems to be in parallel processing and that is something that emulation doesn't do much of. I don't know that it couldn't, but it doesn't. Emulators are largely single thread, with maybe a second thread for some video rendering. PCSX2, the PS2 emulator, does use two threads well but that is it. Generally speaking, emulation coding seems to lag behind regular coding. Emulator authors seem to be good at emulation but not so good at current coding practices.
So my guess is probably not. It is just too powerful, and too odd, of a system to emulate on the PS3. You need a heavier hitting processor to do it, something like an i7.
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They already do (Score:5, Informative)
Go look at PCSX2. All the video processing is done by your GPU, and thus you do get things like better resolution than the PS2 and so on. They make extensive use of HEL tricks, dynamic recompilation and so on. However for all that it is still slow. Also please remember the more tricks, the more problems. UltraHLE was neat but ran all of about 8 games.
There was also a big advantage emulating the processor: It was a very simple design. At its heart, it was just a MIPS R4300i. A well documented processor, with a simple instruction set. Also, few games made use of its 64-bit capabilities so pretending it wasn't was not a big deal for emulators.
The Emotion Engine? Much stranger. MIPS based, but all sorts of additional instructions, many not well documented by Sony. Heavily uses 64-bit (integer and floating point) and has 128-bit FP capability too. In particular the real problem happens with the VU0 and VU1 units, which are 128-bit vector units. The sort of stuff they do would normally be on the GPU in a computer, but it is on the CPU in the PS2.
At any rate, it is a difficult system to emulate, at least for the people trying to do so. If you think you could do a better job, it would be wonderful if you took a swing at it. I do get the feeling from what I've seen that many of the emulation programs aren't the best and brightest at programming overall, they just like emulation.
However as it stands, the very best PS2 emulator out there requires a heavy hitting system to make possible. You need a good CPU, good video card, and even then it can be slow and buggy.
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"The PS2 is a bitch to emulate because its processor and video processor are so strange"
Not really. Emotion was pretty easy to figure out.
"It doesn't even work all that great on high end modern PCs"
That's because PCSX2 only runs on 2 cores maximum and is a CPU-heavy piece of software as you state later on. That will change as support for more threads and more cores is put in.
"Emulator authors seem to be good at emulation but not so good at current coding practices."
For speed, most of those coding practices
Re:Could be tricky (Score:5, Informative)
Not really. Emotion was pretty easy to figure out.
You missed the point. Figuring it out isn't the problem, it's how different the hardware is from the native platform. The more different, the more complex it is to emulate and the slower it will be.
For example, the PS2 doesn't conform to the IEEE-754 standard for floating point like a PC does. Which means every single FP operation must be dealt with to handle these differences or compatability will be broken. Guess what type of operation is most common in a videogame? Suddenly a trivial op is now a major performance problem.
That's just the tip of the iceberg as far as emulation goes. It's never as simple as you think.
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Ummm, in case you haven't noticed, emulation incurs overhead. So quoting Gflops doesn't matter. Also, you are quoting marketing numbers, which means you have little understanding of how things are actually processed in the system. GPUs these days throw down a lot of calculation power, doesn't mean you can use all of it for any task.
However, if it is "just the programmer," then I'd invite you to step up. Personally, I'd love to see better new system emulators. I'm not a programmer myself, I just enjoy playin
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Sony, in their infinite wisdom, didn't create PS3's that can read PS2 game discs.
Sony decided that full or partial hardware support for PS2 games was inflating the cost and complexity of the PS3.
The PS2 "Slim" - which also ditched the "OtherOS" and full PS2 compatibility - is still in production and still available from American outlets like Amazon.com for around $100.
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Re:Sweet. Maybe we can get PS2 emulation next... (Score:4, Informative)
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CECHA, CECHB, CECHC and CECHE models all have PS2 emulation, and even in the CECHE the emulation is partly hardware based. They were still selling CECHE's in summer of 2008. my CECHE has played every PS2 game I've put in it, and the number of games that have had problems on it is small.
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I don't know what all this Ceche crap is, but my full size PS3 can't even read a PS2 disc, which is a load of crap.
If I'd known that before I bought it, I wouldn't have shelled out $300. PS3's are getting to be more and more of a rip off as time goes on. It's ridiculous and indefensible.
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You did know that the different models of PS3's have different capabilites/hardware and are identified by their model numbers? A la CECHA, CECHEB, and so forth?
For example, mine is a CECHE01 MGS4 model, which means: North American Deluxe model PS3 (with the chrome trim), built in card reader, 4 USB ports, backwards compatible with PS2 games using a combination hardware and software solution, SACD support, built in wifi, bundled with Dual Shock 3 and Metal Gear Solid 4, released on June 12 of 2008.
http://en [wikipedia.org]
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The original, japanese run had the full set of PS2 hardware built-in, and didn't so much emulate as switch systems. Then came a nice series for US and EU, that has software emulation. That emulation is not perfect, but pretty good; and we still play ps2 games from time to time.
Only about the time the slims were starting to get mentioned, iirc, did the PS2 emulation also vanish. Do your homework and have a look on eb
Can't wait for Wii emulation (Score:2)
Can't wait to see Wii emulation.
With the PS3 power + Bluetooth support you could end up replacing the wii completely while still maintaining compatibility with wiimotes and accessories.... and with HD support!!
I'd sell my wii to get a PS3 if that was the case, but I know it will take ages until a wii emu is in such a usable state.
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I'd sell my wii to get a PS3 if that was the case, but I know it will take ages until a wii emu is in such a usable state
A "wiimu"?
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I don't know if you mean a "wiimu" wii emulator or "wiimu" the already existing software, which isn't a wii emu but just a Wii System Menu replacement.
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I don't know if you mean a "wiimu" wii emulator or "wiimu" the already existing software, which isn't a wii emu but just a Wii System Menu replacement.
Don't worry about it, I have absolutely no idea what I'm talking about, just stuck two words together because it sounded funny.
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Wii emulation
You can do Wii emulation on a high end PC. I gave Mega Man 9 a whirl just for shits and giggles, but other games supposedly work too.
Problem is, of course, that the playstation isn't a high end PC. A direct port of that emulator will run dog slow, a lot like SNES emulation on the GBA I suspect. MS got Xbox games working on the 360, but likely only thanks to a crack team of coders.
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You can do Wii emulation on a high end PC.
I think you and I have different definitions of "high end". My Core i7 920 (complemented by 12GB of RAM and a 1GB GTX 285) can't handle emulating Metroid Prime at a playable framerate, not even with the processor overclocked to 4GHz. What do you mean by "high end"?
(I realize Metroid Prime is a Gamecube game, not a Wii game, but the two systems are pretty similar so I think my point stands nonetheless.)
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(I realize Metroid Prime is a Gamecube game, not a Wii game, but the two systems are pretty similar so I think my point stands nonetheless.)
I'm impressed it runs at all. It's amazing what a few hobbyists can put together*, though I still strongly doubt we'll see good Wii emulation on the PS3. It may be technically feasible, but it will be a large effort, you c
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You don't need 12Gigs and 4GHz for Wii emulation
Depends on what you're trying to emulate ;) For Metroid Prime, 4GHz apparently isn't enough... that or Dolphin isn't nearly efficient as it could be.
At any rate, it is certainly impressive what they've managed to do.
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I've never played Metriod or any emulated Wii game except a little Mega Man 9. Mega Man ran just fine by the way, not as fun as on the Game Boy versions though, and nowhere near as taxing to emulate as Metroid.
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I'll be happy when someone releases a one-click make-Wiimotes-work-on-your-PC installer.
It works now, but it's a pain in the ass and requires all kinds of voodoo magic to make it work. I have to use BlueSoleil to get it going, because my native Win7 BT stack will connect and work fine but will suddenly drop the connection after 30 seconds or so. Sometimes opening a Wii emulator (that I don't even use for anything else) and having it read the Wiimote makes it work better. The lights seem to do something d
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"Can't wait to see Wii emulation."
Dolphin works just fine for the most part.
Dare I say it? (Score:3, Interesting)
I would think that the ability to run linux *again* might be of more interest here on /.
Having to crack a console to get functionality back sounds like a joke but I suspect few are laughing.
To get back to the topic at hand, given John Carmac's view of the PS3 architecture, it's likely that porting emulators for the more modern consoles (i.e., those that require 3D accelleration) may be a lot more trouble than it was for, say, the original Xbox.
John: I never liked the Cell architecture. You can get high peak numbers out of it, but software development time matters a lot, and not having caches and virtual memory makes development take a lot longer, especially for the majority of applications that don't fit neatly into the DMA pipeline model.
From http://www.tomshardware.com/news/ps3-playstation-3-linux-john-carmack,10035.html [tomshardware.com]
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I would think that the ability to run linux *again* might be of more interest here on /.
Ah yes, but ideally it should be configurable as a Beowulf Cluster, and be able to fit in a car.
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I would think that the ability to run linux *again* might be of more interest here on /.
Linux on the PS3 has become more symbol than reality - at a time when Linux seems increasingly marginalized: iOS tops Linux [netmarketshare.com]
Whatever Android and Chrome might become, their future lies with Google and not the geek.
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On the contrary, a lot of us are laughing.
But does it run Linux? (Score:2)
I know this will sound cliché
but does it run Linux?
(I'd genuinely like to know)
there's also been some rumors that it's been cracked / adapted for 3.42
but I'm not sure if it's fake based on the youtube clips I've seen so far
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AFAICT, yes, the 3.42 cracks on youtube are a fake. It would be a great thing if they were real, for me, as it would mean a crack may be possible in the upcoming 3.5 which adds 3d bluray support. At the moment my ps3 is unhacked but still on 3.41 pending a decision to be made about what I do with it.
And yes, linux is an interesting thing, there are many obstacles though.
1. this is a lvl2 (gameos) crack, which could be fixed in a variety of ways by Sony. Until lvl 0 (hypervisor) compromises are made then the
XBMC? (Score:2, Funny)
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I CAN HAS XBMC FOR THE PS3?
Your delivery was child like but the question is valid.
What I want most for PS3 is XBMC. I have a PS3, O!Play and an original XBOX.
XBox - w/ XBMC best return on investment ever. Getting long in the tooth as it won't play 1080p.
O!Play - GUI is pathetic and controls are terrible. Although it plays 1080p no problem and I haven't had a format problem yet.
PS3 - GUI is OK, BT remote is great and it supports most formats... but doesn't support CIFs. UPnP is the biggest waste of time IMO and the reason I ha
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That's a very good question indeed.
Personally, I *hate* the fact that neither the xbox or the PS3 can play MKVs. I don't know why I would want a HD-compatible media center without support for HD video formats.
(Yes, I know, for streaming the video from the PC media center to the console, but IMHO that's cheating since the console isn't decoding the video and you need to put two machines "to work" just to playback some vid -- I'd really like to play things "natively")
Great! But... (Score:2, Interesting)
Already blocked by a new firmware update [slashdot.org].
So we're still stuck with the choice of running either PS3 games or homebrew, but not both.
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Already blocked by a new firmware update [slashdot.org].
So we're still stuck with the choice of running either PS3 games or homebrew, but not both.
Likewise, PSP games require the latest firmware available at release time, and of course using the playstation network on a PSP always does. This poses no problem to those who run homebrew apps and the latest games on the same PSP as the newest firmware is invariably fixed by the community.
As the community's PS3 knowledge develops, we may see unfucked versions of the latest firmware so that games could be played online without any workarounds such as loaders.
Why would it be the dream console for emulation? (Score:4, Insightful)
There are already emulators for the 360, and have been for some time. The 360 also has the advantage of being a more computer-like architecture and thus taking less effort to make an efficient emu port.
However really, if emulation is your thing, a cheap media PC/netbook is the way to go. For anything that is, say, Playstation 1 or older, you need very little hardware to emulate it. Current PCs are plenty fast enough, even at the low end. Also, there are tons of emulators that are out and available and well developed. So to me, that seems to be the "dream system." If you have a media PC, just load up the emulators on it.
I don't see anything about the PS3 that makes it particularly suited to emulation as opposed to the 360.
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When a PS2 emulator is released... LOL@SONY! (Score:3, Informative)
A 100% software emulator to run PS2 software on the PS3 is entirely possible. The Xbox 1 is a much more powerful system than the PS2, and the Xbox 360 (which is inferior to the PS3) can emulate it perfectly, all in software. So it's only a matter of time before a PS2 emulator appears on the PS3.
The funny thing about this is Sony has recently patented a hardware PS2 addon for the PS3.. if/when the homebrew scene releases a PS2 emulator, Sony is going to look very stupid....and greedy to almost every PS3 owner in the world!
http://www.computerandvideogames.com/article.php?id=264597 [computeran...ogames.com]
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The Xbox emulation on the 360 is hardly perfect. It requires a different emulator profile per game and even then it only supports a few of the popular games [wikipedia.org]. In addition, the Xbox and the 360 are very much alike in terms of architecture than the PS2 and PS3. The more different they are the more resources you need to emulate correctly.
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A few of the popular games? It supports practically every single popular game ever made for the Xbox! I don't think anyone outside Japan (where the Xbox sold dismally) can list more than 5 popular Xbox titles that don't run on the 360. I looked through that list and couldn't find any at all that I played that aren't currently supported.
As for whether or not the machines are powerful enough, don't forget the PS3 is much more powerful than the 360 (though it lacks memory, but which still more than enough to e
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If it only emulates the popular games I'd hardly call that perfect emulation, which is what I was responding to.
The PS2 is anything but a basic machine. It has one of the weirdest architectures ever produced, weirder still that the PS3's. Also, the PS3 is not that more powerful than the 360. It's more powerful in certain aspects but less in others. For example it's very good at parallel problems but that won't help it much in this case because emulation is hard to parallelize. PCSX2 on PC uses only 2 thread
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"In addition, the Xbox and the 360 are very much alike in terms of architecture"
Original XBox: Intel P-3 Celeron @ 733MHz
360: 3.2 GHz PowerPC core and 3 SPE units.
Not even the same hardware arch, man.
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I don't know why you got modded informative because that's incorrect. The 360 doesn't have SPEs, just 3 hyper-threaded cores like you find on PC processors. The major difference is PPC vs x86.
Now compare that to the difference between the PS2 and PS3. The PS2 is a complex little beast [wikipedia.org] with half a dozen specialized processors with weird connections between them. Add to that the weirdness of the PS3's architecture and you'll see it takes a lot more to emulate the PS2 on the PS3 than the Xbox on the Xbox 360,
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Hardware performance is not a linear scale. The PS2 had a lot of domain-specific specialized processors that would all have to be emulated on an SPU. Specialized processors are always faster at a task they were designed for than comparable generic processors. This is not a trivial task, and even the Windows-based emulators have some severe performance issues (at least when I tried one of them a year ago).
Additionally, since the games were coded for a fixed platform, they are very likely to rely on specific
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Additionally, since the games were coded for a fixed platform, they are very likely to rely on specific timings (like DVD loading performance), which are very hard to emulate, even when you have enough performance to do so.
As time goes by this is less and less likely to happen on any console. The PS2, for example, was tempting people with a hard-drive upgrade. It also wasn't unimaginable that they'd release a new PS2 with a nicer drive. It's difficult to imagine that with these in mind game developers made assumptions about just how fast the DVD was going to send data. Heck, it's difficult to picture most PS2 games running anything but smoother if you were to double the speed of the hardware components. Once you get int
Give Us Back Linux (Score:2)
It sure looks like Sony's ripping the Linux option out of the PS3 is what finally coaxed crackers to jailbreak the resulting PS3. For years while hackers had Linux to play around with, even though it was crippled (low RAM, GPU lockout, so all processing including display on the PPC/512MB), there were no jailbreaks. Then no Linux, and a few months later a jailbreak. It really makes Sony's original "give 'em Linux" strategy look like it worked better to protect the console than any DRM or other lockout has fo
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It sure looks like Sony's ripping the Linux option out of the PS3 is what finally coaxed crackers to jailbreak the resulting PS3.
Pesonally, I'm finding it hard to believe that the number of people that want to run Linux on their game consoles would have any significant impact on game sales. This just sounds more like some typically paranoid control-freak upper management decision.
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I disagree with Sony that the negative effects would outweigh the positive effects. However, if any developer could write a game that could play on PS3, using Linux with full access to PPC, SPUs and RSX (all the PS3 HW), they could indeed write games that any PS3 owner could get and play. Those games would directly compete with Sony-licensed games, but without paying Sony a license, and without paying for a Sony development environment. So Sony would not get any revenue from those games, which is where all
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Well, I'm not Sony, but how much could they charge for a "PS3 Developer Version", compared to probably something like the rumored $12+ for every licensed game required by all the locked down PS3s? Their entire business model depends on relatively cheap PS3s, subsidized by probably $100, and an average of 9+ licensed games bought per console to break even. You're talking about reversing that, with a console that can play pirated games including the "piracy fee" in the cost. By the time you convince Sony exec
Pong (Score:2)
It occurs to me that "Pong" is the "Hello World" of homebrew.
Awesome work folks. The Wii Brew scene is waiting for you to catch up, and the bar is set pretty high. I fully expect the PS 3 to meet that, and exceed it.
--
Toro
Wii anyone? (Score:2)
The PS3 is building up to be the Dream Console for emulation.
I softmodded my wii, it took about 10 minutes. It lets me run emulators for N64, SNES, NES, Genesis, NeoGeo, PS1, NDS, DOS, GBA, ScummVM, and more. I haven't seen any dreamcast emulators, but if it can run PSX games, dreamcast shouldn't be outside the realm of possibility. So other than running PS2 games instead of gamecube ones, I don't see why you would consider the PS3 a "dream console" for emulation when the wii can already do what the PS3 hopes to accomplish.
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FYI, the PSX and the DC aren't all that close. The Saturn was of the same generation as the PSX and was more complex/powerful, and the DC was the next generation. It may not be outside the realm, but it'll likely take a while.
The summary only said "dream console" because it sounds neat. I think a Wii is worth having for its unique qualities, but an Xbox does everything you mentioned and is much cheaper. I'm sure a few other systems have that many emulation abilities as well.
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...that Microsoft's Xbox 360 *still* has not been exploited? PS3 has had a number of exploits over the years, but Xbox 360 is still locked down tight. Too bad desktop Windows still has remote code execution vulnerabilities discovered every month...
Probably an economic issue. Microsoft (and Sony, for that matter) doesn't make money from console hardware sales ... they need game sales to make a profit. So there's a clear incentive to make the Xbox hard to crack. Perhaps Microsoft is just better at that than Sony.
Re:Does anyone else find it interesting... (Score:5, Informative)
...that Microsoft's Xbox 360 *still* has not been exploited? PS3 has had a number of exploits over the years, but Xbox 360 is still locked down tight. Too bad desktop Windows still has remote code execution vulnerabilities discovered every month...
Probably an economic issue. Microsoft (and Sony, for that matter) doesn't make money from console hardware sales ... they need game sales to make a profit. So there's a clear incentive to make the Xbox hard to crack. Perhaps Microsoft is just better at that than Sony.
Have either of you actually played a video game before? Where do you get your intel from?
The 360 was the first to have a hypervisor exploit: http://www.xbox-scene.com/xbox1data/sep/EEZkykVkkFmojzapEq.php [xbox-scene.com]
The 360 was the first to allow playing burnt games: http://digg.com/news/technology/Modded_Xbox_360_Plays_Burned_Games [digg.com]
The 360 was the first to have homebrew: http://beta.ivancover.com/wiki/index.php/Xbox_360_King_Kong_Shader_Exploit [ivancover.com]
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Where do you get your intel from?
Slashdot, of course. So why should we believe you?
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Because he provided citation links. You can of course not believe them...
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True, but those exploits don't matter if the system is secure enough to protect itself from those exploits.
As a result, exploits only work in older models and you can't update the console. i.e. it hasn't been fully compromised in that sense.
The PS3 is also supposed to be secure against those kinds of exploits but unlike with the 360 its probably a matter of time until we see "custom firmwares" or a way of upgrading to the latest system version while keeping your homebrew capabilities intact. (which is what
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So, all those people who have hacked their 360's to play backups and even put DLC on the drive... Don't actually exist?
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So, all those people who have hacked their 360's to play backups and even put DLC on the drive... Don't actually exist?
Of course not, Citizen. They're entirely imaginary.
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...that Microsoft's Xbox 360 *still* has not been exploited? PS3 has had a number of exploits over the years, but Xbox 360 is still locked down tight. Too bad desktop Windows still has remote code execution vulnerabilities discovered every month...
They had hypervisor privileges years ago, it's just that it was a pain to implement. http://www.securityfocus.com/archive/1/461489 [securityfocus.com]
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That's because the Xbox 360 is more secure than the PS3. The 360 was attacked first because the PS3 had OtherOS, but now we're finding out that the PS3's native OS is a lot less secure than previously thought.
In particular, the 360's hypervisor model is a lot better, and they have hardware memory signing and encryption for the hypervisor and executable code. The only reason the PSJailbreak works is because the PS3 doesn't implement W^X at all inside lv2 (!), and it has nothing resembling memory encryption o
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Nope. Total control over the machine is what matters most to MS and Sony. Piracy may even have helped sales, every year everyone that gets banned buys a new console.. but Microsoft makes billions of dollars with very little production costs with Live. If everyone's machine was JTAG'd, M$ would really be pissed.
Notice how the JTAG exploit was patched before it was released, by blowing efuses. Meanwhile every single version of the 360's optical drives has been hacked to play backups.. even the slim / s / 250.
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Ummm ... wiibrew.org?
There are hundreds of pieces of Wii homebrew. And not all emulators either!