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With the PS3 you can use a keyboard and mouse, and there are options for the 360.

They're even still publicising this fact here...

Not only is the entire page false advertising, but the most explicit lie is at the bottom of the page:

"To use the Linux operating system, you must update the PS3 system software to version 1.60 or later."

"OR LATER"

You read that right... they're claiming that all versions of the firmware after 1.60 will allow you to install/run Linux.

Sony, you are so fucked. Even MICROSOFT gave the people what they wanted when they fucked up (xbox360 replacements, at THEIR expense, pre-paid shipping container and all).
Just give the people back the features they paid for and all this can end. It's OKAY to admit you fucked up. Because you did. And the majority of the technological population realizes it, but you don't seem to.

If you want to say "fuck you" to the people who didn't buy your system, hey great, go ahead and insult potential customers, and lose the hope of ever having them as customers.
But when you say "fuck you" to the people who KEEP YOU IN BUSINESS, the game is OVER. That's right, Sony, you are going to cease to exist as a company. When you fuck over your customers, you lose them.
Hope you enjoyed your run as a profitable company, because those days are over.

Of course I can. There's a long list of spots where Sony used to refer to this feature at listed on the PlayedStation blog. The writing at Open Platform for PLAYSTATION 3 is certainly ad copy aimed at the market these are being sold to: people who do their research on-line. I don't believe the print or TV ads mentioned the feature, but Sony's on-line ad campaign, such as material on their web site and interviews done with the press, have plenty of spots where it was highlighted.

How about from Sony's site, playstation.com? http://www.playstation.com/ps3-openplatform/index.html

Even if it wasn't stated in the box, it was advertised that it did run Linux. Even people who doesn't need or care about this functionality should stay up to Sony on this. Next time they may remove a funcionality you do care about. Conceptually, it is the same thing as removing the capability of playing Bluray discs.

Well, Sony certainly "advertises" it in their manual:

http://www.playstation.com/ps3-openplatform/manual.html
http://www.playstation.com/ps3-openplatform/index.html
http://manuals.playstation.net/document/en/ps3/3_15/settings/osinstall.html

Choice quote from the second link:

There is more to the PLAYSTATION®3 (PS3(TM)) computer entertainment system than you may have assumed. In addition to playing games, watching movies, listening to music, and viewing photos, you can use the PS3(TM) system to run the Linux operating system.

It may not be on the box, but it's certainly documented on Sony's own websites

Even if it wasn't stated in the box, it was advertised that it did run Linux. Even people who doesn't need or care about this functionality should stay up to Sony on this. Next time they may remove a funcionality you do care about. Conceptually, it is the same thing as removing the capability of playing Bluray discs.

Well, Sony certainly "advertises" it in their manual:

http://www.playstation.com/ps3-openplatform/manual.html
http://www.playstation.com/ps3-openplatform/index.html
http://manuals.playstation.net/document/en/ps3/3_15/settings/osinstall.html

Choice quote from the second link:

There is more to the PLAYSTATION®3 (PS3(TM)) computer entertainment system than you may have assumed. In addition to playing games, watching movies, listening to music, and viewing photos, you can use the PS3(TM) system to run the Linux operating system.

It may not be on the box, but it's certainly documented on Sony's own websites

The only persons this effects are the ones that want to use BOTH linux stuff and the newest PS3 store things.

Why the fuck should I have to choose between them?

Further, could you tell me where I can find this "from day one" notification to disable this feature? Because Sony have just decided to update this page with a disclaimer which I can tell you was certainly not there two weeks ago.

This law suite should fail. Not that I want to be on SONY's side but they were 100% clear in their intentions regarding the "other os" option from day one.

You mean stating that the PS3 was an "open platform" and that "Other OS" and "Game OS" would always be able to coexist on the same PS3?

They're even still publicising this fact here...

Just for anyone interested (I was), the law cited is:

The owner cited European law Directive 1999/44/EC — which states that goods must (1) comply with the description given by the seller and possess the same qualities and characteristics as other similar goods, and (2) be fit for the purpose which the consumer requires them and which was made known to the seller at the time of purchase. How many other European PS3 owners will follow suit?

I'll be asking for a refund from GameStop as I also were required to remove the portion to be able to buy new games.

I assume you told the GameStop clerk that you were purchasing the PS3 specifically for the particular purpose of installing another OS?

In the US, it's even more explicit:

Uniform Commercial Code 2-315. Implied Warranty: Fitness for Particular Purpose. Where the seller at the time of contracting has reason to know any particular purpose for which the goods are required and that the buyer is relying on the seller's skill or judgment to select or furnish suitable goods, there is unless excluded or modified under the next section an implied warranty that the goods shall be fit for such purpose.

Nonetheless, I doubt Gamestop would give you a refund, and I'm really surprised Amazon gave this guy a warranty:
Gamestop (from http://www.gamestop.com/gs/help/disclaimer.aspx:

TO THE FULL EXTENT PERMISSIBLE BY APPLICABLE LAW, GAMESTOP DISCLAIMS ALL WARRANTIES, EXPRESS OR IMPLIED, INCLUDING BUT NOT LIMITED TO, IMPLIED WARRANTIES OF MERCHANTABILITY AND FITNESS FOR A PARTICULAR PURPOSE.

And Amazon (from http://www.amazon.com/gp/help/customer/display.html/ref=footer_cou?ie=UTF8&nodeId=508088:

TO THE FULL EXTENT PERMISSIBLE BY APPLICABLE LAW, AMAZON DISCLAIM ALL WARRANTIES, EXPRESS OR IMPLIED, INCLUDING, BUT NOT LIMITED TO, IMPLIED WARRANTIES OF MERCHANTABILITY AND FITNESS FOR A PARTICULAR PURPOSE.

And of course, if you go back to the source, here's the one that came in the box with your PS3 (from Sony, here http://us.playstation.com/support/warranties/ps3/index.htm):

THIS WARRANTY IS PROVIDED TO YOU IN LIEU OF ALL OTHER EXPRESS OR IMPLIED WARRANTIES INCLUDING WARRANTIES OF MERCHANTABILITY AND FITNESS FOR A PARTICULAR PURPOSE FOR THE PS3 HARDWARE, WHICH ARE DISCLAIMED HEREUNDER. HOWEVER, IF SUCH WARRANTIES ARE REQUIRED AS A MATTER OF LAW, THEN THEY ARE LIMITED IN DURATION TO THE WARRANTY PERIOD.

If you are having problems downloading directly to a PSP you can also do the download to a PS3 and transfer over to the PSP, or you can get the free Media Go software which runs on a PC and then transfer the download to the PSP. http://us.playstation.com/psn/mediago/index.htm

Taken from the Playstation.com forums (nice work!):
----------------

CREDIT goes to Xrobx who posted these in another thread and i wanted to make sure that everyone sees them...

Sony Computer Entertainment Inc.:
"In addition to playing games, watching movies, listening to music, and viewing photos, you can use the PS3 system to run the Linux operating system. By installing the Linux operating system, you can use the PS3 system not only as an entry-level personal computer with hundreds of familiar applications for home and office use, but also as a complete development environment for the Cell Broadband Engine (Cell/B.E.)."
http://www.playstation.com/ps3-openplatform/index.html

(http://74.125.113.132/search?q=cache:byasL-PxEiMJ:www.playstation.com/ps3-openplatform/index.html+http://www.playstation.com/ps3-openplatform/index.html&cd=1&hl=en&ct=cln
k&gl=us&client=safari) - google's cached page of the above hyperlink from March 30th 2010 which does not say anything about FW 3.21 removing Other OS. I've saved the page in case it goes offline, copy http address into browser as link probably won't work. Or, just search google and get the cached page. - kiyyto.

Phil Harrison, February 2007,
President of Sony Computer Entertainment Worldwide Studios 2005-2008:
"One of the most powerful things about the PS3 is the 'Install Other OS' option."
http://kotaku.com/235049/20-questions-with-phil-harrison-at-dice

Sony Computer Entertainment Inc., 2006-2009:
"The Linux Distributor's Starter Kit provides information, binary and source codes to Linux Distribution developers who wants to make their distro support PS3."
http://www.kernel.org/pub/linux

Izumi Kawanishi, Sony, May 2006:
"Because we have plans for having Linux on board [the PS3], we also recognize Linux programming activities... Other than game studios tied to official developer licenses, we'd like to see various individuals participate in content creation for the PS3."
http://www.gamasutra.com/php-bin/news_index.php?story=9290

Geoffrey Levand, August 2009,
Principal Software Engineer at Sony Corporation:
"Please be assured that SCE is committed to continue the support for previously sold models that have the "Install Other OS" feature and that this feature will not be disabled in future firmware releases."
mailing list to PS3 customers using Linux

Phil Harrison, May 2006,
President of Sony Computer Entertainment Worldwide Studios 2005-2008:
"The Playstation 3 is a computer. We do not need the PC."
http://www.spiegel.de/netzwelt/web/0,1518,418642,00.html
SONY
Make.Believe... you didn't see that

Sure they did

http://www.playstation.com/ps3-openplatform/index.html

Note though, that the feature is gone (read the red part at the top).

And, let's look at the original version of the page

http://web.archive.org/web/20061118073923/http://www.playstation.com/ps3-openplatform/index.html

Sony has just issued a firmware update[1] that disables the "OtherOS" support that is used to run alternate operating systems such as Linux on the Playstation 3 (PS3) game console. This was an advertised feature of the PS3 and was a factor in my decision to purchase the product. The firmware update is effectively mandatory; the PS3 will not support online play or game updates/downloads via the Playstation network without it (these are also advertised features).

That a major consumer electronics company can unilaterally remove advertised features from a product that I have bought and paid for is chilling to say the least and appears misleading and deceptive in the classic "bait and switch" style. I request that the ACCC investigate this matter.

[1] http://blog.us.playstation.com/2010/03/28/ps3-firmware-v3-21-update/

I don't know if America has anything like the Australian Competition & Consumer Commission but if you do, I'd urge you to raise this issue with them (and if you're in Australia, please get onto the case).

This is a simple case of a company changing the specs on a product that you have bought, after you've bought it and changing it in an adverse fashion. It is removing a feature that you have paid for and have possibly had for years, without offering any workaround or compensation.

Sony claim that the update is not mandatory, and that it is entirely your choice if you wish to install it or not, but the simple fact is that by not installing the patch, you lose even more functionality than if you do install it. No PSN. No Playstation Store. On online gaming. No access to new games that require this or a newer firmware. No access to bluray content that requires this or a newer version of the firmware. Etc.

Here's the text of the submission I made to the ACCC (you're limited to 1500 characters)

Sony have recently released a firmware update for the PlayStation 3 Games Console.
From what I can see, all this update does is remove a feature from the console. The feature removed is the "Other OS" support - the ability to install another operating system, such as Linux, on the PS3 and use it as a general purpose computer.

Sony claim that the update is not mandatory, however by not installing this update, you lose access to the PlayStation Network, so any games that require this for online play will no longer work. One of the main reasons for owning a PS3 is the online gameplay component.

More information about other features that will be locked out are here on Sony's web site: http://blog.us.playstation.com/2010/03/28/ps3-firmware-v3-21-update/

"Consumers and organizations that currently use the “Other OS” feature can choose not to upgrade their PS3 systems, although the following features will no longer be available; Ability to sign in to PlayStation Network and use network features that require signing in to PlayStation Network, such as online features of PS3 games and chat Playback of PS3 software titles or Blu-ray Disc videos that require PS3 system software version 3.21 or later Playback of copyright-protected videos that are stored on a media server (when DTCP-IP is enabled under Settings) Use of new features and improvements that are available on PS3 system software 3.21 or later"

The article links to the PS3 forums, where this thread lists 673 posts: http://boardsus.playstation.com/t5/PlayStation-3-Updates/Users-with-3-21-technical-problems/td-p/45470549

Did you try contacting their customer support as suggested in the announcement?
http://blog.us.playstation.com/2010/03/28/ps3-firmware-v3-21-update/

For anyone who's interested I wrote a letter to Sony Customer Support about this. Here is the letter I received as a response. Names were removed

Discussion Thread
Response (xxxxxxxxxxxx) 03/30/2010 04:38 PM
Hello xxxxxxx,

Thank you for writing us with your concerns for the upcoming firmware release and it's features.

The Playstation®User agreement states that we may update the system which may change the operating system.

11. MAINTENANCE AND UPGRADES
From time to time, it may become necessary for SCEA to provide certain content to you to ensure that PlayStation(R)Network and content offered through Playstation®Network, your PlayStation®3 computer entertainment system, the PSP® (PlayStation®Portable) system or other SCEA-authorized hardware is functioning properly in accordance with SCEA guidelines. Some content may be provided automatically without notice when you sign into Playstation®Network. Such content may include automatic updates or upgrades which may change your current operating system, cause a loss of data or content or cause a loss of functionalities or utilities. Such upgrades or updates may be provided for system software for your PlayStation®3 computer entertainment system, the PSP® (PlayStation®Portable) system, or other SCEA-authorized hardware. Access or use to any system software is subject to terms and conditions of a separate end user license agreement found at http://www.us.playstation.com/termsofuse. You authorize SCEA to provide such content and agree that SCEA shall not be liable for any damages arising from provision of such content or maintenance services. It is recommended that you regularly back up any data located on the hard disk that is of a type that can be backed up.

If you'd like to read the full user agreement, you may do so at the link below:

Article Title: Terms of Use and User Agreement
Article Link: http://playstation.custhelp.com/app/answers/detail/a_id/1109


Regards,
xxxxxxxxxxxxxx

"In addition to playing games, watching movies, listening to music, and viewing photos, you can use the PS3 system to run the Linux operating system. By installing the Linux operating system, you can use the PS3 system not only as an entry-level personal computer with hundreds of familiar applications for home and office use, but also as a complete development environment for the Cell Broadband Engine."

But then, you'd be a fool to believe anything written by Sony, I guess.

Was it ever advertised with this feature? No.

Yes. http://www.playstation.com/ps3-openplatform/index.html

Are they taking it away? No (you don't have to take the firmware update)

Don't be surprised when your new Blu Ray movies won't play.

Was it removed for monetary or market gain? No

How do you know?

Was it removed to increase security of the platform Yes

How do you know? Because Sony said so? I guess next time they screw their customers it will be to promote world peace...

I hope you like throwing your money away, as that is what you are doing...

You stand a better chance of sueing George Holtz....

Unfortunately I have to agree.

How can they sell something with a certain set of features and then just take it away? I know, it didn't really work all that well....

1 Because the feature was never advertised

Wrong.

They're still advertising the "Open Platform" feature on their website:
http://www.playstation.com/ps3-openplatform/index.html

"There is more to the PLAYSTATION®3 (PS3(TM)) computer entertainment system than you may have assumed. In addition to playing games, watching movies, listening to music, and viewing photos, you can use the PS3(TM) system to run the Linux operating system."

Let's see how long that page lasts...

Interesting business model, I am not sure it will take off, wasn't it Sony who introduced the much maligned CD copy protection .

if thats all you want, go for:

PS3
or
Xbox360

You may not be aware of this, but they have a Twitter account devoted to the PlayStation and a blog. Sadly, the blog doesn't record the time when the entries were posted, but you may notice the 13-hour stretch between "slim consoles still work" and - well, actually, if you follow the link, it basically reiterates that slim consoles are working.

Then complete silence until the 24-hour period ended, followed by a brief announcement that "hey, it works again!" and then completely ignoring that it ever happened. Instead they've posted several blog entries that conveniently knock the PSN outage way down the page.

Do they intend to fix this issue with a patch? Can they? Does it even matter? Who knows, they certainly aren't saying. All they've said is "oops, sorry" and, well, that's it. Not even a "we're still looking into this matter."

Of course, based on the vague "if we get new information we'll keep you posted," I get the impression that this isn't the fault of the people running the blog, it's that the PlayStation group themselves are simply not bothering to communicate. Maybe they're still looking into it, maybe they aren't, but the community managers apparently have no idea based on the weasel-wording on the blog. And that would be a problem that Sony should address.

But in any case, I still have to wonder: why in the hell does a reduced instruction set computer have a buggy leap-year function? Why the hell does it care what the human-readable date is? All it needs to do is keep track of "units of time since a known start point." Let the OS worry about what the human time is.

As one of the owners of a console that got bit by this bug (and the last revision to support PS2 backwards-compatibility), I'm still rather pissed off by this bug.

First off, it's ridiculously stupid. I'd love to hear an explanation from Sony about how, exactly, they managed to have this bug exist in the first place. First off, I'd love to know why the internal clock considers 2010 a leap year but what I'd also like to know is 1) why this "internal clock" is different from the PS3 clock, which knows 2010 isn't a leap year, and 2) why this "internal clock" works on dates in the first place and not on "units of time offset from a known date."

I mean, it's apparently an internal hardware clock, right? It's not user visible. So why, exactly, is it storing dates and not just being a clock?

I'm sure someone's going to say that I should "just get over it, it's just a video game console" which is true. And honestly, I never really was angry at being locked out of my PS3 for 24 hours. What I'm still pissed about is Sony's piss-poor handling of the entire incident. Which, I suppose, given their track record, I really shouldn't be that surprised about.

Yes, it looks like it's over. It probably fixed itself with the change to March, 2. Now, I hope they will be able to prevent this from happening again.

woops wrong first link in post http://blog.us.playstation.com/2010/03/latest-info-on-playstation-network-status/

Here is a monday afternoon post from playstation detailing issue and serving warnings to not even turn on affected units http://blog.us.playstation.com/2010/02/playstation-network-status-update/ updates to problem will be on their Twitter page http://twitter.com/sonyplaystation

Its actually $30, but there are a great number of PS3 games that are in the Greatest Hits series.

Also, PSP Greatest Hits do go for $19.99.

Its actually $30, but there are a great number of PS3 games that are in the Greatest Hits series.

Also, PSP Greatest Hits do go for $19.99.

It was just last week that Sony announced that "hey guess what? Even though you bought the PS3 thinking online networking would be free, well not anymore suckas!".

I must have missed that. Sony is still advertising the Playstation Network as "100% Free". Where did they announce the change last week?

I wonder if they built a modern "Racing Destruction Set" and gave it the level creation tools and networking power of Little Big Planet if it would be a long time hit.

We may get a chance to find out with ModNation Racers for the PS3.

You know, this has the potential to get rather interesting...

Sony is being sued by a blind fellow for not making their PS3 ADA compliant. Amazon was threatened with a lawsuit by the Authors Guild for making their Kindle ADA compliant. Now Intel is taunting the Authors Guild by making a device with the express purpose of giving blind and otherwise visually impaired access to written works.

You right.. never thought to look, but playstation.com fails miserably at xhtml According to http://valiadator.w3c.org/ the http://www.us.playstation.com/ site throws up 159 errors and 88 warnings. It looks like none of the images have alt tags... and they did some real bad coding.

Excuse me?

Some consoles actually are a fair bit more open than others.

There's no guarantee that Sony might not make a similar move at some point. The "openness" of the PS3 referenced above is not inherently assured.

Excuse me?

Some consoles actually are a fair bit more open than others.

Excuse you. The magic of the console, and one of its fundamental "advantages" was supposedly that you didn't have to build it, replace parts, upgrade it, etc. like you would a PC. And since that was true, the developers could assume a static hardware platform and optimize for it.

The post you replied to had nothing to do with "open-ness", but I will just point out that the newest version of the PS3 is much more "closed" than the versions before.

Excuse me?

Some consoles actually are a fair bit more open than others.

The sony playstaion official page is dripping with sarcasm and deeper in the posts are not moderated. Deeper in you see people saying games even crash and freeze now! http://blog.us.playstation.com/2009/08/playstation-3-firmware-v3-00-update/comment-page-40/#comments

You mean kinda like the same way I can load GCC onto my PS3?

You have a fat PS3, which is switchable between a game console and a desktop computer at boot time. But I have a feeling Sony will discontinue it in the fourth quarter of this year, just as it discontinued the fat PS2 in favor of the slim PS2. And like the slim PS2, Xbox 360, and Wii, the slim PS3 is exclusively a game console.

Here's a rumor posted on the PSN boards: http://boardsus.playstation.com/playstation/board/message?message.uid=42798489 I said rumor but the post raises some questions that no one has addressed so far:

- "OtherOS" support has been removed.
- A Cheaper Blu-ray drive is being used. It wont be any slower, but expect to see similar issues that another competitor had a while ago.
- Touch-sensitive buttons on the front for power/eject are gone in favour of cheaper push buttons.

This makes the first batch of PS3s that came out, the "best" ones to own (backwards compatibility with PS2 games from having the full emotion engine on hardware, ability to swap in drives as big as 500GB and being able to install other OSes)

First off, there is still plenty of coding involved to support PS2 titles even when one has the Emotion Engine chip present only on earlier PS3s. The chip doesn't just work on its own without associated driver software that needs to be maintained, and there's specific features like the PS2 upscaling involved too.

And product development resources aren't just coding. The work that was going into the PS2 Support List wasn't trivial either, and in a real product every feature you advertise needs its own dedicated QA. My guess is that the QA effort here is why there hasn't been any success on the long-rumoured software-only PS2 emulation; it's just a giant support mess for Sony relative to what it's worth to them in terms of product sales.

According to Wikipedia, the Slim model has an external power supply.

Here's a photo of the rear of the unit, where you can see the unusual power connector (lower right) that seems indicative of an external brick.

Providing free patches, partially funded by advertising revenue to you is not.

It's not free, nor was the original game. Wipeout HD is $19.99 and the expansion is $9.99. So these people are paying $30 for this nice new "feature".

Quote from http://blog.us.playstation.com/2009/07/17/wipeout-fury-developer-diary-new-game-modes/

Before I talk about what I've been up to on the WipEout HD Fury expansion pack, I would just like to let you know that the pack will be available from PlayStation Store on Thursday, July 23rd for $9.99.

Killzone's controls were laggy, but recent patches have somewhat fixed it. The developer introduced a new 'High Precision' option, which they now enable by default:

When this option is switched on, it makes the analog sticks more responsive to small movements. Turned off, the controls behave exactly as they did before the patch.

http://blog.us.playstation.com/2009/05/27/killzone-2-patch-127-details/

I bought the game on release day and I found it a little frustrating at first - the controls did feel slow and heavy, both for aiming but also for moving. One thing that exacerbated it was that in single-player you would accelerate as you moved, it would take a second or so to get up to full speed so if you changed direction or stopped and started then you would be moving slowly for a while. It wasn't a big deal, but coming from other games like Halo it could feel a little jarring.

It has a cross or a times symbol or something - it's not an "X" unless you really want it to be an X.

Well, Sony wants it to be an X. This support page talks about the "X button" and the "Triangle button".

On that note: Rejected Xbox 360 logo

That being the case the government should make damn sure that any such device deactivates the moment your car starts moving and punish anyone tampering with it.

Yes, this would be the magic government that has the ability to remotely disable ubiquitous portable video screens, using their Amulet of Regulation.

This is a problem that government cannot solve -- appealing to them is not going to make it happen.

I would bet that the type of people who still receive OTA signals are the many times type of people who would think their TV is broken or that they're getting ripped off seeing those black bars. There's a non-trivial portion of the population who thinks that someone is hiding video from them when they see those black bars...

Except allowing me to bowl, while heavily intoxicated, and still score well.

http://www.us.playstation.com/PS3/Games/High_Velocity_Bowling

There's Eyetyo Hero for the PS2 eyetoy. Not actually seen it in the shops though.

Um, early (4 USB port) 80G model was software only, then (2 USB port) no PS2 backward compatibility.

Wikipedia(link below) lists the following PS2 compatibility on the PS3:
(PS1 seems to be software on all of them)

Hardware:
20 G NTSC
60 G NTSC

Software:
60 G PAL
80 G NTSC (4 USB port models)

None:
40 G PAL or NTSC
80 G PAL or NTSC (2 USB port models)
160 G PAL or NTSC

Looking at this chart, any 4 USB port model has some backwards compatibility with PS2 games, and the 2 ports have none. (Sony's FAQ page listing which ones are backwards compatible and what not(US NTSC list.)

Personally, I want a 60G NTSC model because: 4 USB ports, Flash card reader, 802.11b/g WiFi, hardware backwards compatibility (At least one title(according to the compatibility checker) I have seems to have problems when software emulated versus hardware, play with Sony's compatibiltiy checker). And you can always upgrade the hard drive yourself. (At least everything I've read seems to list that as a standard user option)