1. Is it what they should do? Yes.

Then rest assured, they're not going to do it...

Posted at 5:10AM on Sep 10th 2007 by Bored

2. This could change everything.

Posted at 5:11AM on Sep 10th 2007 by Daniel

3. Why not just reintroduce (to the USA) the 60 GB model at the lower $399 price? For a company with buying/manufacturing power of SONY I wouldn't have thought there'd be a massive saving in slapping in 40GB HDDs over 60GB.

Posted at 5:21AM on Sep 10th 2007 by Ian

4. Has very little to do with how expensive the various harddrives are to buy in bulk. They can't reintroduce the 60GB as it is now, since it currently has the EE chip, and that adds too much to cost. So to prevent consumer confusion over which 60GB model they want for backwards compatibility, it's important the cheap model not have the same capacity as either the old 20GB or the 60GB, since everyone refers to ps3 models by harddrive capacity. It's also important that it not have the same or higher harddrive capacity as the more expensive 80GB version, obviously.

If Sony announces and actually sells the 40GB at $399 before mid-November, they might still pull the ps3 out of the dumpster sales-wise.

Posted at 5:33AM on Sep 10th 2007 by apease

5. I don't doubt either of those predictions coming true. If so, I expect a Major Xbox 360 price to follow soon after. A $50 difference isn't going to be enough after something like this o.o

Posted at 5:52AM on Sep 10th 2007 by Aex

6. @ Apease
Good points regarding the EE chip 60/40GB models and how they might be confused.

Posted at 6:18AM on Sep 10th 2007 by Ian

7. @Apese...

The price difference in bulk between a 40GB and 80GB is minimal as well...why not just drop the 80GB to 399?

Introducing a $399 40GB will just mean the 80GB for $100 more will sit on shelves collecting dust (except for a sales to the uneducated that thing an extra 40GB is worth $100)

Posted at 7:29AM on Sep 10th 2007 by Kspraydad

8. That would be better... perhaps I'll end up owning one after all. Though there's still a games problem (as far as exclusives)... especially this holiday since both the Wii and 360 are getting a lot of awesome games...

But if the price gets reasonable this holiday, it'll definitely be manageable by the time Final Fantasy comes out.

That's a pretty quick and drastic price drop though... that's gotta hurt.

Posted at 7:44AM on Sep 10th 2007 by Ninegauger

9. Since NO one has any idea what SONY's CURRENT manufacturing costs are...perhaps it doesn't hurt as much as one might think. SONY doesn't seem to have quality issues so there is 1.5 billion in 'savings' right there.

Posted at 7:47AM on Sep 10th 2007 by Kspraydad

10. No one except SONY

Posted at 8:03AM on Sep 10th 2007 by Kspraydad

11. re. 60 gig/EE chip thing

i have a uk 60 gig model, and it doesn't have the EE chip. so your theory of 60 gig == EE chip can't be right.

Posted at 8:43AM on Sep 10th 2007 by chaod

12. Ok, i think the 80 gig model should drop to $399 if they want to win the BluRay war. If they dont the cheap toshiba HD-DVD might win out.

The other reason is that I can buy the 40 gig model then spend another 100 getting a larger drive, but what a pain in the rear if i have bought anything on the playstation store in the mean time.

As far as the price drop over all. Sony could not produce enough PS3's last christmas with the blue diode production being down. Now with that out of the way they can introduce lower prices since they can manufacture more of them to meet demand. If you can only produce so many it makes sence to charge enough so that anyone willing to anti up can get one. It is making some people pay more but they made the decision to buy when they did.

One more thing that will come into play this christmas is alot of people went HD TV's last year and they will be looking for players and games to use on it this year.

Posted at 8:52AM on Sep 10th 2007 by BruteRules

13. What's and EE chip? someone explain please.

I think this would be a great move hopefully its true (Especially if they bundle SM3 in with it!) that movie wasn't sooo great tho but would still be nice to have SM3 and PS3 in one package, they can help each other sell. Someone who wants a ps3 and kinda wants SM3 can get both, and someone who wants Blue ray SM3 will get that and a player at the same time!

EVERYBODY WINS!

Posted at 8:52AM on Sep 10th 2007 by Young Capwn

14. @Young.

EE (Emotion Engine) chip is the hardware chip that allows the NA 60GB PS3 to perfectly play PS2/PS1 games...without it you are using software emulation which isn't 100% effective.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ps3#Backward_compatibility

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Emotion_Engine

Posted at 9:10AM on Sep 10th 2007 by Kspraydad

15. ok so now they have a 20gig, a 40gig, a 60 gig, and an 80 gig?

From what i heard the 20gig is pretty much a buy it used option/ebay purchase. so thats 3 major sku prices. There begining to lok a lot like microsoft. Why not just put out a bunch of quality games before christmas. (Uncharted, Ratchet/klank and UT3 just wont cut it, none are system sellers)(yes i left out Heavenly Sword, thats this week) Gamers buy consoles based on games. Sure we will buy on the potential of future games too, if we are of a hardercore varaity, but for the most part gamers follow the games.

Making the system affordable is a good plan, but first id make the system desirable. PS3 quite literally has 6 games you cant buy anywhere else. Just 6. (Resistance, Motorstorm, Ninja Gaiden Sigma, Warhawk, Lair and Heavenly Sword) [would you count ninja gaiden it was on xbox1 but ps3 is a soo much prettier game] (2 of those are million sellers, id say 2 have potential to be in the future.) Thats a pretty bleak outlook on the launch year.

Give us more games, give us better games than the 360 or the wii. If you do this, you give the consumer a reason to spend the $500 to $600 on a system. Now once the demand for games is met you lower the cost of the system to attracted new users.

Sorry I just feel I have a really well designed (id have made the power external as that gets too hot) system that plays next gen movies and ocationally games. Id like it to be the other way around and thats where i think sony needs to work on most. Getting the Games out there so the system is a Gaming system first and a blu-ray player second. Then lets work on getting the cost down (at this point its probably a catch 22 situation and they will have to do both at the same time... its sad)

Posted at 9:27AM on Sep 10th 2007 by ShaggyB

16. I for one think it is about time the PS2 becomes cheaper. Then Sony can make a big deal about this and use it to swing people that want a Wii to the PS2. Seeing as it is cheaper then you would think more people would buy that over the Wii. So then just to make sure the PS2 sells more Sony can bring out a PS2 controller that is like the Wii's one.

As for the 40 gig PS3 I think this will happen only because 4 months ago EGM had this in there rumor part. So now more people are talking about it so it might just be real. Plus giving away SM3 as a free gift would also be cool. This way more people see that the PS3 can play Blu-Ray disks and in doing this more people will go Blu.

So I hope to see these rumors come true.

Posted at 9:32AM on Sep 10th 2007 by Joe

17. This would be awesome if it happened. So many people are on the fence with PS3 and the main point is the price. $500 is just too much.

Posted at 9:40AM on Sep 10th 2007 by JarOfFlies

18. Shaggy, you find the PS3 gets to hot? thats strange, I've had mine running a Warhawk server for about 3 days straight now (since the server update) and its not any warmer then it gets after an hour or so, which is warm to the touch but nothing compared to my stereo receiver or my cable box. I don't think the power supply is generating much heat at all as I expect some of the heat is coming from the motherboard.

Posted at 9:48AM on Sep 10th 2007 by Draco

19. I sincerely doubt it, myself. Financially, it doesn't make sense, given how much of a loss they're taking already and due to why the 20gb was canned.
They've also stated that they want to have a single price point on the market. I know companies lie and such, but usually it's only if it's RIGHT before something is about to be revealed, so as to keep it under wraps. They don't usually do a complete 180 (or would this be more of a 360??) like this, though.

The 80gb drop to $500 is a given, though.

Posted at 9:56AM on Sep 10th 2007 by samfish

20. A Xbox360 Elite plus an official wireless adaptor cost more than the 60GB PS3. Even the 20GB Xbox 360 plus an official wireless adaptor cost not much less than the 60GB PS3. And, neither can play HD movies in any format without additional hardware/expenditure. Yet, Xbox360 outsells PS3 in at least the North American/Europe markets. So, perhaps pricing isn't a huge issue?

IMHO, the problem Sony is facing has little to do with the price tag. It's not about Blu-Ray or Gama-Ray either. Nor does it has anything to do with Cell or Hal2000 inpired processor. Instead, it's all about "GAMES". What Sony needs desperately right now is exclusive AAA games from well established franchises. Sony has to come up with a line of GREAT games to attract people to open their wallets wide for their PS3s. Without great games, 499, 399, or even 299, isn't goning to make a whole lot of difference.

And yes, I do know there are some "good" games available for PS3 right now such as Resistance:FoM, Motorstorm, and such. I got to say, I do enjoy Resistance:Fom a lot. It even impressed my bro-in-law who also owns a Xbox360. Warhawk on the other hand drawn me back to the online multi-players games I have been avoid ever since I got tired of Counterstrike. However, these games aren't MGS, Gran Turisimo, FF, GoW (God of War, mind you), nor GTA. While they are fun, they just aren't well know enough nor impressive enough to be system sellers.

Sony needs to spend more time to "really" work closely with developers. I really don't care if Sony has to freaking pay developers to make games for PS3. Sony needs to give PS3 "GREAT" softwares right now, period. And yes, there are a few good games due in 2008. Based on the list, there are just far too few in between. So, if a couple of those highly anticipated upcoming games fail like L.I.A.R., what would Sony do then? Enable PS3 to launch itself to space?

As for Xbox360, I really hope Microsoft would allow developers to put game contents on HD-DVD/Blu-Ray soon. That way, developers can bring games to the next level instead of balance content over graphic or vice versa. And PS3 owners would also benefit from this since a lot of developers do make games for both systems.

At last, sorry for the long post.

Posted at 10:17AM on Sep 10th 2007 by Phantom