PSX Announced
 

http://www.reuters.com/newsArticle.j...toryID=2833998

Wasn't something like this rumored to be put out by MS?

Isn't PSX the abbreviation for the original "Playstation." Me so confused!

Man, the least they could do is put hardware in it that isn't from a machine that is 7 years old! If I'm buying a TiVo type unit then the PSX chip being included would be of little significance.

I don't think that PSX was ever the official Sony-sanctioned abbreviation. I'm pretty sure that abbreviation originated in the press.

The Playstation was first being developed as a CD-ROM add on for the Super Nintendo. After seeing how well Sega's CD-ROM fared, Nintendo dropped the project, and Sony began to develop it's own machine from where it left off.. early development called the machine "Playstation-X" to note that it was a different machine than it started as. The X was dropped somewhere along the lines..

The original Playstation is now the PSone, the PS2 is, uh, the PS2, and the PSX is a PS2 plus all the extra stuff (DVD-RW, satellite etc).

Here's a good story with pics from IGN. Looks pretty cool. Wonder where the controller slots are for the PS2 part of it?

This is definately an interseting development.

The Front
http://ps2media.ign.com/ps2/image/psx_030528_pic3.jpg
The back
http://ps2media.ign.com/ps2/image/psx_030528_pic4.jpg

Ooooh, didn't notice it was slot loading. Pretty sweet. Would be nice if it were multidisc as well. Wonder if you'll have to pay a subscription for the "Tivo" features.

Any word on the price point?

Here's the official presentation highlighting PSX and PSP. Interesting to note that the PSP is drawing interest from Film Studios. Would be cool if you could port divx movies to the PSP to watch while on the road or travelling. They also show the FAB's where the die are manufactured and mention the now infamous CELL processor.

I betting $400....it looks like a TIVO + DVD-r + plays games too!

So........should I get rid of my PS2 while it has reasonable value and get the PSX when it arrives or what?I pretty much understand what the PSX does,but can't I make it my head gaming machine?

I'm wondering if you'll have the option to save games onto the hard drive instead of using a memory card?

120gig hard drive?!?

Man - they aren't playing around - are they?

I wonder what the feeling in MS are right now. Looks like Sony beat them to the all in one punch....

Hopefully this will be the trend next gen as well. Barebones gaming only version and a souped up do it all machine for those not interested in the Tivo, DVD-R, satellite ect.

Looks like a white Xbox. Appears to be approx the same dimensions. Wonder if all those people who bitched about the size of the Xbox will now bitch about the size of this?

I am in love. Give me NOW....must have..machine....AARRRRGGHHH!!!

I would certainly complain if it were the same size, simply because the X-box won't fit under my TV (due to a support beam down the middle of the compartment) where I prefer to keep my game systems.

But it's a moot point as I already have a PS2 and have 0 interest in the extra stuff.

Also very interesting was the financial piece of the article.

I do not know the financials of these companies (Sony, MS, Nintendo, etc), but find it interesting that Sony is apparently having such serious financial issues at a company wide level.

"Sony rattled investors a month ago by posting its biggest quarterly net loss in more than eight years, far worse than the market's expectations, and warning that operating profit in the year to next March would slip to its lowest in nine years.

Sony lost one-fourth of its market value in the two days after the April earnings announcement and its share price has since languished near seven-year lows.

The shares ended Wednesday trade unchanged at 3,000 yen, underperforming a 1.7 percent rise in the Tokyo Stock Exchange's electrical machinery index IELEC.

The briefing began after the Tokyo share market closed.

Sony Chairman Nobuyuki Idei said his company ended talks with overseas firms, which included Dutch insurer Aegon NV, on a possible equity stake in its life insurance unit.

He added Sony would consider splitting its financial businesses, which include an online bank, into a separate unit for possible alliances or an initial public offering."

Sony is only making money in two divisions- Playstation and film. a few years ago the film division was losing money also.

The playstation division is 65% of their profits from what I understand. I guess if they lost money overall then the loses in the remaining divisions continue to grow.

Looks like a nice unit. If it is a tivo unit maybe I might look to add it to my bedroom.

Any chance the price of the current PS2 will drop once the PSX comes out?

Looks pretty cool. I think this is Sony testing out how a gaming console with these features will sell in order to determine what they are going to do with PS3. If it does well, we might see these features in the next generation of gaming machines.

And isn't the films division only making money because of the success of Spiderman? I thought I heard that.

This gamepro article has pics of the interface. Looks to carry on the dual-shock button logo's with the "X" and "O" etc.

My only concern is that you wont be able to use the PS2 for games while recording a show or doing something else. The whole "multi-function home-entertainment hub" deal needs to have a way to play games and perform peripheral functions in the background.

My guess is $299 plus a subscription fee for the TIVO service and video/audio streaming. No price drop in PS2 because of this although that will be down to $150 by the winter anyway. I think this will be a limited release product to test the waters for PS3.

This seems like a similar thing to the Panasonic Gamecube that came out and disappeared.

Not really. That was just a Gamecube that also played DVD's (similar to the current PS2/Xbox model). It didn't have DVR capabilities, a hard drive, or any of that. I don't think it was ever even released in the U.S.

it will be alot more than $299 or $400, my guess is $799, just a 120 gb harddrive costs $100 alone, sony's dvd recorder that is coming which this is based on is $800, so actually this will probably be more
$180 ps2
$300 "tivo"
$800 dvd recorder
$100 harddrive

no way this will be less than $799, if so I will be damned, and it would be a stupid move on Sony's part because there new dvd recorder would not sell at all then.

Actually I think your calculations are off a bit. I see it more as:
$120 PS2 (their cost for making one)
$150 Tivo/Harddrive (basically software + storage)
$200 DVD-RW (their cost again)

Add in a subscription fee to help subsidise the costs and you have a $300-400 all-in-wonder machine. Keep in mind this isn't going to use their new blu-ray technology for recording DVD's. These numbers are all guess-timates of course. ;)

The panasonic gamecube (The "Q" I believe it's called) didnt' really dissappear. It was just only release in Japan and it was a fairly small release as they probably figured (rightly so) that people weren't going to be a lot more for a machine that just looked better and played DVDs.

Good thinking. The PS3 will probably be very similar to this device, with more functionality and next-gen console graphics. They probably want to get this out there not so much to make money, but to get a heads-up on any potential issues with PS3.

I don't think this thing will sell a lot of units. There aren't really any compelling features, outside of the possibility of consilidating your devices. It will be a different story if they go this route with PS3, though. People will buy the unit for the games, but they'll be bringing a trojan horse into their homes. Imagine the nefarious possibilities: it only burns Sony-brand DVD-Rs, it only works with Sony's TIVO service, and has some gee-whiz connection features with the PSP.

i'm sticking w/ the $299 price also. consumer electronics, if it wants to be ubiquitous, needs to be around that price.

in a couple of years:
120GB hard drive less than $50
tivo-like system less than $100
dvd-rw around $100

so, here's sony's salvo into controlling your entertainment future. it's an exciting time and i wonder what microsoft's response will be.

Why all the effort when the PS2 as a game system is in the early stages of becoming dated.

Is the PS3 really that far away?

Wow I like the look so much better than my PS2. If the price is right I may pick one up. I would rather however have a firmware update for my X box. :)

This looks like another smart move from Sony.

PSX appears to target the upscale HT crowd with a simple, functional device that will fit in aesthetically with a lot of HT components.

I can't wait to see what PS3 and PSP turn out to be.

It'll be interesting to find out what this unit costs. I definitely like the look of it.

the Franchise, yeah but Sony is touted their new dvd recorder that will record on all formats except dvd-ram, as the only dvd recorder needed and that is $799, why would they give you that functionaity for $299, it doesn't make sense, again, why would they give you a tivo at this price, when that is the stand alone tivo price, but we will see next year :)

Ummm..... Where do the memory cards go (for those of us that don't want to lose our previous game saves)? I mean I know there's a hard drive and all but what if I was playing [insert RPG title here] and had maybe 40+ hours invested in the game and am far from finished, I wouldn't want to have to start all over from scratch if I were to play [insert RPG title here] on the PSX.

Now that I think about it - this product will probably be very expensive... This is not an SCE product... it's being made by Sony's Electronics division (which is one of their divisions that is bleeding money). They can't afford to sell this item at a loss. They won't be making any royalties off of software - this is SCE doing them a favor more or less.

PS2 only recently reached the BEP - as recent as last Jan or Feb, the hardware costs was still pretty close to 200 bucks (heard this from an SCE employee). Now - factoring the costs to manufacture this device you can basically take their price points for each individual unit and cut it in half (except for the PS2 which we can safely guess currently costs 120 bucks). Then you have to factor in a big unknown which is the cost of design. Sony Electronics spent plenty of money designing this you can bet - plus the costs to develop a completely new Operating System. I don't want to do the math, and I'm sure they don't want to do it either... If the thing only costs 300 bucks in Japan, then it'll certainly be a big hit - but that's just a stupid move to charge less than it costs to make. SCE can do it, but without the prospect of software royalties, Sony Electronics would just be digging their own grave.

To figure out the price, they have to try to predict how many people will buy it at whatever price - see, enough people have to purchase it to absorb the cost to develop the software and design the hardware which was just a big chunk of money rather than something that can be calculated for each unit like the cost of manufacturing.

So there you go - there's no chance in hell that this thing sells for anywhere near 300 bucks I don't think. A friend of mine working in the industry figured it would end up costing $1000 at retail. He might be right.

just like I said :)

You could get the Panasonic Cube in the US... I didn't say it was the same thing, I just said it's similar... this is a company licensing their console hardware technology to another company so they can make a wonder-unit and sell it for a much higher price as a luxury item rather than just a game machine. It just so happens that in this case, both companies are under the same umbrella. This will just be a niche item that will be quite expensive and not many people will buy it I don't think... much like the Panasonic Cube (although I don't know the numbers on that item - if it didn't come to the US as you say, the numbers couldn't have been that great). I doubt this Sony unit will make it to the US - well, it may launch here next year as the article states, but it won't be here long.

Don't get me wrong - I'd like to have one, but I wouldn't spend more than 300 bucks on it and surely it'll cost 3 times that at least.