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Sony Releasing New 1TB PlayStation 4 In July

Posted by samzenpus on from the more-storage dept.

Mark Wilson writes: Known as the 1TB PS4 Ultimate Player Edition (or PlayStation 4 Ultimate Player 1TB Edition depending on who you're talking to), Sony is launching a new PlayStation 4 next month. With the ever-growing market for downloadable content, it's difficult to have too much disk space. Recognizing this, Sony is doubling the size of the largest capacity PS4. The 1TB console will launch next month in the US, Asia and Europe, and the announcement comes just weeks after Microsoft announced a 1TB version of its Xbox One. Gamers in Japan will be able to get their hands on the console by the end of June, but the rest of the world will have to wait until July 15. There's no word on pricing, but Sony has detailed a few other changes that have been made to this version of the console.

98 comments

  1. Weird by viperidaenz · · Score: 1

    The Japanese company does a world-wide release.
    The American company does a Japan-first release.

    1. Re:Weird by XxtraLarGe · · Score: 2

      The Japanese company does a world-wide release.
      The American company does a Japan-first release.

      You might be a little confused. Here's some clarification:

      announcement comes just weeks after Microsoft announced a 1TB version of its Xbox One. Gamers in Japan will be able to get their hands on the console [The PS4] by the end of June

      Sony is releasing the 1TB PS4 in Japan first, the rest of the world July 15. XBone is just mentioned in passing for comparison of announcement dates.

      --
      Taking guns away from the 99% gives the 1% 100% of the power.
    2. Re:Weird by viperidaenz · · Score: 1

      Reading comprehension fail.

    3. Re:Weird by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      It would be weirder if these companies would release consoles that have easily upgradable, commodity hard drives. 1TB is a ridiculously small amount considering the size of games now.

    4. Re: Weird by jmac_the_man · · Score: 1

      I'm pretty sure both the PS3 and PS4 supported commodity hard drive expansion at launch. The Xbox One definitely supported it at launch. (The Xbox 360 had limited commodity hardware support added during its life cycle.)

    5. Re:Weird by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      Yeah, but we forgive you. ;)

    6. Re: Weird by donaldm · · Score: 1

      I got a day one PS3 and in the instruction booklet it showed you how to swap out your hard drive for a different sized one.

      While I have not purchased a PS4 yet for numerous reasons you can also change it's hard drive without voiding the warranty. So basically the 1TB PS4 is a standard PS4 with a 1TB disk and if you look at the price between a 500GB disk and a 1TB disk there is about a $10 to $20 difference and in OEM quantities you would probably be looking at a few dollars. Still when the new 1TB PS4 becomes available I think we are most likely looking at an increase of approximately $50.00. I could be wrong and it may even be possible it could be the same price as the 500GB PS4 but I doubt it. Still even if the price is about $50.00 dearer it would most likely be worth it rather then purchase a 1TB drive later and swap the 500GB one.

      --
      There ain't no such thing as proprietary standards only proprietary formats. Standards are by definition open.
    7. Re:Weird by Agripa · · Score: 1

      Or just support an external hard drive hooked up through USB or eSATA.

  2. Why? by Ormy · · Score: 1

    Why is this news? I know slashdot includes technology news but is every minor update to console hardware worth a story here? Really? Especially since you can buy a 4TB HDD quite cheaply now.

    1. Re:Why? by mlts · · Score: 5, Insightful

      I don't want a console, regardless of maker. They symbolize a fundamental pacts broken:

      During the "don't copy that floppy" era, there were promises made repeatedly that if piracy went away, prices on software would decrease sharply. When the latest and greatest DRM system hit, it was mentioned that if piracy went away, the money spent on that would be shaved off the prices of games and other items.

      Well, fast forward to today. Consoles have a 0% piracy rate on the latest gen, and previous gen consoles get perma-banned if the network detects they were modded. Have game prices on consoles gone down as repeatedly pledged to us? No. In fact, to play a game (or actually get a "game"'s worth of content), it requires hundreds of dollars of DLC.

      So, consoles are an embodiment of a lie promised to the consumer repeatedly, but for the price of a PC game, one gets the luxury of paying a lot more for an immutable, unmodable game, which can't even be sold at a used game store.

    2. Re:Why? by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      Yes, every story an editor wants to post is worthy of being posted. If you don't like it, leave.

    3. Re:Why? by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      Well, it's like there's any major gaming news right now, I mean it's not like E3 just ended so there's a ton of stuff you could post about that which Slashdot hasn't, or that there's any big games coming out tomorrow like the new Batman game, RIDE, or a big World of Warcraft patch.

      I mean, clearly the biggest thing happening in gaming right now is a next-gen console no one owns is going to come with a larger hard drive.

    4. Re:Why? by Dragonslicer · · Score: 4, Insightful

      Isn't the price of a new game typically $50-60? That's the same as 20 years ago, so in inflation-adjusted dollars, the prices have dropped quite a bit.

      I do agree with you about the extra downloadable content issue, but I don't usually buy games like those.

    5. Re:Why? by _merlin · · Score: 1

      I disagree. On Wii U I'm paying similar dollar amounts to what SNES carts cost back in the '90s, and getting far more content for it. So I'm paying less in inflation-adjusted terms for more content. None of the games I've bought have required DLC to get full content. I did buy the DLC for Mario Kart 8, but it's about $10 for 16 new tracks. That's great value even if you only play each of the new tracks once.

    6. Re:Why? by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      "So, consoles are an embodiment of a lie promised to the consumer repeatedly, but for the price of a PC game, one gets the luxury of paying a lot more for an immutable, unmodable game, which can't even be sold at a used game store."

      Yeah well... that's what you get for believing them. Not that the PC market is exactly stellar either with the insane bugs at launch that at times don't get patched and online connections being increasingly required for single player offline experiences, at times with additional DRM added on top of that. If you didn't have that underdog indie industry struggling to make sales and willing to cut out the DRM costs, I doubt you'd see any difference between consoles or PC. I tend to blame the PC market for being the source of all the quality drops in console gaming since the last gen. Prior to that you at least got the FULL game on the disc that you simply had to put in the console and it'd ... work. Now we have bug patches, stripped out content that is DLC, and now the trend towards online-only games like Destiny or Titan Fall where once they take the servers offline you're left with a 60 dollar coaster.

      I stopped buying console games at launch due to price quite a while ago. There's of course the occasional exception, but it seriously isn't a common thing.

    7. Re:Why? by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      Isn't the price of a new game typically $50-60? That's the same as 20 years ago, so in inflation-adjusted dollars, the prices have dropped quite a bit.

      Why do people pretend that inflation only affects the money supply?

      Let me rewrite that for you:

      Isn't the PURCHASING POWER of a DOLLAR typically HIGHER THAN 20 years ago, so in inflation-adjusted GOODS, the prices have INCREASED quite a bit.

      20 years ago, I could have bought a brand new VCD, maybe a DVD for $20. Today I can buy a blue ray. Or . That blue ray output has 10x the pixels. So to back port the price per pixel, 20 years ago the movie would have been $2 for the same value. Except now I also have a billion videos I can watch on youtube for free, aside from the sunk cost of my system, which is the same whether I use it to buy new games or not.

      On the PC side, in 1995, 20 years ago, we already had 1920x1080 monitors.
      http://www.themarysue.com/1995-john-carmack-quake-monitor/

      The console games have NOT had a comparable increase in pixel quality by that metric, much less pixels per dollar. 4k exists today, but none of the consoles offer it. Texture/lights, etc, are better sure, but that's largely thanks to the hardware we buy, not the game itself. The original artwork is drawn and scanned at the same resolution, or made with the same types of tools. You don't get to double dip by claiming Intel's work as your own, when I paid for the Intel parts.

      So the distaste for modern game consoles, by some, its related to that:
      1) They promised lower prices if we went along, then failed to deliver.
      2) The PC people didn't get hit by those price hikes.
      3) We have more options today than we did 20 years ago.

      I mean look at a kindle. It's 10-20x the cost of a book from 20 years ago. Sure, Kindle ebooks are still pricey, but look at the hardware.
      Load it up with project gutenberg or sideload PDFs onto it and you can have, literally, a million books on one of those.

      So let's summarize...
      Movies: Much better bang for buck - 10x for pixelbators!
      Books: 100,000x bang for buck.
      Games-PC's done all right. Compare SSI Goldbox 1986 games to 2006 Neverwinter nights for example. You get a hell of a lot more content, plus tools to make your own, for a lower price than the old gold boxes. Plus 3D. Player controlled camera. And voice acting. Etc. etc.

      Games-Console: The price is $10 higher and the gameplay isn't notably better. I can't think of anything offhand that didn't exist on the PC already in 1993's Doom or my fav, Tribes 1 in 1999. Sure, the visuals are better, but not-remarkably better than high end PC graphics from 20 years ago. Most of the improvement is directly attributable to the underlying hardware - which is not part of the game. This isn't a "computer technology hasn't gotten cheaper" thread, it's about the GAME component.

      So viewed that way, while games may or may not be better than they were 20 years ago in absolute terms (ok they are), they are comparatively far worse off when up against the competition.

    8. Re:Why? by shione · · Score: 2

      Those are some good points made by mlts.

      Even if console prices have come down like you say, they haven't come down as much as they should with zero copyright infringement. You can see this by comparing games that get released on consoles and the pc at the same time. The vast majority of the time, (maybe even all the time?), the pc release is cheaper than it is on a console. But at the same time the pc is the most open and 'pirated' platform. hmmm...

      I think mlts has made some good points. It was always a sham blaming copyright infringement for the high price of software. Look at the price of a genuine windows licence worldwide. It is cheapest in the countries with high piracy rates. Hell, countries with high piracy rates get rewarded with lower prices while countries like Australia which has some of the lowest piracy rates pays some of the highest prices for software especially games on steam.

      If you go back before there was any digital distribution for console games, the higher price for console games could be sort of justified by the buyer getting some of their money back by selling/trading in the game. But now that's gone too, once you buy it its worth basically nothing because you can't sell it to anyone. So not only have console companies kept prices higher with zero copyright infringement they've kept prices high after cutting out the second hard market.

    9. Re:Why? by Xest · · Score: 1

      Yeah, the problem is the cost of game development has escalated drastically.

      So instead of reducing prices they just opted to give us bigger and better games.

      It's easy to make a promise about reducing prices if piracy reduces when all games can be made with a team of 3 in 6 months, but without the foresight that people demand bigger and better games that promise rings a bit naive.

      I found my old Hero Quest video game the other day, price tag on it was £24.99. That would be £50 now and I typically only pay £40 for games, I think a 20% reduction in price coupled with a massive amount more effort put into art work and storyline nowadays is not a terrible deal. The headline price isn't an issue for me, I think it's fair.

      What I do detest is this DLC crap and the fact that Season Passes are now standard from companies like Ubisoft - you're only buying half a game now and the other half is ready at or near release, you just have to pay more for it. That's what's really unfair and unacceptable.

    10. Re:Why? by CronoCloud · · Score: 1

      The vast majority of the time, (maybe even all the time?), the pc release is cheaper than it is on a console.

      That hasn't been the case in the US for years now.

      But at the same time the pc is the most open and 'pirated' platform. hmmm...

      PC gamers are notoriously cheap when it comes to software, especially those outside the US.

      But now that's gone too, once you buy it its worth basically nothing because you can't sell it to anyone. So not only have console companies kept prices higher with zero copyright infringement they've kept prices high after cutting out the second hard market.

      Where do you get the idea you can't sell physical copies second hand? Because you can.

    11. Re:Why? by CronoCloud · · Score: 1

      Have game prices on consoles gone down as repeatedly pledged to us?

      considering the amount of content, even in games with DLC, in modern games and taking inflation in account, we pay less. Remember, some single screen Atari 2600 games went for $40 bucks.

      No. In fact, to play a game (or actually get a "game"'s worth of content), it requires hundreds of dollars of DLC.>/quote>

      What game has hundreds of dollars of "required" DLC?

      which can't even be sold at a used game store.

      Where did you get that idea? Because you can. Perhaps you missed the news that Microsoft backtracked on that? As for Sony, you've always been able to sell retail releases.

      But "real gamers", meaning gamers who don't only play tthe brown-shooter-of-the-week or sports-game-of-the-season, don't sell games.

    12. Re:Why? by Dragonslicer · · Score: 1

      I certainly wasn't trying to argue that the prices 20 years ago or the relative decrease in price since then was in any way connected to copyright infringement. I only meant to point out that the relative price for a new game has gone down. Exactly why that has happened, I don't really know.

    13. Re:Why? by mattack2 · · Score: 1

      No. In fact, to play a game (or actually get a "game"'s worth of content), it requires hundreds of dollars of DLC.

      Ridiculous, it doesn't require that. Just wait 6 months to a year (there's plenty of games to play in the meantime), and the game'll fall to $20 with all of the DLC included.

      Heck, I got the Mass Effect Trilogy for $5 in one of the PSN sales.. (No, I'm not one of the people who pays for the continuous account.)

  3. Cool feature but... by gameboyhippo · · Score: 3, Interesting

    I'd be sold on PS4 if it had BC with PS3. There isn't enough content that I like for me to want to get the PS4 yet, but I wouldn't mind upgrading if it had backwards compatibility.

    1. Re:Cool feature but... by XxtraLarGe · · Score: 2

      Probably not going to happen because of this. Sony doesn't want you to be able to play the games you already bought. Then again, Microsoft doesn't really want you to either, but they're behind in the game, so their hand was forced. Also, backward compatibility only supports a handful of games. I typically don't buy a console until 3-4 years after it's out, then I can get GOTY editions of games for $30 instead of new "patched out of the box" games for $60.

      --
      Taking guns away from the 99% gives the 1% 100% of the power.
    2. Re:Cool feature but... by XxtraLarGe · · Score: 2

      Sony doesn't want you to be able to play the games you already bought.

      Making a slight amendment to this: Sony doesn't want you to be able to play the games you already bought without paying for them again. Sony could blow the whole backward compatible thing out of the water though, if they could scan your account for games you already bought (maybe using your trophies list?) and give you free access to those in PS Now.

      --
      Taking guns away from the 99% gives the 1% 100% of the power.
    3. Re:Cool feature but... by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 3, Interesting

      Sony doesn't want you to be able to play the games you already bought.

      Making a slight amendment to this: Sony doesn't want you to be able to play the games you already bought without paying for them again. Sony could blow the whole backward compatible thing out of the water though, if they could scan your account for games you already bought (maybe using your trophies list?) and give you free access to those in PS Now.

      The problem with scanning your account for trophies is that it gives anyone with a redbox account or something similar a way a game for a pittance. They would probably have to demand that the physical disc be present for proof you actually have whatever it is you're trying to play. Digital games don't really matter, since you need to be signed in with your PlayStation account to access them anyway.

    4. Re:Cool feature but... by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      You're assigning motive to a situation you can't possibly know everything about. The PS4 is fundamentally a different architecture than any of its predecessors, and backward compatibility in prior generations came from including the actual old hardware in some form within the new machine.

    5. Re:Cool feature but... by tlhIngan · · Score: 1

      Probably not going to happen because of this. Sony doesn't want you to be able to play the games you already bought. Then again, Microsoft doesn't really want you to either, but they're behind in the game, so their hand was forced. Also, backward compatibility only supports a handful of games. I typically don't buy a console until 3-4 years after it's out, then I can get GOTY editions of games for $30 instead of new "patched out of the box" games for $60.

      Sony wants you to buy it again. The number of re-releases this generation is staggering - there's plenty of PS3 games being remade for PS4, a few Xbox360 games remade for Xbone (a few, not as many as Sony it seems).

      As for Microsoft? They're behind, yes, but not hugely behind. And not far enough to be desperate - when you're talking about both shipping tens of millions already, you're not "in trouble". Plus, Microsoft found the new price point where sales have picked up and even exceeded PS4 sales.

      All we can say is life is good when both are actually competing with each other.

      (By any measure, the Xbone is a success by itself. Just when you compare it against the PS4, it's not as successful).

      And you can bet Sony is probably trying hard to get PS3 backwards compatibility going because Microsoft's announced it, and Sony's game schedule is starting to look skimpy because Sony's E3 presentation was more about games "in the future", while Microsoft's was "this year or next".

    6. Re:Cool feature but... by drinkypoo · · Score: 1

      Sony could blow the whole backward compatible thing out of the water though, if they could scan your account for games you already bought (maybe using your trophies list?) and give you free access to those in PS Now.

      The only reasonable way is to take your game discs, destroy them (removing them from the used market) and issue you a code. And by "reasonable" I mean it's the only way that Sony can know you're not boning them, because discs aren't uniquely serialized.

      Someday perhaps we will get discs with UUIDs on them, and then they can do what you suggest. More likely discs will just go away, though, and this will be a moot issue in the future. They can either bring your licenses forward, or not.

      --
      "You're right," Fisheye says. "I should have set it on 'whip' or 'chop.'"
    7. Re: Cool feature but... by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      Meh, I want it in white.

    8. Re:Cool feature but... by mattack2 · · Score: 1

      Also, backward compatibility only supports a handful of games.

      Is that part referring to the newly announced Xbox One backwards compatibility?

      If so, didn't they announce a *hundred* to start with, with hundreds more to come? Even if you totally discount the "hundreds more" part (don't count on vaporware), that's likely to be 100 of the most popular games.

      Seems like a win to me.. (and even though I already have far too many games I've already bought (cheaply) that I haven't finished, the backwards compatibility DOES make me curious about getting an Xbox One at some point -- to play the various Xbox exclusive games I've never been able to play.. even if they're "last" generation.) So their spin has piqued my interest, and I'll be paying attention to the backwards compatibility list!

  4. OMG!! by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

    Its a fesitivus miracle!! I can't wait for the summer of shame.

  5. Features by fustakrakich · · Score: 1

    Does it come with email?

    --
    “He’s not deformed, he’s just drunk!”
    1. Re:Features by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      Yes, you get free email access with a subscription to their online service for only $40/mo! /s

    2. Re:Features by CronoCloud · · Score: 1

      I suppose so, if you use webmail. I haven't tried the web browser with gmail or my ISP's webmail interface.

  6. Dues it matter? by frovingslosh · · Score: 1

    I'm not a PS4 (or any other console) fanboy, but I read this and can't help wonder: It there anything that stops a user from replacing the hard drive in a PS4 with a larger drive themselves (wonky interfaces? self destruct when opened cases? magic formatting of the drive that can't readily be duplicated?)? Is it a typical 3.5 inch drive or a smaller drive?

    Since we are finally admitting that size matters and Sony will still be offering only a 1TB drive, and 2TB drives available well under $75 and 4TB or even larger drives quite affordable, who cares about a 500 gig to 1 TB upgrade? What is the largest capacity hard drive that the PS4 hardware and firmware will support?

    --
    I'm an American. I love this country and the freedoms that we used to have.
    1. Re:Dues it matter? by ganjadude · · Score: 2

      seriously just give me some usb ports and allow me to bring my own external HDD.

      --
      have you seen my sig? there are many others like it but none that are the same
    2. Re:Dues it matter? by viperidaenz · · Score: 2

      It's a 2.5" SATA drive.
      Best $/GB for 2.5" drives at the moment is in the 750 - 1000GB size.
      A 2TB drive costs more than 2x a 1TB drive.

    3. Re: Dues it matter? by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      2.5" 9.5mm which probably limits you to 1tb anyway

    4. Re:Dues it matter? by kosmosik · · Score: 1

      > I'm not a PS4 (or any other console) fanboy, but I read this and can't help wonder:
      > It there anything that stops a user from replacing the hard drive in a PS4 with a larger
      > drive themselves (wonky interfaces? self destruct when opened cases? magic formatting
      > of the drive that can't readily be duplicated?)? Is it a typical 3.5 inch drive or a smaller drive?

      It is no problem to replace PS4 disk. You just get compatible (in size - 2,5", max 9,5mm tall, similar performance - nothing fancy, you can even pop SSD) drive, open the console, pop in the new drive, download and install OS from USB flashdrive and it is done. There are plenty of guides on Internet if you Google it. You can also buy an accessory which adds 500gb storage to PS4.

      Also you wouldn't be buing entire new PS4 system if you were short on storage. So this is not the case here.

      So really this is not a big news. I don't quite get why they haven't launched with a bigger drive but it just normal that they release new hardware revision later after launch and adress problems (like limited storage) - it is for people who _do_not_own_PS4_yet_.

    5. Re:Dues it matter? by Tukz · · Score: 1

      You can say the same for laptops.
      So easily replaced, but laptops with larger drives costs more than what the drive would had cost by itself by quite a lot.

      In most cases it's cheaper to buy the laptop with the smallest HDD and replace it yourself with something larger or a SSD.

      Oh and to answer your question, it's a 2.5 inch drive in the PS4, though with a height limit of 9.5mm iirc.
      People have reported 4TB working fine.

      --
      - Don't do what I do, it's probably not healthy nor safe. -
    6. Re:Dues it matter? by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 1

      The PS4 has USB ports and you can hook up an external HDD.

      As long as all you want to do is play music and movies off of it. You can't use it for anything game-related.

      Because Sony.

    7. Re:Dues it matter? by dissy · · Score: 3, Informative

      Better than that, you can just swap out the internal HD with another HD (or SSD) of your choosing.

      It must be a 2.5" drive that is 9.5mm (or less), and 5400rpm to match the built in drive but faster drives will show the speed improvement.

      You can then backup your game saves to a USB drive, swap out the internal drive, format the new internal drive, restore your saves from USB, and go about installing games again.

      The only annoying part is if you already have a ton of games on the internal drive.
      I don't know any way to copy those along, you have to redownload them AFAIK, so hopefully you have a good ISP.

      I know a few people that did this using 512gb SSDs for the speed boost.
      On my friends SSD'ed PS4 I got to play GTA5 before and after the upgrade, and you could very much tell the difference in speed. Much closer to PC loading times than stock console.

      For extra capacity, I think the largest "thin" 9.5mm HDs out there are 2tb, but that too is only a matter of time and I may already be out-of-date wrong with that statement.

      BTW the PS3 is just as easily upgraded.
      I never owned a PS2 so can't comment there (does it even have an HD?), and the PS1 certainly did not.

    8. Re:Dues it matter? by ganjadude · · Score: 1

      yeah i know all that can be done

      but there is no technical reason that i cant simply buy an external drive...plug it into the usb port (that is already there).... and save to it

      Until I can do that, im not getting one

      --
      have you seen my sig? there are many others like it but none that are the same
    9. Re:Dues it matter? by Yaztromo · · Score: 1

      I'm not a PS4 (or any other console) fanboy, but I read this and can't help wonder: It there anything that stops a user from replacing the hard drive in a PS4 with a larger drive themselves (wonky interfaces? self destruct when opened cases? magic formatting of the drive that can't readily be duplicated?)? Is it a typical 3.5 inch drive or a smaller drive?

      Sony pretty actively advertises that the PS4 HDD is completely user-upgradable. IIRC the PS4 manual contains instructions, and they also have them online here.

      I've read articles that have tested magnetic, SSD, and Hybrid(SSHD) drives, and they all work just fine. The main limitations appear to be in terms of physical size (2.5" drive, 9.5mm or less in height). Word has it you can use up to a 6TB drive, although the people doing so are using 3.5" drives in external enclosures (and I've read some reports of some weird issues with powering such systems up).

      Yaz

    10. Re:Dues it matter? by hackwrench · · Score: 1

      The PS2 had an add-on HD and network adapter but the only thing I can think of that you could use it for was Final Fantasy 11 which required it. I think some of the newer form factor PS2's had a built-in wired network adapter, but they didn't have a bay for the hard drive. Don't know of any games that used it.

    11. Re:Dues it matter? by gohmifune · · Score: 1

      If I recall, more games installed in Japan.

    12. Re:Dues it matter? by _merlin · · Score: 1

      Nintendo lets you play games off an external USB HDD on the Wii U. Sony's just fucking you over again.

    13. Re:Dues it matter? by khellendros1984 · · Score: 1

      Out of curiosity, what is attractive about using an external drive through a slow USB interface when you can use an internal drive over SATA? From my perspective: I've got an external drive on my Wii hosting disk images of games, and I hate having it outside the case of the system. The benefit that I see is increased functionality, but it seems like having the drive outside the system is a big drawback. Is your interest in having game saves on a USB stick, or something? Like for transportation to another system, for backup, etc?

      --
      It is pitch black. You are likely to be eaten by a grue.
    14. Re:Dues it matter? by khellendros1984 · · Score: 1

      Don't know of any games that used it.

      There were a number of games in North America with HDD support, and a larger list with online support.

      --
      It is pitch black. You are likely to be eaten by a grue.
    15. Re:Dues it matter? by CronoCloud · · Score: 1

      game performance over USB would suffer tremendously. You wouldn't want to do that.

      You CAN do system backups to USB.

    16. Re:Dues it matter? by CronoCloud · · Score: 1

      I don't know any way to copy those along, you have to redownload them AFAIK,

      You can do a system backup to external drives now, Firmware 2.50 added that feature.

      http://manuals.playstation.net...

      I never owned a PS2 so can't comment there (does it even have an HD?),

      YES! The network adapter has a connector for a standard full size PATA drive. The official PS2 HDD's are 40GB Maxtors IIRC, they're "blessed" though, special firmware so games recognize them. PS2 Games won't recognize a non-blessed HDD. FFXI requires, and is shipped with the HDD. The only way to get the official retail non-Linux-kit PS2 HDD is by buying FFXI. There are a few other games that have HDD support in the US.

      Linux on the PS2 is a different story, it can use any HDD, blessed or not.

    17. Re:Dues it matter? by ganjadude · · Score: 1

      easier to bring an external drive to a friends instead of bringing the entire console for one

      --
      have you seen my sig? there are many others like it but none that are the same
    18. Re:Dues it matter? by DiEx-15 · · Score: 1

      I never owned a PS2 so can't comment there (does it even have an HD?), and the PS1 certainly did not.

      PS2 did have one but it was external, sold separately, and sadly (or weirdly) it never caught on.

  7. Commercial? by s.petry · · Score: 1

    I didn't see much "news" in that little biddy article, I saw a sales pitch and video.

    --

    -The wise argue that there are few absolutes, the fool argues that there are no probabilities.

    1. Re:Commercial? by minstrelmike · · Score: 1

      I didn't see much "news" in that little biddy article, I saw a sales pitch and video.

      In America, that's what IS known as "news."

  8. Not email but.. by s.petry · · Score: 1

    Nope, but your store account will be pre-hacked so that you don't have that to worry about...

    Meant as humor. I know Sony is a big bad evil thing but I prefer them over their competition for game consoles...

    --

    -The wise argue that there are few absolutes, the fool argues that there are no probabilities.

  9. Non-News by SuperKendall · · Score: 2

    Since it's so easy to replace the drive in the first place, this seem like kind of non-news... it will be helpful for some non-technical people but most people are probably not coming close to filling up the drives Sony currently ships with.

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    "There is more worth loving than we have strength to love." - Brian Jay Stanley
    1. Re:Non-News by MobileTatsu-NJG · · Score: 1

      You might be surprised. One of the unexpectedly fun things (for me) with the PS4 is the video recording functionality. They make it very simple to record the videos and post them to Youtube. It makes it easy to fill up the drive, too. I don't plan on upgrading the drive any time soon but I do see how some could find 500 gig insufficient.

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      "I like to lick butts!" by MobileTatsu-NJG (#32700246) (Score:5, Informative)

    2. Re:Non-News by SuperKendall · · Score: 1

      That is a good point, I just figured that would all be streamed up and removed but it could easily impact disk space.

      --
      "There is more worth loving than we have strength to love." - Brian Jay Stanley
    3. Re:Non-News by MobileTatsu-NJG · · Score: 1

      You have to go a lil out of your way to actually get it out to Youtube. Basically what happens is you encounter something funny, so you quickly hit the 'share' button and the PS4 will take the last 10 minutes and save it. If you tell it to stream it'll cancel your game, so instead you bank it until you get a chance to trim it down and upload it later. I suppose that's for the better since if it started uploading it could mess up your ping times.

      --

      "I like to lick butts!" by MobileTatsu-NJG (#32700246) (Score:5, Informative)

    4. Re:Non-News by mattack2 · · Score: 1

      You probably mean PS4, but I filled up my stock PS3 drive with various games bought on the PSN sales... and I would say I'm a "prefers disk" person.. but when a game gets down to $5, I'll get it on PSN.

      So eventually I'll probably replace my PS3 drive with a bigger one.

  10. So what? by bistromath007 · · Score: 1

    It's still going to be a shitsucking 5400 RPM laptop drive, so loading times will just be even worse.

    1. Re:So what? by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      See a video comparison of actual load times with ssd vs stock drive and think agan, asswipe.

  11. But by nitehawk214 · · Score: 1

    Who wants to pay $200 for a 5400 rpm 1TB drive?

    --
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    1. Re:But by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      Sonyggers.

    2. Re:But by arkane1234 · · Score: 1

      Quite ignorant.

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  12. why 2.5 inch only and not 3.5 at least you can cha by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

    why 2.5 inch only and not 3.5 at least you can change the build in HDD out unlike the xbox and xbox 360 (kind of) using a non MS HDD can lead to a ban

  13. Why is "more space" the most interesting upgrade? by wonkey_monkey · · Score: 2

    "More space" is by far the least interesting out of a short list of not very interesting upgrades.

    The others are: 8% lower power consumption, 10% lower weight. Oh, and a matte finish to the hard drive bay!

    --
    systemd is Roko's Basilisk.
  14. Re:why 2.5 inch only and not 3.5 at least you can by wonkey_monkey · · Score: 1

    why 2.5 inch only and not 3.5

    I'm going to go out on a limb and suggest it's something to do with the fact that one is physically smaller than the other.

    --
    systemd is Roko's Basilisk.
  15. Re:why 2.5 inch only and not 3.5 at least you can by ArcadeMan · · Score: 1

    smaller and less waste heat

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  16. "it's difficult to have too much disk space" WTF? by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

    Who talks like that? Oh yeah... AMERICANS... fucking idiot.

  17. Let me guess... by slick7 · · Score: 1

    PS 4,... in July, ...July 4th?

    --
    The mind conceives, the body achieves, the spirit manifests.
  18. Sony Screwed Itself (& You) But Learned Someth by Kunedog · · Score: 1

    Sony dominated the market with the PS1 and PS2, and the resulting arrogance showed in the design and launch of the PS3. Its Cell CPU architecture was powerful enough, but so bizarre and confusing that it took unnecessary effort and time for developers to learn it. Porting games to and from the PS3 was a pain in the ass, which IMO was by design. PS3 expected to continue dominating the market and therefore many publishers, when faced with the extra cost of developing for two consoles with different architectures, would choose to focus their efforts on the dominant console.

    This worked as planned, except that the dominant console (especially early in the cycle) turned out to be the XBox 360 due to Sony's disastrous launch missteps.*

    Sony somewhat returned to reality with the PS4, and it shows in their early lead over the X-Bone (also note Microsoft's initial X-Bone arrogance vs. later backpedalling over always-online DRM, 2nd hand games, the Kinect, and now backwards compatibility). So unlike Microsoft, I did actually believe Sony when they said backwards compatitibility with PS3 games was unfeasible (because of their own stupid Cell architecture mistake).

    * five hundred and ninety-nine U.S. dollars, Ridge Racer, massive damage, etc.

  19. It's a feature by Jumunquo · · Score: 1

    The feature shall be called, "Account Super-Sharing." Microsoft has bc? Big deal. Kiss our account super-sharing!

  20. So..... any self respecting ........ by TeddyR · · Score: 1

    The first thing I did when I got my PS4 was to take out the measly 500gb drive and replace it with a 2TB7200 rpm drive immediately..... Anyone with a Playstation Plus account would really be advised to do so anyways... [I upgraded my PS3 drive to a 7200rpm 1 tb as well recently also to take advantage of PS+ as well)

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    --
    Time is on my side
  21. And for the bump in price.... by Immostlyharmless · · Score: 1

    You could probably buy a 3 or 4 TB drive. These console manufacturers are rip off artists, The street price between a 500 gig and a 1TB drive is like 15 bucks. What a bunch of jokers these assholes are.

    And the fanbois will drop to their knees and chap their lips all the while singing the praises of both Msoft and Sony for finally giving them the storage they both should have been released with when they debuted.

    1. Re:And for the bump in price.... by khellendros1984 · · Score: 1

      You could probably buy a 3 or 4 TB drive.

      I think that 2TB is currently the largest 2.5" drive. The system apparently supports up to 6TB, and I guess some people have done it with cable extensions to 3.5" drives, or something.

      And the fanbois will drop to their knees and chap their lips all the while singing the praises of both Msoft and Sony for finally giving them the storage they both should have been released with when they debuted.

      ....Or it'll give less-technical people another purchase option. The new PS4 version is apparently releasing for AUD550, which is what the previous versions launched at. I don't get where the vitriol is coming from.

      --
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    2. Re:And for the bump in price.... by marsu_k · · Score: 1

      I think that 2TB is currently the largest 2.5" drive. The system apparently supports up to 6TB, and I guess some people have done it with cable extensions to 3.5" drives, or something.

      There's at least one semi-external enclosure, that replaces the HDD cover with a slightly taller version that one can fit a 3.5" drive in. But according to reviews, it seems to perform worse than the stock drive (at least with a 3TB drive), so I'm not sure that's advisable - games probably assume that the HDD works at least as fast as the stock one.

  22. Upgrade my PS3 by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

    The only reason I would want to upgrade my PS3 is because there is so much dust in it now it runs pretty hot and the fan is constantly on - meaning it sounds more like it belongs in the server room. As the case is non-serviceable I can't pull it apart and dust it myself which annoys me I am sure the next gen will be a bigger lock-in and more non-serviceable - No Thank you.

    1. Re:Upgrade my PS3 by arkane1234 · · Score: 1

      Disassemble PS3 slim: https://www.ifixit.com/Teardow...
      Disassemble PS3 fat: https://www.youtube.com/watch?...

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    2. Re:Upgrade my PS3 by arkane1234 · · Score: 1

      Disassemble PS4 (Just in case you get one): https://www.ifixit.com/Teardow...

      --
      -- This space for lease, low setup fee, inquire within!
  23. Looking around at my nearly .1 Petabyte.. by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

    I say "1TB, that's precious!"

  24. the 360 had HDDs in a custom candy with bans when by Joe_Dragon · · Score: 1

    the 360 had HDDs in a custom candy with bans when you changed out the hdd inside of it.

  25. Re:"it's difficult to have too much disk space" WT by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

    I appreciate that you've provided an attribution for your quote, although "fucking idiot" is a bit vague, and it might be nice if you could also provide a citation of the source. Thank you in advance!

  26. 1 whole TB, cool! by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

    I mean, my steam folder alone is sitting around 2 TB itself... Probably cost me less for all those games than it will for someone to buy that "new" ps4...

  27. Re:Sony Screwed Itself (& You) But Learned Som by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

    I don't know if you can say the 360 dominated the ps3 when worldwide, the overall ps3 and 360 sales numbers are so close to each other. The only region where the 360 had a big lead over the ps3 was in the USA and even then the 360 was dwarfed by the wii.

    Overall units sold worldwide:
    wii: 101M
    ps3: 85M
    360: 85M

    USA:
    wii: 39M
    ps3: 17M
    360: 26M

    In every other region the 360 was either very close to the ps3 or lagging far behind like in Japan.

    The 360 had the highest failure rate of the 3 consoles too ( http://www.gamespot.com/articles/xbox-360-failure-rate-237-ps3-10-wii-27-study/1100-6216691/ ) so that could have boosted their numbers from people having to repurchase the console or lose access to their games.

  28. Re:why 2.5 inch only and not 3.5 at least you can by shione · · Score: 1

    2.5" inch drives require less power, generate less heat and are obviously smaller so the overall size of the console doesn't have to be as large.

  29. Why no CIFS support? by guacamole · · Score: 1

    One thing that's always puzzling me is why can't PS3 and PS4 work as a client for CIFS (Windows or Samba file server). I use my PS3 primarily for movies. Sure, you can stream things to it using a media stream server, but I never got it why Sony always wants to lock the users into "the one" way of doing things, and taking their options away. Moreover, media streaming doesn't work well with the PS3 over wireless because of the ancient Wireless-G Wi-Fi interface. So what I do is download the mp4 files directly to the hard drive, and that's why I could use CIFS. Right now I am using PS3 web browser to get the files from my Windows file server running cygwin and apache. Dunno why Sony always goes out of its way to make things harder for the users.

    1. Re:Why no CIFS support? by shione · · Score: 1

      Probably because Sony's entertainment division didn't want the playstation to be able to easily copy/read files easily over the network because any copying/reading makes "omg piracy!" pop up in their tunnel vision eyes. The ps3 and 4 support DLNA for streaming though which is something at least. DLNA was started by Sony I believe and is a open standard while CIFS is microsoft and a closed standard. SMB was only possible by reverse engineering SMB but microsoft often changes the standard giving *nix distributions a lot of headaches. Sony can make sure the playstation always supports DLNA but it's a lot harder for them to fix SMB when windows changes the standard.

    2. Re:Why no CIFS support? by guacamole · · Score: 1

      If Sony wants DLNA to become the way of accessing media, then they should at least get the wireless interface right on the consoles. The very first PS3 came out before 801.11n was a standard, so I can forgive it, but the updated slim PS3 came out years later still with outdated 801.11g. PS4 came only with two stream 801.11n, instead of 801.11ac, and only with 2.4GHz band (probably fair enough for 1080p streaming, just barely, but must still use relatively congested 2.4GHz band)

  30. Re:Why is "more space" the most interesting upgrad by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

    Well, the *more space* is by far the **most** interesting. Why?

    Because if the old FF7 took 4 CDs... the FF7 remake might take 500GB...

  31. Re:why 2.5 inch only and not 3.5 at least you can by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

    Other people have mentioned size / heat considerations, but I'll also add - 2.5" drives are less subject to issues caused by vibration/poor handling/knocks and bumps than full-sized discs, which probably results in improved reliability.

  32. But PS3 hardware is way too different by Kartu · · Score: 1

    Let me put aside the "they want more money" argument as I don't quite get why it would apply to a single company.

    Let's check PS3 and PS4 hardware:.
    PS3: Cell CPU with one "generic" core and 8 vector cores. (that single core ran at 3.2Ghz and was quite fast even by today's standards)
    PS4: 8 AMD "Jaguar" cores. People normally badmouth AMD, but Jaguar's were best perf/watt at the point consoles were released, if we trust anandtech.
    Anyway, there are 8 SMALL cores now, you must multi-thread to effectively use it.

    Try to map that to 1 faster core + 8 specialized cores to 8 not so fast cores. It simply won't work.

    Now Microsoft.
    Xbox360: 3 core IBM cores with some special instructions
    XBone: 8 core AMD "Jaguar" cores that are at least on par of IBM cores
    Still quite a challenge, but nowhere at Sony's levels.

    1. Re:But PS3 hardware is way too different by CronoCloud · · Score: 1

      PS3: Cell CPU with one "generic" core

      It's Hyperthreaded as well, with an Altivec unit. It was DAMN fast on certain tasks (as any PS3 Linux user could tell you) The GIMP performs faster on a PS3 than it did on your average 2006-2008 vintage dual-core.

      So yeah, making the PS4 backwards compatible with the PS3 would be very difficult. It's why they have PlayStation Now. Though I expect they'll eventually get around to doing something like: "Put a PS3 game in a PS4, pay a small fee and you get unlimited access to that game on PS Now.", sort of deal

  33. Re:the 360 had HDDs in a custom candy with bans wh by masterofthumbs · · Score: 1

    There were definitely no bans from swapping out HDDs in the 360, it just wouldn't allow you to format and set it up for use. The only issue was that it would only recognize a certain set of OEM firmwares. You would have to buy a comparable drive made by the same manufacturer (WD, I recall), flash it with the right firmware, and place it in the drive caddy. This would then match up with the Microsoft branded retail drives available for half the price. When they switched to the 360 Slim, you were able to use any SATA 2.5" drive you wanted. You didn't even have to use the plastic caddy that the retail ones were sold with. A folded up piece of paper worked nicely as a spacer to keep it from moving.

    The xbone has USB3.0 support so adding a new internal drive isn't even worth doing anymore. Just get a cheap 3.0 enclosure and whatever OEM drive you'd like.

  34. Would much rather have backwards compatibility by Mickeycaskill · · Score: 1

    A 1TB hard drive is great, especially for people less technically able to upgrade their HDD (I'm terrified of breaking my PS4, but I still have so many downloaded PS3 games to play that I'd like to be able to use my existing hard drive to play them. Given the industry's current focus on HD remakes and re-releases, it's just not going to happen I fear, even if it was technically possible.

  35. Even with the DLC it's about the same by rsilvergun · · Score: 1

    My buddy and I were talking about this. Top Gear on SNES in 1993: $55 bucks at launch. Forza 5 on Xbox One in 2014 with all DLC $120. About the same adjusted for inflation, but Forza 5 is a damn sight more intricate a game.

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