PlayStation 3 Production Begins With 200,000 Units This Month

It's not yet entirely (or even vaguely) official, but according to Chinese newspapers Apple Daily and Commercial Times, the first PlayStation 3 units have already been delivered to Sony earlier this month. The units were reportedly assembled by Taiwanese manufacturer Asustek Computer, who is said to have received 200,000 component sets in June - thus suggesting that Asustek could produce as many as 200,000 consoles by the end of this month.

Forbes went on to report that Asustek's first consignment is for 4 million PS3 units (2 million by October), and that fellow Taiwanese company Hon Hai Precision Industry will also begin production of the consoles shortly.

Should manufacturers and component sets suppliers meet their quota, Sony will apparently be able to produce one million units a month by November, and deliver the 2 million PlayStation 3 units they promised for launch day (November 11/17).

In the meantime, a very weird poll has been posted on the Amazon Japan webiste, claiming that the Japanese are now more interested in Sony's PlayStation 3, than in Nintendo's Wii - contrary to a recent Famitsu poll. The graph ranks the 60GB PS3 model slightly higher than the Wii, but combined with the 20GB PS3 model, Sony's next-gen console clearly outranks the Wii. That is, assuming the Amazon Japan pollsters are correct, which at this point I find rather hard to believe.

(N.B. Archive text, links removed)