Sony Computer Entertainment has proudly produced the third home video gaming console for gaming fans. Its official name is PLAYSTATION 3 and it is abbreviated as PS3.
PS3 is the third and the latest in the PlayStation series which was launched way back in 2004. PS3 is the successor to PlayStation 2. It has competition in the market under the brand name of Nintendos Wii and Microsofts Xbox 360.PS3 is the seventh generation video gaming console.
It is the new features of PS3 which differentiate it from its predecessors. Sony has introduced the PlayStation Network, which is a unified online gaming service. Initially Sony had a policy of relying on the game developers for online play. However, the rules of the game have changed with PS3.
Some other noteworthy features include the PlayStations robust network capabilities and its connectivity with PlayStation Portable.
The connectivity with PlayStation Portable and PlayStations powerful network capabilities are some of the other remarkable features of PS3. In addition, PS3 uses the Blu-ray disc format which is the latest high-definition optical disc format in the market. It can be said that PS3 is the first Blu-ray 2.0 compliant player in the market.
PS3 was launched in different countries successively. It was first released in Japan, then in North America and lastly in Europe and Oceania. In Japan, the date of release was November 11, 2006, while in North America it was November 13, 2006. In Europe and Oceania, it was released in March 2007 due to technical problems cited by Sony.
PS3 was first unveiled by Sony to the general public on May 16, 2005 during the E3 conference. Then it was demonstrated at the Tokyo game show in September 2005. However, at both the events a functional version was not present. In both the events, the demonstrations were held on Devkits and PC hardware. In addition video footage based on the predicted PlayStation 3 hardware was also shown.
Different features in both the models lead Sony to price them differently. The 20 GB model was priced at $499 while the 60 GB model was priced at $599. However, some additional features like HDMI port, Wi-Fi Internet, flash card readers and a chrome trim with the logo in silver were only available in the 60 GB model.