Sony Puts Playstation to Work

Most of us have heard of projects like SETI, but who would have thought that a toy would be able to participate in distributed computing ? Sony Computer Entertainment Inc. just announced that PLAYSTATION 3 PS3 computer entertainment systems will have the capability to connect to Stanford University’s Folding@home program, a distributed computing project aimed at understanding protein folding, misfolding and related diseases. Folding@home is leveraging PS3’s Cell Broadband Engine and what will be an even more powerful distributed supercomputing network of PS3 systems to help study the causes of diseases such as Parkinson’s, Alzheimer’s, cystic fibrosis and many cancers. Because the process of folding proteins is so complex, computers are used to perform simulations to study the process. Since these simulations can take up to 30 years for a single computer to complete, Folding@home enables this task to be shared among thousands of computers connected via the network, using distributed computing technology. Once the data is processed, the information is sent back via the Internet to the central computer. The Cell/B.E. processor inside each PS3, which Sony says is roughly 10 times faster than a standard mainstream chip inside a PC, will help researchers perform the simulations much faster, speeding up the research process. With the latest system software update expected to become available at the end of March, the Folding@home icon will be added to the Network menu of the XMB (XrossMediaBar). PS3 users can join the program by simply clicking on the Folding@home icon or can optionally set the application to run automatically whenever their PS3 is idle.