Angus Kidman30 April 2008, 10:43 AM
Sony is arming itself for battle against Tivo, Foxtel IQ and PVR makers with the impending release of an add-on to turn the PS3 into a top-grade PVR.
Sony's plans to compete in the PVR space are firming up, with the company announcing a pre-Christmas release date and a sub-$200 price point for the PlayTV add-on for the PS3, setting the scene for a three-way battle between Tivo, Foxtel IQ and Sony for control of the consumer TV recording market in Australia.
While final pricing has not been determined, the plan is for the PlayTV to sell for under $200, Sony Computing Entertainment Australia managing director Michael Ephraim said. The projected launch date is late in Q3 or early in Q4, around a month after the product launches in major European markets. (Australia shares the same PAL TV system but needs a slightly different power system, creating a delay.)
A prototype PlayTV was demonstrated to journalists at a press event in Sydney on Tuesday. The design is unprepossessing but simple: a plain black box with a single aerial input (but two internal tuners), and a single USB cable which connects to the PS3 for both power and recording. It lacks the design pizazz of (say) the Apple TV, but it's small enough that you can hide it behind the PS3 anyway.
The PlayTV offers most of the standard PVR features found on rivals, including live pause and rewind, scheduled recordings, and watching one channel while recording another. PSP owners can also use the remote play feature to access live TV or recordings via any WiFi connection, raising the appealing possibility of keeping up to date with Aussie TV while travelling overseas. HD recording will be possible, although punishing in terms of disk space.
Indeed, the biggest disadvantage of the PS3 as a PVR is the puny 40GB hard drive sold on the Australian model. However, the internal drive can be upgraded without voiding the warranty, and some retailers have begun selling PS3 systems with upgraded drives -- Harvey Norman recently offfered a 320GB model for $1,299, Ephraim noted.
Sony executives said no final decision on which electronic program guide (EPG) would be supported had been made, but the company appears to be leaning towards the Freeview guide rumoured to be soon launching in Australia. Because of the PS3's ability to update online, any EPG could potentially be supported, executives said -- though subscription-based models such as Tivo, being launched in Australia, seem unlikely.
The PlayTV's main rivals will be Tivo, Foxtel's IQ (which is scheduled for an HD upgrade later this year) and the multitude of standalone PVRs already for sale which you wouldn't want your elderly relatives to set up. The IQ is generally reckoned to be the market leader.
With 238,000 PS3s now sold in Australia, Sony has a good installed base to work from, although whether the core gaming audience really cares about TV recording remains to be seen. On the other hand, if there's no subscription fee for the EPG, that will give it a market advantage Foxtel and Tivo are unlikey to match. "Australia really hasn't experienced the PVR faciity in a broad sense," Ephraim noted.