Today, Sony announced pricing of the PlayStation 5. While the console isn’t released until November 12th, right in time for Christmas, the console pre-orders opened today.
Within hours, Australian stock was depleted and pre-orders were sold out. There’s a couple of possible reasons for this. The first potential explanation is that demand is absolutely off the charts for Sony’s next-generation console.
It is also possible that the worldwide supply of PS5 units is limited and Australia’s slice of that supply is extremely limited. If supply is very constrained, then even moderate demand would result in what we seen today.
Retailer pages all list slightly different variations of explanations.
- Amazon – “Currently unavailable. We don’t know when or if this item will be back in stock.”
- JB Hi-Fi – “Pre-orders are temporarily suspended. Due to overwhelming demand, we’ve had to hit pause on taking any more pre-orders. Don’t worry, as soon as we have more visibility on stock availability we will re-open pre-orders.”
- Harvey Norman – “Pre-orders sold out. First shipment release: 12th Nov”
- Sony Store – “Sold Out”.
The PS5 comes in two versions, the forward-leaning Digital Edition, perfect for those with decent internet connections and have moved past physical media.
The PlayStation 5 Digital Edition costs A$599.95.
The alternative is the PlayStation 5 which contains the traditional blu-ray drive, for games and movies. Whether you’re after the ability to trade games in the second-hand market, or just have a rubbish connection.
The PlayStation 5 (Standard Edition) costs A$749.95. With the optical drive being the only difference between the two editions, the extra A$150 cost is substantial and will really make the decision difficult for potential buyers.
By comparison, the price of the PS5 comes in exactly the same as the Xbox Series X from Microsoft. These living room PCs now have serious horsepower and that comes at a cost. Xbox is also offering a more affordable option with lower specs, the Xbox Series S, which costs A$499, landing A$100 less than the Digital only PS5.
The Sony Store page actually gives us the best indication of what’s going on.
“Pre-orders for first allocation have now finished.”
This suggests there’ll be additional rounds of units allocated to Australian retailers, which you’d definitely imagine happens ahead of Christmas.
The PlayStation 5 is a significant upgrade on the PS4, which first shipped way back in November 2013. The PS5 will be capable of outputting 8K video and while you are unlikely to have an 8K display in your house in 2020, at some time over the next 7 years, that is likely to change.
The next-generation console features the new hot graphics technique, known as Ray Tracing that more accurately renders light and reflections, giving games an amazing realism. Those games can be played a high refresh rates, as high as 120FPS with 4K resolution.
