Windows on PS3


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So, I have been very interested in putting Windows on my PS3 for one main reason mostly, it would blow the one I'm currently on out of the water, in everything by half or more.

But I have heard that you cannot put Windows on the PS3 due to the fact that it is a IBM PowerPC based processor.

Was wondering, is it true that it wont work with Windows because of this? And if it doesn't work then is there anyway I can mod my PS3 so that it would work?

thxs, Zab

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No, unless you had the source code for windows. The only reason you can even put Linux on there is because you can port GCC to the processor architecture and then compile your kernel. Windows is made to run only on the x86 platform of personal computers. Sorry. You can still install Linux if you want. I hear its pretty neat to use on a PS3. Look at Yellow Dog Linux if you're interested.

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You could theoretically run Windows on a PPC processor(see the old Windows Virtual Machine for Mac). Use an emulator like bochs or something. Keep in mind, even on the PS3, it'll be horrible slow

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You could theoretically run Windows on a PPC processor(see the old Windows Virtual Machine for Mac). Use an emulator like bochs or something. Keep in mind, even on the PC, it'll be horrible slow

What I was about to say ;) lol

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To run windows on PS3 you'd first have to run linux and then run windows inside a virtual machine. Witch would be very slow. It's been done just to say "hey I booted windows XP on my PS3" but it's really not practical.

Even running Linux on PS3 now is slow at some things, Sony hase locked out access to the graphics processor and the 256MB video ram it has while running another OS (such as linux). So you only have access to the Cell and it's 256MB of ram. Cell can be pretty quick with its 1 PPC core and 7 SPUs but applications need to be coded to even use SPUs, so to really get good performance each application needs to be written just for the PS3 under linux.

Hackers are finding ways to access the PS3s graphics processor anyways, so probably a lot will done with PS3 and Linux and the future but don't hope to run Windows.

In linux i was able download torrents and watch 720x480 xvid movie files without a problem, any resolution over that and VLC really started to struggle but VLC can't access the graphics processor at all and it isn't using any of Cell's SPUs. I'm sure eventually well see programs like VLC and probably a lot of emulators ported and optimized for the PS3, and with hackers getting access to the graphics processor the future of linux on PS3 is a bright one.

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Concerning a VM: Can it even run on the processor? Remember that the VM just translates instruction sets. Wouldn't the VM need to be ported to that CPU architecture? Maybe I'm mistaken on how it works, but it seems that it would be alot of work to make it function.

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Concerning a VM: Can it even run on the processor? Remember that the VM just translates instruction sets. Wouldn't the VM need to be ported to that CPU architecture? Maybe I'm mistaken on how it works, but it seems that it would be alot of work to make it function.

yeah your right I meant to say Emulation, witch is even slower then VM :p

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Windows is made to run only on the x86 platform of personal computers. Sorry.

Well, there used to be a PowerPC version "back in the day" (I forget if it it was NT4 or NT5 Beta when it was last seen).

Technically, there still one (where "Windows" is a more loosely defined term, at least) - but it only ships on the Xbox 360 :p In fact that one would probably run pretty well, if it were possible to do so, considering it runs on an essentially identical CPU.

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Concerning a VM: Can it even run on the processor? Remember that the VM just translates instruction sets. Wouldn't the VM need to be ported to that CPU architecture? Maybe I'm mistaken on how it works, but it seems that it would be alot of work to make it function.

Technically, what you need is something like the old Virtual PC for the PPC Macs... which I think boils down to a Virtual Machine that runs inside an x86 emulator.

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Well, there used to be a PowerPC version "back in the day" (I forget if it it was NT4 or NT5 Beta when it was last seen).

Technically, there still one (where "Windows" is a more loosely defined term, at least) - but it only ships on the Xbox 360 :p In fact that one would probably run pretty well, if it were possible to do so, considering it runs on an essentially identical CPU.

Windows NT 4.0 was the last major release of NT to support the Alpha, MIPS or PowerPC CPU architectures.

I still have the CD and the three boot floppies it came on.

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