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Gaming Sony

Sony PlayStation Suite For Android Phones Unveiled

Sony today unveiled its latest mobile gaming platform aimed at Android devices. Called the PlayStation Suite, the new mobile gaming platform will let Android users buy, download and play PSP games on their mobile phones. According to Sony, the PlayStation Suite is basically an emulator for Android 2.3 Gingerbread and above.

Along with the emulator, the PlayStation Suite will also include an Android game store where users can browse through and purchase new PSP games. In case you are wondering, the PSP emulator will include on-screen controls that users will need to play their games. That is if you do not own one of the new Sony Ericsson Xperia Play “PlayStation Phone” that comes with physical controls for playing PSP games.

A launch date for PlayStation Suite has not been announced although we hear it will be “within this calendar year“.

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Gaming Sony

Sony PSP2 Specs As Powerful as PlayStation 3

Sony is yet to officially announce its new portable gaming console, but we all know it is in the works. With competition from the likes of Nintendo heating up, Sony has to outdo itself to stay among the most preferred handheld gaming device manufacturers.

According to a new report, the upcoming PSP2 console could be as powerful as the Sony PS3 that is in the markets now. In addition to this, Sony is planning on offering a lot of downloadable content as well as letting users play physical media in a bid to make the platform attractive to both consumers and developers.

The report does not elaborate much on the possible launch date. We however hear that PSP2 could make its way to the stores at least by the end of this year. If lucky, PSP2 could launch by October.

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Gadgets Gaming Sony

Run Jailbroken PlayStation 3 With Custom Firmware And HomeBrew – GeoHot Video

George Hotz, the popular PS3 and iOS hacker who is responsible for a number of hacks on the two platforms in the past is out with a video that demoes a Sony PlayStation 3 that has been jailbroken to run a custom version of firmware 3.55. But before you get excited, we must point out that this is merely a demo video at this stage and an actual jailbreak software is yet to be released. GeoHot has refused to offer an estimated time for release at this stage.

You can watch the video demo here.

For those looking for a background to this story, German hackers fail0verflow had recently released an exploit that they claimed could let users decipher the digital signature that Sony encrypts on its Playstation devices. This signature is used by the device to authenticate applications before they are run. GeoHot had earlier this week used this exploit to make the security keys of Sony PS 3 public. Now that a demo video is out, you must expect a jailbreak application shortly.

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Gaming Sony

Sony PlayStation 3 Hack To Expose Security Keys Brings Piracy Threat

George Hotz, the popular hacker who is widely known as GeoHot in the jailbreak circles has made Sony’s PlayStation 3 security key public that could enable users to install custom firmwares and games on their console without going through the Sony platform. Thanking the German hacker group, Fail0verflow who discovered the exploit, Hotz wrote on his blog,

“props to fail0verflow for the asymmetric half. no donate link, just use this info wisely. i do not condone piracy”

The security keys are significant in that it is assigned to every legit application and is used by Sony to verify if any particular application the user is trying to open is legitimate or not. By making this security key public, software pirates can open copyrighted gaming applications illegally.

Sony is yet to acknowledge the issue and we hope they act soon enough to minimize the damage caused.

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Software and Apps Sony

Sony Music Unlimited Subscription Service Launches In Ireland & UK

As announced earlier this year, Sony has launched its new music subscription service named “Sony Music Unlimited Powered By Qriocity“. The service was unveiled back in September this year which Sony Europe President Fujio Nishida described as a “cloud-based digital music streaming service that gives music lovers access to millions of tracks stored and synced with your devices”.

The service has initially launched just in the UK and Ireland. According to an announcement from the company yesterday, the Sony Music Unlimited service is expected to extend to U.S., Canada, Australia, France, Germany, Italy, Spain and New Zealand next year.

Although, the feature is not too different from iTunes at the moment, Kazuo Hirai, the executive vice president of Sony has said that they expect the product to stand on its own in a few years time. He has confided that “playing catch-up” with iTunes could make it difficult for the product to find appeal among users.

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Gaming Sony

Sony PlayStation App For iPhone & Android Announced

Sony has announced that an official PlayStation app will soon make its way to the iOS and Android platforms. Writing about this on the PlayStation blog, Emmanuel Orssaud, Portal Manager at Sony, has said that the first iteration of the application will only be available in UK, France, Germany, Spain, Italy, and The Netherlands. A second version that will support the rest of Europe is also noted to be on its way.

The PlayStation app will let users check on their friends’ activities, read and discover the latest games, news and hardware and keep a tab on their PSN trophies. The application shall be free to download.

While this application is sure to let gamers keep a tab on theirs and their friends’ activities, it will not be a useful gaming device. That gap, it has been speculated, will be fulfilled by a PlayStation phone. Reports have suggested that this new Android based smartphone – complete with gaming controls – shall be announced sometime in the first quarter of next year. If you are a hardcore PS gamer, keep your fingers crossed until then.

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Sony

Watch ITV & Channel 4 On PS3 In UK Starting This Week

If you are in the United Kingdom, you can start watching your favorite programs on Channel 4 and ITV from your PlayStation soon. Sony has announced a partnership with the two television channels to bring their content to PS3.

For what it’s worth, ITV has already been available as a web-based service for a while. Also, in the case of ITV, this expansion is not limited to Sony PS 3. The channel has revealed that they are leaving their services open for availability on other platforms – including the console rivals as well. However, in case of Channel 4, the television is likely to be available solely on Sony PS 3 for the moment. The television channel does not seem to have reached agreeable deals with Microsoft and Nintendo which means it will be available solely on PS 3 consoles for the time being.

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Mobile Sony

PlayStation Phone Features, Price & Launch Rumors

The highly anticipated PlayStation Phone from Sony may not be launching/unveiling on December 9 as earlier thought. According to some new rumors, the PlayStation Phone is “nowhere near ready” which means that the device will take at least a couple of more months before it gets ready for release. A February launch around the Mobile World Congress is likely.

We have already heard about the device – regarding its 5-megapixel camera, 1GHz Snapdragon processor and 4.1″ WVGA display. Now according to the latest report, the phone may not be a PSP device coupled with phone capabilities.

What this means is that users may not be actually able to download PSP-compatible games on to this new device. It is possible that Sony could bring an independent line-up of games to this new platform. However this appears to be a rather expensive process since the volumes may not justify the vast line up of games necessary to make this phone a success. What we also hear is that the new phone could be marketed under the Xperia brand which could bring down the anticipation levels for the new gaming phone even further.

Anyway, none of these speculations are substantiated. So at the moment take all of these with a pinch of salt.

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Gadgets Sony

Price Of Sony Google TV & Blu-ray Player Dropped For Holiday Season

Black Friday kicked off the holiday shopping season in many countries including the United States and Sony has announced a massive discount on some of its attractive offerings just in time for the season.

Starting now and lasting until November 29, customers looking to buy a 40″ NSX-40GT1 HDTV from Sony can get one at $899.99 that is $100 less than the original price. Also, the 46″ NSX-46GT1 HDTV shall now be available at a price of $1,199.99 that is a huge $200 price-drop.

This is not all. Those of you looking for a NSZ-GT1 Google TV Blu-ray player too will see some nice offers. The player is now available for $299.99; a good 25% price drop from its original price. The price also pits the Google TV Blu ray player against the Logitech Revue that is available at the same price as well.

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Mobile Sony

Sony PlayStation Phone Release Date On December 9?

December 9 may turn out to be quite an eventful day if all the rumors doing the rounds are to be true. Yesterday, we had written that the highly anticipated Notion Ink Adam tablet could be making a launch or at least open for pre-orders on December 9. Now, it is being rumored that Sony too could be launching their new PlayStation Phone on this day.

According to reports coming from France, Sony Ericsson has called for a media event that will be headed by Pierre Perron, head of Sony Ericsson in France. There is no specific mention of the agenda of the meeting and so we expect at least an unveiling, if not an official launch of the PlayStation Phone on this day.

What do you think? Are we being too optimistic here? Tell us in the comments.