Register Hardware

Original URL: http://www.reghardware.co.uk/2008/04/21/sony_deny_amazon_playtv_preorder_date/

Sony pooh-poohs Amazon PS3 PlayTV pre-order posting

By James Sherwood
Published Monday 21st April 2008 11:16 GMT

Sony has dismissed Amazon’s claimed July release date and price for the PlayStation 3's anticipated PlayTV DVR add-on as “erroneous and speculative”.

The online retailer’s UK website (http://www.amazon.co.uk/Sony-Play-TV-PS3/dp/B0017UV0UG) was recently updated to allow customers to pre-order PlayTVs for dispatch on 31 July.

Amazon was even bold enough to offer £10 off the DVR’s claimed £70 (€90/$140) RRP.

But a spokesman for Sony today told Register Hardware that since Sony has yet to name an official release date for PlayTV, the e-tailer’s posting must be incorrect.

He must have been on blower straight to Amazon after talking to us, as the website has since modified its PlayTV page to reflect Sony's official vague timeline.

The electronics giant previously said that it would release the add-on in early 2008, a schedule it hasn’t stuck to.

Amazon_playtv2 (http://regmedia.co.uk/2008/04/21/amazon_1.jpg)

Amzon UK claims PlayTV will ship from 31 July
Click for full-size image

Whether Amazon’s scheduled release date is a genuine mistake or not remains a mystery. But the published dispatch time would certainly coincide nicely with the 8 August start of the 2008 Beijing Olympics – surely a marketing opportunity too good to miss?

Amazon isn’t the first to pre-empt Sony’s official PlayTV release announcement. In February, HMV blamed a rival retailer (http://www.reghardware.co.uk/2008/02/28/hmv_play_tv/) for a webpage that claimed the DVR add-on, which HMV was offering for £100 (€120/$200), would be available from 28 March. HMV quickly yanked the page.

At the time, a Sony spokeswoman told Register Hardware that PlayTV was going through quality assurance testing, but that a release date would be announced “fairly soon”.