PS3 Price Drop, Cell Hits 45nm

IBM announced that the Cell CPU (used in the PlayStation 3) will soon make the transition to IBM's next-gen 45nm high-k process. 'The 45nm Cell will use about 40 percent less power than its 65nm predecessor, its die area will be reduced by 34 percent.

A practical up shot of this is the greatly reduced power budget that will minimize the amount of active cooling required for the PS/3 console, which in turn will make it cheaper to produce and even more reliable.

Sony's per-unit cost is the reduction in overall die size. A smaller die means a smaller, cheaper package; it also means that yields will be better and that each chip will cost less overall.

I would like this more if they allow PS3/Linux users to access 7 of 8 SPUs instead of only 6.


A price drop would be nice (though when compared to the Xbox360, the PS3 is very competitive), When is the PS3 slim appears, all the pieces will be in place for a slim.

Since Sony has been aggressively shrinking the motherboard in the PS3, and the chip size has dropped from 90nm, to 65nm and now 45nm. All that means less power (smaller PSU) and less heat (less fans & heat-sinks). Smarter design means a better product than its prototypes.