Wired On The "Crippled" Version Of The PS3

If you go in for the $499 PS3, you don't get the much-vaunted Memory Stick/SD Card/CompactFlash inputs. Hell, you don't even get IEEE 802.11 wireless.

And worst of all: you don't get HDMI output. Know what that means? You can't watch Blu-Ray movies. Sure, you can watch them in standard definition. But not HD. Isn't that, like, the whole point?

This just made Microsoft's $299 Core Pack look like a genius idea. At least it's possible to upgrade an Xbox Core. I don't know what kind of arcane magick will have to be executed to give a crippled PS3 actual functionality.

-- Okay, PS3 Has Serious Issues

They are all odd exclusions. The card reader? That's what ... $30 retail? It might not be the worst thing to pass up on, if it was expensive. Removing it just makes Sony look cheap. Wireless? This simply makes Sony look dated. Not placing wifi on any box they can hints that they might not be maximizing their online offering as much as they'd like us to think they are. Maybe they can be replaced with handy add-ons ... but it just seems daft.

The HDMI? Removing that seems to have three results: 1) Those of us who don't own an HDTV and aren't going to get one just for the PS3 will wonder why we even need Blu-Ray in the first place. 2) Those of us who own an HDTV with HDMI won't even consider it. 3) Those of us who might get an HDTV down the way will regret not having the option later.

I'm assuming there's an excellent business reason for this, but it seems like one model with a 40GB drive and all the features for $550 would have been a better solution than dividing up the brand.




tagged: game, gaming