Cell "Shrinks" Again, Early Cell 3 Info

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Over time, production becomes cheaper and easier. That's just the way business goes. And it seems the new details regarding the "lighter" Cell chip have appeared, which could indicate yet another PlayStation 3 price drop by the end of the year.

According to PS3coderz.com, the new 45nm chip has dropped in power consumption by 40%, which means it won't have to use as much silicon as the 65nm version. All in all, this translates to a "simpler, lower cost cooling system," and we shouldn't have to explain why this is a big benefit to consumers. Evidently, they will start production of the 45nm chip some time this summer, so perhaps we will see another PS3 price cut for the 2008 holiday season. But the news doesn't end there: the site talks about new info regarding the "Cell 3." We won't bother trying to translate the following into layman's terms; we'll just let you read it word for word-

"Cell 3" has been seen on IBM slides before as a Cell with 2 PPEs and 32 SPEs but nothing more has been said about it. According to a presentation the SPEs will be getting some redesign to reduce latency and improve bandwidth. The PPEs on the other look like they light be based on POWER7 technology. Sounds like it could be a pretty serious piece of kit. It's not known if this particular version will go into a future PS4 or if it'll get it's own "game" version."

Anything involving falling production costs is always good news, no matter how you look at it. And maybe we'll locate new info about that Cell 3 in the near future...

3/3/2008 Ben Dutka

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