The Playstation 4

Sep 7 official:

So the fan in my PS4 was obnoxiously loud all the time (even just watching blu-ray movies), and since my PS4 is out of warranty, I took the drastic step of replacing the fan and re-applying thermal paste to the CPU/GPU. iFixIt has a nice step-by-step guide and videos for replacing the fan. You’re basically disassembling the whole bloody thing to get to that fan. It took me about an hour to complete and, boy, what a difference. It’s virtually silent now. I paid $15 for the replacement fan off eBay, not bad.

That Playstation event scheduled for September 7th? Likely to be a Neo and PS4 slim reveal. In fact, someone in the UK already snagged a slim from a shop owner:

https://twitter.com/shortmaneighty2/status/767475854414901248 (a few pictures in the tweet chain)

It’s not as good looking as the original. (If that’s a real picture).

Eurogamer sent a reporter to visit with the guy who bought the alleged Slim PS4. It’s totally real and they have video of it booting up:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=H2cIwkg7OVQ&ab_channel=Eurogamer

Since this thing was even in sealed retail packaging I expect it will be announced with immediate availability during the Sept 7th PlayStation meeting.

WTF - their service is slow as crap now and goes down too much. Browsing their own stupid store is like pulling teeth.

Expect MS to follow suit immediately.

Xbox Live Gold is already $59.99 MSRP for the year. This just brings Sony’s price up to Microsoft’s level.

Ahh, that makes sense. That’s why they did it then.

Maybe MS will say, “Xbox Live is such a tremendous value, we also have to raise our price $10” and it will go to $70 a year.

Weirdly, the “real” price of both subscriptions is still reversed if you’re looking for bargains throughout the year. I found PS+ several times a year for $40 for a 12 month subscription. It’s quite common. And Xbox I found for $33-$38 for a 12 month subscription several times a year. Even though Xbox is supposed to be $10 more for a while now. I don’t know why the sales prices end up that way.

I think the wholesale price of Xbox Gold subscription cards was traditionally just much lower since it was originally designed to be a high margin upsell. PS Plus launched as a service that included a bunch of games you could play so Sony had to build that expense into what they charged retailers.

It’s heavenly compared to the Xbox One store, both via console and via web browser. Another reversal from the previous gen.

Really?! Whoa that’s a surprise. I thought Microsoft had the power of the cloud behind them?

I have prepurchased my PS Plus for the next 3 years. The codes have already been entered into my console.

What does that mean for people like me who have prepurchased their codes already? Do I have to pay an additional amount for the next 3 years? or am I grandfathered in?

You’re good @DrDel. You don’t need to worry for 3 years.

Sa-weeeeet!

Is this possible? Because the Sony online store is, without question, ones of the most confusing and terrible interfaces I’ve ever seen.

XBL on the 360 was far better. Has it somehow gotten worse now?

I’m still new to the Xbox One, but remember how the Xbox 360 dashboard and store started out great and then got more and more junky and complicated over the course of its life? The One feels like it picks up where the 360 left off and continues that unfortunate trend.