Playstation 3
As Microsoft and Nintendo are aggressively pricing their gaming consoles for Christmas, one would expect the same for Sony’s Playstation 3… No this year folks.
From I4U News: “Sony’s CEO, Kazuo Hirai, told the Financial Times that the current PS3 pricing is the one that Sony will go into the Holiday shopping season. Sony is arguing that the Sony PS3 is a better value than rivals half its price.”
Xbox 360
Microsoft officially responded to rumors around a Blu-Ray disc player for the Xbox 360.
They “do not plan on having Blu-Ray support anytime soon” confirmed Major Nelson on his official Xbox 360 blog. This probably has to do with very slow adoption of the “new” Blu-Ray media, and also because of the failure of the original HD-DVD external drive that Microsoft tried to push when HD-DVD was still alive.
I guess they just don’t want to repeat the same mistake again…
Playstation 3
Sony has announced more details on the upcoming firmware updates for the PSP and the PS3. These updates should be available in the very near future.
With the new 5.00 update on the PSP, users will be able to access the Playstation Store right from the device using WiFi. It will also add a sleep timer for when you are playing music, and a full screen keyboard for easy typing.
The PS3 update will be version 2.5 and will feature support for a new Bluetooth headset, better voice transport system (when using a headset), movie scene search will allow users to set cue points at different intervals within a movie (like chapters) for fast access to certain scenes, power saving features will allow users to turn off the console and controllers when not in use, in-game screenshots, and background downloading with automatic console shut-down.
Sony Vaio JS
Sony’s new all-in-one PC, the Vaio JS, now has a price (or two in fact).
In direct competition with the iMac 20″, the new Sony PC will retail for $1099.99 for the basic version and $1499.99 for the more powerful version.
The basic version (model JS130) features a 2.5GHz Intel Core 2 Duo CPU and the more advanced version (model JS190) features a 3.0GHz Intel Core 2 Duo CPU, a Blue-Ray Disc Reader, and integrated stereo A2DP Bluetooth® Technology.
The rest of the specs are the same:
Model JS130 is available in black, silver and pink. Model JS190 is only available in black.
Xbox 360
Total game console sales between the Wii, PS3 and Xbox 360 were 196,166 units.
Nintendo overtook Microsoft and Sony yet again with 109,548 Wii sold between September 1st and 28th, then came Microsoft’s Xbox 360 with 53,547 units, and Sony with 33,071 of it’s Playstation 3 systems.
Japan’s console market shares for September 2008:
Mainly due to major price cuts by Microsoft, this is the first time where the Xbox 360 beats the PS3 in the Japanese market.
Sony Ericsson Music Phones
In an effort not to loose too much market share to Nokia’s Come With Music service, Sony Ericsson announced a new service called PlayNow.
This service will be available at first only in the UK and will make it’s way around other global markets by 2009. From cNet: “Sony Ericsson will eventually offer users 5 million songs, which will be wrapped in digital rights management software, and keep them for the length of their contract. After their contract ends, the company will allow them to keep “a number” of DRM-free songs.”
Sony PlayStation Store
The Sony PlayStation Store is really nice for renting and buying movies. You will be able to watch a rented movie for 24 hours, which should be enough to enjoy it once or twice.
Buying movies should be as enjoyable as renting. So how long can you keep your purchased movies? As long as you don’t delete them! What happens if you delete them accidentally? Well, according to the T&C, you are scre*ed.
However, if you contact Sony’s customer service, you might get a redownload autorisation code to get your payed-for-movie back on your hard drive once again.
Word to the wise: ”don’t delete!”
If you have missed the Sony Ericsson Webcast on the new XPERIA X1 mobile phone, you are in luck. Our friends at inXPERIA have recorded the webcast and made it available for your viewing pleasure.
In my opinion, the phone looks great but I tought it performed rather slowly in the demo.
Sony XPERIA X1
Sony’s latest phone to hit the market will not hit the North American market anytime soon it seems but at least we know it’s coming.
There will be a webcast announcing the launch of the phone in the Europe, Asia and Latin America. Those markets will see the XPERIA X1 starting on September 30th.