The one real, relevent point that was brought up was the price of games. The console price being lowered will obviously shift more units, but £40 to £50 per game will mean that the main target audience of mid 20s adults just won't be able to buy as many of them, especially in the current financial climate.

And as Sony depends on the sale of games to recoup cost I think it will take longer than they had expected to become profitable on this console.

Agreed.

Of course, most people still want BC me too! That's their whole strategy. I'm pissed, really pissed. I was waiting for a PS3 console with 65nm Cell with BC and before you know it I'll need to buy an old version to have BC and when I want the version with 65nm I can kiss BC for good goodbye!

how do you know the 40gb is 65nm ???
just a question.

about the thread,

+1 for Mars & co

Backward Compatibility was the PS3's greatest justifier. Blu-Ray, who cares. PS3 games, I can wait for more and better ones to come out. What I really want though is a reliable and well built system to play my PS2 and PS games on. The PS2 is not well built, it is rickity and will fail, most places don't even repair them anymore because just too many are broken from poor parts and manufacturing. People want something that can continue the legacy of their game collection, not something that tries to smugly talk down to you about how BC was "so last gen".

BC is the only reason I would have ever bought a PS3. 

I don't, but as the 40GB version no longer has BC so won't future consoles have either world wide. Unless Sony is tricking its buyers and some other version pops up "with" BC. For that ... I'll just wait even longer.

GGE: If the only reason you were going to buy a PS3 was to play PS2/PS1 games, why the hell don't you just buy a PS2.

I'm sure you'd save a few pennies. Just a few.

Sony seem more determined than ever to confuse and alienate their audience. I'm not even sure they know who their audience is anymore; it seems like they're focussing significantly more attention on the Blu-ray aspects of the PS3 lately than the gaming aspects. Say what you will about Microsoft's multiple SKU's of the 360, but at least they have been designed to ADD functionality, rather than remove it. I wonder how many 60GB purchases this will encourage with a software attach rate of zero...

 Then buy a PS3 with BC for even less than it was before!!!!

They are not going to completely eliminate a version of the console with BC without introducing a better one.

The 80 gig still has BC, any worthwile game will be supported. 

Why would you ever buy a PS3 if BC was the only reason you would have gotten one, just use a PS2

You amaze me with comments like this., Truly incredible 

Yeah like I said before. If you want PS3 with BC for PS2 games either pay $500 for the 60GB or $600 for the 80GB or just use your old PS2. I'm thinking about getting the $400, because I can care less about the BC for PS2 games. I don't play those games anyway so this 40GB is matching my tastes now. If only FFXIII will release soon and MGS4.