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Playstation 3 Delay Official

Posted by ryuzaki0 on

Aleman writes "In this interview with Variety magazine, Sony CEO Howard Stringer confirms that the Playstation 3 will be released during the holiday 2006 season." Not very surprising given the available information.

6 of 132 comments (clear)

  1. Maybe I missed something.... by RingDev · · Score: 4, Insightful

    But wasn't Q4 '06 the original expectation for the US release?

    -Rick

    --
    "Most people in the U.S. wouldn't know they live in a tyrannical state if it walked up and grabbed their junk." - MyFirs
    1. Re:Maybe I missed something.... by Yusaku+Godai · · Score: 4, Insightful

      That's kinda what I thought too. Either way it's not like it's a huge delay. Heck, I'd kinda rather they'd wait even longer for

      a) The price of some of the hardware to come down
      b) To watch Microsoft fumble around more
      and
      c) To rethink this whole format war business

      I have a bad feeling that the last one especially won't happen :( If they're gonna stick a Blu-Ray drive in this thing I sure as hell hope it ends up being the dominant next gen video format, or Sony is fucked, I think.

  2. A bad thing? by hunterx11 · · Score: 4, Insightful

    From a sales perspective, wouldn't the holiday season be a good time to release a product like this?

    --
    English is easier said than done.
  3. Re:Sony Strategy? by gormanly · · Score: 4, Insightful

    huh?

    • The NES was released 27 months before the Master System and won, despite being technically inferior.
    • The SNES was released a year after the Mega Drive and won, and was technically superior.
    • The N64 was released 18 months after the Playstation, and lost, despite being technically superior.
    • The GameCube was released 18 months after the PS2 and just before the Xbox, and lost, despite being technically superior to the former and inferior to the latter.

    What matters seems to be the available games, though in the PS2 case a lot of people bought it as their first DVD player, justifying the purchase that way. That's what Sony were banking on with the PS3 too, but the BluRay capability has undoubtedly delayed their launch.

    Add in the facts that their CPU is quite weird and hard to program, and that they'll be last to market in this generation, and they've some small difficulties to overcome.

    I'd still bet that they will be a very strong contender this time round (not least due to backwards compatibility and the desire to keep game libraries while trashing the old machine), but unless MS continue to shoot themselves in both feet it'll probably be a lot closer this time round...

  4. Re:Given all the time by MS's execution by Austerity+Empowers · · Score: 4, Insightful

    I've said it before, but be very careful about estimating the price of components sold in consumer systems. Volumes speak volumes. A component we may buy in small quantities (1000) can cost 1/2 to 1/4 if sold in high volumes with a volume commitment (usually 100k/year is where it starts). Designs of mine have been estimated at costs of "$400" by marketing, but the actual COGS was closer to $100-$150 after negotiations.

    People assume there is some discount on goods costs with volumes, I don't think many people realize how high it really is. I don't think they're losing money on XBox 360 hardware, nor do I think Sony will lose on the PS3. If money is lost it's warranty/returns.

  5. Re:Death toll for Blu-ray by Perseid · · Score: 4, Insightful

    I don't think so. The format war isn't going to actually start for quite a while. HD-DVD is going to be prohibitively expensive for the average consumer when it comes out and few people have HDTVs at the moment, making DVDs good enough for the average schmo right now.

    Since Sony is going to make the PS3 a loss leader, it might actually be cheaper than comparative HD-DVD players when it comes out. And while many people might wait to see which player comes out on top in the format wars before deciding on a player, you know millions of people are going to instantly start salivating as soon as the preorder slips go out for the PS3. Having a game console push your format is as big of an advantage as Sony says it is. Is it big enough? We'll see, of course, but I don't feel this hurts Sony much, if at all.