PSP2 Power Causes Delays

There’s been a rumor circulating around the NeoGAF forums recently regarding the oft-rumored Playstation Portable 2 (PSP2).
An (ex) Nvidia engineer has leaked information that the PSP2 will be powered by Nvidia’s Tegra II line.

Quoted from source:

It is now set for a CES showing, but it will almost assuredly be released at a later date. This isn’t due to the number of engineers mauled by moles yesterday, but because the Tegra 2 is massively over it’s promised power budget. In a segment that finds 5% overages unacceptable, Tegra 2 is 20%+ over power budget. That explains why Nvidia PR suddenly changed the focus of the PSP2 screed to avoid the word ‘phone’, but, luckily for Sony, the PSP2 does not have phone capabilities.

The power ‘whoopsie’ means delays and possibly spec downgrades for the PSP2, but we will have to see where it ends up. Between that overage and several showstopper bugs, Sony is said to be very miffed at Nvidia right now. Even the moles could sense that before they pounced on engineer after engineer. The scene in the streets is almost as bad as the scenes in the Nvidia meeting rooms when the Sony people come around.

If the chip that Sony uses for the PSP2 is a vanilla Tegra 2, the design is in trouble. If they use a custom version of the part, there is a chance for things to work out in the end, but expect many delays as the silicon is respun and respun. For a device that has already been delayed because of it’s CPU, that is not a good sign.

In short, either they’re installing an overpowering Tegra chip in the PSP2 or Nvidia engineers will have to find ways to create a custom Tegra exclusive for Sony’s handheld. If the rumor is true, we’ll be seeing the next PSP unveiled on January 2011 (the next CES). But don’t expect any release date yet. This one’s still a long way off.

For those interested in the nitty-gritty of Nvidia’s Tegra II, specs down below:

Tegra 2xx series
Tegra 250

• Processor: Dual-core ARM Cortex-A9 MPCore, up to 1 GHz [8]
• Graphics: double 3D graphics performance of Tegra 600 series
• LP-DDR2 / DDR2
• 1080p H.264/VC-1/MPEG-4 Video Decode
• 1080p H.264 Video Encode
• JPEG encode and decode
• dual-display support
• camera support

Sony’s itching to push the Nintendo 3DS off the top spot. It’s gonna be a long and rough battle.

Source:
NeoGAF Forums
NVidia Official Site

Tags: Nvidia, Playkultur, Playstation Portable, PSP, Sony, Tegra