Figures for the first quarter of 2008 have just been released and Blu-Ray standalone player sales dropped by 40% between January and February and rose by only 2% in March. Analysts had predicted that the winning format would see a strong surge in hardware sales but this is not happening.

The price of the Blu-Ray player cannot possibly be the reason for the sharp drop. The players were as expensive when Blu-Ray was still competing with HD-DVD and the prices have not changed a lot since then. One possible reason could be that the customers who wanted to purchase a Blu-Ray player have already done so and that the others simply do not want to pay that much money for a movie player.

Add to that the Internet update problematic and horror stories that some early Blu-Ray players will not be able to play new movies because of technology updates and you pretty much got it summed up.

Would not it be funny if no format would win the war ? That Blu-Ray would not win either because most consumers don’t need it ? That another company would come up with a better format, without DRM, for a lesser price ? I would love to see that. How about you ?

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Many sites that report these numbers point out that the amount of sales in dollars comes close to each other but fail to mention that is is not enough to compare game system sales but also consequences for game and accessory sales. With almost 700000 more systems in Japan in this year Nintendo is going to sell more games, more gamepads and other accessories increasing the revenue in that field as well.

It is also an important sign to game creators that the Wii is selling well and that it is currently the gaming system that producers will most likely sell the most games for. At least in Japan. The situation is different in North America and Europe where Microsoft is leading the field with their Xbox 360 thanks to the one year head start.

Which gaming system will be the dominant system in this generation ? Or, will there be a dominant system at all ? What do you think ?

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Yahoo reports that Sonys Playstation 3 will play fewer old games citing a Sony spokesman. The apparent reason is that they removed some “parts” of the Playstation 3 that were used to increase backwards compatibility. With the parts removed, to reduce production costs, the Playstation 3 will not reach the compatibility grade of US and Japanese systems. Software emulation will be used instead to provide that functionality.

If that is not enough the pricing for European systems is ridiculous. While the 60GB Playstation 3 can be bought in Japan for $497 and in the United States for $599 Europeans in the Eurozone have to pay an average of $787 for the premium version. Gamers in Great Britain pay $830 and Denmark tops it all with $969 for a Playstation 3.

A difference of almost $200 for a delayed, crippled Playstation 3 ? Now who is still going to buy this system ? If you ask me, I’m happy with my Nintendo Wii and probably purchase a Xbox 360 soon. That is all I do need. My main gaming station is my computer anyways.

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You will need the following hardware:

• 1 medium Phillips screw driver.
• 1 3.5″ SATA HDD
• 1 3.5″ SATA HDD enclosure.
• 1 Male SATA 7-Pin DATA to Female SATA 7-Pin Cable. (I’m using a 20″)
• You may need a set of needle nose pliers or a pair of snips.

The author has linked to websites that aid you in the process. He recommend an external SATA case to add the 3,5″ SATA drive to it. The case needs an external SATA connection as well as its own power supply to work flawlessly.

I do not own a PS3 yet which means I could not try this little hack on my own machine. It seems to me that you have to use the internal SATA connector to connect the external SATA drive. Here is what he is saying about this, rather vague unfortunately:

If you want cut, a hole in your PS3’s HDD cover and run the cable through go ahead. However, I may at a later time make a male to male SATA cable. I will lilkely use the extension cable I already have and a cable from a SATA cable bracket like in the following pics. I will cut a hole of the appropriate size in the HDD cover and attach the bracket end to the cover. Figure this part out yourself. For now I’ll keep the PS3 in a vertical position with the cable hidden running through a hole below to the drive enclosure.

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This is by far the craziest launch I ever witnessed. How far do people go for a gaming machine ? I decided to collect the most interesting articles in the categories Crimes, Hardware and Games. Please add your links if you want to join the fun.

Crimes:

Man shoot waiting to buy Playstation 3
PS3 Fight shuts down Walmart
PS3 Riot
Texas Gamestop Robbed at Gun-Point

Hardware:

One Man’s HDMI Issues
PS3 dead on arrival
PS3’s disc loaders defective ?
PS3 does not do 1080i ?

Ratings:

Gundam – 2 of 10
NBA 07 – 4.9
Resistance 9.3

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Sony is still claiming that the launch in Japan and the United States will not be postponed but the current situation does not look very promising. They plan to launch in Japan with 100000 systems and in the United States with 400000 systems. Am I the only one that thinks that this figures are not really impressive ? I mean, 100000 systems for Japan ? This must be the worst premiere start of a console system ever in Japan, the 400000 systems for the USA aren’t impressive either.

Consider that many European die hearts will try to catch one of those rare systems by importing them to Europe using well known internet shops like lik sang or play Asia. Customers in the US and Japan will surely face at least the same severe shortages that the XBOX 360 had when it launched, and Microsoft managed to supply 1.5 million systems.

I do not think that it is that bad if the release date for Europe gets delayed. Sony has a history of producing bad console system which get improved over time. They will manage to sell all of the 500000 system that’s for sure, but they are also facing a big opposition with every passing day. They pissed of Europe; and customers in the United States and Japan who will not manage to buy a PS3 at launch date will surely be angry as well.

Microsoft has a comfortable position in Europe with the biggest contender out of the way for the Christmas season. Nintendo will also profit from Sony’s absence, both parties should be very happy about this decision.

The important question however is: what will the customers do ? Will they wait until the PS3 becomes available ? Will they buy a Xbox 360 or Nintendo Wii or both instead ? Time will tell but most people on gaming forums seem to favor the second option and buy a Xbox 360 or Wii for Christmas and forget about Sony.. for now.

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Today joystiq.com cites an unnamed ex-gamestop employee who seemingly shed some light into the rumor. He claims that the developer systems that Sony sent out to the PS3 developers had some serious cooling problems which made the systems overheat and meltdown rather quickly.

He furthermore claims that Sony fired its whole Development team which should have got some media feedback but somehow did not. It seems that Sony has to consider to change the cooling system for the developer systems and probably even for the retail systems.

This in fact could explain the massive delay.

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