We're looking for new writers to join us!

CES 2007 - IBM

by: Chuck -
More On:

When you think about next generation gaming you really don’t think about IBM. I know I’m a bit old school but when I think of IBM I usually think of patents (they usually crank out the most patents every year), mainframes, and nerdy white guys wearing striped short sleeve shirts with bad ties. That’s a far cry from the truth though as IBM is behind some of the hardware in the Xbox 360, Wii, and the PS3. Today we got spent 30 minutes with Stephen Canepa, IBM’s VP of Global Media and Entertainment Industry to talk about where IBM is going in these venues.

For their in home services they are focused on two main areas, processing capacity and security. In terms of processing power you don’t get more powerful than IBM’s new Cell processor. Right now it’s the brains behind the PS3 as well as a bunch of other digital content creation schemes. IBM is showing off a demo at CES where the processor is rendering 720P output in real time and Mr. Canepa indicated that the processor could handle 1080p output but they lacked the bandwidth to do so currently.

Security is another interesting media area as it relates to protecting content and DRM. Currently a lot of media is bound to the physical media it’s distributed on and IBM is working on a new way that would allow you to transfer that security to other devices. This would allow for “content portability” which could be pretty cool as you could legally share content between devices.    This may mean that you’ll be able to rip that HD DVD copy to your media server at home and then view it on other devices in your house (which seems to be all the rage these days) as well as being a key factor in the digital distribution.
 
Another interesting tidbit that was gleaned from our meeting this afternoon was that IBM is allowing their massive consulting services full access to this technology so they can come up with new ways of applying it in a bunch of new ways.