Just a side note.

WII was originally designed to be an add-on for the game cube. Nintendo saw that it would not sell, as the game cube was not selling well, and people would not buy a gamecube just to get a revolution, or what it was called then. Even if bundled.

Revolution in itself was not designed to be a strong add-on, they wanted to have the same quality of games, or use existing games, but have the wireless controls not interfere with the power of the gamecube itself.

In fact at e3 2005 the "revolution" was running on 2 gamecubes, back stage, and no the motion controls don't nearly need a whole other gamecubes power.

So instead of releasing the revolution, they repackaged the gamecube as the wii.

People often get mad when we say "repackage" however it's true.

The CPU on the wii is a power PC based processor named "Broadway" it is the successor to the gamecubes "gekko" uses less power, and is about 15% more powerful

The GPU named "Hollywood" is a improved version of the GPU used in the gamecube.

The gamecube had 43Mb non-unified ram(used by CPU and GPU if needed), 24 MB ram dedicated to CPU and 3MB dedicated to GPU.

WII has 88 MB. 24 MB dedicated for CPU, and 64 mb dedicated to the GPU. Also GPU has a 3mb dedicated for texture buffering.

They upgraded the gamecube, and repackaged it.

Also, for the guy who said "NINTENDO WILL NOT SELL AT A LOSS OR AT EVEN" you are wrong.

Nintendos gamecube sold for a loss at launch. As did it's 64, and snes. The famicon sold for a loss, but NES did not.

PS1, ps2, ps3 sold for a loss.

Xbox, dreamcast, 360, etc etc. All sold for losses at launch anyhow.

But why? Because they have to at first, no one will buy something for production costs at first, they sacrifice this money, because they know they will make it back, and majority of money comes from games.

You do know different factories manufacture the WII, and nintendo has divisions in america etc. American division pays for costs of WII for american units, so currency fluctuated does not change for american consoles to lose less. American division manufactures(Or buys parts) and gets it's own profits, as does japan branch and european branch.

I'm not sure if Wii's are made in America or Europe. I am actually pretty sure they are not.

Some of the components may be made in America though, and a rising currency would make those parts cheaper.

Yeah I'm confused about the prices too. Normally, I would never bring up an article like this, because it really doesn't show anything. We don't know which companies, where, make what, and for how much. I just posted that in response to what somebody else brought up. There was no real answer to his comment except that very brief small bit of information I just posted.

I'm a little confused, probably because I need to go to bed already =) But, what was your argument that the price of the parts not getting cheaper with time? A 1 GB stick years ago cost over $100, now it costs about $20. We know that much of the old GC parts were reused for the Wii, and processors naturally get cheaper with cost. Manufacturing and raw material costs have generally declined with the rest of the economy.

So how exactly is Nintendo locked in to the same price from launch to now for their parts?

the reason why a 1GB stick drops so far in price is because they are selling much more of them. tens of companies all sell them and compete with each other for pricing, millions upon millions of people have them. Shit I have about 12....that I got for FREE, because companies just give them out with their logos on them.
They're in everything from thumbdrives to pens to little rubber cartoon characters.

The things inside the wii are old, yes. But they are not saturated anywhere near what a 1GB stick is. I mean, some of the parts are, like 802.11 wireless and bluetooth, but not the processor or mobo or GPU. Unless I am mistaken, they are variants of products that are, for the most part, not commercially used.
As such, a company needs to allocate distinct machines for it's production, they need their own storage and parts.

It's just the same with the cell. the cell is also a modified chip with all the same problems of manufacturing. That's why it's still so expensive.

EDIT: I'm not saying they're locked in price, I'm saying it takes a lot longer for the costs to go down. Plus manufacturing doesn't get cheaper from cost alone, it's main way to lessen price is mass prodution, millions upon millions of them made.

For example, a new piece of tech, like the BR diode, doesn't just drop in price because of the ps3 sales, it drops in price from everything that uses that same light, and there are probably in the realm of 200M BR diode using products in the world.
From recorders, to externals, to internals, ps3s, and standalones.

Nothin in the wii, except for a couple already cheap parts, is really used in anything else, hence why it takes so long to drop in cost.

I dont think market saturation has much to do with raw manufacutring costs. Lets say, for arguments sake, the parts for a processor are copper and silicon.  the raw goods needed to make those components have considerably gotten cheaper due to a sluggish economy. Yes, you're right, it will take time, but it's also been 3 years + a near collapse of the world economy. I feel pretty certain that Nintendo is paying less for parts than they did in 2006.

That said, the Wii doesn't need its price cut yet. The PS3 and 360 pricecuts will help those systems sell comparitively to the wii once the price cut effect fades in october. The HD systems are just trying to keep up the pace.

Yeah I think so too. They are paying less. Less of their money now buys more of our goods.

What I mean is that the goods that Nintendo is paying for were already cheap to produce. Sure they cost less now too.

But take for example Sony's costs, which, being bleeding edge tech, were very very expensive to make, especially since nobody was using it yet. A tech like this can drop in price by huge percentages, whereas an older tech starts at a lower cost and gets slightly cheaper.

Say the wiis components are at the 20000 Units produced mark.

Sony started at the 0 Unites produced mark.

This is why Sony had lots of room to drop the price and wii has less.

Or at least that is what my point is.

I just still not getting why the value of the money drops against other money.

Politics and Economy are confusing.