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Technology Stocks : Rambus (RMBS) - Eagle or Penguin -- Ignore unavailable to you. Want to Upgrade?

To: Don Green who wrote (73136)	5/17/2001 1:14:04 PM
From: Don Green	Read Replies (1) \| Respond to of 93625

PlayStation 2 to Become Broadband Terminal Sony Computer Entertainment (SCE) announced three policies in February 2001 (see Fig) that will turn the PlayStation 2 (PS2) into a broadband terminal: development of a broadband-capable PS2 for use in arcades; launch of a service linking cell phones and PS2; and sale of hard disk drives (HDD) and the construction of a business platform. SCE president and CEO Ken Kutaragi has not quite achieved his dream of running a bit distribution business by 2001, as was his target when the PS2 was first released in September 1999, but he is steadily getting closer. "We can't get there in a single jump," said one source at SCE. "We have to accustom end-users to broadband step by step." Business-use Terminal The first step is to demonstrate broadband applications, starting with the development of a business-use terminal expanded from the PS2 platform, equipped with an 80-Gbyte HDD and a 100Mbps Ethernet port. This terminal will be installed at SCE-group retailers and amusement centers run by firms like Sega Enterprises and Namco, with broadband network links between facilities. Games and services running on these resources will start up around the end of 2001, with national access in 2002. As SCE's Kutaragi explains: "We will provide duplex entertainment, only possible with high-speed communications running at 10 or 100 Mbits/s." The second step, linkage with cell phones, consists of a connection service between the i-Mode cellular telephones, available since 2000, and game systems (PlayStation, PS1, PS2). "We want to bring the enjoyment of network connection to our users, with live performance and communication," said SCE. In March this year the company developed a cable to connect the phone with games, and it began a games software service for new toys in April. Copy Protection The third step, the HDD unit and business platform, is essential to evolving the PS2 into a network-capable machine. The HDD unit is scheduled to ship in July 2001, combining a 40-Gbyte drive with an Ethernet port running at 100Mbps. While this will provide high-speed datacom functions, at present there are no connection services available to utilize this potential. SCE explained that it is concentrating on "high-band" for the time being, not broadband, because there seem to be many users who can handle datacom at several Mbps. "We want to supply them with games software," said one SCE source. Once the PS2 shares more similarities with the personal computer (PC), the problem of illegal copying occurs. "We do not want copyright problems, such as the music industry faces with Napster and such, to occur in the games industry or the software entertainment industry," cautioned Kutaragi. The new platform will incorporate the newly-developed dynamic network authentication system (DNA-S) for this reason, and new games software released from April 2001 is provided with identification (ID) codes. "When games software is installed from the CD-ROM," continued Kutaragi, "the serial numbers of the CD-ROM and the PS2 both will be registered in the server. This will make it possible to prohibit reinstallation unless the same two IDs are found again." by Taro Yoshio (May 2001 Issue, Nikkei Electronics Asia)

To: Don Green who wrote (73136)	5/17/2001 1:33:36 PM
From: Dan3	Read Replies (1) \| Respond to of 93625

Re: DRAM Makers Quadruple Rambus Memory Production (over the past 12 months) The difficulty for Rambus is that every time they doubled production, prices were cut by more than half, so RDRAM licensing revenue actually dropped. Meanwhile, the 2/3's of Rambus's revenue that comes from SDRAM/DDR looks like it is about to go away, and their quarterly legal bills are quite a bit higher than their RDRAM revenue. Next quarter, SDRAM and DDR chipsets for P4 come out, and RDRAM revenues will drop precipitously as the both the volume of chips sold goes down and the price per chip collapses due to supply surplus. Really looking quite ugly for Rambus. Regards, Dan - number 3 on the paided bashers list - just a regular guy trying to do his job :-)