This was brought up in the last PS3 thread I made, and since then, it seems like there has been a little bit more info about it released online. http://www.terrasoftsolutions.com/products/ydl/delivery.shtml Maybe not a big deal for the average gamer, but some people might really enjoy this news. A good way to get a lot of extra functionality out of the system I guess...which you might expect given the price tag, but still.
Didn't get to post this in the original post, but YDL v5.0 will feature E17 (which has yet to be released I believe...supposed to be a next-generation desktop system if I am understanding things correctly). You can check out some (old) videos of it in action: http://www.rasterman.com/files/e17_movie-01.avi http://www.rasterman.com/files/e17_movie-02.avi http://www.rasterman.com/files/e17_movie-03.avi http://www.rasterman.com/files/e17_movie-04.avi You can read more about it on Terra Soft's website: http://www.terrasoftsolutions.com/products/ydl/e17/ Or Enlightenment's website: http://enlightenment.sourceforge.net/Enlightenment/DR17/ Or Wikipedia of course: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Enlightenment_(window_manager)
wow! It'll be a full-fledged Linux box! I'm glad they're shipping this as a fully-functional computer. It is kind of silly to have all this box that's more powerful than most home computers, yet not use it as one.
Official PR with a little bit of new info: http://www.terrasoftsolutions.com/news/2006/2006-10-17.shtml Spoiler Yeah, I know only like 2 people on the BBS care about this, but I'm posting updates on it anyway.
Okay, I've done some more reading on this, and I think it's really exciting. PS3 used to be the least interesting of the three next gen consoles, now it may be my next console- because it will also be a computer and media server. I was thinking of putting together a cheap Linux box with a large hard drive so I can put my entire CD collection on lossless format and channel it to a Squeezebox for listening. Now, if I buy a PS3- I've got a fully fledged Linux box with a state-of-the art Cell processor, fancy graphics unit, blue ray drive, and HDMI output for about $600. I could by a tuner card and get Myth TV and use it as a DVR with HDMI output, and, well... any number of the Linux apps out there. I've been using Firefox and OpenOffice on my windows laptop for years, so there will be no adjusting in that dept, since they are both in this Linux distribution. If you want to read some Linux developers debating the real nuts-and-bolts issues, check out this thread: http://episteme.arstechnica.com/eve/forums/a/tpc/f/174096756/m/983009551831/p/1 One of the more important points I pulled from that discussion is that Cell development tools will be available- that is, customizing and creating Linux applications for the Cell processor can and will be done by the open-source community. A lot of developers are licking their chops to get a crack at the Cell and utilize it's multi-core structure. I've never used linux before, but this may be the thing that will get me to try. The PS3 has 4 usb ports so I can attach large storage and use it as a media server if I want. I need to read up on the heat and noise issues.
Thanks for the info. I've been keeping up only with what gamers have thought about this news, so it was interesting to see what some non-gaming Linux users thought about it. I'm in about the same situation as you are when it comes to Linux. Outside of the time I checked out Knoppix, I've never used Linux. About 2 months ago, I started looking into the various distributions and considered installing one of them on my PC. I was kind of scared I'd screw something up in setting up my PC to dual-boot, so I decided to hold off on that idea until I learned more about the process. Fortunately, now I don't have to worry about that...although I probably won't be getting a PS3 for a while, so my experimentation with Linux will still be on hold. I'm trying not to get too excited about this. I'm still worried that Sony might enforce some restrictions, which would make it difficult (if not impossible) to perform some of the great things the PS3 could do without those restrictions. I have been surprised by some of the comments by the YDL staff(disc access was hinted at for example), so maybe it won't be as restrictive as I fear it might. In any case, this will definitely be something to keep an eye on in the next 30 days or so IMO.
