Sony will now discontinue production of both 20GB and 60GB models in Japan,

20GB, 60GB PS3s axed in Japan

If you want a PS3 that plays PS2 games, the race is truly on because, flowing the killing of 60GB PS3's here in the West, Sony will now discontinue production of both 20GB and 60GB models in Japan, too.

An official statement reads: "Along with both the increased efforts to improve software development environment and the availability of a more extensive line-up of software titles for PS3, SCEI will vigorously promote the expansion of the PS3 platform by further concentrating on the 40GB HDD (CECHH00 Series) model introduced in November 2007, equipped with the core technology components that make PS3 the most advanced high-definition entertainment system while realizing lower power consumption."

That leaves just the 40GB version, which lacks PS2 BC support (although PS1 support remains) and chops two of the older model's four USB ports as well.

We plan to keep our 60GB full-fat PS3s in mint condition for 200 years, then sell the 'OMG RARE!!11' console for about 80 million quid.

Sony discontinuing 20GB and 60GB PS3 in Japan
The PlayStation maker has axed the two more expensive models of the console in the region.
The newest PlayStation 3 SKU, the 40GB machine, has proved a controversial choice for those who hoped that their next-generation console would play PlayStation 2 games. According to Sony, the 40GB PS3 is not backwards compatible in any way, shape, or form.

It is, however, cheaper. And it looks like the price is right for Japanese gamers, as the new model--released in the region in both piano black and ice white colours in October--has helped Sony gain market share, according to Bloomberg.

At the moment there are three different PS3 models on sale in the region, the 20GB, the 40GB, and the 60GB. Price-wise, the 40GB is the cheapest of the three, weighing in at 39,800 yen ($362), followed by the 20GB at 44,980 yen ($410), and the 60GB, which retails for 54,980 yen ($501).

Sony intends to whittle this down to leave just the 40GB model on sale in the country. In the UK, a similar plan is underway, as the 60GB model has been given a price cut (£350, $687) as it is phased out, with the plan to leave only the 40GB (£300, $589) on sale.

In the US, the 40GB PS3 ($399) is also on sale, along with an extra large 80GB model ($499).
Tokyo (eCanadaNow) - On Thursday, Sony announced plans to drop the 20-gigabyte and 60-gigabyte PlayStation 3 (PS3) in Japan.

The company said the move is designed to better focus on the 40-gigabyte model.

Unlike the other models, the 40GB unit does not support PlayStation 2 (PS2) games. The unit also uses less energy, allowing Sony to use smaller components, AHN reported.

In addition to focusing their attention on the 40GB model, Sony will "vigorously promote the expansion of the PS3 platform" throughout 2008, with "increased efforts to improve software development environment and the availability of a more extensive line-up of software titles for PS3."

Late last year, Sony cut the PS3 line in the European market as well.

Across the U.S and Canada, gaming fans still have a choice between all models of the PS3.

The motion, formation, and recycling of Earth’s crust

Earth's Moving Crust May Occasionally Stop
The motion, formation, and recycling of Earth’s crust—commonly known as plate tectonics—have long been thought to be continuous processes. But new research by geophysicists suggests that plate tectonic motions have occasionally stopped in Earth’s geologic history, and may do so again. The findings could reshape our understanding of the history and evolution of the Earth’s crust and continents.

Synthesizing a wide range of observations and constructing a new theoretical model, researchers Paul Silver of the Carnegie Institution of Washington and Mark Behn of the Woods Hole Oceanographic Institution (WHOI) have found evidence that the process of subduction has effectively stopped at least once in Earth’s past. Subduction occurs where two pieces of Earth’s crust (tectonic plates) collide, and one dives beneath the other back into the interior of the planet.

Most of the major geologic processes on Earth—the formation of continents, the birth of volcanic island arcs, the opening and closing of ocean basins—are driven by tectonic plate motions and intimately linked to subduction and to seafloor spreading. If those processes were shut down, there would likely be a global decrease in earthquakes and volcanism.

Today, the vast majority of subduction occurs around the edges of the Pacific Ocean, which is slowly closing as the Atlantic Ocean opens. In roughly 350 million years, researchers estimate that the Pacific basin will be effectively closed and a new supercontinent will be formed.

Closure of the Pacific basin could shut down most of the Earth’s capacity for subduction, unless the process begins somewhere else on the planet. However, there is no evidence that subduction is currently expanding or initiating anywhere else on the planet.

Though such a shutdown defies the prevailing wisdom about plate tectonics, Silver and Behn read the geologic evidence to suggest that just such a dramatic decrease in subduction happened about one billion years ago, after the formation of the supercontinent Rodinia.

Their findings—captured in a paper entitled “Intermittent Plate Tectonics?”—were published in the January 4 issue of the journal Science.

“The scientific community has typically assumed that plate tectonics is an active and continuous process, that new crust is constantly being formed while old crust is recycled,” said Behn, an assistant scientist in the WHOI Department of Geology and Geophysics. “But the evidence suggests that plate tectonics may not be continuous. Plates may move actively at times, then stop or slow down, and then start up again.”

Behn and Silver started their investigation by considering how the Earth releases heat from its interior over time, also known as “thermal evolution.” If you take the rate at which the Earth is releasing heat from its interior today and project that rate backwards in time, you arrive at impossibly high and unsustainable numbers for the heat and energy contained in the early Earth. Specifically, if the planet has been releasing heat at the modern rate for all of its history, then it would have been covered with a magma ocean as recently as one billion years ago.

But we know this is not true, Behn said, because there is geological evidence for past continents and supercontinents, not to mention rocks (ophiolites) on the edges of old plate boundaries that are more than one billion years old.

The Earth cools more quickly during periods of rapid plate motions, as warm material is pulled upward from deep in the Earth’s interior and cools beneath spreading ridges.

“If you stir a cup of coffee, it cools faster,” said Behn. “That’s why people blow on their coffee to get the surface moving.”

“It is a similar process within the Earth," Behn added. "If the tectonic plates are moving, the Earth releases more heat and cools down faster. If you don’t have those cracked and moving plates, then heat has to get out by diffusing through the solid rock, which is much slower.”

Periods of slow or no subduction would help explain how the Earth still has so much heat to release today, since some of it would have been capped beneath the crust.

Silver and Behn conclude their paper by suggesting that there is a cycle to plate tectonics, with periods when the shifting and sliding of the crust is more active and times when it is less so. Rather than being continuous, plate tectonics may work intermittently through Earth history, turning on and off as the planet remakes itself.


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The Woods Hole Oceanographic Institution is a private, independent organization in Falmouth, Mass., dedicated to marine research, engineering, and higher education. Established in 1930 on a recommendation from the National Academy of Sciences, its primary mission is to understand the oceans and their interaction with the Earth as a whole, and to communicate a basic understanding of the ocean's role in the changing global environment.

The Carnegie Institution of Washington has been a pioneering force in basic scientific research since 1902. It is a private, nonprofit organization with six research departments throughout the U.S. Carnegie scientists are leaders in plant biology, developmental biology, astronomy, materials science, global ecology, and Earth and planetary science.