Former PlayStation exec Shuji Utsumi tells Wired that Kutaragi, years before the Xbox was introduced, believed his competitor was Microsoft. "I thought, what is he talking about?" Utsumi says. "Is he nuts? But even before PlayStation was born, he was predicting a big war for the living room." But how different are the next-gen Microsoft and Sony platforms? Epic's Tim Sweeney says double the effort is needed to max out the PLAYSTATION 3. Until then, there's no discernible differences between the two machines. He adds:
The Cell has more theoretical computing power, but it might be years before we see that reflected in actual performance. So it's a fundamental question whether the long-term direction in computing is with architectures like the Cell.
A big part of the PLAYSTATION 3's selling points is not just performance, but promised performance, it seems. And can that, Wired asks, save Sony?