With the release of PS3 and Wii, the battle for console supremacy has officially started. Both PS3 and Xbox 360 target are going after same target audience whereas Wii is trying to carve out a different segment of the market. It is more likely that consumer own PS3 or Xbox 360 and Wii than both Xbox 360 and PS3. So, the PS3 vs Xbox 360 really comes down to two contenders: PS3 and Xbox 360. Xbox 360 got an early jump on PS3 by coming to the market 12 month ahead of PS3.

With nearly year head start, Xbox 360 was able to build up impressive library of games. Where Xbox 360 is strong in number of games released, the PS3 shines in its technical superiority. With nearly eight multi core processing, it can handle better graphics and better HD mode. Xbox 360 sports three multi core processing and HD format up to 1080i compared to 1080p for PS3. Sony also supports next-generation storage format, Blu-ray, without any extra equipment. Xbox 360 will support HD-DVD format through optional HD-DVD drive. There is clear advantage of hardware power for PS3 over Xbox 360. However, the graphical difference will not be as significant as some might suggest. For both of these systems, the success or failure will depend on the quality of games. With strong third party support for both the systems it is hard to predict one system completely dominating the other system.

Xbox 360

Xbos 360 specification

360 Hardware:
1. Support for DVD-video, DVD-Rom, DVD-R/RW, CD-DA, CD-Rom, CD-R, CD-RW, WMA CD, MP3 CD, JPEG photo CD
2. All games supported at 16:9, 720p and 1080i, anti-aliasing
3. Customizable face plates to change appearance
4. 3 USB 2.0 ports
5. Support for 4 wireless controllers
6. Detachable drive
7. Wi-Fi ready

Custom IBM PowerPC-based CPU
- 3 symmetrical cores at 3.2 GHz each
- 2 hardware threads per core
- 1 VMX-128 vector unit per core
- 1 MB L2 cache

CPU Game Math Performance
- 9 billion dots per second

Custom ATI Graphics Processor
- 500 MHz
- 10 MB embedded DRAM
- 48-way parallel floating-point shader pipelines
- unified shader architecture

Memory
-512 MB GDDR3 RAM
- 700 MHz DDR

Memory Bandwidth
- 22.4 GB/s memory interface bus bandwidth
- 256 GB/s memory bandwidth to EDRAM
- 21.6 GB/s frontside bus

Audio
- Mulitchannel surround sound output
- Supports 48khz 16-bit audio
- 320 independent decompression channels
- 32 bit processing
- 256+ audio channels

Games:
Over 100 games available
Marquee games include Gears of War, Tom Clancy line of games, Call of Duty 3, and F.E.A.R.
Anticipated games include Lost Planet, Virtua Fighter 5, and Metal Gear Solid 4.

Controller
Xbox 360 controller will be wireless. It will be similar to that of old Xbox 360. It does not offer any motion sensing capability.

Connectivity
Wi-Fi, 3 USB port, Ethernet port, component, composite, s-video

A/V ability
Xbox 360 will be able to play DVD out of box and HD-DVD with upgrade.

Backward compatibility
Most of the Xbox games are compatible with Xbox360. For complete list go to http://www.xbox.com/en-US/games/backwardcompatibilitygameslist.htm

Online capability
Xbox 360 owners will be able to compete over Xbox Live service. It is the same service used in the original Xbox. However, it will have additional features and contents specific for Xbox 360. It will cost $59.99 for year for the Xbox Live service.

Playstation 3

Price: $499 for 20 GB and $599 for 60 GB

PS3 Specification

CPU: Cell Processor PowerPC-base Core @3.2GHz
1 VMX vector unit per core
512KB L2 cache
7 x SPE @3.2GHz
7 x 128b 128 SIMD GPRs
7 x 256KB SRAM for SPE
*1 of 8 SPEs reserved for redundancy
Total floating point performance: 218 gigaflops

GPU RSX @ 550MHz
1.8 TFLOPS floating point Performance
Full HD (up to 1080p) x 2 channels
Multi-way programmable parallel Floating point shader pipelines
Sound Dolby 5.1ch, DTS, LPCM, etc. (Cell-based processing)

Memory
256MB XDR Main RAM @3.2GHz
256MB GDDR3 VRAM @700MHz
System Bandwidth Main RAM– 25.6GB/s
VRAM–22.4GB/s
RSX– 20GB/s (write) + 15GB/s (read)
SB2.5GB/s (write) + 2.5GB/s (read)

SYSTEM FLOATING POINT PERFORMANCE:
2 teraflops

STORAGE
HDD Detachable 2.5″ HDD slot x 1
I/O–USB Front x 4, Rear x 2 (USB2.0)
Memory Stickstandard/Duo, PRO x 1
SD standard/mini x 1
CompactFlash(Type I, II) x 1

COMMUNICATION
Ethernet (10BASE-T, 100BASE-TX, 1000BASE-T) x 3 (input x 1 + output x 2)
Wi-Fi IEEE 802.11 b/g (60gig only)
Bluetooth–Bluetooth 2.0 (EDR)
ControllerBluetooth (up to 7)
USB 2.0 (wired)
Wi-Fi (PSP)
Network (over IP)

AV OUTPUT
Screen size 480i, 480p, 720p, 1080i, 1080p
HDMI out x 2
AV multi out x 1
Digital out (optical) x 1

DISC MEDIA
CD
PlayStation CD-ROM
PlayStation2 CD-ROM
CD-DA
CD-DA (ROM),
CD-R,
CD-RW
SACD Hybrid (CD layer),
SACD HD
DualDisc (audio side)
DualDisc (DVD side)
PlayStation 2 DVD-ROM
PlayStation 3 DVD-ROM
DVD-ROM
DVD-R
DVD-RW
DVD+R,
DVD+RW
Blu-ray Disc
PlayStation 3 BD-ROM
BD-ROM
BD

Games

Currently, there are about 10 games released.
Marquee games include Resistance: Fall of man, Dark Kingdom, and Ridge Racer 7.
Anticipated games include Final Fantasy 13, Metal Gear Solid, Virtua Fighter 5, Tom Clancy line of games, and Grand Theft Auto 4.

Controller

The PS3 controller looks exactly same as the PS2 dual shock controller. However, the PS3 controller added Sixaxis motion sensing system as well as wireless capability. Due battery life constraints, the rumble function has been removed.

Connectivity
3 Ethernet ports, Wi-Fi, Bluetooth, USB, HDMI, composite, component, and s-video.

A/V ability

PS3 will play DVD and Blu-ray formats out of box.

Backward compatibility

PS3 will play both PS1 and PS2 games.

Online capability

Through Playstation network, players will be able to compete online. Similar to Wii, players will be able to purchase classic games as well as new games.