Slashdot Mirror
Sony Officially Dropping 20GB PS3 in North America
An anonymous reader writes "Sony has just announced they're officially ditching the 20GB model of the PS3. 'Due to the overwhelming demand for the 60GB model from both retailers and consumers, we have ceased offering the 20GB model here in North America. In addition to the larger internal hard drive, the 60GB PlayStation 3 features added storage media slots and built-in Wi-Fi not found in the 20GB system. Based on retailer and consumer feedback, we have decided to focus our current efforts on the more popular 60GB model.'"
Seems MS was right to put the new xbox at $480 then. Keeps the $100 premium for the PS3 intact.
11 was a racehorse
12 was 12
1111 Race
12112
So much for "20 GB is enough for anyone"
I think that most people who would be willing to shell out $500 for a console wouldn't mind having to pony up another $100 for built-in wireless (I think that's usually about $100 to add on, at least that's what it is for the Xbox 360), an extra 40 GB of room on the HD, and some media card slots (not sure how useful these are).
Makes me wonder when Microsoft is going to axe the $300 version of the Xbox 360, which in a way is kind of crap since it doesn't come with any way to save games on it by default without shelling out at least enough for a memory card or a special HD (since you can't plug your own in as far as I know). With the new Elite version coming out in the future, why bother having this lowend version take up shelf space?
But I only want a 20 gig drive, and I liked the $100 cheaper price. Oh well, I guess I'll just have to wait longer before getting a PS3.
(yes, I actually was planning on getting one at some point. But only the 20 gig model).
Hey - the PS3 at any price is still being marketed by a company that installed rootkits on the computers of their own customers and launched predatory lawsuits against lik-sang.com (a legitimate business that was merely employing the right of resale) - and that, my friend, is why the price wasn't the issue for me.
Amen! :-)
Although the PS3 sales are hardly strong, I honestly think the 20GB PS3 was more or less vaporware, from a practical stand-point. I swear to the Lord that I have never seen one in any store. Ever.
I've come across mountains of 60GB PS3's, but never the lesser one. Which makes me curious about this whole "more demand for the better one" thing. How would they even gage something like that, when it's seemingly impossible to find the goddamn things in the first place?
It's like General Electric making five toasters, selling out of them, and then saying demand was too low to justify building them because you only sold five at retail. What planet am I on?
- Scott
The 20GB model has:
GigE networking
A Hard drive that is user servicable and replaceable
The same AV connections
Anything else used to actually play games, lacking only a media reader for things like CF cards.
I was going to buy the 20GB model, and put a larger HD in it. So I personally think it was the superior option as it was more configurable and it did not have wireless if you did not need it. Lots of things are coming with wireless built in now which is nice, but I was going to wire it up anyway so as not to have the possibility of interference.
I can kind of see why they did it but I'm annoyed they are removing that option.
"There is more worth loving than we have strength to love." - Brian Jay Stanley
if they're dropping it due to poor demand, they should drop the 60GB model too:P
Wouldn't that mean asking Microsoft to drop the 360 as well? The PS3 has been outselling the 360 every day since Amazon finally had them in stock a few weeks ago (scroll down to "Sales rank of the primary Systems").
And yes, the Wii is still trouncing them both.
"There is more worth loving than we have strength to love." - Brian Jay Stanley
The company with the rootkits is Sony Music, not Sony Games. If your brother robbed a bank should you go to jail too? Truly large companies are really lots of smaller companies that make their own choices.
"There is more worth loving than we have strength to love." - Brian Jay Stanley
Here is hoping that everyone has learned their lesson about releasing multiple versions of consoles. Just do one console at release guys. If you want to release another lower end version a few months later by all means feel free but for the most part anyone who bought the lower end versions of these consoles would have eventually bought the "higher end" version if the lower end version was never available after the first price drop. All you do is sow discontent among the people who were gullible... err.. trying to save some money.
I keep telling myself I'm not the desperate type.
I don't think there was even much of an opportunity to evaluate true demand, because there was never really a choice - you took would you could get. I think Sony just didn't want the 20GB model as an anchor weighing them down as they move into media sales...
However, there is one small bit of anecdotal evidence that backs up what Sony is saying. Amazon had at one point a lottery to get a chance at buying a PS3 from a shipment, you could enter either a lottery for the 20GB or the 60GB model (you didn't pay anything, but could only sign up for one or the other). They displayed the odds of winning a purchasing slot, and the 60GB model had about 8x more people signed up for a chance.
The one thing I could see that would make it more appealing is the WiFi support which would make it easier to hook into a network, since so many people have WiFi... even if it's not your own!
"There is more worth loving than we have strength to love." - Brian Jay Stanley
Now when we make price comparisons, we don't have to account for the $500 model any more! That makes it even easier to say that you can get an Xbox 360 and a Wii for the price of a functional PS3 system, because you don't have to qualify it. Sony haters rejoice!
"You're right," Fisheye says. "I should have set it on 'whip' or 'chop.'"
I love how they decided to drop the 20GB model because of the "overwhelming demand for the 60GB model from both retailers and consumers" when I can walk into any retailer and buy a 60GB PS3 whereas the 20GB model has never been in any store or online.
Yeah, the 20GB model was practically a hoax, Sony released a few of them, here and there, so they could say, openly, that the PS3 started at only $500. It was all just a sales gimmick to get people to come in and buy them, and then when there weren't any 20GB models on the shelves, they'd just go "oh well" and buy the 60GB models. Pretty pathetic, if you ask me. I mean, it's Walmart's tactic (get people to come in for the cheap stuff, but then sell them the expensive stuff), but at least Walmart actually HAS the cheap stuff, Sony didn't really even ever have a 20GB, there's little evidence that very many ever existed.
This also gives credence to the concept that the PS3 is not going to have a price drop for a VERY LONG TIME.
Multiplayer Gaming (defined): Sitting around, discussing single-player games with my friends, at the bar.
Um, more like the only ones that are selling in any quantity, if you look at shelf space.
Sadly, this won't change until Sony gets some high-quality multi-tier games out which not only fully utilize the new PS3 features, but are fun games to play and that work well on both 480p home TV sets (US) and the 720i/p and higher HDTV resolutions.
That may not be until this upcoming Xmas.
-- Tigger warning: This post may contain tiggers! --
Ah, but now you can compare it to the XBox Elite (est. $480) and the fact that to get a Wii you have to buy it second hand (starting at $379.95 on Amazon last I checked).
No, the Wii sells in retail bundles online at Costco and WalMart that are priced far far below that - and ships within days.
-- Tigger warning: This post may contain tiggers! --
I already said the Wii was winning. I also said the PS3 was outselling the 360, so those that think PS34 sales are low would also have to apply the same wonderment to the 360.
I don't have any of them at the moment, so it's not like I have the fanatical devotion to any one system that you have. I'm just pointing out that Amazon sales for the PS3 are not bad.
"There is more worth loving than we have strength to love." - Brian Jay Stanley
Do you think the Board of Directors approved the rootkit? Or even the president? Hell no. That was up to the division. That division made a bad call, and the Board is responsible insofar as they hired the doofus that made that choice for Sony Music. But they are not directly responsible, and Sony Games being yet a step further removed is less responsible.
Again I ask, if your brother rob a bank should you go to jail? Your father raised both of you, why shouldn't he go to jail? You talked to your brother at some point, surely you are to blame. All of these statements are as silly as what you are trying to say.
"There is more worth loving than we have strength to love." - Brian Jay Stanley
So that makes it a collector's item, right?
EBAY!
Finally, PS3 owners will get the $1000+ auctions they were dreaming of!
Just a point was all, as to why they might have thought that. But as I said I don't think they ever gave the market a real chance, and think they pulled that model for other reasons with that one as cover.
I think they were not sure they could really sell as many as they wanted at $600 as $500 - once they saw they could outsell the 360 at the $600 price point they decided to stick with that model to make things simpler for retailers and Sony. Sony (and Microsoft) do not really care about the Wii I think, since they are aimed at such different markets... I see next gen gaming being the Wii + at least one other "power" console for many gamers (though probably lots of casual gaming households with only Wii's).
"There is more worth loving than we have strength to love." - Brian Jay Stanley
Exactly. I've seen estimates that extra parts and labor that go into the premium PS3 versus the regular is about $35 and the assembly lines can be diverted late during production to keep a variable ratio of one to the other. It would have been useful if they were having trouble keeping PS3s on the shelves but, evidently not. In practice, the 20GB version has been MIA in retail for a while... it costs $100 more so making all 60GB versions lets Sony takes about $65 less in red ink. It's a good way to mitigate the bleeding since they simply did not sell as many as they wanted to.
With the $480 360 Elite, if Sony REALLY wanted to, they could skip buying this year's ivory back scratchers and drop the PS3 to $500 and really put the pressure on the top end of the 360 consumer. Sure there'd be a lot of PS3 owners pissed off to see a price drop so soon, but, it wouldn't be the first time Sony's spit in the faces of their fanboys.
More Twoson than Cupertino
I had a sinking feeling that this was coming...
When I first heard about the different PS3 models, I was all for the "why would I buy a gimped version of the PS3?!?" argument. Then I started considering the prices.
The benefits of the 60 gig are:
+40 GB drive
memory card slots
Wifi
And it costs 100 dollars more.
I have a wifi router in my house. My entertainment system is close enough to my router (for my Xbox, et al) to connect with a cable. I connect it, BAM I have WiFi access to my PS3.
A USB Memory card adapter is $10 at the Electronics store.
So I'm left paying $90 for 40Gigs of storage? I'd rather shell out the extra $30, get a 500Gig drive, and plug it in myself (standard SATAII cables, doesn't void warenty).
So, the 20 Gig was the only version I was actually looking at to buy.
That and the fact that upgraded versions of the PS3 have a good chance of being "Software backwards compatible" like in the UK, which is to say "not backwards compatible at all"
I can only hope that they won't get rid of the 20gig here as well.
--------
Nothing can be done before the tremendous power!
RabidComics
And you call that "the PS3 is outselling the 360 for the past few weeks"?
The February NPD numbers show a much different story. Granted, the NPD values aren't complete either, but much more so than merely combing just Amazon.
In any case, the March NPD numbers will be along shortly, so we'll see if your theory holds up.
That said, yes, the Wii is still trouncing them both.
-- jchenx
How am I going to conveniently categorize fanboy comments?! Seriously, did Sony ever think of that?!
Before, pro-Sony would refer to the PS3 as $500, anti- would use $600 (and sometimes $700). How am I supposed to ignore the people I disagree with?!
It's the same thing with Nintendo... back before they announced the price, people would say either $300 or $200 (or sometimes even $150!) depending on who they were rooting for... now... well, I guess they're still more than $300 on eBay, so this still works some of the time :-P
Thank goodness I can still tell how people feel about Microsoft! Especially with the new model coming out...
I am the man with no sig!
4 months later and they axe one of their products?
Wow, that's a short amount of shelf time.
I'd have thought the P-is-for-poverty-S3 would have been their way in.
The 20gig thing wouldnt' have been an issue for people who want to play games, but the other missing features (wifi, etc) were a burn.
Am I mistaken, or did this thing either not come with DVI cable, or it didn't have a DVI port at all?
You have to see through all this "we listened to our customers" crap (Sony never does), and realize this is all because of the Wii's seemingly runaway success.
Any plans to release any good games to make up for the exclusives they've lost?
I don't need no instructions to know how to rock!!!!
I decided to look for the 20G model since I saw the HD was user replaceable. The WiFi is nice, but I have no need.
But when I tried to buy one, none were available anywhere. I've never seen one at retail.
So it's too bad really... I figured on using the additional $100 to upgrade the HD, making the PS3 a good media extender. But it's pretty clear the 20G model was always the model for price comparison, and I believe it became a casualty of sonhy trying to get a bit rational about distributio of the PS3.
I think we'll see a reduced price PS3 by the fall in the United States, but it will not have hardware emulation for PS2. They'll do the same they did for the European release of the PS3 and use software emulation (perhaps making the early PS3's slightly more desirable?). It's going to be a tough year for Sony Games.
You were mistaken. Which is odd, since memory shouldn't be a problem for you
The Wii, PSP and freaking Nintendo-$150-DS have built in wifi... $100 for wireless is quite clearly just raping trapped consumers in a captive market.
No bias there, 'The PS3 Will Fail'. I am curious about your 'right to resale' though. If I'm the manufacturer of something, *I* have the right to say who can and cannot sell my product. If that hurts business, that's my problem, not anyone else's.
Good lord, you should apply for marketing at Sony or something. On that page, every other statistic shows that either the Wii or the 360 is selling far better than the PS3.
No, other entries say things like "There are more items for sale for the 360" Well, yes - that's pretty obvious - it's been out longer. And as the 360 has been out longer with more games the games they do have are also outselling most PS3 games. That seems pretty obvious as well. What is not obvious, and what is interesting, is that the PS3 every time it was availaible at Amazon, has outsold the 360. It just happens that that has only held true (Amazon havng stock) for any length of time starting around the end of March.
And even in your particular example, it's only based off the last 2 weeks of data, and in only one store (Amazon), and the difference between the "sales rank" is small (360 is 20, and the PS3 is 16). It's not that clear what "sales rank" even means.
You need to understand "the rest of the story". See all those times the graph is low? On every one of those days, the PS3 was not in stock and sales were from third parties charging $100 more for the console. That's every day since the start of the year.
As for what "sales rank" means, you cannot of course derive absolute numbers from sales rank. But what you can say is hat something with a sales rank of x+1 sold more units than something else with a sales rank of x. It might be only one more unit, or it might be 10k. But it is more. And ever since Amazon has had the PS3 in stock, it has outsold the 360.
The February NPD numbers show a much different story. Granted, the NPD values aren't complete either, but much more so than merely combing just Amazon. In any case, the March NPD numbers will be along shortly, so we'll see if your theory holds up.
The Feburary NPD numbers agree with the graph. The March NPD numbers will also agree with the graph, and should show the 360 with a lead (note the rise in the graph only started around the 23rd or so of March). It's the April numbers that will be interesting and will or will not bear out the point I am making.
Of course when the Elite comes out, that will probably push the 360 in front of the PS3 for a while again I imagine.
Let me be clear, I am making no judgements against or for any console with these numbers (I own none of them). I am just saying what the charts and obvservation of all three since the start of the year has shown.
"There is more worth loving than we have strength to love." - Brian Jay Stanley
How ridiculous is this... on Walmart's canadian website, you search for "wii", and it returns a bunch of PS2 games
After 3 days without programming, life becomes meaningless
- The Tao of Programming
WalMart has a bundle for $598, which is sold out. How is that far far below $380?
I've never seen the 20gb model in any store. I don't think retailers are big on giving consumers choices. Even if they carried both versions store employees would inevitably direct customers to purchase the more expensive version. I wouldn't be surprised is Sony released the lesser version simply an attempt to alleviate the shock of a $600 price tag.
Clearly, it didn't made a difference considering whenever anyone thinks of the PS3 price tag they only think of $600. The recent announcement of the Xbox360 Elite makes it easier to justify carrying only the expensive version.
Either way, I expect this to make no difference whatsoever. As I've mentioned, everyone already sees only one price tag for the console. What will make a difference is the library of games available and eventual price drops and those had better come sooner than later.
When you can walk into any walmart and return the games you don't want you can get the price down to $249, I believe. It's true that the bundles keep selling out quickly...but they keep relisting it frequently.
Just go to http://xpbargains.com/wii_locator.php and sign up for the RSS feed.
Here's the problem. How do you know that's truly "the rest of the story"? Could there be a similar problem with 360 sales now? Or perhaps the PS3 sales are artificially inflated for some other reason? We don't know because we don't work at Amazon.
I know because I have been monitoring this almost daily for months. You can look at the 360 and the PS3 and see if they are in stock, or not. Why? I have no idea, it amuses me to see which way the trends turn.
Of course we could play the "what if" game all day. That's why I always take sales numbers from one retailer with a huge grain of salt.
Yes, but we are not just talking about any retailer - we are talking about Amazon. I personally think it's pretty representitive of the market, or at least represents a large segment of sales.
I agree aggregated numbers are more useful and revealing (though I think NPD excludes some large retailers as well) but until those arrive Amazon is a good leading indicator. As I've said, the graphs from Amazon track very well with results revealed so far.
I just disagree with your assessment that, coming from one online retailer, the PS3 has surpassed the 360 overall in sales, since all the other data and trends so far hasn't indicated this. Basically, I think you jumped the gun way too early.
Possibly, like you say we'll know more for certain when the April figures come out... I am not wed to this evaluation, though I'm pretty certain it's correct. March should be better than Feburary for the PS3 though even if it doesn't quite match the 360 at that point.
"There is more worth loving than we have strength to love." - Brian Jay Stanley
It may not be a law, but companies certainly do have the right to tell their resellers what they can and don't with their product. If the reseller signs a contract with Sony (or whatever company), the contract may stipulate what can and can't be done, and the reseller is legally obligated to follow that contract.
WWJD.... for a Klondike bar?
Also, the post you responded to says *I* have the right to say who can and cannot sell my product." - It doesn't say anything about dictating what you can and can't do with a product you've purchased.
Again, it may not be a law, but a company can sell or refuse to sell their product to anyone they choose. A reseller can't force a company to sell them their product.
WWJD.... for a Klondike bar?
I forgot that you don't have to trust my observation at all - that same site has a page that specifically shows the data over time for sales rank vs. quantity on hand - for the PS3 and also the 360 (though I'm not sure I quite trust the quantity data for the 360 in early January).
A very interesting site if you like to follow trends. Not without flaws, sometimes they drop data but overall pretty interesting.
"There is more worth loving than we have strength to love." - Brian Jay Stanley
DMCA.
Has this guy recently spent some time legally dead for tax reasons?
kill all the fucking niggers
How lazy. They could at least show some flair and take a blunt object to it.
Decoy effect anyone?
It holds that if I buy a PS3 in Japan, take it to France and sell it there - Sony believes they have the right to sue me for that. Do you agree with that?
One of the biggest reasons to game on a console has always been uniformity of hardware. If I wanted to worry about whether or not a new console game in the store would work well with my particular iteration of the console, I'd be browsing the PC games instead.
Slashdot Burying Stories About Slashdot Media Owned
Oh, they exist. Since early January we have had the SAME five 60gb models warming our display case, but we've sold all both 20gb models after all these months. Standard price, regular ***mart customers, just no one wants this gold-plated brick in the red states.
:D
Silly Sony, so many Americans are living in this "booming" economy of fast food and chain retailers wages. Thinking $500-600 + $60 (for 1 game) + $___ for extra controllers, cables, etc, etc. is ridiculous. Don't forget those taxes too!
The PS3 may have some hp, but its just too damn expensive (sorry, Mr. dead horse). Should be no shock that the Wii and handhelds are overwhelmingly popular for price alone. At lease folks in these red states could scrape $500 + ___ misc fees to enjoy some games a lot faster than they could with the $600 model. Oh well, at least we'll never have to deal with an angry customer because we're sold out of PS3s
I submitted the story on 3-19 that Best was dropping the 20G model and that it was rumored that most major retailers would follow suit. Looks like Sony got the message.
Well that depends. Did you sign a contract with Sony agreeing you wouldn't do that?
I seriously doubt that Sony thinks they can sue *you* for doing that. If you had a reseller agreement (contract) with them, that would be another story entirely.
Lik-sang.com had no such agreement. Anything else?
Cowards need not reply. If you don't care to sign your comment, I don't care to believe anything you say.
Yeah, because people who have names never lie.
I think this is a smart decision, especially the buiilt in wi-fi. Stupid Microsoft should have built in the wifi as well instead of ripping people off with it costing $100 more, that's a rip-off just like their live market place and additional online content e-sodomy points/pricing. The 60 GB hard drive would be nice once downloading full content games really takes off, and for those people that will find ways to mod the sytem to play pirated games. It's not a real big deal the 60 GB, but more is better - now if only they could get that price down and provide some games worth playing on it over the other sytems and PC.
Gaming for over 25 years
I'm disappointed to hear this. I did see a few 20GB models on the shelf back in January, but have been waiting to buy until the Stanford folding software was really available. That's been out about a month, but then I was waiting for another Meijer 15% off day. Getting a PS3 for about $425 didn't sound too bad to me. Now I'll have to pay over $500.
For my purposes, 20GB and no WiFi wasn't an issue.
Maybe someday they will come out with a PS3 "blade" without blueray, etc.
Because Amazon, like a lot of other high profile online stores, will provide free shipping on orders above a certain currency threshold.
Since when does high demand require that products always be sold out?
The graphs only make it look close because of earlier values before they had stock, when there was a lot more variance. The charts show, day to day, that the PS3 is outselling the 360 by some amount (how much is impossible to say, only that it is more). That is the only thing I am asserting.
I do not think Amazon defines the trends. It only mirrors them, in the same way statisticians use smaller samples to determine bhaviour of larger populations.
As for the shipping, others already covered that. That and the fact that with Amazon there is no sales tax. For anyone on a budget it's a lot cheaper to go with Amazon, which is why I think those figures are very interesting, since you get a cut of people who want the best deal possible along with those looking for convienience (not having to travel to a store).
"There is more worth loving than we have strength to love." - Brian Jay Stanley
Sony may tick off some people, but, as someone who bought a PS3 in December, I certainly wouldn't be angry about a price drop in the June-September time frame.
Sony certainly is not ticking off as many of their "fanboys" as MS has/is. MS dropped support on the original XBox after a very short life. They may have had to do that to remain "competitive" by releasing the 360, but it still left those who bought into the original XBox high and dry. Now, those who thought they were getting the "Premium" model (instead of just "Core"), find out there was an "Elite" model. Again, they might have had to do this to stay "competitive", but adding a new "top model" that includes HDMI and a huge hard-drive isn't anywhere near as disruptive as dropping the lowest model being produced.
MS has also managed to tick off developers this generation by not including a hard-drive as a standard feature. Games for the 360 can't take it for granted, and even if you DO have one, the deployed hard drive is either small, or requires a costly proprietary replacement. If I was a content maker, or a consumer, the latter part would tick me off (for different reasons
Heck, even Nintendo has been ticking people off this generation by not making Wiis fast enough (which SHOULDN'T be a reason in my book, but some people are getting mighty angry about it).
This space for rent. All reasonable inquiries will be entertained at proprietors discretion.