Micro SDs are also made of flash memory, so your bill of materials would be about the same.

The supply shock hit RAM sticks and then other forms of flash storage much earlier than Micro SDs, so their price so far has just doubled or tripled instead of quadrupled, but that doesn't mean bulk contract prices for Micro SDs are any lower.

That does make me a bit worried about Switch 2 game cartridges, the 64 GB versions weren't cheap before, and must now be approaching N64 prices for future contracts. I bet we'll see a lot more GKCs and people being pushed to physical "deluxe" versions that are well above $80.

I remember purchasing a Series X on sale for $350USD back two years ago. Insane to see how much has changed!

KeplerL2 said back in March he estimated the bill of materials for the PS6 was $760. Today he has said it's closer to $960 now. Helix is even more expensive.

We're so cooked.

Let's hope they were targeting 2TB. I just don't understand why Sony refuses to offer a 512 GB option when Microsoft and Valve both do.

I believe he's said the PS6 would have a 1TB SSD so this cost would be based on that.

Sony already dropped the Slim from 1TB back to the 825gb the OG had, dropping that again to 512gb probably wouldn't save more than $50 max.

Game hardware is probably cooked for the next 3-4, maybe 5 years, lol.

Even if they launch a PS6 at $900-$1000 ... the adoption uptick is going to be so low that developers are not going to support it with any exclusives creating a situation where it's basically just a Pro Pro for a niche audience.

Better off delaying to 2028 at this rate, if not 2029 and even then accept that the pricing is going to be expensive.

Xbox Series used to go on sale quite a bit at certain retailers because they were trying that strategy to get people to buy them.

Now, they are the most expensive. No balance there. 

This AI craze is the worst.

^ Agree wholeheartedly with this. I see no sane AAA developer looking at the current trajectory of next gen prices and thinking to themselves that they’ll want to develop next gen exclusive experiences. If we thought the overlap period from PS4/XBO to PS5/XBSXS was long, we haven’t seen anything when it comes to this upcoming generation.

Another concern that comes to mind is how many units Sony/Microsoft will be contractually obliged to ship in order to satisfy their chip manufacturing contracts. If Sony has promised 10M PS6 shipments within the first calendar year, for instance, then we may see Sony pull another PS4/PS5 stunt (i.e. cut back on PS4 shipments in order to boost adoption of PS5). This would certainly put an even bigger strain on the industry as the barrier would be PS6 prices.

Series S 512GB is $100 cheaper than the 1TB model.

Steam Machine 512GB is $300 cheaper than 2TB.

PS5 (Disc Edition) still has 1TB, and Pro is at 2TB. They can easily bring the cost of all their consoles down via a simple solution that everybody but them thought about and executed. It's werid. It would shock me if they don't reduce Pro's storage to 1TB soon.

And a $50 reduction (825 to 512GB) wouldn't be so bad anyway. We'll take anything!