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Blu-ray discs? Who needs 'em!?

In an effort to get around long load times with Blu-ray discs on the PlayStation 3, some publishers are looking to install game content to the internal hard drive to speed things up. Two games that take advantage of the hard drive install include Ridge Racer 7 and Genji: Days of the Blade.

In the case of Ridge Racer 7, gamers have the option of using up 5GB of storage for game files. With Genji, as much as 4GB can be taken up by game files to quicken load times. According to Sony representatives, a three minute one time only procedure will load the 4GB of game data to your PS3's hard drive. As a result, in-game load times will be cut from 15 seconds down to 4 seconds.

Console gamers have long lobbied that their PlayStations and Xboxes didn't have to worry about such silly things as multi-gigabyte installations or patches to enjoy their games. And now as we progress further with console development, we're seeing consoles take on some of the same characteristics as their PC counterparts. And just today, we saw the release of a patch for Saints Row that fixes a number of issues that should have been caught before the game went gold -- and this is two months after the initial release.

And this leads us all down the road that Sony executives have been hinting at for the past few months -- an always connected, disc-less console with massive amounts of internal storage. Sony's Phil Harrison first talked of a "disc-less" future when he commented that the PlayStation 4 was unlikely to have an optical disc drive. Sony's Jamie McDonald followed up in early October by saying that the majority of gaming content would be provided digitally in the next five years.

So as we all sit around and battle over DVD-9 vs Blu-ray for the current generation of gaming consoles, it looks as though it may become a non-issue in the not too distant future if Sony has its way.

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Great idea
By rocchioo on 10/31/06, Rating: 0
RE: Great idea
By edogawaconan on 10/31/2006 11:02:22 PM , Rating: 2
Great. When PC games increased in term of copy protection (which normally forces you to use the game disc), Sony plans to make disc-less game console.


RE: Great idea
By Ecmaster76 on 10/31/2006 11:10:51 PM , Rating: 2
They wont be disc-less unless someone cracks it.

Even if all the data is copied (unlikely) I guarantee its still gonna require the disc.


RE: Great idea
By edogawaconan on 11/1/2006 12:17:47 AM , Rating: 2
I'm not saying it for PS3. But to their plan for PS4


RE: Great idea
By kamel5547 on 11/1/2006 12:42:29 AM , Rating: 2
Right because you'll have to download all the games... and they'll be DRM'esd enough to make you cry knowing SOny's style. As far as PC's its still better than whats the first word of paragraph 3 sentence 2 on page 102 (cause thats what it used to be like)


RE: Great idea
By Chapbass on 11/1/2006 1:51:18 AM , Rating: 2
ohhhhh man go go gadget star wars games! they did that ALL the time...so silly...especially after i lost my manual and just had to start guessing planets at times. good stuff.


RE: Great idea
By rushfan2006 on 11/1/2006 9:55:10 AM , Rating: 3
quote:
As far as PC's its still better than whats the first word of paragraph 3 sentence 2 on page 102 (cause thats what it used to be like)


LOL...yep I remember those days, also remember back when games came on 5 1/4" floppys, and almost all the "first run" games came with some kind of decoder ring with multiple rings on it. You had to align the rings matching up certain symbols or numbers and then type or select the corresponding system/number displayed in the center of the wheel...that was the "copy protection".

Until they figured out something....called a Xerox machine...;)

Folks started dismantling the decoder wheels and photocoping them...LOL...I remember my older brother, me, his friends and my uncle (the oldest gamer I know btw...today he's in his 60's and still games regularly...and he's career....cop for over 30 years..lol) had stacks of xeroxed decoder wheels for games like Bard's Tale and Ultima.




RE: Great idea
By pixelslave on 11/1/2006 9:46:24 PM , Rating: 2
If it's DRM'ed, I would rather buy a disc -- it's easy and I have the right to resell the disc, but reselling your downloaded DRM'ed game? This is probably SONY's plan to squeeze the used game sellers out of the business.


RE: Great idea
By Lazarus Dark on 11/1/2006 11:31:22 AM , Rating: 2
remember cartridges?- No load time!
Thats why I stuck with n64 when all my friends had dreamcast and playstation. I frickin hated the load time on my friends' ps. well at least sony is doing one thing right with this.


RE: Great idea
By rushfan2006 on 11/1/2006 4:22:09 PM , Rating: 2
True. It's a shame they don't make ultra high capacity, ultra fast access catridge based systems - but that would be hugely expensive. Imagine a fast accessing cartridge with a 30-40 gig capacity.

You know what I also liked about the catridges -- durability....DVDs/CDs are so fragile...I remember tossing N64 carts around left and right, think I even stepped on one by mistake -- still worked without a hitch. If you make a mistake like that with a DVD its toast.

Anyway all that aside, its about damn time someone thought of ripping the page from a PC's book and install the game to the internal HDD. Kind of amazing to me it took this long for a console to do this.



RE: Great idea
By ViperROhb34 on 11/1/2006 7:23:53 PM , Rating: 2
The maker of Oblivion was commented as saying the PS3 version woukdnt load any faster because its Bluray player read DVD's alittle slower then a DVD player.

This is likely a reason they need a larger hardrive.
Imagine games loading from a BLuray disc that are larger then DVD data-wise and reading slower then a DVD.

Their only hope for those games is makers will have to use the hardrive somewhat thus saving the ridiculous loading times one might face.


Non-issue?
By kextyn on 10/31/06, Rating: 0
RE: Non-issue?
By FITCamaro on 10/31/2006 11:34:17 PM , Rating: 2
Exactly. You're always going to need some kind of storage medium. Unless the PS4 is gonna have like a 1TB hard drive (and even then) you can't store every game you own on it. And even if they did, they'd have to have some way of copying games to disc in case you run out of space.

Blu-ray might have higher capacity. But 25GB of data should not be needed for a game yet. An 8.5GB dual layer DVD should be more than enough space. Even top PC games are only hitting 5-6GB of data right now. Oblivion's files fits on one single layer DVD. The largest game on my hard drive is FFXI which rings in at 7.5GB with all 4 expansions.


RE: Non-issue?
By thegrimreaper3 on 11/1/2006 12:34:37 AM , Rating: 2
vanguard will be 25 gigs i hear... and flight sim X is 15 gigs.. thes are of cource pc games mind you... but it wont be long..


RE: Non-issue?
By Xavian on 11/1/2006 6:28:59 AM , Rating: 2
vanguard is 25GB when its installed (i.e not when its compressed on a disc), it fits all only a single DVD-9 with no problems.

You also forget an important thing, vanguard is a mmorpg, this means a LOT of textures and art assets to fill the massive game world. Compare this to a game like RE4 (the GC version, since its better), where most of the game takes place in 'rooms', there is no massive game world that needs to be textures, in RE4, the world is simply a skybox with nice textures and effects place up them.

The reason why FSX takes 15 GB (uncompressed and installed on the HDD, NOT on disc), is much the same reason, you fly a plane, over a very large, textured world, the world needs to be realistic (since its a simulator), so we are talking a massive world, that games 10 years from now wont need or reach.

So FSX is a rather large exception rather than the rule to PC games. I still don't see the need for Blu-ray.


RE: Non-issue?
By Assimilator87 on 11/1/2006 7:05:29 AM , Rating: 2
Since consoles load the data from the disc, it would be optimal to have it all uncompressed so in that sense Blu-ray is better.


RE: Non-issue?
By SimonB on 11/1/2006 7:27:35 AM , Rating: 2
That assumes that disc read time is faster than the CPU(s) can decompress. There used to be a PC utility that compressed data on-the-fly before it wrote to the hard disk. In some instances it made systems faster as the reduced read/writes saved more time than the CPU decompression/compression took.


RE: Non-issue?
By Pirks on 11/1/2006 11:15:19 AM , Rating: 2
quote:
we are talking a massive world, that games 10 years from now wont need or reach
OMG Crysis will take more than 10 years to reach us! Thanks for a good laugh man :)


RE: Non-issue?
By IronGeek on 11/1/2006 8:54:08 PM , Rating: 2
640K oughtta be enough for anybody.


RE: Non-issue?
By trabpukcip on 11/1/2006 7:57:39 AM , Rating: 2
I believe that all games code for all regions, languages and TV formats are all on one blu-ray disc.

If data is being cached to the HD you would only need data for the current PS3 console location in use.

What I would like to see is easy to do console upgrades with generic HD's (and manufacturers warranty intact). But I don't see that happening anytime soon.


RE: Non-issue?
By Trisped on 11/1/2006 1:50:15 PM , Rating: 2
The quote is in reference to the PS4, which would probably have 1TB of storage space.

The issue then becomes download time and storage limitations, as Sony is claming that many games need 20GB now, so I expect the PS4 games will need 40-50GB, which puts a 1TB drive at 20 games. Then there is the fact that most games expand out so they load faster, and the fact that you have to download them. If you figure a download speed of 6Mb/s for 50G it would only take 18.5 hours to download a game. And to save money Sony would probably run it as torrent, so your upload would be affected too. Internet connection changes from a tool to a necessity, like electricity.


Blu-ray drive
By InsidiousAngel on 11/1/2006 7:37:59 AM , Rating: 2
I haven't posted much here, and I don't think I saw this commented on, so I will throw this out there about the drive. I read an article in Game informer, discussing the upcoming Oblivion for PS3, and the developer stated that the Blu-ray drive was twice as slow as the 360's DVD drive. Which they then stated do not expect the load times to be faster than the 360 version. At the same time, they also didn't state that it would be any slower either, which could be a possibility. So I wonder if the loading of data to the PS3 hard drive is to counteract the slower access of the Blu-Ray disc?




RE: Blu-ray drive
By Topweasel on 11/1/06, Rating: 0
RE: Blu-ray drive
By Aikouka on 11/1/2006 11:36:29 AM , Rating: 2
Yup, it's really the speeds on the drives that make the Blu-Ray worse to load from, but I'm really not surprised to see the speed of the drive. Sony chose new-tech and almost all optical new-tech comes in at slow speeds ranging around 1x (I remember the old 1x CD-Rom and 1x DVD-Rom devices). It simply may've been a bit hasty of a choice by Sony to use a very recent-to-market idea in their console, especially when optics are the slowest part of a system (in comparison to cache, memory, solid state and fixed disc (hdd)). Making a waiter in a restaurant even slower doesn't help to feed the hungry fast eaters ;).


RE: Blu-ray drive
By Topweasel on 11/1/2006 12:54:30 PM , Rating: 2
Well you got to keep one thing in Mind. 1X BD is still like four times faster then DVD 1x was when released in terms of raw speed. It will just take some time to ramp up to about 8X which will probably be near the cap in terms of throughput and disc spin speed. It does have the ability (along with HD-DVD) to about double the transfer rate where as CD and DVD ended at about the same(22-25 MB/s).


RE: Blu-ray drive
By InsidiousAngel on 11/1/2006 2:21:26 PM , Rating: 2
You are correct; BD does have a faster 1x start, but roughly 5x the capacity. I think the debate here (for PS3 at least) is your accessing large uncompressed textures and amounts of data at less than 8x DVD speeds. The 360 uses a 12x DVD-ROM which provides at max an additional 5 MB/s accessing a DVD5 or DVD9 tops. All of this is theoretical of course, and the only real conclusion can come when you start comparing load times on games like Oblivion which have a lot of access time on a 360 vs. how it will it fair on a PS3 with the slower read access of a Blu-ray Drive.


RE: Blu-ray drive
By Aikouka on 11/1/2006 3:48:02 PM , Rating: 2
Trust me, I know that aspect as well :). It all differs in how fast the drive spins compared with the density of the pits that offers the theoretical max read speeds. Since the blue wavelength is smaller, it fits more pits into one area and therefore reading across one area in comparison to DVD yields more information.

Although I don't see how theoretically DVD would end at the same speed as CD based on what I just said (as DVD also uses a smaller wavelength than CD) and two discs made from the same base material should be able to stand up to the same spin speeds (as we know if a CD reaches a certain speed, it will shatter). So at the same actual spin speed (not 1x vs 1x but rpm vs rpm), a DVD should read more than a CD.


RE: Blu-ray drive
By ViperROhb34 on 11/1/2006 7:26:37 PM , Rating: 2
I just made a comment above before I saw the your post.
THe Oblivion makers said the PS3 version wouldnt load faster because of its slower DVD read times...

I feel this is a reason they will NEED the hardrive to store some of the games on larger ones or load times could be a real issue..


HD not going to last long.
By Combatcolin on 11/1/2006 5:00:56 AM , Rating: 2
5GB a game?

Ouch.




RE: HD not going to last long.
By aGoGo on 11/1/2006 5:32:07 AM , Rating: 2
4 games for the PS3 Basic,
12 for the Premium =/


RE: HD not going to last long.
By Aikouka on 11/1/2006 10:08:42 AM , Rating: 2
Eh, there's a problem in your thought process and I even thought the same way until I realized we're not thinking correctly. A lot of people seem to be relating this to PC gaming where you install a game and leave it there. PC gamers (as far as what I've personally seen) tend to never uninstall a game unless the game turns out to be a flop and just isn't fun. So, if there's a chance they'll play it within a couple months, it stays on the hard drive.

I really don't see this being the way people treat the PS3's hard drive loading capability. Especially for certain games such as an RPG, you tend to play them in large spurts, so the content being on the HDD is really only helpful while the game is seeing heavy use.

Although, I do see games like Halo (using XBOX as an example) staying on a Hard Drive, since for most people, if they owned an XBOX and Halo, they played it often enough to warrant it a permanent position.

So yeah, that's my 2 cents on it. I don't see size being an issue if people take it from a console gamer's standpoint and not a PC gamer's standpoint. In short, PC Gamers are used to the excess space, console gamers aren't.


About time
By hstewarth on 11/1/2006 11:28:07 AM , Rating: 3
About time they did this in consoles. I really hope they allow you to installed the game, play the game without disk in the machine and store the game away.

If XBox 360 had this feature, my Tiger Woods would still work - because the drive would not have eat when it accidently got tilted while playting the game.

This is a very good idea.




RE: About time
By freon on 11/1/2006 3:21:37 PM , Rating: 2
They wont let you do that simply because it opens the door for very easy piracy. Other than that, the games will contain far too much data to allow a full install.
What Sony is saying is the install will be limited to small chunks of game data, to save loading times. The disc will surely still be accessed for video, smaller files, and other data that will not take 15-20-30 or more seconds to load.


hmmm
By MDme on 10/31/2006 11:47:22 PM , Rating: 2
When Sony does this, I wonder if it will be possible to take a drive and make an image of it (with all the games loaded)?

I seriously doubt that it (disc-less) will happen on the PS4 unless they plan to alienate a lot of the third world market without adequate broadband infrastructure.




RE: hmmm
By Clauzii on 10/31/2006 11:58:53 PM , Rating: 2
Maybe "Cardridges" aka. Polymer-storage or Holo-cards. It's about time - the first TESA-film storage device I saw dates around 15 years (or more) back!


Not bad
By Suomynona on 11/1/06, Rating: 0
RE: Not bad
By otispunkmeyer on 11/1/2006 5:25:21 AM , Rating: 2
same with the xbox

whack in a big 3.5inch IDE drive, load up xbox media center and you have a cracking SD media machine, and you can load games right of the Hard Disk too

in that way the old consoles really have abit of a 1 up on the new consoles


RE: Not bad
By tozz on 11/1/2006 5:27:47 AM , Rating: 2
That's the idea, you will be able to take any disk out there and use it. It does however use 2.5" disks so size aren't quite up there yet, but you'll be able to get a lot more than 60gb :)


RE: Not bad
By Seer on 11/1/06, Rating: 0
It's...
By Pollock on 11/1/2006 6:43:02 AM , Rating: 1
It's Riiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiidge Raaaaacer!




RE: It's...
By MonkeyPaw on 11/1/2006 7:32:48 AM , Rating: 3
Yeah, RR has possibly the most annoying voice-over of any game ever made.

Personally, I don't mind the load times. It gives you a mandatory break, allowing you to catch up on all the blinking you missed during the game. ;)


A Great Idea, But....
By UserDoesNotExist on 11/1/2006 9:20:43 AM , Rating: 2
This would be a good idea, a great idea even, if the hard drives were larger. As it stands, with 20 to 60 GB hard drives being the norm, there simply isn't enough room to do this, especially as games start to install more and more on the hard drive. The 60 GB hard drive will suffice for now, but it'll quickly fill up even for the non-hardcore gamer. Unfortunately, the hard drive for the PS3 is built into the console, so if more games start doing this (which I expect they will) Sony's going to need to release PS3s with larger hard drives. The snap-on hard drive for the 360, weird as it looked at the time, is starting to make sense now.

Anyone else worried about heat dissipation though?




RE: A Great Idea, But....
By InsidiousAngel on 11/1/2006 11:24:40 AM , Rating: 2
Yeah wasn't too sure about the snap-on hard drive and the concept of 'taking it to a buddy's house'. However, with MS in the works to release a 100GB HDD in Korea, means most likely the other markets are going to get the same product. And considering the constant patches, expansions to games via marketplace, and not to mention demo's and music, I welcome that feature now.


Makes sense.
By Clauzii on 10/31/2006 11:52:50 PM , Rating: 2
In that it also makes the BR-drive last longer, by decreasing the amount of use of it.

If it also means that ones favorite games could be instantly avaiable, saving wear & tear on the discs, it really makes sense :)




nice....
By otispunkmeyer on 11/1/2006 4:04:37 AM , Rating: 2
this is a good idea

speeds up the console and reduces the noise, my 360's disc drive is the loudest thing i've heard, running demos off the HDD is much quieter

however, hopefully every game doesnt decide to do this as 20gb will last about 2 seconds and the 60gb drive wont be far behind, especially if sony intend you to be using it as some kind of media center too with photos n HD video and what not

it would be even cooler if you could install game content on another machine attached to your network, then the console could tap into as much HDD space as you could cram into a PC case and stream game data over your network. it has gig ethernet doesnt it? so speed wouldnt be a problem




Is it not possible
By Merry on 11/1/2006 5:30:21 AM , Rating: 2
To use a part of the HDD as some form of temporary swapfile in order to reduce loading times. Surely that would be a better idea?




Not so much
By BOLt on 11/1/2006 10:06:07 AM , Rating: 2
quote:
So as we all sit around and battle over DVD-9 vs Blu-ray for the current generation of gaming consoles, it looks as though it may become a non-issue in the not too distant future if Sony has its way.


Sony may have its way, but it'll be at least 5 years down the road unless they release new versions of the PS3. Sony has stated that the PS3 will be its console for the next 5 years or more. That is to say, there will not be a newer console released by Sony (read: PS4) for at least five years. Implementation of such "disc-less" console design, while great, is very far off.

Also, PCs rule.




By rpgman1 on 11/1/2006 1:59:20 PM , Rating: 2
There has to be some software programs that can use external hard drives to the PS3's USB ports. 60GB is too small to save up who knows how many games players buy. Those hackers with HDloader did a great job for the PS2. Let's just hope Sony doesn't go after hackers with C&D letters and lawsuits just as they did to Lik Sang. Developers are already having a hard time trying to program their games on the console as it is. If Sony keeps chasing down hackers and programmers who can crack the PS3s, then not many people will buy the system as it is.




Here comes the sony haters
By Serifan on 11/1/06, Rating: -1
RE: Here comes the sony haters
By MrX8503 on 11/1/2006 1:58:27 AM , Rating: 3
New Tech=Expensive. I dont care if we get a bluray player at a discount, its still expensive. Remember when CD/DVD burners first came out and how expensive they were? Same thing here.

People say buying a PS3 is futureproof with the bluray. IMO i see it as paying a premium for an unestablished medium.

One last thing, the hacking community was able to make the xbox a discless console a long time ago. Sony making the PS3 being able to save partial games would just help the hacking community and I wouldnt be suprised if the PS3 becomes discless.


RE: Here comes the sony haters
By Serifan on 11/1/06, Rating: 0
We don't know how to make a $500 computer that's not a piece of junk." -- Apple CEO Steve Jobs

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