PS3 delayed until March 2007 in Europe; only 500k units total in US/Japan at launch (1 Viewer)

[Ed B]

My take on all of this is that that Sony should of left the BD out of the machine and just offered another SKU down the road with it in the system.

The PS3 would of been out now, the cost would of been lower, Sony wouldn't be taking a big of a loss on the units and mostly they wouldnt be hurting the BD stand alone players. They could of offered another model down the road with a BD drive or add on unit ala 360.

On an interesting note there was an article that I saw today saying that Nintendo was not sure if they were going to add DVD support to the Wii. Really with DVD players costing $30+ they're getting to the point of when we had tape re-winders to reduce the wear and tear on our VCRs. I see in expensive DVD players as being the same to a high costing gaming console in that why have all that wear and tear on the unit when a low costing unit can do the same thing.

 

[Chris S]

What were the initial 360 release numbers? I thought it was closer to 1.2 million units on launch day.

 

[ppltd]

Actually it might hurt the BR camp, as it looks like Sony is buying up all available BR diodes for it's PS3. This may be part of the reason for the delay to market from the other BR hardware companies. But it isn't the only reason for the negative change in the qty. of PS3's that will be available; Sony is still having problems with the qty of good Cell processors it is capable of producing.

As these problems increase, the loss Sony takes on each PS3 goes up. If they miss their release date, or can not supply enough PS3's into the supply channel, things could get very shaky at Sony.

BTW, it is not a shoe in (even if it is likely) that the PS3 will take the industry by storm. It wasn't too many years ago the Sega and Nintendo held that vaulted spot, and look where they are today. This is a fickle market...
Thomas Eisenmann

 

[Brian Kaz]

Why would the PS3 have been out by now? As far as I know, they're hitting the target date they always wanted (except for Japan, which was supposed to be Spring). Also remember, the PS2 is still selling great for them.

 

[Jonathan White]

The PS3 was originally supposed to be out in March 06 worldwide, this was delayed until November 06 worldwide. Now Europe, Australasia, Russia the Middle East and Africa have to wait to March 07.

http://www.ps3portal.com/ps3/article/489.html

Also instead of releasing 4 million by the end of the year, they are going to release 2 million.

So in March 07 I could buy a PS3 for between £375 - £425 (If I pre-order) In November 05 I bought a 360 for £280 and there will be barely any difference between games. No doubt the price of the 360 will drop around then also.

 

[Jason Harbaugh]

I don't have the exact numbers, or haven't seen if they were actually released, but it was something like ~400k available in NA on launch day, and 1.5m worldwide by the end of the year (2005).

MS also spread the launch over Europe so the grand total on launch day was more than what Sony is proposing, but in the respected markets, it is about even.

Edit: According to wikipedia, North American sales totaled 326,000 units in November.

 

[Matt^Brown]

"The PS3 was originally supposed to be out in March 06 worldwide, this was delayed until November 06 worldwide. Now Europe, Australasia, Russia the Middle East and Africa have to wait to March 07".

This is the big disappointment to me and my friends as game players. I have several friends that were going to buy a 360 or PS3 this summer after both systems were out and they could compare them. After the first delay that was out of the question and now the limited supply is going to make it impossible to get one this Christmas if you prefer the PS3.

 

[Rob_Walton]

Did the 360 come with a component cable?

 

[Harminder]

I just want the Nintendo Wii, a system staying out of this format war and focusing on what it was specifically made for, KICK ASS GAMES!

 

[Brian Kaz]

Not sure where they got that from...

From CNNMoney.com (March 15. 2006):
http://money.cnn.com/2006/03/15/comm...ming/index.htm
"First, it's worth noting that the "delay" of the PS3 really only affects consumers in Japan. Sony never promised a U.S. launch in the spring – and no publishers or industry observers expected it here before November."
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From a Nov. 2005 story:
http://www.xbox365.com/news.cgi?id=GGPGPLdruN11071107
"In an interview with hollywoodreporter.com Stringer [CEO of Sony] talked about the price range of the Playstation 3... The other interesting part of the interview was the notion that Japan will get the PS3 in March with a U.S. following aimed at Holiday 2006.
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From a Feb. 6, 2006 story:
http://blogs.mercurynews.com/aei/200...taragi_ta.html
"In May, 2005, Sony said it would launch in "spring 2006.'' But it didn't say what territories it would launch in or define what it meant by spring."
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A random website:
http://www.ps3newsresource.com/date/2005/12/
"We've recently found out that Sony?s next-generation Playstation 3 console will be released in Spring 2006 - it was confirmed by Sony CEO Sir Howard Stringer at a recent SCE business strategy meeting. No word yet on whether the PS3 release will be staggered or simultaneous worldwide"

 

[Jonathan White]

"Sony CEO Sir Howard Stringer" this is the same bloke who promised the PS3 would enter the market at $300 - $400.

http://www.gamesindustry.biz/content_page.php?aid=13145

 

[PeterTHX]

Well, in all fairness it wasn't an HDMI cable. Nor did the 360 didn't include an optical digital cable for Dolby Digital.

I replaced my 360 cable with a Monster Gaming one. Much better quality.

I'm sure the PS3 will include a component one.

 

[MarekM]

http://www.thedigitalbits.com/#rstar

parts of article about PS3 from digitalbits.., link to full article on videobusiness.com


" Only approximately 400,000 units will be available in the U.S. for the 11/17 debut, but some1.2 million additional units will be shipped into the U.S. by the end of the year."

"Other Blu-ray Disc manufacturers, however, are claiming they haven't been affected by the shortage."

"Panasonic apparently still plans to launch its BD player later this month", and Pioneer's Andy Parsons confirmed to me last night (at the launch of the first Pioneer retail store here in Orange County, CA) that they expect to ship their first BD player in October. You can read more on this story here at Video Business.
http://www.videobusiness.com/article/CA6369164.html
"

 

[Ryan-G]

See, I'm having a hard time with this. Several months of preparation and production yields only 500,000 units. But somehow, in only 6 weeks they'll manage to produce 1.2 million. And they'll do this with terrible yields on both the Cell and the Blue part of the BR Player.

I expect another "Oops! Silly us, we can't produce what we said we would!" by November.

I also find it quite interesting that Sony's Kutargi admits that they aren't doing hardware very well.

http://today.reuters.com/news/articlenews.aspx?type=reutersEdge&storyID=2006-09-08T124607Z_01_T73859_RTRUKOC_0_US-SONY.xml&from=business

Makes me wonder more and more about BR...

 

[ppltd]

Just a quick comment. As with any new purchase of hardware (most certainly with hardware sold at a loss from the manufacturer) the first thing any buyer should do is toss out the cheap cables supplied with the hardware. It is a given that both Sony and Microsoft have not sourced their cables through any top quality supplier. The cheapest of the HDMI and Component cables I use on my HT cost nearly 1/3 the price on my 360.

I would rather see a slight reduction in the cost of the hardware and they can keep their cables.

All this becomes more important when you move into HD, where the quality of the cables can make a night and day difference in the quality of your display (and sound).

So Sony and Microsoft: Keep your cables. They just become more garbage in my garage.

Thomas Eisenmann

 

[Frank@N]

For me, including a HDMI cable with an expensive player is big deal.

For example, the A1 comes with a HDMI cable and for me that's a big plus.

Several people have pointed out that you can get cheap HDMI cables online, but who wants to go through all that trouble.

Radio Shack also might have cheap cables, but they're no better or worse that a 'free' one.

I certainly don't want to spend $50-$100 dollars on cables after make a big purchase to begin with (A1, PS3, BR player).