So What's in a Price Drop ?

 

The next wave of price drops are soon to hit us for the 09 holiday season. So there's no better time to jump into the High Definition gaming platform ……or is it? While Sony has already announced its new PS3 Slim with a price drop of $299, we are still awaiting the “official word” from Microsoft on the “new” Elite SKU of $299.

So now you can get a Xbox 360 top of the line Elite system for just $299 or can you ? Like Sony before it the new 360 SKU comes with more the just a price change. It also comes with a bit of a down grade. Yes you still get the Black Xbox, 120 GB HDD, headset and Ethernet cable, but the one thing you don't get that is the HD component cables which now need to be purchased separately. Instead just “standard” A/V cables are packed in. 

What's the big deal you ask ? Well for anyone using an HDTV set it would mean spending more money to get the true next generation experience. Now a days a simple $10 HDMI cable will do the trick so the cost isn't that bad. My biggest problem here isn't the added cost, but the fact the average consumer may  not even know that that they would have a choice to maximize their gaming experience. Here's to hoping that most people are educated in the world of High Definition. Folks gaming on a normal TV set would be good to go.

On the brighter side of things the price of gaming is coming down at a time when the we are in a economic state of BLAH which is great for the industry going into the holidays season. $299 for a High Definition gaming system is a great deal. And as always there's still the $199 entry level Xbox 360 Arcade unit and the $250 Nintendo Wii.

-TX