PS3 factoring?
 

Someone suggested I get a (used) PS3 instead of a plain old Blu-Ray player. If I knew that I could factor on it, I would consider it. But, if it was a no way, I would consider a standard BR player instead.

Well is anyone doing it?

[url]http://mersenneforum.org/showthread.php?p=258039#post258039[/url]

which can be followed to groklaw. I think I read there that someone is suing Sony for removing their OS from jail-broken PS3's. From that, I would surmise that no open source developer is willing to cope with Sony's closed hardware, since Sony feels the right to kick anyone off at any time, especially if they aren't game developers.

But I invite contradiction, having ASSUMED something without proof...my next factoring machine will be a GTX470 doing CUDA.

A more authoritative source reached me on the saga of people trying to actually program the PS3. I can't find my copy of IEEE Spectrum, but Sony sued (and settled out of court with, quite recently, like early this year) the guy who unlocked the PS3 for arbitrary programming. (and oh, yes, they subpeonaed the IP address of everyone who even looked at the blog involved). It seems that even though you have purchased the hardware in a store, you don't actually own it. A decent consumer protection agency should be crying foul. If you want to join me in complaining to the whitehouse, I don't mind, but I'm not terribly hopeful. Further comments belong in the soapbox.

I'm sure its possible to program the PS3, but it's way too much work, unless you can sweet-talk a Sony exec into letting you put prime95 on the PS3.

[QUOTE=Christenson;260645]A more authoritative source reached me on the saga of people trying to actually program the PS3. I can't find my copy of IEEE Spectrum, but Sony sued (and settled out of court with, quite recently, like early this year) the guy who unlocked the PS3 for arbitrary programming. (and oh, yes, they subpeonaed the IP address of everyone who even looked at the blog involved). It seems that even though you have purchased the hardware in a store, you don't actually own it. A decent consumer protection agency should be crying foul. If you want to join me in complaining to the whitehouse, I don't mind, but I'm not terribly hopeful. Further comments belong in the soapbox.

I'm sure its possible to program the PS3, but it's way too much work, unless you can sweet-talk a Sony exec into letting you put prime95 on the PS3.[/QUOTE]On the contrary, you own the hardware. What you don't have is a license from the copyright owner to make modifications to their intellectual property. If you want to write your own firmware [i]ab initio[/i] without using any of Sony's work the company can't stop you.

Whether or not you think the law is sensible, it's actually quite easy to understand at a reasonably high level.

Paul

[URL="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Texas_Instruments_signing_key_controversy"]Texas Instruments[/URL] redux?

Wiping out a toy and replacing its guts with your own toy code is one thing; it's quite another to wipe out your desktop and replace the whole thing, including the BIOS. Assuming the latter is even possible. If you do, getting to distribute the result to unmodified PS3's may also get you sued.

I wonder what EPFL is going to do now; start buying old PS3's on ebay?

[QUOTE=jasonp;260674]I wonder what EPFL is going to do now; start buying old PS3's on ebay?[/QUOTE]AFAIK, they have no intention of increasing the size of their PS3 cluster. They were, of course, very careful to avoid installing Sony's downgrade patch which came out a year or so ago. As soon as I read about that patch I mailed Arjen to warn him but he'd already heard about it.

Paul

OK, but a PS3 can take a disk of the "right" form, and run programs from it. Where do I stand legally if I figure out what that "right" form is, and start distributing disks with a program in the "right" form?

I supposedly own the hardware. I'm not modifying Sony's IP. I'm distirbuting it to other owners of the hardware.

I'll pass the TI link back to the IEEE spectrum; they might want to take it up.

IEEE Spectrum already featured the illegal DMCA threats sent by TI :smile:
[url]http://spectrum.ieee.org/consumer-electronics/gadgets/for-texas-instruments-calculator-hackers-dont-add-up/0[/url]
For some reason, we at RSALS (which centralized the entire sieving of 12 keys, and a part of the 1st one) did not receive the French equivalent of a DMCA threat, but a Switzerland-hosted server where we discussed the work got one.

Other links which lay down very clearly the complete illegality of TI's threats:
[url]https://www.eff.org/deeplinks/2009/09/ti-leave-those-kids-alone[/url]
[url]https://www.eff.org/press/archives/2009/10/13[/url]
[url]https://www.eff.org/deeplinks/2009/10/texas-instruments-stop-digging-holes[/url]

Debrouxl: Thanks for the pointers. I wasn't paying that close attention. What are the legal bounds on a PS3?

Not sure about current, but the initial PS3 ran at 3.17Ghz and has 6 cores available. It executes 1 instruction a cycle a core.

So basically that is similar to 3 cores of a x64 at that speed.

Not sure whether that will be any interesting.

Sure if it would be low power. However the ps3 is rated 380 watt peak and 220 watt with average operation.

Realize it's a device from 4+ years ago.

Really outdated by todays standards.