Am i fanboy? I question myself..

Lets see, i own consoles from every maker, Nintendo, Sega, Atari, Microsoft, Sony you name it...
I also enjoy my PC nad im planing to get more games for it more often now that i bought a new one.
If you look at my sig:

You'll see what systems i use now, the 1st and most used PS3, PC next and PS2 last, you can see the portable systems and last the consoles i retired (i need to remind myself to put GBC and the GBA in the "no-longer-in-active-systems").
I've retired havent retired the PS2 cuz i havent finish Final Fantasy XII, hope soon, but fear never :_(

At the end of my sig you'll find some trashing on the wii and 360.

Why all that?

1st - Why i choose the PS3?
Cuz its was the most appeling to me.
It had a blu-ray player, and i was a supporter of it on day 1, my 1st DVD player was the PS2, i dont think i need to say more.
It had more future vision in its design, as soon as i heard that the 360 was coming without the hd-dvd player and the games would came in dvds9 i choose PS3.
It has support for multyusers, i have a brother, so how would why play on-line with only 1 account (thats what you get in the "way-better-than-psn-xbl") either one of us (me or my brother) wouldnt play on-line or we had to share the account. So the PS3 with the "crappy-psn-compared-to-xbl" was looking MUCH better.
It had more appeling games MGS, FF, GT, GOW, just to mention a few, i was very dissapointed with the original Xbox games Halo and KOTOR speacially, dont get me wrong, they are good games, but not as good as people like to say, especially halo, story good enough for 20 books? Is that a joke? I must say my favorite Xbox game was Fable and is the only reason i would consider buying a 360, but if Golden Eye Mario 64 and Zelda OoT were not enough for me to buy a N64 you do the math.

So in the end im set only with a PS3, the 360 has no exclusives that really apeal me, and the wii is definitely not my thing.
So this gen the only console siting in my living room is gonna be a PS3, so i'll stick with her and defender her, if that makes me a fanboy so be it.

I am a Fanboy, Sony got it so right with the PS and PS2 that i become their fanboy and got a PS3 ONLY.

PS. i'm dying to get MGS4...

Lets start from the begining:

1 - PlayStation

The PlayStation was frist available in Desember 3, 1994 in Japan and it had 2 major competitors:
- The Sega Saturn, witch last gen had been in 2nd place with her Genesis (aka Mega Drive) with 29 millions units sold was first available in November 22, 1994.
- The Nintendo 64, witch last gen had been in 1st place with her Super Nintendo Entertainment System with 49 millions units sold was first available in June 23, 1996.

The Sony PlayStation had 1 big problem, Sony has a brand had very high credibility, but PlayStation had 0 (zero), it first became available in the USA at September 1, 1995 and it her 1st year on the NA market sold 800 000 units (needless to say, it was realy bad).

In the end it end up like this:

PlayStation - 106,49 millions
N64 - 32,93 millions
Sega Saturn - 10 millions

Small miracle when you think about it, the PlayStation was said to be a failior on day 1, in a company dinner Sony Music execs said to SCE "Why did you did that?[PS1], you're never gonna win, you are gonna lose this one".

2 - PlayStation 2

Sega was not happy, the recent newcomer Sony had wipe the floor with the competitors and the Sega Saturn was the worst console in terms of sales that the companie had so far, so they though on getting some revenge.
- The Sega Dreamcast was first available in November 27, 1998, 16 months before the PS2, the Dreamcast was generally considered to be ahead of its time and was initially successful at restoring Sega's reputation in the gaming industry, and it was the fastest selling console at that time.

But when the PlayStation 2 was released in March 4, 2000, if the general public opinion was that the Dreamcast was gonna dominat the market, those afirmations only got stronger. The PS2 had nothing wort buying for and games like Tekken Tag were said to came to the Dreamcast sonner or later. And the fact that the Dreamcast had a on-line service and the PS2 didn't was another reason not to buy a PS2, besides a larger game library and cheaper games of course.

And sonner that was expected, it was time for round 2

After the Dreamcast was "out of the way" the war for market dominance was far from over.
- The Nintendo GameCube was the latest machine from Nintendo, first available in Septamber 14, 2001, being more powerful than a PS2 and cheaper plus dev tools said to be able to make something "look like a game" in 2 weeks of work made the GameCube the most probable candidate to win the war.
- The Microsoft with the sucess of the original PlayStation saw a huge potential on the games console business, the Xbox was Microsoft's first independent venture into the video game console arena, after having collaborated with Sega in porting Windows CE to the Dreamcast. The Xbox was first available in November 15, 2001. Early rumors said that the Xbox was going to play Windows PC games, something that might be part of Microsoft initial plans because the Xbox hardware looked much more like a PC than a console, it was probably in responce of the backward compatibility of the PS2.

1st Sony had go 1-on-1 with the Sega Dreamcast and now it had another 2 competitors, the ex-market dominator Nintendo with her GameCube, and the giant Microsoft with her super powerful Xbox.

And the war was dicided like this:

PlayStation 2 - 115,36 millions (still selling better than anyone)
Xbox - 24 millions
GameCube - 21,52 millions
Dreamcast - 10,6 millions

3 - PlayStation 3

The corrent war, i think pretty much anyone nows what going on so ill cut to the point.

The only rival of the PlayStation 3 is the Xbox 360, the Wii is said even by Nintendo PR not competing against any other machine, the fact is simple, its for a diferent market, a diferent kind of players.

So in sort, in order of more dificult competition to less:

1 - Dreamcast vs PlayStation 2 vs GameCube vs Xbox
2 - Sega Saturn vs PlayStation vs Nintendo 64
3 - Xbox 360 vs PlayStation 3

So the top 3 best selling Consoles of all time goes like this:

PlayStation 2 - 115,36 millions
PlayStation - 106,49 millions
NES - 60 millions

It has never been a more dominating console than the legendary PlayStation, it has competed with more powerfull and cheaper consoles, if you think the PS3 is a failior and will not sell, you are not looking at the full picture.

Its comon knowlage of the general public that Sony has the most loyal fans of all 3.

"The research showed 60 percent of those who own a PS2 and are considering a new console likely to buy a PS3, which exceeded the 45 percent of Xbox owners looking to buy an Xbox 360 and 46 percent of GameCube owners looking to buy a Wii."
http://www.itwire.com.au/content/view/7253/127/

This one is in the bag.

NINTENDO

NES - 60 millions
SNES - 49 millions
N64 - 32,93 millions
GameCube - 21,52 millions

SEGA

Master System - 13 millions
Mega Drive - 29 millions
Sega Saturn - 10 millions
Dreamcast - 10,6 millions

SONY

PlayStation - 106,49 millions
PlayStation 2 - 115,36 millions (still selling better than anyone)

MICROSOFT

Xbox - 24 millions

PS3 sales in North America beat target

"Beating early production blues, the Japanese game giant, Sony Corp., managed to meet its goal of shipping 1 million PlayStation 3 machines to the U.S. in 2006" - THE MONEY TIMES
http://www.themoneytimes.com/articles/20070108/ps3_sales_in_north_america_beat_target-id-102641.html

Playstation3 Hits One-Million Mark

"The company successfully achieved this milestone by the end of the 2006 calendar year, just six weeks after the product was introduced on November 17, 2006.
PS3 has been selling-out at retail outlets across North America since it was launched. This high consumer demand drove PS3 to reach the one-million mark before its predecessors, the PlayStation®2 computer entertainment system and the original PlayStation game console – both systems combined have shipped more than 200 million units of hardware and more than two billion units of software worldwide." -  NEWS.ECOUSTICS
http://news.ecoustics.com/bbs/messages/10381/311590.html

PS3 clocks 1m

"SONY says it met its goal of shipping 1 million PlayStation 3 (PS3) video game consoles to North America by the end of 2006.

The electronics maker also said in a presentation at the Consumer Electronics Show in Las Vegas that it was on track to ship 6 million PS3 consoles worldwide by the end of March 2007." - AUSTRALIANIT.NEWS
http://australianit.news.com.au/articles/0,7204,21026867%5E15317%5E%5Enbv%5E,00.html

Sony Meets PS3 Targets

"Sony shipped one millions PS3 units to North America in 2006, which many critics thought would be impossible due to production delays." - PS3NEWS

http://www.ps3news.ca/01072007/15/sony_meets_ps3_target

It's Official: PlayStation 3 Launch Tops Xbox 360

"And now it is official: PlayStation 3 had a more successful launch than Xbox 360 did a year ago. Even though the PS3 launched been plagued with delays and did not quite go off as planned, Sony still shipped a million consoles in North America alone.

To compare, Microsoft sold 600,000 Xbox 360 units from their November launch to the second week in January, according to Kotaku." - PS3NEWS

http://www.ps3news.ca/01072007/23/its_official_playstation_3_launch_tops_xbox_360

PS3 Launch Outsells Xbox 360 Launch

"Sony today announced that they have sold 1 million Playstation 3s in North America since the launch of the console six weeks ago.That makes the Playstation 3 the fastest selling home console Sony has ever launched

Microsoft sold 600,000 of their Xbox 360s from their November launch to the second week in January." - KOTAKU

http://www.kotaku.com/gaming/top/ps3-launch-outsells-xbox-360-launch-226742.php

[PS3] 1 Million PS3 Units Shipped To North America

"Despite tons of manufacturing problems, Sony has announced that they have shipped one million PS3 units to North America in the first six weeks of sales.

'The fact that we were able to reach the one-million mark faster than our top-selling platform, the PS2, further validates the strength of the PlayStation brand and our belief that consumers are ready to experience true high-definition gaming.'

In comparison, the Wii sold 1.8 million units in the same timeframe, while the Xbox 360 sold 600,000 units." - 411MANIA

http://www.411mania.com/games/news/49424/%5BPS3%5D-1-Million-PS3-Units-Shipped-To-North-America.htm

1 Million PS3 Shipped

"Sony have just put out a statement claiming to have shipped 1m games consoles to the US in 2006. Apparently they actually only managed this by the first week of 2007.

Whenever a new, next-generation technology is scheduled, you can always rely on it to be late. Especially if you are aiming at the holiday season. But Sony can afford to take a little extra time. Aside from the removal of 'rumble' technology, the PS3 is the most advanced games console on the market.

 Once the next batch of Sony games arrives we are sure to see some true innovations and advancements - ones that Microsoft cannot deliver as it has no motion sensing technology

But it really can't be forgotten that the PS2 outsold the Xbox 360, the PS3 and the Wii put together.

The PS3 will also offer music, movie and TV downloads soon enough – it won’t just be the Xbox 360 with this capability." - ITWIRE

http://www.itwire.com.au/content/view/8455/52/

Sony Ships 1 Million Sony PS3 Consoles in United States

"We already mentioned it yesterday in our PS3 CES Coverage that Sony announced to have shipped 1 million Sony PS3 consoles to retailers in the United States.The PS3 has been reaching the one-million mark faster than the PS2." - I4U

http://www.i4u.com/article7600.html

PS3 > wii60

-----------------------------------

http://ps3.ign.com/launchguide/
"Boasting 512 MB of RAM, a Blu-Ray disc drive, backwards compatibility, and the cutting edge Cell processor, PS3 is the most advanced game console ever created." - IGN

http://crave.cnet.co.uk/gamesgear/0,39029441,49285075,00.htm
"So what are we missing out on? Well, as you can see in our recent video from the Best of Stuff show, titles such as Motor Storm offer an unprecedented level of graphical detail." - CRAVE

http://www.guardian.co.uk/commentisfree/story/0,,1942997,00.html
"[PS3]The extraordinary power of the new breed of computer game heralds the age of interpassivity" - GUARDIAN

http://www.itwire.com.au/content/view/7107/983/
"[PS3]the most advanced gaming device money can buy" - ITWIRE

[urlhttp://www.gamespot.com/special_features/bestof2006/achievement/index.html?page=13[/url]
"The console is easily the most technologically sophisticated gaming machine this side of a tricked-out $4,500 PC rig." - GAMESPOT

http://www.gamespot.com/news/6163625.html?tag=lastword;link
"The firm believes that the PS3 will ultimately carry the largest market share, with 75 million PS3s sold worldwide by 2010." - GAMESPOT

http://www.itwire.com.au/content/view/7253/127/
"The company predicts that more than 120 million PS3s will be sold through 2012, compared to 60 million Xbox 360s and 23 million Nintendo Wiis. North America will account for more than 50 percent of all console sales over this period." - ITWIRE

http://www.itnews.com.au/newsstory.aspx?CIaNID=43981&src=site-marq
Dublin-based Research and Markets claims that the latest version of Sony's games console will rack up 71 million sales, with the Xbox 360 selling around 40 million and the Wii coming third with around 31 million. - ITNEWS

The RSX is currently a worse GPU than the Xenon, true. However, it has an advantage: It's an Nvidia card on a system that comes standard with both online and a ridiculously high-capacity disk.

How does this benefit the RSX, you say? I'm getting to that.
Nvidia has a tendency to release cards, then to release new drivers for said cards that, instead of fixing minor glitches that shouldn't have been there in the first place *cough*ATI*cough*, increase the speeds of the cards by a significant amount. I recall, back in 1999, I had an old Nvidia Riva 128 (4 or 2 MB) that suddenly could run Unreal when I installed the latest Detonator drivers. It was quite impressive, I had a larger speed boost than I ever imagined was possible.

Sony has already shown with the PSP and PS3 that it has absolutely no qualms about making us update our systems with online functionality or the comparitively large amount of space stored on a UMD/BD-ROM. So, why not bundle an Nvidia driver package on one of those discs? Suddenly the RSX gets a 20% speed boost (typical for Nvidia drivers) and that puts it ahead of the Xenon for good. And when you give Nvidia 5 years to work on drivers, that could happen several times throughout the console's life cycle.

This is a decisive advantage, especially when coupled with the blazing fast parallel processing powers of the Cell. In fact, it puts the PS3 far ahead of the Xbox 360, graphic-wise.

This last part is to placate the lemmings: The Xbox 360 has a year's start on games, and I don't think that that is a gap Nvidia will be able to bridge.

New Cell processor previewed at chip show - runs twice as fast as PlayStation 3's

The chip operates at 6GHz at 1.3V and is fabricated in a 65nm CMOS SOI technology. The CELL Broadband Engine is, of course, better known simply at ‘The Cell processor’ and is used in the PlayStation 3 (as well as IBM’s Blade servers and some HD TVs).

The Cell currently powering the PS3 runs at 3.2GHz and is fabricated on 90-nano-metre (nm) Silicon On Insulator (SOI) tech.

We read on:
”The 65nm CELL Broadband Engine design features a dual power supply, which enhances SRAM stability and performance using an elevated array-specific power supply, while reducing the logic power consumption. Hardware measurements demonstrate low-voltage operation and reduced scatter of the minimum operating voltage.”

http://news.spong.com/article/11413?cb=993

Now a good move by Sony was:
1º Order a better GPU from nVidia (one like gf8800)
2º Put this new Cell together with that GPU
3º Replace all the sold PS3s for they new one that was gonna be far ahead of the X360 on DAY 1... hehehe.. hey dreaming IS free..