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Sony PlayStation (Games)

Sony Officially Dropping 20GB PS3 in North America 144

Posted by Zonk from the get-thee-behind-me dept.
An anonymous reader writes "Sony has just announced they're officially ditching the 20GB model of the PS3. 'Due to the overwhelming demand for the 60GB model from both retailers and consumers, we have ceased offering the 20GB model here in North America. In addition to the larger internal hard drive, the 60GB PlayStation 3 features added storage media slots and built-in Wi-Fi not found in the 20GB system. Based on retailer and consumer feedback, we have decided to focus our current efforts on the more popular 60GB model.'"
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Sony Officially Dropping 20GB PS3 in North America More

Sony Officially Dropping 20GB PS3 in North America

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  • xbox elite (Score:3, Interesting)

    by k_187 ( 61692 ) on Wednesday April 11, 2007 @06:16PM (#18695697) Journal
    Seems MS was right to put the new xbox at $480 then. Keeps the $100 premium for the PS3 intact.

    • Re: (Score:2)

      by *weasel ( 174362 )
      In the same sense that they were 'right' to price games at $60... sure.

      But I'm not about to celebrate the fact that they're successfully pushing the upper-limit of what the gaming public is willing to pay.

  • Sound familiar? (Score:3, Interesting)

    by Mark Gordon ( 14545 ) on Wednesday April 11, 2007 @06:16PM (#18695699) Homepage
    So much for "20 GB is enough for anyone"

  • Makes sense to me (Score:4, Insightful)

    by alvinrod ( 889928 ) on Wednesday April 11, 2007 @06:22PM (#18695749)
    I think that most people who would be willing to shell out $500 for a console wouldn't mind having to pony up another $100 for built-in wireless (I think that's usually about $100 to add on, at least that's what it is for the Xbox 360), an extra 40 GB of room on the HD, and some media card slots (not sure how useful these are).

    Makes me wonder when Microsoft is going to axe the $300 version of the Xbox 360, which in a way is kind of crap since it doesn't come with any way to save games on it by default without shelling out at least enough for a memory card or a special HD (since you can't plug your own in as far as I know). With the new Elite version coming out in the future, why bother having this lowend version take up shelf space?

    • Re: (Score:2, Offtopic)

      by Fallen Kell ( 165468 )
      Wireless costs a total of $7 to add in. I picked up several USB, PCMCIA, and PCI based wireless cards for $7 after rebate almost a year ago... don't say it costs $100 to add when the parts are only $5-6 in cost anymore. It is probably even connected via an internal usb header.

    • Re: (Score:1)

      by amuro98 ( 461673 )
      What if you already had a wireless or ethernet solution in place? I have a wired switch behind my entertainment unit. No need for WiFi, so that's a $100 I'd rather not have to waste.

      Larger HDD...eh. Maybe. But again, I could just buy a 50GB HDD from Frys for $50.

      As for the lame, HDD-less 360 "Core", I think Microsoft will keep it around as a way to compete with Nintendo, even though it is $50 more. Besides, $299.99 is a lot more...friendly...to price constrained (but not necessarily educated) consumers
  • But I only want a 20 gig drive, and I liked the $100 cheaper price. Oh well, I guess I'll just have to wait longer before getting a PS3.

    (yes, I actually was planning on getting one at some point. But only the 20 gig model).
    • > But I only want a 20 gig drive

      Ebay is your friend.

    • So go buy one! They're probably going to stop shipping them over here, not just ditch the ones already on the shelves.

      And yeah, like the other guy said, eBay. :P

      Me, I'm holding out til the price drops a bit - so hopefully, if they concentrate their efforts on one model, that model's price will drop simply due to the economic efficiency of dealing with one model over two.
      • Actually not true. I work at Best Buy and we've never received a 20GB system aside from the original launch shipment (which was something like 8 20GB models and 50 60GB models). In fact our inventory system has listed them as discontinued for over a month. My supervisor told me back in January that Sony had no intention of shipping 20s until they were totally caught up on 60s.

    • Re: (Score:2)

      by adisakp ( 705706 )
      But I only want a 20 gig drive, and I liked the $100 cheaper price.

      I bought my PS3 for $480 used off Craigslist. Actually it was new, still in an unopened box. I actually broke the seal on the box and took the wrappers off everything.

      AND it was the 60GB version !!

      If you want to save $100, there were a lot of people who bought PS3's early for "profiteering" reasons who never intended to play them or use them. Those people are selling them because they need money for other reasons and they're prett

  • Here is hoping (Score:5, Interesting)

    by Durrok ( 912509 ) <calltechsucks@nOSPaM.gmail.com> on Wednesday April 11, 2007 @06:41PM (#18695947) Homepage Journal
    Here is hoping that everyone has learned their lesson about releasing multiple versions of consoles. Just do one console at release guys. If you want to release another lower end version a few months later by all means feel free but for the most part anyone who bought the lower end versions of these consoles would have eventually bought the "higher end" version if the lower end version was never available after the first price drop. All you do is sow discontent among the people who were gullible... err.. trying to save some money.
    • While I generally agree with you, at least the low-end Xbox 360 was upgradeable to be identical to a high-end one at a fairly reasonable price. That's not true of the PS3, and I think that's the real problem Sony faces... if their low-end was upgradeable to a high-end, it probably would be much more popular.

      • Re:Here is hoping (Score:4, Interesting)

        by bluk ( 791364 ) on Wednesday April 11, 2007 @09:19PM (#18697325)
        What feature from the 20GB vs. the 60GB is not upgradable that you would want? The big 3 are bigger hard drive capacity, memory card readers, and wireless. The hard drive is user swappable and standard connections (unlike the extortion-like prices that Microsoft is charging for their hard drive). Memory card readers can be attached via USB. Wireless supposedly could have been expanded too via a USB adapter.

        The Xbox 360 cannot use a HDMI connection without the Elite model. And while the Xbox 360 is upgradable, it is expensive to do so compared to standard PC parts (which the PS3 uses). That's why you can use bluetooth or USB devices on the PS3 to expand but have to pay outrageous prices for the hard drive, keyboard, etc. for the Xbox 360.

        IMO, Microsoft made a bigger mistake by not including the hard drive as a standard. Developers can count on a hard drive in the PS3 which could be used in a few different ways (expansions, caching, MMORPG content, etc.). The missing wireless and memory card readers don't affect game development like a missing hard drive would.

    • Re: (Score:1)

      by amuro98 ( 461673 )
      Actually, my understanding has been there was more interest in the $500 model since many didn't care about WiFi or the larger HDD, or the completely pointless CF media reader....

      This is just a move by Sony to force folks to buy the larger model which has better margins. Sony will still lose money on each one, but at least they'll be losing LESS.

      Next up: Sony updates the PS3 in the US to remove the PS2 hardware and replace it with the sucky emulator they inflicted on Europe.

    • Re: (Score:1)

      by akarnid ( 591191 )
      If this wasn't already modded up I'd spend a point on it. The worst thing about the two next-gen consoles are the two different versions. Microsoft actually shot themselves in the foot IMO by not including the HD as standard issue in all SKU's -therefore preventing the use of the HD as a cache device and speeding up loading times like they did with first Xbox.

    • Re: (Score:2)

      by elrous0 ( 869638 ) *
      Sony is full of shit on this one. There was a significant demand for the $500 model because a lot of people just wanted the cheapest Blu-ray player they could get (including me). But Sony lost even more money with it than with the $600 model, and it didn't encourage people to use the thing as a game machine (and buy the games to make up for the loss they were taking). So adios $500 model.

  • That's great! (Score:5, Funny)

    by drinkypoo ( 153816 ) <drink@hyperlogos.org> on Wednesday April 11, 2007 @06:42PM (#18695963) Homepage Journal
    Now when we make price comparisons, we don't have to account for the $500 model any more! That makes it even easier to say that you can get an Xbox 360 and a Wii for the price of a functional PS3 system, because you don't have to qualify it. Sony haters rejoice!

    • Ah, but now you can compare it to the XBox Elite (est. $480) and the fact that to get a Wii you have to buy it second hand (starting at $379.95 on Amazon last I checked). For $859.95 you can buy a PS3 plus a game (or a laptop and a desktop machine with Linux ;)).

  • Um, more like the only ones that are selling in any quantity, if you look at shelf space.

    Sadly, this won't change until Sony gets some high-quality multi-tier games out which not only fully utilize the new PS3 features, but are fun games to play and that work well on both 480p home TV sets (US) and the 720i/p and higher HDTV resolutions.

    That may not be until this upcoming Xmas.

    • Re: (Score:1)

      by Froster ( 985053 )
      I've found the opposite. The last few times I've been shopping for video games, it seems that the 60G PS3 is the one that is always in abundant supply. Even in the fall just after the initial release, my local Best Buy was sold out of the few 20G PS3s it had, and had a skid of 60G models for some time. The skid was only cleared because they sold their mini-PS2s and that opened up some shelf space for them after Christmas.

  • Well color me miffed (Score:3, Informative)

    by jdubois79 ( 227349 ) on Wednesday April 11, 2007 @08:11PM (#18696849)
    I had a sinking feeling that this was coming...

    When I first heard about the different PS3 models, I was all for the "why would I buy a gimped version of the PS3?!?" argument. Then I started considering the prices.

    The benefits of the 60 gig are:
    +40 GB drive
    memory card slots
    Wifi

    And it costs 100 dollars more.

    I have a wifi router in my house. My entertainment system is close enough to my router (for my Xbox, et al) to connect with a cable. I connect it, BAM I have WiFi access to my PS3.

    A USB Memory card adapter is $10 at the Electronics store.

    So I'm left paying $90 for 40Gigs of storage? I'd rather shell out the extra $30, get a 500Gig drive, and plug it in myself (standard SATAII cables, doesn't void warenty).

    So, the 20 Gig was the only version I was actually looking at to buy.
    That and the fact that upgraded versions of the PS3 have a good chance of being "Software backwards compatible" like in the UK, which is to say "not backwards compatible at all"

    I can only hope that they won't get rid of the 20gig here as well.
    • Your argument sounds rational, but for whatever reason the 20GB model was not selling. And it must have been a horrible deal for Sony, because the cost savings to manufacture the 20GB model must have been miniscule (60GB drives aren't exactly high-end anyways), so it was almost an extra $100 hit on each one sold for them.

  • This is terrible news. (Score:4, Funny)

    by Garse Janacek ( 554329 ) on Wednesday April 11, 2007 @08:25PM (#18696959)

    How am I going to conveniently categorize fanboy comments?! Seriously, did Sony ever think of that?!

    Before, pro-Sony would refer to the PS3 as $500, anti- would use $600 (and sometimes $700). How am I supposed to ignore the people I disagree with?!

    It's the same thing with Nintendo... back before they announced the price, people would say either $300 or $200 (or sometimes even $150!) depending on who they were rooting for... now... well, I guess they're still more than $300 on eBay, so this still works some of the time :-P

    Thank goodness I can still tell how people feel about Microsoft! Especially with the new model coming out...

  • I decided to look for the 20G model since I saw the HD was user replaceable. The WiFi is nice, but I have no need.

    But when I tried to buy one, none were available anywhere. I've never seen one at retail.

    So it's too bad really... I figured on using the additional $100 to upgrade the HD, making the PS3 a good media extender. But it's pretty clear the 20G model was always the model for price comparison, and I believe it became a casualty of sonhy trying to get a bit rational about distributio of the PS3.

    I t

    • Re: (Score:2)

      by hexix ( 9514 )

      I think we'll see a reduced price PS3 by the fall in the United States, but it will not have hardware emulation for PS2.

      I'm surprised. Either I missed some comments or you're the first person to point this out.

      There seems to be a lot of things pointing at a price drop. Like you said, they launched in Europe with the Emotion chip removed. It seems pretty obvious if they engineered a version without this chip and started developing software backward compatability that we're going to see that here in the states. There was also just a story about them starting volume production with a company called Foxconn.

      It is al

      • It is also interesting that I've read other reports of people who have been looking for a 20gig version and unable to find them. So there seems to be demand for the 20gig that wasn't being met. The excuse that stores weren't ordering them seems a bit odd.

        I work for Best Buy. It wasn't a matter of us not ordering them, it was a matter of them not offering them in the first place. We had requests all the time for the 20GB model.
        • I work for Best Buy. It wasn't a matter of us not ordering them, it was a matter of them not offering them in the first place. We had requests all the time for the 20GB model.

          But did those customer requests get forwarded to the buyers in Best Buy Corporate who actually dealt with Sony?

          If very few 20GB PS3's were shipped from Sony to Best Buy, is that because Best Buy did not ask for very many, or because Sony did not offer the quantities that Best Buy wanted?

          • Re: (Score:2)

            by trdrstv ( 986999 )
            If very few 20GB PS3's were shipped from Sony to Best Buy, is that because Best Buy did not ask for very many, or because Sony did not offer the quantities that Best Buy wanted?

            Sony announced when they launched the PS3 (in Japan and the US) the split would be 80/20 in favor of the 60 gig model. Sony was expecting / hoping to sell fewer of the cheaper unit, so they made less of them.

  • Not surprising. (Score:4, Interesting)

    by MaWeiTao ( 908546 ) on Wednesday April 11, 2007 @11:28PM (#18698079)
    I've never seen the 20gb model in any store. I don't think retailers are big on giving consumers choices. Even if they carried both versions store employees would inevitably direct customers to purchase the more expensive version. I wouldn't be surprised is Sony released the lesser version simply an attempt to alleviate the shock of a $600 price tag.

    Clearly, it didn't made a difference considering whenever anyone thinks of the PS3 price tag they only think of $600. The recent announcement of the Xbox360 Elite makes it easier to justify carrying only the expensive version.

    Either way, I expect this to make no difference whatsoever. As I've mentioned, everyone already sees only one price tag for the console. What will make a difference is the library of games available and eventual price drops and those had better come sooner than later.
  • How lazy. They could at least show some flair and take a blunt object to it. [youtube.com]

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