PSP Giga Pack Announced

Sony Computer Entertainment America today announced the PSP Giga Pack, a new $299 bundle that includes a PSP, a 1GB Memory Stick PRO Duo, USB Cable, and an all-new PSP Stand. The Giga Pack will be available for a limited time starting in November. Sony also announced that a PSP-branded 1GB Memory Stick PRO Duo will be sold separately later this calendar year (pricing not announced). In addition, the company confirmed that the current PSP Value Pack will continue to carry its $249 price tag.

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From the official press release:

Further solidifying the company's role as an entertainment visionary, the new PSP Giga Pack will come pre-installed with the PSP Firmware 2.0, allowing users to take advantage of the unit's built-in Wi-Fi capability to wirelessly search and download content from the Internet from Internet Access Points or hot spots. The addition of the 1GB Memory Stick PRO Duo further enables user to customize their entertainment experience by downloading large or small files of video, music or photos onto their memory sticks, for more entertainment options on-the-go.

"As we approach our first holiday season with PSP, offering consumers a new value option in the Giga Pack demonstrates our commitment to allowing consumers further control and customize their entertainment options," said Jack Tretton, executive vice president, sales and marketing, and co-COO, Sony Computer Entertainment America. "It is natural for our company to use our resources and experience to pass along value to the consumers, and offer those great values with the most current technology. This new dual hardware structure will broaden the unprecedented portable entertainment already provided by PSP and drive a strong year for the category, particularly during the key selling season."

The PSP 1GB Memory Stick PRO Duo will also be sold separately at retail for consumers who already have a PSP Value Pack. Consumers will immediately see the value of having one gigabyte of digital content available on their PSP, which is equivalent to more than 30 hours of music on ATRAC3 (66Kbps), four hours of MPEG4 (384Kbps) moving images and 360 images at five mega-pixel quality. These files can be downloaded from the Internet using the PSP system's Internet Browser or downloaded from a PC using the USB cable that is included in the PSP Giga Pack.

Following a record-setting launch in March 2005, PSP has quickly become a cultural icon and a market-altering force with more than 2.2 million units sold in North America. In addition to the revolutionary PSP hardware, there are currently more than 45 games available for PSP on the proprietary UMD(TM) (Universal Media Disc) and more than 200 feature films, TV programs and videos from major studios combining with downloadable content from the Internet to create an unmatched library of entertainment content.

PSP features an unmatched 4.3-inch, 16:9 wide-screen TFT LCD that displays full color (16.77 million colors) on a 480 x 272 pixel high-resolution screen. PSP also comes complete with built-in stereo speakers, exterior headphone connector and diverse input/output connectors such as USB 2.0, and 802.11b (Wi-Fi) wireless LAN, enabling users to connect to the Internet and/or play online via a wireless network. In addition, wireless capabilities allow software and data to be downloaded directly to a PSP and saved onto a Memory Stick Duo.