Long standing speculation on the fabled PlayStation 3 (PS3) Slim have been confirmed to be true this past week, when Sony unveiled the new model, officially called the PS3 CECH-2000, Tuesday at Gamescom 2009. The new model made it's debut by Sony Computer Entertainment chairman Kazuo Harai during the SCEE (Sony Computer Entertainment Europe) presser, shadowing virtually every other announcement made so far during the event in Cologne, Germany. The new version looks like it's moving in the right direction in every single way: it's smaller, less power-hungry, more capable, and a bit less harder on the bank, too.

This long-heard of rumor about the PS3 Slim has been going around strong since way early in May of this year, when some blogs had posted up what appeared to be leaked photographs showing the production process and packaging of a new PS3 model, even donning the characters “PS3” on more than one angle of the product. Since then, many of those blogs had reported that they had received cease-and-desist letters from a Taiwan based law firm, which just about confirmed any suspicion over the authenticity of these pictures to damn near everyone holding interest in the rumor. After a long summer of waiting for something to come around, the speculation came true, and now fans in the Sony-side of console gaming have something to look forward to come September 1st, when the new gaming and media console will be available to consumers at an approachable price of $300. This finally marks the first major price drop of the PlayStation 3 line, since it's always hovered around $400-$600 since release in 2006.

Let's take a look at more of the specifics that make this device worth the attention of any console gamer, or maybe even a media or home theater nut. First of all, the PS3 Slim retains it's Blu-ray capability, so if you're looking for a Blu-ray player that does more than just movies you can still keep the PS3 in mind. What it also keeps from the previous version is it's backwards compatibility with the original PlayStation game library, which stretches to almost 15 years worth of games available to play, including classics like the Final Fantasy series, Gran Turismo 1 and 2, and the incredible action-packed espionage drama, Metal Gear Solid, which some enthusiasts think is the best video game ever in the PlayStation line, or maybe even of all time (take the hint and go lose yourself in it).
However, the PlayStation 3 Slim will not have backwards compatibility with the PlayStation 2 library, and this really isn't any different from the latest line of PS3's since they haven't had that capability since the first release models a few years back, making the original 60GB PS3 device a rare and highly sought after example. It's important to mention the PS2 issue, but I don't think it will have any more of an effect on the Slim's performance than the most recent models on the market.
This new Slim model is much smaller than the previous iteration of the PS3, and that original PS3 is a formidably-sized beast. When the PS3 was officially revealed and announced back in 2005, jokes had sprung up about how it's size and shape reminds gamers of those George Foreman fat-reducing electric grills, and photo-shopped pictures of PS3's donning various meats and veggies under it's hood eventually made way into a real, working PS3 Grill. Meanwhile, this new model is much thinner and easier to place somewhere into your home media center, and it also loses that dust-collecting glossy finish that the original line always had, opting for a solid matte-black shell instead.
As far as power goes, Sony made an effort to control some of the energy-consumption the the product is responsible for, and so these new Slim models will be using smaller-sized processors (45nm vs. 65nm). This drops the power consumption from 280 to 250 watts, and allows the processor to run at a cooler (maybe a lower fan speed?) and possibly even faster than the previous line. A quieter and more powerful console is worth looking forward to. These models will also don some upgraded hard drive packages, with a standard 120GB console available at launch in September, and an expected 250GB option which will appear some time in the future.

One final thing that plays in favor of the PS3 is Sony's track record for building a solid game console, this can be seen when compared to the number of Microsoft Xbox 360's that are prone to the system-killing “Red Ring of Death” (the name is derived from the system's three-red light error code that appears around the power button). News had surfaced just recently from print-edition of Game Informer (posted online by The Consumerist) where a survey had been done to find out some estimation of how many consoles are expected to eventually break from Microsoft's faulty design, and the survey had found that an estimated 54.2% of Xbox 360 consoles are prone to failure. That is in comparison to the PS3's 10.6%. So consider your investment carefully, and if you've been holding out on buying the PlayStation 3, especially for pricing reasons, September just may be that special month to let the walls down and finally enjoy some of the best gaming that Sony has to offer.