Referbished XBox360...a calculated risk

After mourning the loss of my 60 gb Playstation 3 for almost a year now (stolen right out of my house). I saw this site on the Internet. Asking a mere $34.99 for a refurbished XBox360 Premium with a 1 year warranty. Seems like a steal of a deal, and I am "tempted" to put my coin down and give it a try.

After spending an absorbent amount for my Playstation 3 ($1,000). I have been without a console and have been weighing the pros and cons of the major contenders (the Wii, the XBox360 and yet another Playstation 3).

I see the pros and cons in all systems and here is my assessment on them. I will start with my first love.

Playstation 3
I advocated for this unit from the beginning, knowing hands down that it was superior to anything on the market. The ability to install Linux sold me right away and backwards compatibility for Playstation 2 games was just cinch that made me pinch every last penny I had to purchase one. The Cell CPU and the 1080p capability along with being an inexpensive Blueray player (which is the current winner in the format wars, I won the bet with myself) made me a happy elitist to own one.

Why I am not getting one this time around...
Aside from the price, which after purchasing it at its high of $800 when I first got my hands on it. This platform has some limitations that has made me reconsider acquiring another one. First, it has a piss poor selection of games which drives me nuts. Second, the eternal delay of Home (Playstation's version of second life) has irked me to no end but the killing blow was their reversal to include backwards compatibility to Playstation 2 games. But the nail in the coffin was that Sony made no attempt to include a SDK to create games on the device like Microsoft did. This has made me sit on the fence just waiting for Sony to stop being such prudes and to get with the program.


Wii
Now the Wii was one I was really interested in, its price point is perfect, the games are interactive and fun especially in parties and groups. I have heard only good things about the Wii

Why I am not getting one this time around...
Ok, for all of its fun points, I still do not think it has the selection of games I really hunger for. Still I need a SDK to write my own games on this and no attempt to date has been made to do so. Yes, I will pass, but to the credit of the Wii it is in my next round of console purchases even over the Playstation 3.

The winner?
XBox360

Why?
Listen, the game console stability and horse power sucks when compared to the Playstation 3 it certainly doesn't have the full availability of fun and interactive games that the Wii has. But, it does score over both of them in two very distinctive ways.

First, it has the selection I like and has many RPG type games to ensorcel me for hours.

Second, XNA, the capability (for a price) for the common people to build games on.

Now red ring of death and overheating issues aside as well as the numerous complaints in the forums about having to return defunct systems and waiting weeks on end for another system that lasts for only a few months before it has to be returned yet again. I will spend the coin on a refurbished system until Sony gets its act together and the Wii becomes more competitive with its selection.

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.

Linux Specific Development

Linux has the highest learning curb, with the biggest level of control over the device. Slackware Linux, Fedora Linux (Redhat), Yellowdog Linux all work off the same kernel, and can offer a plethora of intresting setups for the development enviorment.

Linux does come with all the tools you need, but they are not initially a very user friendly GUI (Graphical User Interface) and IDE (Intergrated Development Enviorment) solution out the gate. Everything is configured through simple text files creating a complex level of simplicity, which unfortunatly to many is still quite complex. If you are comming from windows you may be expecting dropdown menus, checkable boxes, etc. with Linux instead of these easy identifiable menus, one has to memorize a vast array of command-lines and be savvy to the location of configuration files to get things done.

We have Linux Yellowdog installed on our PS/3 unit, but it leaves much to be desired. Without access to the GameOS, we are restricted to the framebuffer to do any thing with graphics.

Sony does not want linux developers writing games for the linux side of the PS/3 and some could argue not even for the GameOS side without a very heavy licensing agreement that can cost thousands of dollars.

Mac Specific Development

With the Mac, the story is diffrent, and it is far from "standard" its enviorment is a hybrid of BSD UNIX and the GUIness of Windows, or vice versa. Macs are, well made and their OS really works well and solid. Like Linux we have had zero downtimes with these machines.

Game development seems amiss as the Mac is geared to just contemporary development. The tools are not "obvious" and may require some digging into the machine to find the right development tools, but they are there.

Macs do things just a tad diffrent than PCs, and its main interface has specilized tools Carbon and Coco that spins a slightly diffrent syntax than the core C++, but the Mac is capable of C++ programming with the C++ Tool framework.

We find that the development should be done through the OS's XCode, but the user is free to go the Linuxy gcc/subversion route, XCode gives a efficient veiw of the code, the source and binaries all in one place.

Macs are not known to be "game machines" but they are certainly capable of becoming them. OpenGL's direct compeditor DirectX obviously does not play well with the Mac platform. The only real way to "develop" with the .NET, XNA and DirectX suite is to either to install VMWare or Parrlles to actually run Windows or install Mono (the open source port to the .NET platform)