I think the general reaction towards this lawsuits pretty much condenses onto this:

They are very easy to find in stores.  Even when demand increases once better games come out and during the 07 holiday season, there is still not going to be a mass shortage driving ebay prices up.  Your probably safe getting it whenever.Hoosr70

That's true. Sony would be very stupid to let what happened at Launch take place again, but I don't think that a mass shortage would be the reason for a hike in bidding. People can get very competitive on eBay, and sometimes, even if they are not going to get a better deal than if they got it somewhere else, they will keep on bidding and inflate the price of whatever they want. Of course, this would happen frequently and in various circumstances, so the sellers are going to see a trend and say "It seems that people are willing to pay more for the PS3 now than ever. Let's raise our starting bids!," therefore causing the average closing price to rise by a least $60. My only regret is that I didn't get this sudden urge to buy a PS3 back when the console was getting really bad publicity, but I guess that now, with the exclusivity quagmire going on, it's not a bad time either XD.

Since I don't believe that there will be a price drop anytime soon, I don't see the point in waiting. If you are interested in the PS3, then buy it.NextGen86

Well, that's not exactly what I was talking about. Sony is not cutting the console's retail price until at least 2009, but in eBay you can get one within a price range between $460-540, excluding shipping, which is well below the $650 I would be paying if I bought it at a GameStop or something like that (I live in TX and we have a 8.25% sales tax). I worry about the timing as, I believe, demand for the PS3 will grow when the hot games come out, so you'll see higher bidding on eBay, therefore raising the average price of a PS3 there (I predict that you'll be seeing consoles selling for $700 or so). I personally think that getting it now would be the better move, but I couldn't be sure of that, because supply could increase and match (or hopefully, outstrip) demand by then and prices wouldn't shoot up as much as I think they will.

Anyway, thanks for the help!

Hi,

I´m pretty sure you guys are pretty tired of the little, sometimes obvious questions by n00bs about the PS3 and all that, but I wanted to get some info from actual owners:

- I´m worried that, even though of the humongous graphical capabilities of the PS3, I won´t be able to enjoy them as I don´t have a HDTV (although I do have a flat-screen with component ports). Is that really the case?

- Obviously, I want to save as much money as possible in my purchase of the console, so I pretty much decided to get it from eBay rather than physical sellers (I will save some money, and I'll evade sales taxes). When do you think is the best time to get it? Right now, or when the bonanza starts (Fall and Winter)?

- The loss of all those exclusivity deals doesn´t really affect me because I´m trying to be as much Microsoft-free as possible, so there´s no way I´m getting a 360, no matter the circumstances, but, beyond those popular games, what are the chances that the PS3 will get many fresh, actually original games like LittleBigPlanet?

- I´m a Wii owner, and I´ve noticed that Nintendo draws a whole bunch of money from you in accesories that are somewhat necessary. Is this the case with the PS3 too?

- Finally, what´s the status on the online functionality on the PS3? I´ve heard that it´s the weakest of all the next-gen consoles right now, but that Sony is planning to put up Second Life-like interactivity between users, and that they are refining all of the internal things like the browser, PS Store and PC-PS3 interaction. Is all of this true?

Sorry if the questions are a bit complicated, but I really want to get all of my doubts out of the way before I make a huge investment like this one.

Thanks!