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PSP-4000 in 2009?

Expect more details from CES in sunny Las Vegas next month

Hot on the heals of the recent PSP 3000 launch, Sony plans to refresh the PlayStation Portable yet again in 2009 with the planned release of (yep, you guessed it) the PSP-4000 model.

The news comes courtesy of unnamed games publishing sources talking to Eurogamer.net, who suggest that Sony will follow the PSP-3000 next year with another ‘iterative approach’.

If so, this means that the recently rumoured PSP mark 2 might not be seen by gamers until 2010 at the very earliest.

Source: Techradar.com

Tags: Sony, PSP, PSP-4000, playstation

PlayStation 4 Secrets

This webpage provides information on the Sony PlayStation 4 console that will probably arrive sometime in 2011 the earliest. It will be updated regularly as more PS4 secrets are uncovered in the public, so visit often for the latest scoop. Please link to this webpage, rather than copy the contents. If you have a secret, you can leave a forum message at: PS4 Discussion Forum. Because the PS4 can run PS3 games (in High Definition, not Standard Definition mode like NTSC and PAL), you should visit the PS3 Secrets webpage for PS3 specific information.

Before going into the details, the following chart describes the evolution of PlayStation consoles. With this chart in mind, it is easier to understand the technology discussed many parts of this webpage.

PlayStation 4 Secrets

Tags: Playstation4, sony, PS4

New 160Gb PS3

UPDATE: 160GB PS3 ‘Drake’s Fortune’ bundle caught in the wild

Hey, pal — remember that 160GB PS3 Drake’s Fortune bundle we told you about back in August? Well thanks to the totally awesome skills of one intrepid reader, we now know that they’re available for purchasing pleasure at your local Best Buy (and other spots, we like to imagine). From what we can tell based on that extremely blurry photo you see, the package will sell for a holiday-destroying $499.99, so you’d better hope grandma drops a big check on you this season.

Source: Engadget.com

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Box shot of the upcoming 160gb PS3. As you can see it comes with Ratchet & Clank: Quest of Booty, Last Guy, Gran Turismo 5: Prologue and Super Stardust HD.

Tags: PS3160Gb, Sony, Ratchet & Clank: Quest of Booty, Last Guy, Gran Turismo 5: Prologue, Super Stardust HD

Xbox Experience vs PS3 Home

Source: Blorge.com

This generation has seen a new battleground for the console wars: the online community offerings. Up to now, few would argue that the Xbox 360 has ruled the roost, with Xbox Live offering a brilliant and user-friendly place for gamers to congregate. But the battle lines are now being redrawn as the all-new Xbox Live attempts to go up against Home on the PS3.

The Tokyo Game Show has brought few surprises, but some interesting announcements, nonetheless. In terms of the new online offerings from both companies, Sony confirmed that its long-awaited Playstation Home service, exclusive to the PS3, will be here by the end of the year; while Microsoft announced details of its New Xbox Live ‘Experience’ - coming to a 360 near you on November 19th.

Home has been a long time coming and there are still mixed views over whether it will actually live up to the hype built over the past three years. It’s still not quite here, currently stuck in private beta, but a full, open beta has been promised before the end of 2009.

Home will allow PS3 owners to create an avatar and decorate their own apartment. They will then be able to live out a virtual life, online, in a kind of Second Life way. Community will be the order of the day, with meeting new people, chatting, hanging out together and generally cohabiting being the main bulk of the experience.

Other features will include a virtual cinema, showing movies, stores by companies such as EA, Rockstar, and Sega, and of course the chance to play against other gamers online for free.

The New Xbox Live ‘Experience’ demonstrates a whole new way of thinking by Microsoft. According to an interesting look at the new online playground by CNET, the Experience is mostly about the new avatars, which themselves are just a rip off of Wii Miis.

Another new feature will be ‘Parties’, a new way of interacting with friends and keeping track of who’s playing what. But apart from that, there doesn’t look to be too much to get excited about. And to be honest, I can see many Xbox Live veterans not being happy at the changes, clearly intended to appeal to the more casual end of the gaming spectrum.

I can see both services having difficulties for a few months, with Xbox 360 owners struggling to adapt to the changes while PS3 owners will have to come to grips with the complete change of pace on their network. In the end though, despite all the difficulties, delays and disappointments in getting Home here, I think it’ll prove to be the ultimate winner.

Tags: Microsoft, Opinion, PS3, PlayStation 3, Sony, Xbox 360, Xbox Experience, Xbox Live

PlayStation 4 plans start to take shape

Tags: PS4, xbox 720, Sony, Playstation 4

Name-brand Blu-ray players break the $200 barrier

EngadgetHD has been keeping a close eye on the prices of Blu-ray players, and recently noticed that both the Samsung BD-P1500 and Sony BDP-S300 have fallen below the $200 mark at certain stores (RadioShack and Amazon, respectively.) This is right in line with previous reports of falling Blu-ray prices, and while the BDP-S300 is pretty old, the BD-P1500 is currently Samsung’s most recent Blu-ray player. In many ways, these cuts are more important that the budget players we’ve seen from Insignia and Memorex, since for many people it’s a lot easier to drop $200 on Blu-ray if they know they’re getting a “Sony”.

EngadgetHD’s link to RadioShack is no longer working and we couldn’t find the BD-P1500 on the site by searching–we’re guessing they’re sold out. But if you can find the BD-P1500 for $200, it’s a much better deal than the BDP-S300. When we tested the BDP-S300, we found it painfully slow and it only supports the older Profile 1.0 standard. The BD-P1500, on the other hand, is currently Profile 1.1 compatible and is upgradeable to Profile 2.0, and considerably faster to use than the BDP-S300. The BD-P1500 is also on deck to get DTS-HD Master Audio decoding in the future, which means you’ll be able to get high resolution soundtracks using most HDMI-equipped AV receivers.

Source: crave.cnet.com

Tags: Sony, BDP-S300, Samsung, BD-P1500, Blu-ray

All about the upcoming PlayStation 4

(Source: TechRadar.com)

How the PS4 is shaping up to be the next must-own console

If Microsoft is secretly readying a new Xbox to succeed the Xbox 360, then surely Sony must be working on a PlayStation 4?

Speculation is rife that the next console battle will be fought around 2011-2012. This is when Crytek’s CEO Cevat Yerli and industry analyst Colin Sebastian believe that a potential Xbox 720 and PS4 could appear.

Recycling PS3 for PS4

To imagine what a PS4 might be capable of we should look at what the current PS3 doesn’t have or doesn’t do well. For starters, Sony will need to closely integrate the hardware and software development for its next console.

According to SCEA’s CEO Jack Tretton: “The hardware guys developed the [PlayStation 3] fairly independently, then dumped it onto the software guy’s lap, effectively saying ‘do something with it.’”

Considering that Sony spent around $3 billion developing the PS3, it seems likely that it will use an improved version of the Cell processor for a PS4. IBM has already released an improved version of the Cell for its blade servers. The PowerXCell 8i is a 65nm chip, with support for 32GB of DDR2 memory and eight fully-functional SPEs (compared to seven on the PS3).

The advantage of recycling the Cell is that Sony could retain a familiar development environment and use existing code libraries. The modular design of the Cell architecture could also allow extra Synergistic Processing Elements (SPEs) to be added to future chips. Twenty or more SPEs might be possible on a single 32nm Cell processor.

And if increasing the on-chip SPEs isn’t an option in the proposed 2011-2012 time frame, then a PS4 could incorporate multiple Cell chips. IBM’s Cell roadmap includes a PowerXCell 32iv, which appears to feature four PPEs (Power Processor Elements) and 32 SPEs, ie four Cell chips running in parallel.

Inside the PlayStation 4

If the PS4 is a revamp of the PS3, we’re likely to see some obvious technology upgrades – 802.11n to replace the existing 802.11b/g chipset; an external power supply (to reduce the size of the box and to improve cooling); a massive hard disk; new graphics processor and an increase in the onboard memory.

The memory architecture in the PS3 splits 512MB equally between graphics and application use and it’s been suggested that this limits developer freedom. You’d expect the PS4 to address this issue, giving developers more dedicated memory in which to load game levels. Although it’s worth pointing out that the PS3 (and any future Cell-based consoles) can use the SPEs for maths-intensive tasks like physics.

New graphics processor

What about a replacement for the PS3’s NVIDIA-built RSX graphics processor? We’ve already speculated that Microsoft could use Intel’s general purpose Larrabee chip in its next Xbox to handle real-time physics and AI. Rumours also suggest that Intel is pimping Larrabee to Sony for the PS4.

Like any Xbox 360 replacement, the PS4 is also going to have a much bigger hard disk. This will be in readiness for a wealth of downloadable content that will include games, demos, music, movies and TV shows. A terabyte HDD isn’t out of the question. And in a world that will increasingly be looking to online services for content, does any PlayStation 4 still need a Blu-ray drive?

A PS4 without Blu-ray?

While the PS3 was instrumental in helping Blu-ray beat off HD DVD, there’s a strong argument for dropping an optical drive from the PS4 altogether. Console owners are already downloading gigabytes-worth of game demos, video trailers, full-length movies and TV shows. With a giant hard disk in the PS4, games could simply be piped straight to the console on release day; long install/level load times would be eliminated.

Along with the Cell processor, the Blu-ray drive is one of the PS3’s most expensive components. The PS3’s high price has forced it into third place behind the Nintendo Wii and Xbox 360. Sony will be keen not to price itself out of the next console battle.

As Acclaim boss Dave Perry recently claimed: “Because of the cost of making the PlayStation 3 and because they sold it at a loss, Sony basically has pretty much no chance of making money on the PS3, because it’s lost more money than they made during the entire peak of the PlayStation 2 – it’s not going to happen again for Sony.”

Sony can’t simply slash its prices like Microsoft has recently. And Blu-ray is partly to blame. Billy Pidgeon, an analyst at market researcher IDC points out: “Blu-ray licensees would be threatened by pricing the PS3 below stand-alone Blu-ray players. The PS3 is a bit challenged on that side.”

Chasing the dream of a digital hub

Do consumers really want a PlayStation 4 that does everything? Sony’s next console needs to be a machine that plays the best games. Just like the PS2 did. The PS4 could go one of two ways – a premium all-in-one box that offers Blu-ray, integrated playTV and a much larger hard disk; or a pure games machine, stripped of its expensive technology in favour of mass market appeal?

Whatever the PS4 looks like, the final question to be asked is: when will it launch? Sony’s Kaz Hirai has already given us a hint: “If you look at the history of the way we’ve managed our console business,” he said, “we always try to hit a 10-year life cycle “

That might put any PS4 launch back to 2016. But when you consider that the PS2 is still chugging along in the shadow of the PS3, a PS4 could easily sit alongside and overlap the existence of the PS3.

Tags: sony, playstation, ps4, Xbox 720, Cell processor

Sony unveils 240Hz LCD TV

Hold your breath until December (in the US), because that’s when Sony’s 240Hz LCD TVs will be available to the public. Currently LCD TVs are topping out at 120Hz for consumers, and that’s already a significant improvement in speed over the standard 50-60Hz of normal (for want of a better term) LCD TVs. The new 240Hz technology promises to provide the smoothest, most lifelike, movement ever from an LCD TV and will be great for gamers using next-gen consoles especially. We’re still a little concerned about 240Hz with movies though. As it is 120Hz makes TV and movies look a little fake.

The 240Hz technology will be available in the KDL-46W1 and KDL-40W1 that boasts full-HD, 3,000:1 contrast ratio, BRAVIA Engine 2 and 24p support.

This isn’t the only big step forward from Sony though, they have also shown off the KDL-40ZX1 LCD TV that is just 9.9mm thick. It’s not thin on features though. With BRAVIA Engine 2, 120Hz technology and 3,000:1 contrast ration, imagine having one of these bad boys in your room!

We have no doubt Sony’s 240Hz models will make our top ten list of gaming TVs when they are launched, but until then, check out the current top ten list here.

PlayStation video download service is live

The long delay until Sony launched its video download service (actually more like a few hours), is over. HD and SD rentals, and SD purchases from an assortment of movie studios is now available in the Playstation Store by selecting the video button at the top left. Need to know what’s available in your region but aren’t near your PS3? Check out the website for a list of what awaits.

PlayStation video download service is live - Engadget

Tags: breakingnews, BreakingNews, e3 2008, E32008, playstation, playstation 3, playstation store, Playstation3, PlaystationStore, ps3, psn, sony, video store, VideoStore

New LED HDTVs from Sony!

Just noticed this posting from an Australian site (gadgetzone.com.au) mentioning the new line up of LED TVs from Sony:

The XBR8 range consists of the Full-HD 55-inch KDL-55XBR8 and the 46-inch KDL-46XBR8, boosting Sony’s already significant range of panels.

These new models feature Sony’s mythical sounding TRILUMINOS three color LED backlight technology that expands the TV’s colour reproduction by aligning the red, green and blue backlight LED. This improves colour reproduction when compared with models with single white LED backlights.

The TVs will also be great for sports fans everywhere. Motionflow 100Hz technology has been replaced with Motionflow 120Hz providing for a clearer, judder-free picture. Sixty unique frames are created by the Bravia for every 60 regular frames for the clearest picture possible.

Another fancy new technology that Sony has added is its Advanced Contrast Enhancer PRO (or ACE PRO as we like to say) technology. ACE PRO enhances contrast and dynamic range by controlling the LED backlight level depending on the area, so that dark areas are given more detail while other areas are given more brightness. By reducing unnecessary light emission better blacks are achieved, which has always been a weakness of LCD TVs when compared to Plasma displays. This reduction of light also saves on your power bill.