Wii avalibility...

[Kwaad]

stewacide said: I think the Wii may be a bit more expensive to build than you're giving credit: while the processing hardware is pretty vanilla, the other kit in the Wii (blutooth and wifi chips, the fancy slot drive, the IR and motion sensors, the solid-state memory) are likely still relatively pricey although continually declining. For Nintendo to have room for a healthy profit I doubt they could go much lower than $200 right now. As I recall that was their target price initially, and essentially what it goes for in Japan minus the pack-in, but in one of many recent bouts of genius Nintendo decided to bump the price a bit (which obviously hasn't hurt sales at all) and give most of the difference to RETAILERS: so that EB or WalMart or whoever make (as I recall) over twice as much selling a Wii vs. a PS3, hence the Wii is getting better placement in stores (an area where they really suffered with the GameCube getting pushed into the dark corner)

1. Every PS3 display I have seen at wal-mart is on a endcap. That is the best spot. The Wii is halfway down in the middle. So the Wii has just as bad placement as the GC. (actually the exact same spot) 2. the bluetooth+wifi chips on the PS3 cost less than 15$ 3. the solid state memory is... $15.99 (if you buy a 1gb CF card at consumer prices) 4. the CPU+GPU = about 30$ 5. the memory on that is about 5$ 15+16+30+5=66$. Add the DVD drive. 15$. Add all the ports. 10$. Add the PSU. 5$. 96$ add the plastic case. 5$. Add the controllers 25$ 129$. That is aiming high. I assure you. I give it credit where it is due. The Wii should cost me the consumer. 200$. (or less) Rember the PS3 at launch cost sony around 800$ and you pay 600$ Meaning your paying 75% of it's value. The Wii you are paying... over. 200% it's value. (value is what it costs to make)