[PS3 RUMORES] PS3 aún incompleta / Presencia limitada en el E3?

THE NEWS ABOUT PS3s being scarce at E3 is kind of troubling to me, but not totally unexpected.
We are about six months from launch, and debugging should be done, prototypes and dev kits should flow like water, and all the tame magazines should already have one. The situation is rather different though, they are nowhere, and there are two related reasons behind this.

The first is size. People tell us that the current PS3s are about 50% too large to fit in the sleek but empty boxes they have been showing off. This is a problem, but a solvable one, electronics always get smaller. Time solves all, and there is still time, just not much.

More troubling to me is that Sony is still bidding on components for the boxes. This means the development is far from final, and it will be debugging up to, and in a Microsoft overheating manner, past the last minute. Not a good sign.

Overall, I think it will be out late in the year, but Sony will push the launch out as far as humanly possible. If you have one on your non-denominational year end holiday list, you may be waiting in XBox360esqe lines to get your toys. Basically, don't hold your breath waiting, you may be blue till next spring. µ

BIG FIRM SONY will keep on keeping its PS3 prototypes locked away from prying eyes at the next E3 show.
Hacks expecting a PS3 prototype fest at the May E3 games show have been told that the console will not even make an appearance at the Sony stand. Demo units which are usually given to third parties in their own booths will also be in short supply.

One publisher moaned to Spong that they are uncertain if they will be able to demonstrate their product mostly because Sony has not told them if they are allowed.

Sony apparently only wants people to see its machines in tightly restricted conditions, preferably back lit or under a very heavy table cloth.

The game gear maker has assured press that the chances of any of them getting their filthy paws on them are fairly minimal, so they might as well just go back to the pub.

More on Spong here.

The PS3, unlike the PS2 before it, has a real operating system running at the same time as the game. This operating system will take care of things like voice chat, video chat, instant messaging, and other stuff. I’d previously heard that the OS reserves one of the Cell’s seven SPEs to itself.

According to some “inside sources” (or something like that), PS3 Portal has uncovered that there’s a lot more to the picture. Supposedly the OS can request a second SPE of the currently running game at any given moment. Which means that a game can use the main PPU, plus 5 SPEs, no problem. It can use a sixth SPE knowing that it can be taken away at an instant’s notice. This isn’t so bad really. The PPU is a powerful core. Each SPE is a powerful core too. A game running on one PPU and 5 SPEs still has a lot of horsepower available to it. If that was all, the news wouldn’t be so bad.

But according to PS3 Portal’s sources, that’s not all. The OS also reserves 32MB of the GDR3 graphics memory and 64MB of the R main memory. That’s about 19% of the system’s memory. That’s a lot. In the world of console gaming, memory is as precious as Coca-Cola is to a programmer. And to pour 19% off a full glass isn’t so bad if there’s Coke in the glass, but its a major hindrance if it’s memory.

Well, it’s a rumour right now. And if there’s a hint of truth to it, maybe the numbers aren’t so bad. But either way, I have a feeling that developers can make up for that missing 19% and still make some killer games.