PS3 - Performance of a supercomputer at the price of an entry-level PC

Research firm iSuppli said its recent PlayStation 3 (PS3) teardown analysis shows that the PS3 is an engineering masterpiece that sets a new high mark for computing price/performance – even when considering it is more expensive than its nearest rival, the Xbox 360 from Microsoft.

"With the PS3, you are getting the performance of a supercomputer at the price of an entry-level PC," said Andrew Rassweiler, teardown services manager and senior analyst for iSuppli.

PS3 costs

The combined materials and manufacturing cost of the PS3 is US$805.85 for the model equipped with a 20GB hard disk drive (HDD), and US$840.35 for the 60GB HDD version, according to iSuppli. This total doesn’t include additional costs for elements including the controller, cables and packaging.

At these costs, Sony is taking a considerable loss on each PS3 sold. Materials and manufacturing costs for the 20GB model exceed the suggested retail price of US$499 by a total of $306.85. For the 60GB version, costs exceed the US$599 price by US$241.35.

With Sony taking a smaller loss on the higher-end model, iSuppli said it's not a surprise the company is steering customers to the 60Gbyte version.

Source: iSuppli, compiled by DigiTimes.com, November 2006

In contrast, the HDD-equipped Xbox 360 has a manufacturing and materials total of US$323.30, based on an updated estimate using costs in the fourth quarter of 2006. This total is US$75.70 less than the US$399 suggested retail price of the Xbox 360.

It's common for video-game console makers to lose money on hardware, and make up for the loss via video game-title sales. Still, the size of Sony's loss per unit is remarkable, even for the video-game console business.

While many fret over the high cost and price of the PS3 compared to the competition, iSuppli believes the console provides more processing power and capability than any consumer electronics device in history. Because of this, the PlayStation 3 is a great bargain, well worth its US$599 price and US$840.35 cost, iSuppli believes.

Source: iSuppli, compiled by DigiTimes.com, November 2006

Cutting-edge design

iSuppli notes that Sony has delivered an amazing level of performance for the cost for PS3. "The reason why the PS3 is so costly to produce is because it has incredible processing power," Rassweiler said. "If someone had shown me the PS3 motherboard from afar without telling me what it was, I would have assumed it was for a network switch or an enterprise server."

Some of the more advanced features of the PS3's design include:

The dual graphics processing units (GPUs) – the RSX Reality Synthesizer from Nvidia and the Emotion Engine and Graphics Synthesizer from Toshiba. The RSX Reality Synthesizer delivers cutting-edge high-definition graphics – while the Emotion Engine provides backward compatibility with PlayStation 2 (PS2) game titles.

The Cell Broadband Engine from IBM, which serves as the central processing unit of the PS3, provides the equivalent computing power of eight individual microprocessors. The Cell is what endows the PlayStation 3 with its supercomputer-like power, Rassweiler observed.

The use of four Samsung Electronics 512Mbit DRAMs that employ high-speed memory interface technology from Rambus. This marks the first use of the advanced XDR DRAM technology that iSuppli has detected. Samsung's memory represents 11% of PS3 costs. Samsung and Elpida Memory are dual sources for the XDR DRAM.

Source: iSuppli, compiled by DigiTimes.com, November 2006

"To give an example of how cutting-edge the design is, in the entire history of the iSuppli teardown analysis team, we have seen only three semiconductors with 1,200 or more pins. The PS3 has three such semiconductors all by itself,” Rassweiler noted. "There is nothing cheap about the PS3 design. This is not an adapted PC design. Even beyond the major chips in the PlayStation 3, the other components seem to also be expensive and somewhat exotic."

Rassweiler cited the PS3's inclusion of a power supply that packs a whopping 400-watts – yet uses a very compact, low-profile design. At US$37.50, this power supply costs about twice as much as an average unit found in a PC.

Other component winners

While many of the major components found in the PS3 were already known, iSuppli reported some surprise part selections in the game console that could boost the fortunes of their suppliers.

International Rectifier, which contributes several power-management devices to the PS3. Marvell Technology's 802.11 b/g module chipset, which provides wireless local area networking capabilities. CSRs BlueCore 4 solution, which supports version 2.0 of the Bluetooth wireless standard, plus Enhanced Data Rate technology, giving it a transfer speed three times faster than current Bluetooth devices, according to CSR. Spansion, which contributed an 8Mbit NOR flash memory chip for the PS3's Bluetooth module, and a 16Mbit NOR flash part for the console's Blu-Ray module.

A component glitch

Sony has suffered some well-publicized problems meeting its PS3 3 production and delivery goals.

Production problems meant that only 100,000 PlayStation 3 machines were ready in time for the console's debut in Japan on November 11, according to Chris Crotty, senior analyst, consumer electronics for iSuppli. When it goes on sale in the United States on November 17, about 400,000 PS3 consoles will be available. Meanwhile, the console's European launch has been pushed back until March of 2007.

Crotty said the reduction in shipments was due to yield problems at Nichia, which supplies blue laser diodes for the PS3’s Blu-ray DVD. This slowed PlayStation 3 production.

Blues for Blu-Ray

Sony's Blu-Ray DVD read only optical device in the PS3 has dual purposes: up-converting the game console's output to high-definition resolution, and allowing viewers to watch high-definition movies using the console, according to Krishna Chander , senior analyst, storage devices, for iSuppli.

Sony's strategy was not lost on Microsoft, which plans to offer a separate add-on high-definition DVD system for the Xbox 360. This should be available around the holiday season this year. Nintendo has no plans to offer a next-generation DVD system in its game consoles.

Given that more studio movie releases now are supported by Blu-Ray disks, Sony's PS3 has a slight advantage. However, Microsoft plans to offer some network television movies for download into the Xbox 360 system.

PlayStation's HDD

The PS3's HDD is a 2.5-inch, 20GB capacity drive supplied by Seagate Technology. The reason a HDD is included in the PS3 is to store the mathematical modeling based on physics for the motion and impact of the various game objects. The DVD media produces the objects that are manipulated by the game player and for each scenario; the most realistic situations are replicated using the Cell processor and mathematical models, according to iSuppli.