"A fast-paced tell-all. . .one of the great business stories of our young century." —Steve Cherry, IEEE Spectrum Magazine The Xbox 360 and PlayStation 3 game systems have changed the face of home entertainment. But few know the amazing story inside the consoles—how David Shippy and his team of engineers at the Sony/Toshiba/IBM Design Center (STI) forged the tiny miracle at the core of it all: a revolutionary microprocessor chip that set a new paradigm in personal computing. At stake were the livelihoods—and sanity—of an unsung group of tireless visionaries. At war were the giants Microsoft and Sony. «Drama and secret deals. . . This is the real deal.» —Bob Molyneaux, ChipBridge Here is a dazzling, behind-the-scenes account of life in the tech world, featuring memorable characters, high-level corporate intrigue, and cutthroat business dealings. It's a story that's never been told—until now. «The real story of a team of people tasked with doing the impossible.» —John C. Beck, author of Got Game "Remarkable. . .fascinating." —Dean Takahashi, author of Opening the Xbox "The story of the whole effort to build the Cell." — The Wall Street Journal
Оглавление
David Shippy. The Race For A New Game Machine:
THE RACE FOR A NEW GAME MACHINE
David Shippy and Mickie Phipps
CONTENTS
INTRODUCTION
ACKNOWLEDGMENTS
NOTE TO THE READER
PROLOGUE
CHAPTER 1. The Holy Grail Vision
CHAPTER 2. Building a Team for Success
CHAPTER 3. Know Your Competition
CHAPTER 4. Do Your Homework
CHAPTER 5. Inspire Innovation
CHAPTER 6. Work Hard, Play Hard!
CHAPTER 7. Enable Engineering Risk-Taking
CHAPTER 8. Enable Corporate Risk-Taking
CHAPTER 9. Stay Positive, Even in the Swirl of Controversy
CHAPTER 10. Keep Up the Pace
CHAPTER 11. Be Proactive, Anticipate Problems
CHAPTER 12. Celebrate Success!
CHAPTER 13. Plan Ahead, Be Persistent, and Be Patient
EPILOGUE
NERD WORD ALLEY
INDEX
Отрывок из книги
Creating the Chips Inside the Xbox 360 and the PlayStation 3
I love you more than words can express.
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Kahle threw big parties for the design team at his house, nestled on the cliffs overlooking Lake Austin. Always a savvy investor, he built his house back in the 1980s before the rest of the world discovered Austin. The folks at his parties were rowdy and consumed lots of beer and margaritas. Kahle cooked his famous “Kahle burgers,” delicious, if technically inelegant—thick, hearty, and smothered in cheese. Classic rock tunes from the 1960s and ’70s played in the background. There were generally two camps of folks at the parties: The first camp wanted to talk nonstop about work (shoptalk). They could pontificate ad nauseam about the details of their work. The second camp, which I belonged to, wanted to talk about anything but work. Both camps liked to drink a lot.
We were having so much fun, we didn’t even realize we’d awakened a sleeping giant. It took several years, but ultimately Intel crushed Somerset just as they did all of their competitors. Kahle fondly referred to those days as “taking on the dark side.” There was a negative perception of Intel in the engineering world due to the technology giant’s monopoly of the PC microprocessor design space. On the software side, there was a similar perception of Microsoft, which dominated the software used on PCs. Microsoft and Intel, nicknamed the “Wintel” pair for their combination of the Windows operating system and the Intel microprocessor, presented a formidable foe. Even facing that serious challenge, Somerset was still a fun and intellectually stimulating environment that Kahle and I both badly wanted to re-create in the STI Design Center—but this time, we meant to win.
