PS3 - Lateness With Linux?

ZombieRoboNinja writes "The New York Times is reporting that Sony's press conference has confirmed the delay of the PS3, which is now slated to come out in November. More interestingly, the article claims that PS3 will ship with a 60-gig hard drive, built-in network card, and Linux!" Serious stuff here, with Sony's shares falling on the delay confirmation. There was a lot more news handed out at the conference than just the delay. Next Generation has details from Ken Kutaragi's 10 Point Breakdown. From the NYT article: "'We were discussing selling it in September, and some even said put it out in July,' Mr. Kutaragi said. Some analysts were immediately skeptical of this explanation, saying Sony needed to get the console out as soon as possible to combat Microsoft's head start, and the expected release this year of Nintendo's next game console, Revolution. They said Sony may be trying to buy time to bring down the production cost of key components, particularly untested technologies like Blu-ray and Cell. While Mr. Kutaragi did not reveal a price on Wednesday, analysts say Sony will likely try to sell PlayStation 3 for about $500." Please see related links and commentary below for more coverage. My two quick cents -

1. If they're not releasing in Japan until November, I find it highly unlikely they'll be releasing in the states until 2007. Previous PlayStation launches have always been staggered Japan first, U.S. second. I don't care if they say they're launching worldwide; At this point I think they're spinning to keep people happy.
2. If they're not out in the U.S. until 2007, they'll probably be the last next-gen console to do so. So far Nintendo says it's on track to launch this year. Sony isn't getting finalized dev kits out until June. Even just with that metric on the table, Nintendo looks to be in a better position than Sony at the moment.
3. At $500, there are going to be a lot of indifferent customers come March of '07. This will be especially true if, over a year after launch, Microsoft cuts the price of the 360 to coincide with the PS3 launch. If you have to choose between a solid platform that costs $300 (and already has a stable of games available) and a brand-new system that is two hundred bucks more with far fewer games, which one do you think most people will buy?

Regardless of what happens a year from now this is a major blow for Sony, a coup for Microsoft, and breathing room for Nintendo. What do you think the console market will look like this time next year?

Comments

Article Access

[eldavojohn]

A functioning link to the NYTimes article.

Also interesting is the component pricing total that reveals why Sony will most likely have to take a loss of hundreds of dollars per console to remain competitive.

Will there be an emotion chip too?

[hal2814]

Sounds to me like Sony shot themselves in the foot by muffing a Christmas release of the PS3 so they're gearing up the speculation by promising the kitchen sink like they did with the PS2 to try and keep anybody from buying something else in the meantime.

Re:Will there be an emotion chip too?

[Overly Critical Guy]

I'm pissed at them for a weird reason, too. I don't want Microsoft and its crappy console to gain any foothold. The only reason the XBox exists is to push the Windows platform into the living room--originally Microsoft offered their platform libraries to Sony and Nintendo and only made the X-Box when both companies refused to ship Windows on their consoles. Microsoft cares nothing at all about games or quality of games, which is why we get commercials espousing the wonders of sweat on a basketball player mesh. They only care about extending Windows and tying people to it in some way.

So with the Playstation 3 delayed--arguably the only sure bet to crushing and stomping out the XBox for good--this gives more time for the XBox 360 to actually gain a foothold, even despite their pathetically slow start (Nintendo sold more Gamecubes last Christmas than Microsoft sold XBox 360s).

I expected the Playstation 3 to dominate once more, with Nintendo coming on the side as the cheaper "add-on" gaming console that everyone buys to play Zelda and Mario Kart on the side.

What a coincidence...

[Spy der Mann]

Sony seems to use Linux for the PS3 - and at the same time, Linus says he won't use GPL3 for Linux due to the DRM clauses.

Interesting coincidence, don't you think?

Like I've always said

[tomstdenis]

I'd be willing to pay more for a gaming console if I had control to produce my own content [e.g. programs, games, whatever].

I'd pay 800$ for a PS3 if it meant I could ssh to the thing and play with the cell processor or beam media to it or something.

If all I can do is play games then I wouldn't pay more than 200$ for it. Cuz at that point I'd just play my xbox1 out of spite.

Tom

Blaze of Glory

[blueZhift]

I actually love how Kutaragi-san is putting it all on the line. Global launch, standard hard drive, free online service... Oooh Weee! Sony is either going to astound the analysts with one of the most successful product launches ever, or go out in a blaze of glory that may cripple the company. Either way, you gotta love the balls to the wall attitude. This is going to be really interesting to watch.

the ADAM computer

[mrpeebles]

More and more, the PS3 is reminding me of the ADAM computer. For those who don't remember, it was the successor to the colecovision video game system, and it was going to be both a video game system, AND an affordable home computer system. Unfortunately, it tried to do too many things, didn't do enough of them well enough for the money, and flopped. (Also, the controllers attached to the SIDE of the main box, so that when you pulled them out, little kid that you were, you broke the machine.) Anyway, these similarities may only be superficial, but a much better comparison may be the LISA computer by apple. We will see...

Re:It *IS* released Nov 2006 worldwhile

[default luser]

Agreed. People who don't believe this need a touch of history.

Back in the 1980s, most TVs were much smaller than what they sell today, and much lower quality. You had a lucky few with big screens (greater than 30"), a significantly larger slice with screens in the 20-30" range, and the majority of the population with screens ranging from 12-20".

It's absolutely amazing how times change. My computer monitors even going back to the mid-1990s dwarf my family's old 14" TV, and have much better sharpness, bandwidth and color fidelity. You can buy 27" TVs at Walmart for less than 150 bucks that have visual quality most of us could only wish for in the 80s.

So, it's no surprise that VHS was considered good in the 1980s, when you consider that the average TV of the era was tiny and crappy. The 1990s started the wave of cheaper, larger, higher-fidelity televisions that showed the limitations of VHS, and by the end of the decade the market was hungry for DVD.

Unfortunately, the market hasn't changed much since DVDs were introduced. Screen sizes are up a bit, but HDTV technology is still too expensive for your average Walmart buyer. Even if HDTV suddenly dropped to the price range of your average Walmart buyer, you'd still have to wait 5 years or so for a potential market to build up.

HD-DVD and Bluray are in a very similar position to Laserdisc...not a huge improvement over the cheaper alternative, and selling to a very limited market. When only 5-10% of the market even owns equipment good enough to tell the difference, and they have to shell out $500+ to experience it, you've got limited room for growth.