As buyers wait in line for a PS3 in the US, the tension builds as the countdown continues

Alex Zaharov-Reutt
Thursday, 16 November 2006 16:21

Your IT - Entertainment

With bids on the US auction site eBay already reaching US $1800 and going up, up and away, or currently triple the price of the 60Gb PS3, it’s easy to see why some want to take full advantage of the free market to put a few extra greenbacks into their wallets.

And with the PS3 such an amazingly versatile digital media machine, those who leave the store without actually purchasing any games may not simply be those seeking to profiteer on auction sites.

While actually buying a game would seem to be an obvious move for any PS3 owner, the PS3 itself is, as we know, a Blu-ray movie player, a DVD player, a CD player, an mp3 player, a photo viewer, a web browser, an instant messaging machine, an Internet phone, a video phone, a games player and practically a full computer.

Why? Because Sony is allowing users to load versions of Linux onto their PS3s, and is actually encouraging homebrew coders to create their own PS3 software, unlike Sony’s actions with the PSP (Playstation Portable), where Sony has actively tried to discourage homebrew software by releasing updated firmware versions to simultaneously add lots of new features to the PSP while closing the holes that hackers use to break into the PSP to load their own software.

Of course the hackers aren’t just trying to create their own software, or run emulation tools to turn their PSP into a machine capable of playing retro Nintendo and arcade favourites, but some of them are trying to run pirate versions of games, an act that any content publisher frowns upon with absolute disdain.

But with the PS3 having homebrew software actively encouraged, it will be interesting to see how soon it is before hackers ‘crack’ the PS3, trying to run pirated games or turn their PS3s into something else entirely. As a computer, which is the ultimate emulation machine after all, the possibilities are clearly endless.

But to get to try all of that out for yourself, you need your very own PS3, and unless you’re one of the lucky few who’ll get one of the allocated 400,000 on November 17, or one of the 600,000 more due in the US before the end of the year, you might just have to wait until 2007 to find out just what all the hoopla really is all about.

And if you’re waiting in line for a PS3 right now, as you read this article, connected to the Internet using wireless broadband and equipped with some spare batteries, either in a line for a midnight purchase, or in another line for a store that agonisingly opens hours later at 8am, we wish you the very best of luck in scoring one of the digital era’s most incredible creations ever: the Sony Playstation 3.