It's tight on RAM (only 256MB main memory + 256MB VRAM, a large portion of which can be used as fast swap space, at least on Linux), the SPUs will sit mostly idle unless your software is specifically written to utilise them. Especially older models consume a lot of power, even when idle. A cheap Atom-based Nettop or NAS is probably better for home server type stuff.
That'd be my question as well. In older times, the performance/price ratio of PS3s was very good. A lot of universities at least considered building a cluster of them. But the PS3 is getting pretty old.
The cells SPUs are comparable to modern ATI/NV GPU computing, and new graphics cards are released every year. Wouldn't it be more cost-effective to buy a GPU card?
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How does a PS3 compare spec-wise with a regular PC? Alternative server solution?
It's tight on RAM (only 256MB main memory + 256MB VRAM, a large portion of which can be used as fast swap space, at least on Linux), the SPUs will sit mostly idle unless your software is specifically written to utilise them. Especially older models consume a lot of power, even when idle. A cheap Atom-based Nettop or NAS is probably better for home server type stuff.
That'd be my question as well. In older times, the performance/price ratio of PS3s was very good. A lot of universities at least considered building a cluster of them. But the PS3 is getting pretty old.
The cells SPUs are comparable to modern ATI/NV GPU computing, and new graphics cards are released every year. Wouldn't it be more cost-effective to buy a GPU card?