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Blu Ray Drive Will Cost $100 Per PlayStation 3
fembots writes "The Inquirer is running an article detailing how Blu-Ray drives for the PlayStation 3 will cost Sony a small fortune. It turns out that at the release of the console in the first half of 2006, Sony will have to pay more than $100 per drive which will dramatically increase the unit cost of the PS3."
Replace the blue-ray drive with a 1.44meg floppy drive.
Do you want to pay an extra $130 ($100 cost of drive plus 30% profit margin) on your new PS3 for a DRM-laden drive that can 'punish' you? No thanks.
Stasis is death. Embrace change.
This shortly following the announcement of additional DRM in blu-ray. Maybe Sony has finally made a fatal mis-step. Obviously they haven't learned from history yet.
That I'm going to be paying even more than the $300 pricetag that was on the PS3 before this spec was released? That just makes me wonder why I'd even get one in the first place, especially with the performance statistics and upgradeability of current PCs. If you ask me, console gaming is pointless if you have a worthwhile PC. If the game isn't on the platform, run an architecture emulator. Like the controller? Buy an adapter. Consoles are a waste of money.
Where did that figure come from? Sony owns the patent so it's not from licencing, unless they need gold wires/contacts through out the reader I doubt that $100 figure is accurate. It will have both an economy of scale as well a verticle intergration for this hardware, I'm more inclined to beleive 40$ of raw materials and a fudged math estimated R&D of 60$ per unit.
"There are more things in heaven and earth, Horatio, than are dreamt of in your philosophy."
IIRC, Microsoft sold each XBox at a loss, and game sales made up for the loss. Is it possible that Sony will think the same way?
Where are they getting this from?
The Inquirer doesn't say where they got this number from... they don't have a source... it just seems to have come out of nowhere. Do they have a source they just forgot to cite? Or are they just running rumors without checking them?
This is the same number ($100) the Merill Lynch analyst report about the manufacturing costs of the PS3 (which slashdot itself has reported on at least once in the last few months) gave. I have the same doubts about it that I had then; it isn't from an "official" source (or in this case... any source at all), and I wonder if that $100 represents real per-unit costs or things that ought to be considered sunk costs, things that are just a natural byproduct of getting blu-ray production lines up and running. The reason this distinction matters is because Sony is going to have to be paying the second category of costs anyway, since for whatever reason they're going to be building blu-ray drives for sale anyway... so bundling those costs into the per-unit costs of the PS3 doesn't make all that much sense.
Irritable, left-wing and possibly humorous bumper stickers and t-shirts
Can they seriously not fit all their games' data in a Dual-layered DVD?
This might be a deal-breaker for me. If I can interface my PS3 with, say, my PC or share it out to the network to use the Blu-Ray drive with non-gaming discs, then it's useful new technology and adopting it with the PS3 may end up cost-effective in the long run. Otherwise, this is Sony using new tech for... What purpose, exactly? Copy protection? Gee, thanks.
Synergy is your friend
This is actually a very smart move by Sony in my opinion. With Sony backing Blu-Ray (I'm assuming) for the next generation DVD format, this will enable Sony to move large numbers of Blu-Ray drives, driving down the price and increasing the installed base of consumers with Blu-Ray players. Not to mention Sony gets to safely sell at a loss with game licensing backing up their bottom line... Leaving Sony and the Playstation as the best vendor and device for Blu-Ray movie playback and price.
Do Sony really expect a lot of people to be able to afford these? Given the depressed state of the US economy, I can't see people snapping these up.
I suspect the Nintendo revolution will be reasonably priced, and I'll most likely buy one of those instead.
I own a ps2, but really can't justify spending that much on a console.
Over the life of the console, this will come down significantly. So the average cost of that player will end up being somewhat less. Also, if you consider what a new standalone Blu-Ray player will likely cost when Sony introduces the PS3, it makes the PS3 look like a much better deal, even to people who mostly just want to play Blu-Ray, not games.
As I recall, in markets outside the United States, the PS2 saw a large percentage of its initial sales attributable to being an inexpensive (for the time) DVD player, that happened to also play games. It looks like they're repeating what worked well for them, before.
Now it does add value (just like the DVD drive in the PS2) if you want a Blue Ray player. That said, I still think it's a good move for Sony in future-proofing. We are already seeing multi-disc DVD games, and with the kind of graphics that people will expect on the XBox 360 you will need lots of space for artwork and models. That means more and more multi-disc games. Having all that extra space will surely help as time goes by.
It's a gamble. I think it will pay off, but it is a surprisingly high cost for the drive. The Revolution and the XBox 360 are both sporting DVD drives from what we know right now.
The one thing that comes to mind most with this is: one more reason for Sony to hike the price up. I've been buying consoles at their release since the PS1. But even though I now have a job and it pays well enough, I'm not planning on buying a XBox 360 because it is WAY too expensive. I'll wait for the price drop, or to buy one used because someone didn't like theirs. I trust Sony and would like a PS3. I was planning to buy one. But if it costs more than $300, I'll wait on that too. The Revolution is the only one I don't know the price of, but I'd be willing to pay up to $300 (I expect them to launch at $250), and I intend to buy it.
Sony and MS are trying to price me out of the market (especially with games). And at this point, they have succeeded at delaying my purchase. If they're not careful, I'll learn I can live without it. If there is one thing I learned during this last generation, it was that I was right assessing the previous generation. N64 vs PS vs DC games? 30+ vs. 6. vs. 4. 'Cube v XBox vs PS2 games? 15+ vs 5 vs 8. DS vs PSP? 10 vs 4.
Nintendo systems always seem to have the most games that I want. Sony and MS aren't helping themselves with their prices.
Comment forecast: Bits of genius surrounded by a sea of mediocrity.
That gamers (1) don't care about DRM or other "side issues" -- they just great games and (2) have money to burn for the great games?
Are they thinking that if they get this out, create some envy/demand and drop the price as they hit production volumes, they could have a hit?
http://www.thebricktestament.com/the_law/when_to_
It's the fee or "tax" needed to pay for all the DRM servers and it's bandwidth. I mean, it's going to take a lot of money to setup a DRM infrastructure to monitor and deactivate "hacked" PS3s.
Talk about getting fucked sideways. sheesh!
Life is not for the lazy.
Sony has with its previous consoles sold the console at a loss initially, then gradually moved into profitability on each unit as their production costs come down. The Microsoft XBox was selling at a tremendous loss initially and is probably still doing so now, right up to the point where the console is being discontinued-- Microsoft H&E is still continuously losing money.
Sony will probably sell the PS3 at a loss initially.
Costs for Sony don't mean costs for you as a consumer. Businesses don't necessarily set prices for goods based on what it cost them to make it, they set prices based on what they think the market will bear. If you raise the price of your product by $100 and only half as many people are willing to buy your product as a result, your revenues have just gone down, right? Of course if you lower your prices below your per-unit cost you aren't going to make any per-unit profit, but there's more than one way to make profit; for example, Sony makes licensing fees on every PS3 game sold, and the more people own PS3s the more people there are out there buying PS3 games.
We didn't know whether the PS3 was going to be $300 when that number was batted around. We don't know whether the PS3 is going to be $400 when that number was being batted around. We have no idea what the PS3 is going to cost except that it's almost certainly going to be too expensive. If you don't like that, Nintendo would be more than happy to sell you something cheaper.
If you ask me, console gaming is pointless if you have a worthwhile PC.
So $300 for a console that will last you four to five years is crazy unreasonable highway robbery, but $3000 for a computer that will play this year's top-of-the-line games (but might not play next year's top-of-the-line games unless you buy an expensive new video card) is only just, normal and rational?
Right...
Irritable, left-wing and possibly humorous bumper stickers and t-shirts
What people are forgetting about here is the HDTV specs, which roughly triple or quadruple the memory requirements of video footage stored on a game cartridge/disk. Forgetting about the dual layer capabilities in the future, a 24G Blu-Ray disk, divided by 4, equals 6G. Approximately the size of a standard DVD. "But wait!" you say, "A DVD already can play HDTV!" Ah yes, but a typical game with multiple avenues of game play doesn't record the content of a single linear gameplay... it records many different avenues of gameplay. Which winds up tripling or quadrupling the storage requirements.
My two cents worth of opinion? With this decision, Sony is going to have a much better HDTV compatible offering.
Ya, just like they did with SACD. All their DVD players and DVD dream systems were being made with SACD to give the format a foot in the door. The bottom line is that nobody wants SACD because nobody has a great stereo and nobody cares enough to notice a difference. It's the same with Blu-ray. 90% of people don't own a TV that is going to show a difference and they don't want to re-buy their recently bought DVD collection. Even those with nice HDTVs largely don't want any more. The market for Blu-ray or HD-DVD is probably 1% this year and maybe 5% next year. In other words, complete failure awaits.
. . . will just the drive be disabled? Or will the DRM gods take out your whole PS3 as just compensation for daring to defy their digital restrictions management/regional price scam schemes?
I too have felt the cold finger of injustice.
$100 for some as seemingly trivial as the optical drive is simply insane for a console. I was a bit skeptical when Sony said this would be expensive, I figured they were blowing smoke to get MS to up the price of 360 but if this article is true then our wallets (well not mine) are in for a world of hurt. Estimates Blu-Ray $100 GPU $100 Ageia Physics $70 CPU $200 Misc Materials $30 Labor $10 EST Total $510 and thats being generous.
The point of ANY high def drive is moot. Seriously. How long is it going to take for enough people to upgrade to a high definition set that could take advantage of (and justify) the drive's capabilities?
Sheesh, we may as well wait to justify the Playstation 4 and XBox 720.
Just because you can mod me down, doesn't mean you're right. Shoes for industry!
I wouldn't trust The Inquirer regarding PS3 news.
G PU-Less-Powerful-than-GeForce-7800/
G PU-More-Powerful-than-GeForce-7800/
They were the ones who spread false PS3 news last week based on a message board post saying that the Nvidia 7800GTX was faster than the PS3's RSX. It turned out that the person on the message board misread PSM magazine and it really said the RSX is FASTER than the 7800GTX. I don't think that they do any fact checking. Likelyhood is that Sony manfacters the Blu-ray drives in house and it won't cost more than adding the DVD to the PS2 and they would likely be able to leverage economies of scale in the long run(which were very expensive at the time of the PS2 launch).
http://www.theinquirer.net/?article=25838
http://www.theinquirer.net/?article=25862
http://news.teamxbox.com/xbox/9126/PlayStation-3-
http://news.teamxbox.com/xbox/9132/PlayStation-3-
i wonder if Sony is spreading this rumor to let microsoft increase their price on the 360? there is no source behind this rumor as others mention. the price might be quite lower than people assume, but if sony could fake out microsoft by letting them shoot for a higher price. sony may come back with a $299 console
Supreme executive power derives from a mandate from the masses, not from some farcical aquatic ceremony.
the current DVD format is not HDTV spec. While some of the newer players can up-convert the output to 480p, 720p, and 1080i, the original DVD source is not HDTV spec.
This would be like taking the RF (coax) signal from my Atari 2600 game system and up-convert it to S-Video. While I might get a more stable imagine for the TV to work with (depending on the hardware doing the up-converting), the resolution of the source still sucks ass.
Life is not for the lazy.
You're kidding right? The point of these is not "HDTV", though it will be nice for HDTV. The point is that you can throw 50-100GB on a single disc. This in turn means large, detailed textures, hi-poly models, audio, video, and anything else they want to throw on the disc.
DVDs just don't cut it. They never really did. Right now I'm playing FFXI and, on the PS2, it takes about 16GB. And the texture and model quality isn't even all that great. When we start getting into next-gen platforms which can handle lots more data, 50-100GB will be barely enough.
Don't think of it as a flame---it's more like an argument that does 3d6 fire damage
Sony: Say, Random HD-DVD Manufacturer, how much would we be paying for some HD-DVD drives for the PS3?
Random HD-DVD Manufacturer: For the PS3? Well, since you're going to be buying about 6 quintillion of them, I'd say about $25 a drive. Hell, make it $15 if you put our logo somewhere on the case.
Sony: Let me rephrase that. How much would we be "paying" for some HD-DVD drives if we wanted to justify an insane price-point for the first 12 months of the PS3 release?
Random HD-DVD Manufacturer: Oh, then it's $100 per drive. But if the first batch would turn out to be "bad" for some reason, we would of course be obligated to ship you 5.9 quintillion drives at a vastly reduced price - Say about $25 - to make up for our error, if it would help ensure future business with you.
C. Montgomery Burns: Excellent!
Yeah yeah, I know, new technology, blah blah blah. All I know is that this 4th gen console war is quickly making me want to dust off the Dreamcast.
Eddie: This is a sex shop isn't it?
Assistant: Yes.
Eddie: I'll have five quid's worth then!
Assistant: Very droll, sir. I've never heard that one before.
Eddie: Haven't you? Shall I tell it again?
Assistant: No thank you sir, I'd rather have a pineapple inserted violently into my rectum.
Eddie: You've been working here too long mate.
How much does this Blueray tech cost over using HD-DVD...
Your freedom.
Regards,
Steve
"The Inquirer is running an article detailing how Blu-Ray drives for the Playstation 3 will cost Sony a small fortune. It turns out that at the release of the console in the first half of 2006, Sony will have to pay more than $100 per drive which will dramatically increase the unit cost of the PS3."
Though this story was recently posted by the inquirer, it's very old news, and only a third of the story.
I already rebuked the story a couple days ago on my own website at http://www.gamegeeknews.com/?p=140 which itself referenced a GamesIndustry story from the end of June.
In short, Merril Lynch Japan has determined that it would cost Sony +$101 per part to manufacture each of the PS3's key components (Cell CPU, nVIDIA GPU, Blu-Ray Drives). That said, it expected Sony to sell the PS3 for $399 and to stomach a +$100 loss on each system sold. So this isn't new news, it doesn't mean the PS3's price is going to sky rocket... It's all already been covered.
there's no real point to sony including blu ray discs on PS3 games. a standard single layer blu ray holds 23GB, you could get that much space from 3 dual layer DVDs (actually, you get a little more with the standard DVDs). then sony would save about $70.
i doubt that sony will use multiple layer blu rays for the PS3 games themselves, really it's just for movies. and who is going to be willing to connect to the internet to watch a movie anyway?
seriously, who is dissatisfied by the visual quality of DVDs? people consider DVDs to have the best picture quality around, i dont see how sony could possibly expect to win any kind of format war, if you can call it that since nobody's going to buy HD DVD either. people will see these new technologies and think "i probably need $2000 in equipment just to use this"
and they'd be right. it's the same reason why everyone doesn't have a DVR, cable HDTV channels, or any of the more hardcore TV watching stuff out there. TV isn't really worth watching anymore, so why pay monthly fees to use a DVR or buy a $3000 TV for marginal picture improvement. at this point, you'd have to be pretty blind not to be somewhat satisfied by standard picture quality. you can see what's going on, can't you? then why does it matter?
Sure, if cutesy kids games are your thing, go for Nintendo.
They certainly are if I have to choose between them and the masturbatory, self-indulgent tripe that passes for "mature" these days. Honestly, don't you guys feel the least bit patronized? Or are tits and violence the only things you want from an experience?
"Or are tits and violence the only things you want from an experience?" yes and yes.
If you mod me down, I will become more powerful than you can imagine....
Lots of gamers upgrade their PCs in parts, so while the initial cost of entry is high, it's not as high from an ongoing standpoint.
Example: A 6600GT (decent video card) would run me $140 right now. That's a pretty cheap upgrade. I run a Barton based Athlon ($70) on an Asus A7N8X ($75) motherboard with a 6800GT ($270 [admittedly expensive]) and play BF2 @ 1280 x 1024. With a 6600GT ($140), I'd be limited to 800 x 600, possibly 1024 x 768. These resolutions rival what I can get from consoles, and what's stopping me from connecting my computer to my TV? I do it frequently.
The costs of upgrading can be spread out, and I still remain on par with console gaming quality. I also get free network play and the flexibility of running a large variety of emulators on the same PC, as well as media content and whatever else I please. There are no limitations from the manufacturer either. That's a much stronger sell than replacing the entire box, agreeing to some shrink wrap license, and taking it up the arse every two years.
Oh yeah, the DRM stuff shouldn't bother many people either. XBox Live already prevents mod chipping. Don't get me wrong, I don't have an XBox partially because of that reason and that might the reason for me to choose Revolution or XBox 360 over PS3, but don't act like it is anything new.
Or you can have both - Gamecube games that are mature rated and are actually not bad.
Condemnant quod non intellegunt.
Because we all know how unpopular "masturbatory" forms of entertainment are...
[PowerPoint] is a tool for capitalist presentation
Isn't it just. I've been a PS2 owner and moderate fanboy for ... a while ... and it's been great. Then I had a go with a gamecube and just, kinda, liked it. And bought a DS and had a similar experience.
Now with Nintendo being the only company to stand up and say "Fuck HD" and probably keep their historical focus on cheap hardware, fun games and lower load times.... I could be about to buy a Revolution.
I suspect it's either that or 'do nothing'.
Dave
I write a blog now, you should be afraid.
You know, no offense, I find the "buy Nintendo because it's priced reasonably" argument to be as bogus as "buy an XBox because it has a GF3" in it. We're not talking a lawnmower or a washing machine or whatever else that is fully self-contained and does something all by itself. We're talking a game console, which has one single use: to play games.
So here's a crazy idea: I'll buy a console for what games it has, not for the theoretical gigapixels per second (I don't play directly with the shader pipelines, I play with games that use those), nor because it's the cheapest (even something that costs only $100 is still just a wasted $100 if it doesn't also have games that interest me.)
_If_ the Revolution will have any games that interest me, sure, I'll buy one. But if not, not.
_If_ Sony's consoles again are the ones with 90% of the story driven RPGs, I'll go buy a Sony console again.
So far, I don't even like Nintendo's kinds of games, which were really the only ones that were exclusive to the N64 or GCN. Now I won't call them "bad" games or "kiddie" games, but they're just not in the genres I like. I know others like them. More power to them as far as I'm concerned. But I don't.
So unless Nintendo hires a new designer sometime soon, _I_ just can't see myself buying a Revolution, no matter at what price. On the other, hand, being a very happy and entertained owner of both the Playstation and PS2, I can easily see myself biting the bullet and forking over $500 for a PS3.
But again, I'll wait and see what games are available for them, and _then_ decide whether I buy either.
A polar bear is a cartesian bear after a coordinate transform.
It'll come out for PS2. The horde will buy it. And rightly so.
This guy are sick.
For something as non-accuracy-requiring as realtime, where the HDR map only needs to handle some massively overbright pixels and maybe a couple stops of exposure adjustment on the rest, 10-bit logarithmic encoding should be fine. It'll be expanded to 16-bit or 32-bit float in graphics memory, but won't take up so much space on the disc. I have to ask the OP, however, why all the textures in the scene need to be 2048x2048, and what graphics hardware they anticipate loading such massive textures into.