Playstation 3 Officially Dated

I think everyone will be happy to know that the Playstation 3 will be available as of November 2006. However, more of you will be pleased to know, that unlike previous estimates and speculation, it would seem that Sony is dedicated to a simultaneous release of the console in Japan, North America and Europe. Estimates suggest a production capacity of 1 million units a month and expects 6 million consoles to be shipped by March 2007.

I would take the unit capacity statistic lightly, as unforeseen problems and recalls can cause this number to be completely void of actual fact. However the fact that they are aiming so high hopefully means they wouldn't fall to short.

Kutaragi went on to give his reasons for the delay, most notably the problems with the Blu-Ray Protection software. However he feels that this is also a good thing, because it allows for Sony to better develop the Blu-Ray technology as well as support. He went on to talk about the 60 GB HDD that comes standard with the PS3, not only that but it is upgradable and preloaded with Linux (chew on that Xbox 360), he also made it very clear that developers are designing in favor of the HDD, so things that are not possible on the Xbox 360 will be so with the PS3, such as much faster load times, and larger environments. In other words with the HDD doing a lot of the storing and loading it gives the CPU and Graphics Processor more room to load advanced textures and animations.

Kutaragi also confirmed that the console will be backwards compatible with the entire library of PS1/PS2 games, and there will be no favoring of select titles like some lamer companies (*cough*Microsoft*cough*). Though no price has yet to be confirmed, which is expected considering the evolving technology currently in the PS3, so if they were to give us a price it wouldn't be final anyway.

On a side note, Kutaragi also said that the PSP price would drop down to 200 bucks by the end of this month (March).

Much Love : 1up.com