The PS3 is a Mess

[noel]

blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah

blah blah blah.

Funny how all your posts read just like this.

[Siji]

blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah

blah blah blah.

Funny how all your posts read just like this.

Funny how much we have in common sweetie.

[Sparty]

http://money.cnn.com/2006/07/05/comment ... ney_latest

Whatever and ever, amen.

My name is Sparty

[Animalor]

And now, CEO's are getting shuffled within Sony.

http://www.gamespot.com/news/6153573.html

Looks like Kaz Hirai, CEO of SCEA and David Reeve, CEO of SCEE are being promoted.

Wise strategy to shuffle your CEO's within a couple months of the most important launch in your company's(or at least division's) history?

[vn_Tanc]

And now, CEO's are getting shuffled within Sony.

http://www.gamespot.com/news/6153573.html

Looks like Kaz Hirai, CEO of SCEA and David Reeve, CEO of SCEE are being promoted.

Wise strategy to shuffle your CEO's within a couple months of the most important launch in your company's(or at least division's) history?

Anything that dilutes the influence of those nob-ends Kutaragi and Harrison is only good for Sony's long term.

[Winnow]

Nice story covering Microsoft's efforts to include "Japan friendly" games this time:

Updated: Friday, 07 July 2006

Japan: Games that Could Save Xbox 360

By Tim Rogers

It’s no secret that the Xbox 360 could use a boost in Japan. Games like Blue Dragon, an upcoming shooter from Square-Enix called Sylph and a few other Japan-friendly titles may provide the system with just what it needs to appeal to Japanese consumers.

The truth is, if you ask me right now which console is the most enthralling, it's the Xbox 360. Microsoft's policy seems to be, loosely, to put out original games with beautiful graphics and sparkling concepts, with simple enough play and big enough budgets to qualify as entertainment first, videogames second. The queue of "Japan-friendly" games soon to release is now quite formidable: Lost Planet, Dead Rising, Project Sylph, Blue Dragon, Lost Odyssey, Cry On (Mist Walker and cavia's positively brilliant-sounding action/adventure/RPG with Katamari / Shadow of the Colossus-esque elements), and the Gundam FPS by Dimps all look like spectacular games with texture and value. Trusty Bell, Namco and tri-Crescendo's RPG about the composer Chopin, will likely be very interesting as well, at the very least.

Blue Dragon, Final Fantasy creator Hironobu Sakaguchi's first game with his new company, Mist Walker, under the umbrella of AQ Interactive, developed by Artoon, starring characters by the most popular Japanese comic artist of all-time, Akira Toriyama, will be available in playable demo form at Jump Super Tour, starting July 26th here in Japan.

Jump Super Tour is a comic event held by Shueisha, the publisher of Shounen Jump, Japan's most famous comics magazine, held to drum up interest in new titles and encourage support (through sale of exclusive merchandise) of old ones. From 1984 to 1995, Shounen Jump was home to Akira Toriyama's Dragon Ball Z -- a force in manga so strong that a new PlayStation2 game based on it (Chou Dragon Ball Z) was the second-best selling game of the week this week in 2006, trumping all of the usual DS long-stayers. Akira Toriyama's colorful characters also fill the Dragon Quest series of games, Japan's surest-selling games.

Blue Dragon is set up to be another stick of dynamite with Toriyama's name written on it, though how willing casual fans will be to pick it up depends entirely on its advertising campaign. In America, it's becoming a simple enough strategy to put a demo of something on Xbox Live and let it spread through word of mouth. This is not so possible in Japan, mostly because most people here don't have an Xbox 360. Polls for months have indicated that the majority of casual gamers would reserve their judgment of the 360 for when they could play Sakaguchi's games. Well, it seems that Sakaguchi is ready to let them try one of them. Let's hope it's able to drum up enough hype all on its own.

(I wonder how it plays?)

The subject matter appears darker than Toriyama's usual tales of plucky adventurers on Dragon Quests -- though it's not quite a Twisted Metal over Mario Kart, that's for sure. Sakaguchi is a smart man when he has to be, and for six months now he's been grinning in interviews like no one's ever seen him do. Selling Blue Dragon -- and then Lost Odyssey, which Sakaguchi has been so bold as to call "The next real 'Final Fantasy'" is Sakaguchi's biggest challenge in years. He's learned to love challenge. Since losing all that money with the "Final Fantasy" movie fiasco back in 2000, he's had something to prove.

Meanwhile, AQ Interactive's first published game, Bullet Witch, goes on sale three weeks from today.

SQUARE-ENIX'S FIRST ORIGINAL XBOX 360 GAME SURFACES

Meanwhile, Square-Enix's announcement of interest in Xbox 360 development is starting to bear fruit, as healthy screenshots of Square-Enix's space shooter "Project Sylph" (working title) are surfacing. The particle effects at work are quite enthralling. Don't trust any cheap magazine scans you might see online. If you ask me, it looks beautiful.

It will apparently be an action space-flight-shooting game descended from an old series called Silpheed. Previous Silpheed games have wowed the world by first (on Sega CD) having polygonal graphics and character voices and second (on PlayStation2) by proving that having uber-developer Treasure involved in your game's development does NOT guarantee your game will be any good.

This new Silpheed will be a three-dimensional, third-person shooter slightly reminiscent of an excellent PlayStation game called Colony Wars. That game was by Psygnosis, and was very carefully put together. Given Square-Enix's recent run-ins with god-awful execution (Final Fantasy VII: Dirge of Cerberus and Front Mission Online comes to mind), it's easy to worry about "Project Sylph" -- though part of me is hopeful, because the game is being developed by Game Arts, whose Gungriffon Blaze for PlayStation 2 was among the more finely-crafted games, control-wise, of the current generation. It's often overlooked; give it a shot. It should be less than ten dollars used by now, wherever you are. Ten dollars is a tiny price to pay for an army of giant robots that control like butter.

True to the Colony Wars and Gungriffon comparisons, it seems that the game also has some deep customization options. You can choose what weapons to put on the "arms" of your ship.

I really can't get over these graphics. Wow. The cut scenes star anime-styled computer-animated characters polished so that they look like they'll really shine on a nice HDTV. The aesthetic actually reminds me a great deal of the newest Xenosaga. Maybe it's the same character designer? Either way, unlike Xenosaga, this game will likely be fun to play, so that's one thing going for it.

This game is, like Bandai's Dimps-developed Gundam FPS, clearly designed for evolving online play. So -- add another game to the stack of Games that Might Somehow Save the Xbox 360 in Japan

[Animalor]

I hope you have a headset.

Some shreaking and bitching from a Sony fanboi about the PS3

http://sonyfanboy.ytmnd.com/

[Winnow]

Bahaha.

more rumors:

PS3 Cell yields are in the toilet

Semicon West 2006 Will we ever see a PS3?


By Charlie Demerjian in San Francisco: Wednesday 12 July 2006, 15:43

REMEMBER WHEN WE said that Cell yields were in the toilet?

Remember the fanboi brigade with more Internet access than either brains or common sense? They howled that it couldn't be true because their ego is staked on the PS3 that they will someday have. It just can't be happening. Well, we wonder if they will believe IBM Semiconductor VPs?

One of these pointed out that cell yields are in the 10-20 per cent range . With logic redundancy (translation: 'PS3 buyers only need seven SPEs [Synergistic Processing Elements], more would just be too much for such simple creatures'), they can double that. This suggests yields of 20-40 per cent.

Intel would have a hit squad sent off to deal with production execs if one merely cracked a joke about 70 per cent yields, and I can't see how 40 per cent will ever make the PS3 economically viable.

Once this gets out, look for a triumphant Sony exec to tell us about how it may be slow and de-featured, but the PS3 will be reassuringly expensive, and profits are for lesser companies. Besides, we mere mortals just don't get what Sony is trying to gift us with, DRM infected lock in.

Me, I am still trying to justify a 360 at half the price, available now. µ

[Kluden]

I do like the point he made at the end of it

[Jice Virago]

Once again, system specs mean shit. Games are what make or break a console. One need only look at SEGA vs NES or PS2 vs Xbox1 to see that. I am sure Halo 3 will sell a bajillion copies, but one game does not a console make. If the 360 becomes more than the "ShooterBox" and PS3 drags its knuckes on getting third party apps, then the Xbox will take command. As it is, the real battle is between the Wii and PS3, in my opinion.

[Animalor]

Me, I am still trying to justify a 360 at half the price, available now.

The three words that did it for me at my house -
"Media Center Extender"

That is, once I actually explained to my wife what this was and how it related to the features that she already loved from Windows Media Center.

She went from someone who had no real interest in gaming to someone who whenever I turn around now is either playing New SMB on the DS or Zuma on Live Arcade in about a 3 month span.

[Animalor]

An interesting article depicting results of a survey conductecd by a Famitsu publication on Japan.

I have no idea who Otona Fami(the mag publishing this) is geared towards so that may skew the results pretty dramatically also.

http://www.next-gen.biz/index.php?optio ... 3&Itemid=2

In the latest issue of its Otona Fami (the casual version of the Weekly Famitsu), Enterbrain has made a study on the approaching launch of the Wii and the PS3, with Nintendo's machine winning over gamers, retailers and developers.
Gamers (216 participants):

While many find the PS3 way too expensive, they are very much interested in the popular licenses which should come on the system. However, they appear to be more interested in the innovative gaming the Wii is set to bring. Gamers polled prefer to wait for a significant PS3 price-drop, and in the waiting, they want to buy the Wii. Many gamers were also interested in playing old games (retro-gaming) via the Wii Virtual Console.

Here’s what gamers said are the consoles they’re most interested in buying:

73.6%: Wii
16.7%: PS3
9.7%: neither

[Winnow]

Despite the title of the article, this is good review of the current state of Blu Ray vs HD-DVD from a movie viewer's perspective:

http://www.projectorcentral.com/blu-ray_2.htm

Blu-ray: Can it Survive?

Evan Powell
July 14, 2006
ProjectorCentral.com

They say the outcome of a war is not determined on the battlefield, but rather in the strategy rooms long before the first shot is fired. And so it is with the great "format war" between the new high definition video disc rivals HD-DVD and Blu-ray. From our vantage point, it appears that HD-DVD has already won. It only remains for the various battlefield moves to be played out before it becomes obvious. The real question now is not whether Blu-ray will win, but whether it can survive to capture a reasonable share of the home theater market.

HD-DVD is currently well-positioned to take the lion's share of the market for one very simple reason: HD-DVD offers a much better value proposition to the consumer. That value proposition comes in the form of three formidable advantages: (1) At this writing, HD-DVD image quality is clearly superior to Blu-ray, (2) HD-DVD player prices are half those of Blu-ray, and (3) HD-DVD has twice as many movie titles on the market as Blu-ray, and that ratio will hold through the end of this critical launch year. In short, HD-DVD is aggressively delivering what the consumer wants today. Meanwhile, Blu-ray is far behind the power curve with overpriced and underperforming products. If it does not turn itself around its survival as a vehicle for home theater movies is questionable.

Image Quality

We have spent the last two weeks with Blu-ray and HD-DVD, doing various side by side comparisons with two identically calibrated Optoma HD7100 projectors. How do the formats compare to each other, and how much of a leap forward from standard DVD do they represent? Based on the discs that have been brought to market so far, HD-DVD wins in a runaway.

We started by viewing the film U-571 in both standard DVD and its new HD-DVD version side by side. The DVD was played on the Oppo 971 DVD player, and the HD-DVD disc was played on the Toshiba HD-A1. Both players were set to feed the signals at 1080i via DVI.

The result: a night and day difference. The HD-DVD image was much higher in contrast and showed beautiful detail in high resolution that was completely lost in the DVD. It was smoother, cleaner, and much more three-dimensional. The standard DVD looked surprisingly dull and grainy in comparison. This was true despite the fact that the U-571 DVD is actually a much better than average video transfer.

This dramatic improvement in image quality was apparent across all HD-DVDs we have seen thus far. From the outset we were happily surprised by the substantial improvement in image quality being delivered by the $500 Toshiba HD-DVD player. And after investing $1000 for the Samsung BD-P1000, we were expecting to see at least comparable results. After all, the player is twice the money, and the discs are encoded in the same 1080p resolution format. How different could it be?

Quite different, as it turns out. The Blu-ray launch delivered a rude surprise—picture quality that is moderately better than that available on standard DVD, but not rising to the level of anything one could call high definition. We viewed The Fifth Element, Terminator, and The House of Flying Daggers side by side in their DVD and Blu-ray versions, deriving the same results from each test: the Blu-ray discs showed somewhat better contrast and detail over their DVD counterparts. But the difference was not nearly as dramatic as the comparisons between DVD and HD-DVD. Moreover, none of the Blu-ray discs matched the higher quality of the HD-DVDs.

Rumors are circulating that the problem with Blu-ray is due to an alleged defect in the HDMI output of the Samsung player. Some have said that one needs only to switch from HDMI to component video output to solve the problem. There is a bit of truth to this. We do see marginally better images from the Samsung player on most discs when using component video. But the improvement is not dramatic. The resulting image still looks only incrementally better than DVD. So while the use of component video yields a somewhat better picture, it does not transform Blu-ray into a great deal for the money. Furthermore, it should be noted that the Blu-ray demo disc being used by many retailers at the moment plays just fine over the Samsung BD-P1000's HDMI interface. There is not the slightest hint of a defect in the player with this particular disc. So we are more inclined to suspect that this oddity is related to Blu-ray disc quality, and will reserve judgment until more is known.

Part of the reason for Blu-ray's present lackluster image quality may be attributed to a strange confluence of unfortunate events. First, they have not yet been able to successfully mass-produce dual-layer Blu-ray discs. That means the storage capacity on the first releases is limited to 25 GB rather than the 50 GB available with the dual-layer structure. Second, someone decided to use MPEG-2 on these initial releases. It appears that 25 GB is not sufficient storage space for high quality video at 1080p/24 resolution when compressed via MPEG-2. Somewhere along the line vital video information is not making it onto the Blu-ray discs, and it is visible on the screen.

The solution to this problem would be to either switch to a more efficient codec like MPEG-4 or VC-1, or solve the problem related to manufacturing the dual-layer discs. We have no idea how long it will take before either of these solutions find their way to market. But once either one of them shows up, we have little doubt that Blu-ray image quality will rise to the level of HD-DVD. However, there is no reason to imagine Blu-ray quality would ever exceed that of HD-DVD.

At this point we should address what can only be characterized as a hoax—the notion that Blu-ray must be technically superior to HD-DVD because the Samsung player outputs 1080p, whereas the Toshiba player is "only 1080i." One high-end home theater retailer told me last weekend that the reason you pay $1000 for the Blu-ray player is for the "higher resolution 1080p output." This is absolute baloney. If you encounter any retail sales rep feeding you this line, keep your wallet in your pocket and leave the store.

The truth is this: The Toshiba HD-DVD player outputs 1080i, and the Samsung Blu-ray player outputs both 1080i and 1080p. What they fail to mention is that it makes absolutely no difference which transmission format you use—feeding 1080i or 1080p into your projector or HDTV will give you the exact same picture. Why? Both disc formats encode film material in progressive scan 1080p at 24 frames per second. It does not matter whether you output this data in 1080i or 1080p since all 1080 lines of information on the disc are fed into your video display either way. The only difference is the order in which they are transmitted. If they are fed in progressive order (1080p), the video display will process them in that order. If they are fed in interlaced format (1080i), the video display simply reassembles them into their original progressive scan order. Either way all 1080 lines per frame that are on the disc make it into the projector or TV. The fact is, if you happen to have the Samsung Blu-ray player and a video display that takes both 1080i and 1080p, you can switch the player back and forth between 1080i and 1080p output and see absolutely no difference in the picture. So this notion that the Blu-ray player is worth more money due to 1080p output is nonsense.

(As a side note, 1080p could offer a subtle improvement in motion smoothness if (a) the player was able to output at 24 frames per second, and (b) you happened to have a video display that could take 1080p/24, which is a rarity these days. In the future it is probable that both HD-DVD and Blu-ray players will output 1080p/24. But neither one does it today, so it is not relevant to the present competition between the formats.)

So why all the confusion? If live video is originally captured with an HD video camera in 1080p, that is a much higher resolution than capturing in 1080i. The reason is that when an HD camera captures in 1080i, it is scanning 540 odd lines at one moment in time, and the 540 even lines at a subsequent moment in time. So in motion sequences, vertical resolution drops to 540 lines rather than 1080. Furthermore, interlaced capture produces motion offsets in the reassembled frame, resulting in the interlacing artifacts that people don't like. That does not occur with either HD-DVD or Blu-ray 1080p film-sourced material since it is all progressively scanned from film frames that represent single moments in time. So this material can be transmitted from the player to the display via 1080i without introducing interlacing artifacts.

The Price Factor

Currently we have the bizarre phenomenon of the $500 Toshiba HD-A1 HD-DVD player delivering a markedly better picture than the $1000 Samsung BD-P1000 Blu-ray player. As noted previously, this is due primarily to the inadequacies of the Blu-ray discs, and not the relative merits of the two players. Once the Blu-ray consortium is able to issue discs encoded with VC-1 or MPEG-4, the image quality should begin to rival that of HD-DVD. But that is the best one can expect. Since both formats will (a) encode film in 1080p/24, (b) eventually use VC-1 and MPEG-4 as preferred video codecs, and (c) output via HDMI, there is no material difference in the technologies that would cause one to produce a better quality image than the other. In point of fact, image quality variances between titles will be dependent on the quality and condition of the original film source and its restoration rather than any inherent differences in the HD-DVD or Blu-ray processes.

Retailers who are currently promoting Blu-ray over HD-DVD point to two "advantages" of the Samsung player over the Toshiba player. The first, already discussed, is that the Samsung BD-P1000 outputs 1080p whereas the Toshiba HD-A1 does not. For reasons just discussed, this feature is not worth an incremental $5, much less $500. Now, if either player could output 1080p/24, that would be a small advantage worth mentioning. But neither one will do that, and 99% of the HD video display systems on the market wouldn't recognize that signal even if they did.

The second purported advantage of the Samsung player is that it loads faster, and indeed it does. Everyone has complained about the slow load times on the Toshiba HD-A1. However, let's put this into perspective since the Samsung is not as fast as a conventional DVD player either. Starting from power off, without a disc in the drive, the Samsung player takes 25 seconds to boot up and open the drawer. The Toshiba player takes 39 seconds to do the same thing. So the Toshiba player requires you to wait an additional 14 seconds in this part of the start up cycle.

Once you drop a disc into the tray and press the close button, the Samsung player take 32 seconds to recognize the disc and commence delivery of the image to the screen. The Toshiba player takes 60 seconds to do this. So the incremental wait time to load and play is 28 seconds. The bottom line is that it takes an additional 42 seconds to power up the Toshiba HD-A1 and get a movie playing compared to the Samsung BD-P1000. True, that can seem like an eternity for consumers used to the instant response of a DVD player. But in the grand scheme of things, we don't see this as a big factor in deciding between the formats, especially when there are differences in image quality to worry about.

In short, it is difficult to see what the consumer gets for the incremental $500 investment in Blu-ray over HD-DVD. At the moment, Blu-ray delivers moderately faster load times and less impressive picture quality. Sometime in the future (hopefully soon), Blu-ray discs will begin to look as good as HD-DVD. But when they do, the consumer will still be asked to pay a $500 premium to see them. There is no rational justification for this price differential.

Film Studio Support

The most unsavory aspect of this entire format war is that some of the major film studios have elected to take sides. This, more than any technical issue, is causing many consumers to sit on the sidelines and wait for some clarity. Quite understandably, nobody wants to invest in the next Betamax fiasco. It seems that Sony would have learned a lesson with Betamax, in that attempting to dictate an industry standard sometimes doesn't work out so well. But here we are again, with Sony now holding the substantial film libraries of Sony Pictures and MGM as hammers over the consumer: "Buy the expensive Blu-ray players, or you won't see our films in HD." Other studios, notably Disney, Fox, and Lion's Gate have joined with them and, as of this writing, indicated that they will release their films only in the Blu-ray format (although Disney has recently indicated that it is considering support of HD-DVD).

There is one little problem—all the money these studios want is currently in the consumers' wallets. And consumers do not react kindly to threatening "buy this or else" marketing propositions. The success of the HD-DVD format is clearly in the interest of the consumer. Not only does it represent a much better value today in both performance and price, but if Sony's Blu-ray is to survive at all, the influence of HD-DVD in the marketplace will drive down the prices of Blu-ray through natural market competition. Either way, the consumer wins with a healthy HD-DVD presence in the market.

Thankfully, a number of major studios have taken a pro-consumer position in this battle. Universal Studios has established a solid commitment to HD-DVD and refuses to lend any support to Blu-ray. Others like Paramount/Dreamworks, Warner Bros, New Line Cinema and HBO have taken the position that the customer ought to be able to acquire their films in whatever format they choose—they will release their titles in both HD-DVD and Blu-ray editions. The good news is that the combined film libraries of Universal, Paramount, Dreamworks, Warner Bros, and New Line Cinema contain many thousands of titles. Their collective support of HD-DVD is more than sufficient to ensure the success of the format. The films from these studios alone will give the consumer who chooses HD-DVD a lifetime of great HD movie viewing.

So we must ask ourselves as consumers: How big of a deal is this fuss over studio support anyway? What if I invest in HD-DVD today and Disney decides not to support it after all? Our answer is an emphatic so what? Not being able to see a Disney film in HD is not the end of the world. Disney films will always be available on regular DVD. You can pop those DVDs into your HD-DVD player anytime you want, upsample them to 1080i, and see them in very close to the same quality as Blu-ray is delivering today. Problem solved.

Meanwhile, you'll have a huge variety of titles from the HD-DVD friendly studios to select from, so you can enjoy true HD quality at prices that are much easier on your budget. If Disney, in the end, chooses not to actively support HD-DVD, the company will simply lose out on your HD disc purchases. Oh well, that's the breaks. Let Disney management explain to their shareholders why they backed what is now looking like it might be the lame pony in this horse race. This is not the consumer's problem.

We believe the Hollywood studios will eventually wake up to the fact that HD-DVD is not only in the consumer's interest, it is in Hollywood's interest as well. HD-DVD's low prices and high performance will ensure a rapid proliferation of HD-DVD players in consumer households. That will, in turn, fuel a new boom in HD disc sales and rentals. There are many hundreds of millions of dollars to be made in the HD revolution, and the "Blu-ray only" studios are just shooting themselves in the foot by not supporting technology that is in the consumer's best interests.

Conclusion

HD-DVD has proven itself to be an outstanding value for the money. Blu-ray has not. If Blu-ray is to survive it needs to drop the price of its entry level players to $500 and increase the quality of its discs. In essence, it needs to match the price/performance benchmark established by HD-DVD. Surely better Blu-ray discs will be forthcoming at some point. But from the looks of things it may already be too late. HD-DVD is solid, it delivers superb quality for a nominal price, and there are twice the number of HD-DVD titles on the market as BDs. The outlook for the holiday season is that there will be over 400 HD-DVD titles released, while Blu-ray will be lucky to have 200.

In addition to the strength of the HD-DVD release, the technology has a latent cost advantage in manufacturing. HD-DVD players can be built at lower cost, and that will translate into lower prices to the consumer. Faced with this challenge, Blu-ray will eventually need to deliver image quality that is superior to HD-DVD in order to justify premium player prices. It is certainly not doing that today, and we do not believe there is any realistic chance that it could happen in the future.

For these reasons, we enthusiastically endorse HD-DVD. If Blu-ray can ever demonstrate that it is able to deliver similar quality at similar prices, or even better quality at a premium price, we will be happy to endorse Blu-ray as well. But based on the less than stellar performance of Blu-ray coming out of the starting gates, we wonder whether it will survive in the home theater market.

Our message to consumers is this: Do not be concerned by the demands of the "Blu-ray only" film studios who ask that you pay top dollar for Blu-ray players to see their movies in HD. The HD-DVD launch has established that you do not need to spend $1000 or $1500 to see great HD films in your own home. If some studios don't want to accommodate you, buy from those who will. At the very least, the competition between HD-DVD and Blu-ray will ensure that prices of both formats become rapidly accessible to the maximum number of consumers.

On a final note, think about this: Your real objective should be to get the absolute best picture possible for the budget you are willing to spend. In order to meet that objective, you will be much better off buying HD-DVD and investing the incremental cash you would have spent on Blu-ray in a higher quality projector or flat screen HDTV instead. Once consumers begin to spend big money in pursuit of their own best interests, the studios will fall into line.

[vn_Tanc]

CHrist who the fuck read all that crap?

Here's a clue: HD-DVD versus BLU-RAY will NOT be any kind of deciding factor in the format war.

[Boogahz]

CHrist who the fuck read all that crap?

Here's a clue: HD-DVD versus BLU-RAY will NOT be any kind of deciding factor in the format war.

If those were the two formats in the "war," what else COULD be a deciding factor?

[vn_Tanc]

CHrist who the fuck read all that crap?

Here's a clue: HD-DVD versus BLU-RAY will NOT be any kind of deciding factor in the format war.

If those were the two formats in the "war," what else COULD be a deciding factor?

We're talking about games consoles not DVD players

[Boogahz]

CHrist who the fuck read all that crap?

Here's a clue: HD-DVD versus BLU-RAY will NOT be any kind of deciding factor in the format war.

If those were the two formats in the "war," what else COULD be a deciding factor?

We're talking about games consoles not DVD players

Ah, then maybe switching the bold word with console would make more sense

[Syenye]

We're talking about games consoles not DVD players

there's no reason the two should be mutually exclusive, especially when sony is using the ps3 to push their format.

[Winnow]

CHrist who the fuck read all that crap?

Here's a clue: HD-DVD versus BLU-RAY will NOT be any kind of deciding factor in the format war.

If those were the two formats in the "war," what else COULD be a deciding factor?

We're talking about games consoles not DVD players

It makes a difference for the people that were planning to buy a PS3 Blue-Ray drive on the cheap for movies and don't get them because Blu-Ray loses the format war. It doesn't make much sense when Sony is calling the PS3 a "computer", not a game console. If Blu-Ray isn't going to be the standard, then people are paying a few hundred more for no benefit in games...or even better, if it had an HD-DVD in it, they could use it for watching HD movies from the majority of the movie industry.

[Winnow]

Here's another article for those looking for a massive supply of PS3 games (beyond the three original games it's going to launch with) to chew on:

bold part included for those that read slower than a chimp

http://biz.gamedaily.com/industry/feature/?id=13291

7/20/2006 12:28:56 PM

Report: Developers are Steering Away from PS3

There's never been a company that has dominated the video game business for three straight console generations. Can Sony pull it off? It's not looking good as the high price seems to be putting off not only prospective consumers but also developers, and that could be a vicious circle.

Is Sony's PlayStation 3 in trouble before it even launches? Sony has been the undisputed champion of the last two console generations, towering over the competition, but now it seems like every analyst, developer and industry pundit is placing a laser sight directly on Sony's forehead.

The biggest problem would appear to be the pricing for the system. Even the lower priced $500 SKU is expensive, and $600 seems ridiculous to most. Ever since Sony revealed this pricing strategy at this year's E3, the company has been put on the defensive, arguing that it's a "computer" and that with the inclusion of a high-def Blu-ray player it's really a "bargain."

Sony CEO Sir Howard Stringer himself has admitted that the console is expensive and that consumers are paying for its "potential." In the PS3's native Japan, the reaction has been less than pleasant, with more than 90 percent of developers in a recent survey stating that the price of the console is just too high. And indeed it seems that this high price is affecting whether or not certain developers decide to develop for the PS3. Sony's PlayStation business has always been backed by incredibly strong third-party support, but now for the first time that could be in jeopardy.

According to a BusinessWeek Online report, some developers are actually steering resources away from the PS3 in favor of the more affordable Wii from Nintendo and even the Xbox 360. Hirokazu Hamamura, president of publisher and game industry researcher Enterbrain, believes that Sony's next-gen console might not be a smash hit the way previous PlayStation systems have been. "Many developers think the console's initial high price will lead to slow sales and are holding off on creating games for Sony," Hamamura explained.

"At its autumn games preview on July 13, for instance, traditional Sony ally Electronic Arts spent far more time showing off innovative Nintendo games than it did titles for the PS3," emphasized BusinessWeek. "EA announced six Nintendo Wii launch titles and showed long working demos for two of those. But it offered only a short clip of a car-racing game for PS3. EA says it's still testing the potential of the PS3."

Ultimately, developers and analysts agree that in order for the PS3 to be a success in the long run, Sony will have no choice but to bring the cost of the system down as fast as possible. "It's likely Sony will have to discount more...and faster" than planned, commented JP Morgan analyst Hiroshi Takada.

[Animalor]

So I got to see a BluRay player in action last friday at Futureshop. I havta say that what I saw looked damned good. I looked around to see if they had an HD-DVD on display to compare and sadly there wasn't.

The only thing is that I wish I didn't have to buy a 1000$+ TV to get such nice imagery.

[Winnow]

The only thing is that I wish I didn't have to buy a 1000$+ TV to get such nice imagery.

You don't have to.* HD content is on the newsgroups although you're looking at monster downloads.

-Unlimited Giganews Account ~24.00
-750GB HD ~249.00, or if you want to spend the equivalent of a Blu Ray player: 4X750GB HDs (3TB/3000GB) ~1000.00

(if not a giganews user already, there is special offer of free use of Newsleecher app and search if you sign up for unlimited giganews account. 30/year value...although my Newsleecher year expired June 8th but is still working fine for some reason)

250.00 and you're on your way (with the bonus of having a 750GB HD to save all the other great newsgroup content on as well!)


*If you have an HTPC setup!

[Winnow]

The no-brainer hacks for the Xbox 360 are rolling in. You can switch on or off for Xbox Live play:

http://www.globe-360.com/home.html

Features:

* Plug&Play: Don't need the extraction of drive-key from the original firmware of drive on your console, only install the chip and the "unsigned" firmware on-board will be boot.

* Firmware-drive Upgrade: you can use an upgraded firmware for better performance of your DVD-drive to reading DVD-R DL support (ex: you should use on Hitachi-LG the firmware vers. 059 instead your original 47D or 46D).

* Electronic Switch ON/OFF: enable or disable the chip when turn-on your console by power button, you can check the state of chip by a led-indicator.

* Easy Reprogrammable Flash eprom: the on-board flash eprom is mounted on a socket connector for an easy and clean remove in order to fast reprogramming it.

* Compatible with all DVD-drives on the market (Hitachi-LG and Toshiba-Samsung).

* High reliability through ACTEL CPLD technology.