PS3 360 Wii: National Survey Shows Which Is Most Wanted For The Holidays

In a survey located here three in four (74%) have at least one digital lifestyle product on their wish lists leading up to the Christmas season according to the national survey of 1,200 American consumers by Solutions Research Group. Three surveys were conducted including: Top 10 Overall. Top 10 For Men, and Top 10 For Women. HDTV sets and Windows Laptops topped the overall top 10 list. Where did the PS3, 360, and Wii come in on these top 10 lists? Read on to see the break down.

Top 10 Overall

1. Flat Screen High Definition TV 35%
2. New Laptop Computer (Windows) 20%
3. New Digital Camera 17%
4. New Desktop Computer (Windows) 14%
5. GPS Navigation System for the car 10%
6. New Cell Phone 10%
7. New Digital Video Camera 9%
8. Nintendo Wii 9%
9. Sony PS3 7%
10. Blu-ray or HD DVD High Definition DVD Player 6%
    

Top 10 For Men

1. Flat screen High Definition TV 37%
2. New Laptop Computer (Windows) 21%
3. New Digital Camera 16%
4. New Desktop Computer 15%
5. GPS Navigation System for the car 11%
6. Sony PS3 10%
7. New Cell Phone 9%
8. New Digital Video Camera 8%
9. Xbox 360 8%
10. Nintendo Wii 8%

Top 10 for Women

1. Flat screen High Definition TV 33%
2. New Laptop Computer 19%
3. New Digital Camera 18%
4. New Desktop Computer (Windows) 13%
5. New Cell Phone 12%
6. New Digital Video Camera 11%
7. GPS Navigation System for the car 10%
8. Nintendo Wii 9%
9. Apple Laptop Computer 7%
10. Tivo or another DVR 6%

HD-capable flat screen TVs were number one with a bullet among all population subgroups with
35% of mentions. Interestingly, most of those HD sets will not deliver true HD to their owners, as only 2% also intend to get a HD box from their cable or satellite company (ranked at #20 on the list).

Apple’s iPhone was ranked #15 overall. The hottest Apple-branded product was a laptop, ranked #11 overall and #9 among women.

While no individual Apple product ranked higher than #11 on the wish lists, when combined, Apple-branded technology products make it to the top 5 overall with one-in-six considering purchase, suggesting strong potential holiday season for the company.

Men and women had six items in common in the top 10—the rest were unique by gender. Sony PS3 and Xbox 360 were on the top 10 list of men but did not make it to the top 10 list of women. On the other hand, TiVo/DVR and Apple laptops were in the top 10 for women but did not show upon men’s wish lists for the holidays.

Laptops were preferred over desktop PCs 2-to-1 among those 18-34. Nintendo Wii, Sony PS3 and Xbox 360 were all on 18-34 lists—Nintendo Wii was the highest ranked console, ranked #8 overall, edging out Sony PS3 which came in at #9. Xbox was ranked #12.

Digital cameras are popular across all age groups—ranked #2 or #3 in all age or gender groups. GPS navigation for cars is mainstreaming—it was ranked #5 item among men and #7 among women.

The information in this release comes from Digital Life America—Holiday 2007 Edition. The results cited are based on a survey of 1,200 online Americans aged 18 and older in September 2007 using a professionally-managed panel representative of the US online population. To maintain an unbiased perspective, Solutions Research Group funds its own syndicated research.

With Xbox 360's holiday bundles, the still rumored $399 40GB PS3 for North America, and the Wii's low entry price it'll be very interesting to see who comes out on top. It looks like Sony, Microsoft, and Nintendo will all have a great holiday season.

Source Link (PDF)

40 GB PS3: Will No PS2 Backwards Compatibilty Hinder Sales?

It was officially announced yesterday that a new low priced 40GB PS3 would be hitting overseas next week. A U.S. announcement has not been made at this time. See HERE for RDG's thoughts on that. The only complaint about this new model seems to be the lack of backwards compatibility with the PS2 game library. So lets take a look at whether this would truly hinder many sales.

With this model it seems as Sony is going primarily for PS2 owners who have not chosen to purchase the PS3 yet, whether it be due to price or due to the PS3 game library. With over 120 million PS2 owners out there why wouldn't they target this demographic?

Will the loss of b. c. be a big reason for people opting not to purchase this lower priced model? RDG does not think so and here is why.

The most obvious one is well PS2 owners own a PS2. So when they see that this model does not have b. c. with their existing library the next thought that will go through their mind will be whether or not they want to have 2 consoles in their entertainment system. Having both consoles to play your gaming library really isn't going to matter to the majority of people out there. Parents doing holiday shopping that are aware of the lack of b. c. are going to think, well "little johnny" has a PS2 for his PS2 games anyway or "little johnny" wants a PS3 to play PS3 games. Also note that this new PS3 sku can play PS1 games.

Now RDG has taken into consideration those PS2 owners that want to trade in their PS2 towards a PS3 in order to save more money. Well i have some bad news for those people. If you go through GameStop the trade in value for the "big PS2" is only $20 and the "slim PS2" is only $30 so as you can see someone wanting to go that route would only be saving a maximum of $30 towards the PS3 anyway.

So PS2 owners that can afford this new sku at the lower price will have really one decision to make and thats if they are alright with having two consoles to play their games. I think its safe to say that this is an easy decision and that the majority will go ahead with the purchase.

Now for the non PS2 owners that want a PS3, RDG thinks that we can all agree that if they are going to purchase a PS3 then they are doing it to play PS3 games and aren't worried about PS2 games or they would have purchased a PS2 by now.

The demographic that this lower priced PS3 will really appeal to is those wanting it for its blu-ray and media capabilities. The only complaint we can see about this is the 40GB hard drive but thanks to the PS3 this is easily solved by upgrading to a larger hard drive which Sony has made an easy option for the PS3.

Now their have been people saying that this can also be solved by Sony releasing a firmware update in the future which could be possible but one major thing that people also forget is the PlayStation Store and though it has been awhile since Sony has released a PS1 or PS2 game on the store this option is still available. Sony could begin to release their PS2 library through the PlayStation Store more aggressively if the lack of b. c. becomes an issue. As we've seen the price of these releases have been affordable but those not wanting to pay again can just play it on their PS2 or pay a fee to have a disc less upscaled version.

So as you can see for the most part lack of b. c. should not hinder many sales and that Sony does have the option to improve this by releasing a firmware update or tapping into the extensive PS2 library and releasing them over the PlayStation Store. The only people we can see not purchasing this lower priced model are those that still can not afford it at this price so to those we say "start saving your money now" because with the holiday lineup looking great and next years looking even better with Metal Gear Solid 4, Killzone 2, Final Fantasy XIII, and more your not going to want to miss out!

For those that can not live without the b. c. in the new PS3 you still do have the option of the 20GB, 60GB, or 80GB version.