USC game hardware course material to include IBM PowerPC 970MP

The Univesity of Southern California School of Engineering will be offering a new course, Game Hardware Architectures, which includes classes on IBM's dual core PowerPC 970MP.




The inclusion of the 970MP in the course is interesting, since no game console uses it. However, its single core predecessor, the PowerPC 970, is used in Power Mac G5 development boxes for Microsoft's Xbox 360. Furthermore, all three next generation consoles are PowerPC based*, so it makes sense to study other PowerPC chips for comparative purposes. Also, practically, it will be a lot easier to get 970MP machines (ie. Power Macs) for labs (assuming 970MP machines are released soon by Apple or IBM) than it will be to get development machines with the same CPUs as the consoles.

* - Confirmed for the Sony PlayStation 3 and Microsoft Xbox 360, and presumed for the Nintendo Revolution (since IBM will be making the chip).