Agreed Todd, this discussion should not have been aired in this thread and would have been better suited to pm's right from the start of it.
I'm deleting my off topic posts to save the mods the work.
Black XB360 120 Gig HDD + HDMI = $479
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Agreed Todd, this discussion should not have been aired in this thread and would have been better suited to pm's right from the start of it.
I'm deleting my off topic posts to save the mods the work.
Back on topic, I find it interesting how HDD capacities are becoming a differentiator between SKUs, and how the economics of the HDD market might have an impact. It's been said before that HDDs only get so cheap..that after a while they hit a certain price and don't go down any further. For example on newegg, 40GB and 60GB drives cost virtually the same at this point. Is it possible that 20GB PS3s are disappearing because there is now little difference for Sony in the cost between 20GB and 60GB HDDs, but at retail they're $100 apart? On the flipside, would a 40GB HDD really be any more expensive for MS to include in the premium box now, instead of 20GB HDDs?
I think it would be interesting if either company just "went with the flow" of the HDD market as capacities go up and prices go down instead of manipulating the consumer's sense of value. If one did, and the other did not, it could alter price gaps quite significantly in one or other direction depending on who was doing what. Assuming the HDD market does indeed still work like that.
edit - nm on the sony comment
I think it would be interesting if either company just "went with the flow" of the HDD market as capacities go up and prices go down instead of manipulating the consumer's sense of value. If one did, and the other did not, it could alter price gaps quite significantly in one or other direction depending on who was doing what. Assuming the HDD market does indeed still work like that.
edit - nm on the sony comment
Titanio, I think you are correct regarding the HDD pricing/sizes.
the only difference for MS is that they are using a 2.5" SATA in a custom connection enclosure (it's designed to be easily removable/attachable and used as portable storage) so they are automatically paying more than a typical drive.
OTOH, the 20 can not be much less cost then a 40? In fact I wondered why (both Sony and MS) went with 20 instead of 40 in the first place?
the only difference for MS is that they are using a 2.5" SATA in a custom connection enclosure (it's designed to be easily removable/attachable and used as portable storage) so they are automatically paying more than a typical drive.
OTOH, the 20 can not be much less cost then a 40? In fact I wondered why (both Sony and MS) went with 20 instead of 40 in the first place?
Just in my situation, if the Elite was 65nm for both Xenos and Xenon, I would probably sell my current premium to get this. HMDI is and added bonus as my plasma has ports for it. However, it's not 65nm, which is likely to come at the end of the year so no worries, maybe the price will drop by then as well. 
20 would have been noticeably cheaper in Nov 05, even Nov 06. That's obviously changed, even in the time since the PS3 launch.
It'd be quite funny if Sony made a unit the same as the current 20GB one, but replaced the HDD with a 60GB one (if they cost no more), and then cost-reduced by the end of the year based on the other changes to the system. $399?
Of course, they won't, they'll reap the extra cash based on consumers' manipulated sense of value, either to break even or make a profit. A $200 price drop would be very dramatic, afterall. But it is funny what could probably be done if you wanted to be very aggressive - subbing in higher capacity drives 'for free' into units once they hit that shared minimum cost would be a very cheap way to very substantially boost the consumer's perception of value, particularly now that we're using HDD capacity to differentiate between SKUs.edit - I'm not sure if I'm really expressing myself well..what I mean is, if they were willing to sell a 20GB unit last year for $499, then 12 months on they should be willing to sell a 60GB equivalent for the same price, since the cost of the drives will likely be little different at that point, if they're not already, just by the way the HDD market appears to work. Whether they wanted to price reduce further depends on how aggressive they want to be, but unfortunately I think they'd effect their 'price drop' based on HDD economics alone, and use the cost reductions elsewhere to take in more money on the hardware.
Ditto for MS, there seems no reason why they wouldn't use higher capacity drives that should cost no more..except to maintain their now 120GB SKU as even better value (i.e. go from 20 to 120 for $80 more etc.)
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It was, but thank you, i hope that Sony will be as agressive as Microsoft and put lots of stuff on the Playstation store as well.
Microsoft: Data From Two Xbox 360 HDDs Can't Be Combined On 120 GB Drive
[ http://blog.wired.com/games/2007/03/microsoft_data_.html ] ...
Just in my situation, if the Elite was 65nm for both Xenos and Xenon, I would probably sell my current premium to get this. HMDI is and added bonus as my plasma has ports for it. However, it's not 65nm, which is likely to come at the end of the year so no worries, maybe the price will drop by then as well.
makes me to wonder whether this SKU will fix
- ELITE noise levels
- ELITE failure rate
edit: i still can't find version of HDMI included into the box.
agreed.
MS's proprietary HDD approach, which again, sounded good from a feature standpoint of "portability" in '05, is now a liability.
Sony can get much more aggressive WRT to HDD sizes and pricing. there is of course an absolute bottom for HDD costs which are fixed eventually. that is where the core comes in for MS (2008
), but along the way, the HDD situation could get interesting.edit: i still can't find version of HDMI included into the box.
I don't think it matters. They are just carrying video right? Even HDMI 1.1 can do PCM5.1 though.
makes me to wonder whether this SKU will fix
- ELITE noise levels
- ELITE failure rate
edit: i still can't find version of HDMI included into the box.
It is version 1.2... not sure why they aren't doing 1.3 but like that really matters for gaming.
agreed.
MS's proprietary HDD approach, which again, sounded good from a feature standpoint of "portability" in '05, is now a liability.
Sony can get much more aggressive WRT to HDD sizes and pricing. there is of course an absolute bottom for HDD costs which are fixed eventually. that is where the core comes in for MS (2008
This is an awful guide to use, I guess, but here's where retail prices are at the moment on newegg:
Cheapest 40GB: 42.99
Cheapest 60GB: 46.99
Cheapest 80GB: 56.99
They don't stock 20GB ones any more, presumably because they're just not cheaper than the 40GB ones. 40GB ones may well start disappearing in the medium term looking at how 60GB prices are creeping down. I remember looking at these late last year, and the cheapest 60GB and 80GB drives were about $15 more expensive in each case. Looking at this it doesn't seem impossible for even 80GB drives to bottom out by the end of the year.
It's something I never thought about before, but it is amazing how we're literally using HDD capacities to define SKUs - the 20GB PS3, the 120GB 360 etc. In PCs, HDD capacity is the last thing you use to define its value..it's taken for granted that they get bigger and cheaper quite quickly. That characteristic, coupled with the now established norm of labelling SKUs according to that, could do some interesting things. It's quite crazy to think that Sony could effectively price drop or even increase the value of their system without it making any difference to their bottom line. Ditto with MS, you would think they could add more capacity to every premium in the morning without it changing much at all. I never ever ever thought about this before today, but it's quite a powerful mechanic at play here when it comes to pricing strategy.
Don't forget the cheapest 120 gig is 84.99 (WD HD)
Do we know what brand HD MS is going with?
Just because you have a silly edition of the X360, it won't
- make the 60GB PS3 version any cheaper
- make the X360 Premium any more expensive
- magically undo the price difference between these two.
don't forget, 2.5" SATA ... with proprietary enclosure and connection. (snap in/snap out) (which now looks like a stupid idea)
that's why we can not compare apples/apples.
a source on GAF said that he is familiar with MS's cost on 20 gig current (proprietary :smile
drive and that MS HAS to price it at close to the current $99. So I doubt cost doubling.Actually, the 120GB harddrive is the sign of a very different strategy - MS believes that the future of HD is downloadable content.
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