Xbox 2 SDK released - G5 + R350 based

[PowerPC 603e]

http://www.theinquirer.net/?article=14407

-Quote-
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Xbox 2 SDK released on cool Apple Power Mac G5s

It comes to pass


By Paul Dutton: Saturday 28 February 2004, 15:59

WE'VE JUST got word that the Software Development Kit (SDK) for Microsoft's
forthcoming Xbox 2 has now been released to Developers.
As we reported earlier, IBM processors are indeed the Xbox 2 development
platform of choice.

The big news to us is that the XBOX 2 SDK has been seeded to developers on
dual Apple Power Mac G5 systems running a custom Windows NT Kernel.

The Apple Power Mac G5 is based upon two of IBM's 64-bit Power PC processors
and features ATi RADEON 9800 Pro (R350) graphics. However the R350 is
believed to be an interim solution and will, in due course, be superseded by
the forthcoming ATI R420.

Interestingly the SDK apparently also features an Apple logo on a side bar
within the application.

What we don't yet know is whether the custom Windows NT Kernel for the
64-bit capable IBM Power PC processors is 64-bit or 32-bit.

Though as ATI is so clearly behind with even its iAMD64 device drivers for
both Intel and AMD x86-64 platforms, we suspect that it's 32-bit.

Let us know if you know. µ
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So SDKs for Xbox 2, aka Xenon, aka Xbox Next are out - they're using two
64-Bit PowerPC processors and ATI R350 (Radeon 9800 Pro) for graphics - soon
to be changed to R420. I wonder how many CPUs the final Xbox 2 will have.
my guess is, no more than two.

I cannot wait to see what SEGA can do on the *final* Xbox2 hardware, which
obviously does not yet exist in silicon.

Also, I wonder how different Nintendo's N5 console will be fron Xbox 2 -
Nintendo is using the same companies for CPU and GPU, though I realize the
two consoles, Xbox 2 and N5, will have different chipsets.

 

[Tony Hill]

http://www.theinquirer.net/?article=14407

Ohh no... The Inquirer is at it again!

The big news to us is that the XBOX 2 SDK has been seeded to developers on
dual Apple Power Mac G5 systems running a custom Windows NT Kernel.

My guess is that it's based off of the current PowerPC port of Windows
CE. WinCE is the natural version of Microsoft's OS for such an
application, though I don't know if it natively supports DirectX.
Still, I'm sure that it wouldn't take much to hack a custom version of
DirectX onto WinCE for PPC.

Interestingly the SDK apparently also features an Apple logo on a side bar
within the application.

That may well be for entering/exiting OS X? Total shot-in-the-dark
here, but maybe this SDK runs a sort of dual-boot type setup, allowing
users to switch between running OS X normally or switching into this
Windows XBox2 SDK? Just a thought.

What we don't yet know is whether the custom Windows NT Kernel for the
64-bit capable IBM Power PC processors is 64-bit or 32-bit.

Why in the hell would you want a 64-bit processor for a gaming
platform? You lose performance and gain essentially nothing in
return. It's not like the machine is going to be addressing more than
4GB of memory, and 64-bit INTs are a REAL rarity in games (not
non-existent, but no where near common enough that dealing with 64-bit
INTs as two 32-bit ones would offset the performance gain in running
in 32-bit mode vs. 64-bit mode).

So SDKs for Xbox 2, aka Xenon, aka Xbox Next are out - they're using two
64-Bit PowerPC processors and ATI R350 (Radeon 9800 Pro) for graphics - soon
to be changed to R420. I wonder how many CPUs the final Xbox 2 will have.
my guess is, no more than two.

My guess is a single dual-core processor, a trimmed down version of
the upcoming Power5. It may well have SMT as well though, so that
would make it 2 physical processors and 4 logical chips.

Also, I wonder how different Nintendo's N5 console will be fron Xbox 2 -
Nintendo is using the same companies for CPU and GPU, though I realize the
two consoles, Xbox 2 and N5, will have different chipsets.

Who cares about the chipsets, they'll be running TOTALLY different
operating systems! The software is more important than the hardware
here, and XBox2 games will be all Win32/DirectX stuff while the
next-gen Nintendo will be.... err, whatever Nintendo calls their API.

 

[xTenn]

My guess is that it's based off of the current PowerPC port of Windows
CE.

Then again it could be a good start on reaching for non-intel, non-alpha
systems with their operating system. Any development on win2000+
architecture could possibly be used beyond the XBox, and allows for
intelligent use of investment dollars.

For that reason I can't see CE as the operating choice, but rather win2000
and beyond. Call it a hypothesis.

 

[Tony Hill]

Then again it could be a good start on reaching for non-intel, non-alpha
systems with their operating system. Any development on win2000+
architecture could possibly be used beyond the XBox, and allows for
intelligent use of investment dollars.

Been there, done that, HUGE flop. WinNT 4.0 was available for PPC,
Alpha and MIPS in addition to the standard i386 port. None of the
other architectures ever saw any sales at all and were nothing but a
money-losing prospect for MS.

I HIGHLY doubt that Microsoft has ANY interest is going down that path
again. The market for desktop operating systems for non-x86 chips is
REAL small these days, and there are already dozens of competitors in
that market. Besides that, Microsoft would need to port MS Office as
well in order to get any sort of meaningful sales on the desktop side,
or any number of their server applications to get server sales.

In short, the possibility of MS making ANY money at all by selling
such an OS is virtually zero, and there's no way in hell they would
ever recoup their investment.

 

[xTenn]

In short, the possibility of MS making ANY money at all by selling
such an OS is virtually zero, and there's no way in hell they would
ever recoup their investment.

But that is just it - a large portion of the investment would be done on the
XBox side of things. Granted, it would take a lot more to get a full blown
OS there, but it is the badly desired foothold, however flimsy it is. After
all, Microsoft looks long term.

..02

 

[ammonton]

Been there, done that, HUGE flop. WinNT 4.0 was available for PPC,
Alpha and MIPS in addition to the standard i386 port. None of the
other architectures ever saw any sales at all and were nothing but a
money-losing prospect for MS.

I don't know if Microsoft lost so much money. At least Digital wrote and
paid for the Alpha port and I imagine platform vendors did at least some
of the work on the other ports. But you're right in that the thing never
went anywhere. The Alpha port was the most long-lived, mostly because
Digital's FX!32 emulation system let you run native x86 apps. The other
ports had no software to run and were soon dropped - the MIPS port
before service pack 2 and the PPC port before sp3.

-a

 

[Chocolate]

Granted, it would take a lot more to get a full blown

OS there, but it is the badly desired foothold, however flimsy it is.

I thought they would just recompile the code for Win2K on a different
platform.

Doesn't seem like too much work?

 

[RusH]

But that is just it - a large portion of the investment would be
done on the XBox side of things. Granted, it would take a lot
more to get a full blown OS there, but it is the badly desired
foothold, however flimsy it is. After all, Microsoft looks long
term.

then again - remember my nightmare with ALL_MS computers manufactured
by Microsoft, with Microsoft OS and sold directly by Microsoft ? XBox
allready has a mediacenter app.
Sony made a first step in that direction with the new PSX "almost
full blown computer, but home entertainment system for the time being".


Pozdrawiam.

 

[Eric Pobirs]

Depends what part you're talking about. NT was designed with portability
in mind. The layer that deals with the local machines details that cannot be
avoided is called the HAL. (Hardware Abstraction Layer) The intent is that
in a best case scenario everything that lives above the HAL can be portable
high level language code. All well and good for creating an OS for desktops
and servers across multiple platforms. Even on x86 platforms custom HALs are
seen in systems with internal structure greatly different from a typical PC,
such as some of the monster multiprocessor systems developed by Unisys to
run Windows Data Center.

This is all well and good for enabling big server systems where the
payoff is in the efficient aggregation of a big array of processors in a way
that makes the death of one or more of those processors survivable without
bringing the whole enterprise to a grinding halt. The loss of a portion of
any single processors performance capacity to that functionality is a very
acceptable trade. The priorities for a game console are just the opposite.
Fault tolerance is nonexistent and performance is everything. The OS in this
case lacks about 95% of the functions found in that for a desktop/server and
is little more than a way for developers to use a set of standard APIs. For
a console a little hardware abstraction is good but it comes at the cost of
putting a layer in between the develops code and the hardware, so it needs
to be kept to a minimum.

This results in a OS that is almost all HAL to enable the DirectX suite.
This means nearly all of the code is below the level at which NT is readily
portable. So there is no great advantage to be had.

The code base for PPC NT was last updated an effective eternity ago but
the WinCE stuff is pretty current and designed with a footprint that goes
well with console limitations. (Those limitations being relative to the era.
The $50 PS1 would have been the basis for an amazing personal computer at
any point in the 80's.) I cannot think of anything an Xbox2 would likely be
asked to do that isn't well within the bounds of WinCE now.


The above is an extremely simplified explanation but I hope it gets the
idea across.

 

[Tony Hill]

But that is just it - a large portion of the investment would be done on the
XBox side of things.

Yeah, like 2% of it maybe. The XBox2 will require drivers for about 3
different things and that's it. It needs only a VERY limited
implementation of the operating system, it requires basically no
customer support at all. Most importantly though, they don't need to
port or support ANY applications aside from games.

Porting the base operating system for limited hardware is the easy
part, it's getting all of the other software to work with all of the
other hardware that gets tricky.

Granted, it would take a lot more to get a full blown
OS there,

It's a whole world away from getting a full blown OS there.

but it is the badly desired foothold, however flimsy it is. After
all, Microsoft looks long term.

The thing you're missing is that it's NOT a "badly desired foothold",
not in the least! Microsoft has absolutely ZERO interest in
supporting non-x86 PCs because there is NO money to be made selling
operating systems there, none! Look around at just how many companies
make money off selling non-x86 desktop/server operating systems?
There are none! Even Apple, the second largest OS vendor in the world
after MS, makes ALL of their money off their hardware sales. MacOS
exists only to sell the hardware, if they wanted to sell the OS, they
would port it to x86.

Where there IS money to be made is in the embedded software space, in
the set-top box market, in the in-car computer market, the
home-entertainment system market, etc. These markets are ALL best
served by WinCE/WinXP Embedded/Windows Mobile. That's where Microsoft
is going with all of this, not for something like Windows of a Mac, or
Windows on an IBM Regatta server or anything like that.

While I'm sure that Microsoft would love if the whole world ran on
Windows, they are WELL aware that the cost to support a platform like
IBM's Regatta servers would be HUGE while the potential sales from
such a thing would be TINY.

 

[xTenn]

Where there IS money to be made is in the embedded software space, in
the set-top box market, in the in-car computer market, the
home-entertainment system market, etc. These markets are ALL best
served by WinCE/WinXP Embedded/Windows Mobile. That's where Microsoft
is going with all of this, not for something like Windows of a Mac, or
Windows on an IBM Regatta server or anything like that.

Why would you think I was talking about PowerPCs? My expectation is that
microsoft will have more home devices that have non-x86 architecture, and
furthermore it will not be CE but rather win2000+ kernal. I see a media
center device replacement running non-x86, as well as a device with webtv
capabilities. Microsoft's foray into the home has stepped away from x86,
and any development will play into the future of what we know today as PCs.
As fond as I am of CE, I cannot see it being the focus of future development
in this arena. With the current XBox NOT being CE (although arguably it
would have been a good match, as Sega has shown) this should be readily
apparent.

 

[Tony Hill]

Why would you think I was talking about PowerPCs? My expectation is that
microsoft will have more home devices that have non-x86 architecture, and
furthermore it will not be CE but rather win2000+ kernal. I see a media
center device replacement running non-x86, as well as a device with webtv
capabilities. Microsoft's foray into the home has stepped away from x86,
and any development will play into the future of what we know today as PCs.
As fond as I am of CE, I cannot see it being the focus of future development
in this arena. With the current XBox NOT being CE (although arguably it
would have been a good match, as Sega has shown) this should be readily
apparent.

Ok, I understand what you're getting at here. Basically you're
expected Microsoft to port their WinXP Media Center Edition to other
architectures, and for that I would agree. Currently it's only
available for x86, but I would expect them to port it to other
platforms in the near future.

However at the moment it also seems to me that this platform has WAY
too much bloat for the application, and unless it can slim down some
it's going to be beaten out by smaller, faster and cheaper rivals
(mostly Linux-based). While currently XP Media Center Edition is
basically just regular WinXP with a few extras added in (mainly so
that it can be used with a remote instead of a keyboard + mouse), I
would expect that the two will diverge somewhat in the future.

Anyway, you can find more info about the current version of XP Media
Center here:

http://www.microsoft.com/windowsxp/mediacenter/default.asp

 

[Chocolate]

Depends what part you're talking about. NT was designed with portability
in mind. The layer that deals with the local machines details that cannot be
avoided is called the HAL. (Hardware Abstraction Layer) The intent is that
in a best case scenario everything that lives above the HAL can be portable
high level language code. All well and good for creating an OS for desktops
and servers across multiple platforms. Even on x86 platforms custom HALs are
seen in systems with internal structure greatly different from a typical PC,
such as some of the monster multiprocessor systems developed by Unisys to
run Windows Data Center.

This is all well and good for enabling big server systems where the
payoff is in the efficient aggregation of a big array of processors in a way
that makes the death of one or more of those processors survivable without
bringing the whole enterprise to a grinding halt. The loss of a portion of
any single processors performance capacity to that functionality is a very
acceptable trade. The priorities for a game console are just the opposite.
Fault tolerance is nonexistent and performance is everything. The OS in this
case lacks about 95% of the functions found in that for a desktop/server and
is little more than a way for developers to use a set of standard APIs. For
a console a little hardware abstraction is good but it comes at the cost of
putting a layer in between the develops code and the hardware, so it needs
to be kept to a minimum.

This results in a OS that is almost all HAL to enable the DirectX suite.
This means nearly all of the code is below the level at which NT is readily
portable. So there is no great advantage to be had.

The code base for PPC NT was last updated an effective eternity ago but
the WinCE stuff is pretty current and designed with a footprint that goes
well with console limitations. (Those limitations being relative to the era.
The $50 PS1 would have been the basis for an amazing personal computer at
any point in the 80's.) I cannot think of anything an Xbox2 would likely be
asked to do that isn't well within the bounds of WinCE now.


The above is an extremely simplified explanation but I hope it gets the
idea across.

Thanks, most useful.
I remember being forced to learn about the portability of NT when doing my
NT MCSE, even though no f*cker was actually using it on anything but x86.

Nice to know how it fits into the XBox scheme of things.