The PSP needs to get iPods out of pockets to be succsefull. A seemingly ridiculous statement, but consider what the PSP should be able to do: play games, music, and movies. Now here this, there is already a cheap small machien that play games on the go, the GameBoy, and the iPod plays your music(or whatever other media player you use, but for the sake of relativly high-investment products...), and most of America doesn't expect to pull movies out of their pockets yet.

What Sony really needs to do, is show that their device thatin all likely hood will be more expensive than a GameBoy or DS plays games better. Then needs to show people that it is as good as or better than something like an iPod at playing music. Finally they need to establish pocket movie wtching as a way of the future. In the mean time all of it's functions are competeing against established, or growing(portable movies) markets. It has to be able to really compete in price and functionality against a lot more than something like the GameBoy or even the DS.

I would even say that Sony will find less early adopters of the PSP than most people expect. THe PS2 sold like crazy ebcause it had backward compatiblility and compatibility with the premire new media format. PSP is really starting from scratch, using one new format for media and one that the masses don't usually have.

Now the DS has to amke sure that enough people are willing to put away their GameBoy/Color games and go above and beyond. There is a massive loyal user group for the GameBoy, but the expections are to be able to play anything that they ever bought for a portable. Nintedo has to show that this is the gameing of the future really, and that the DS is the way things are heading, whileat the same time not alienating those who stick to their GameBoy Advances.

Tricky enough, but all that the device is expected to do is play games, not 2 other things which makes positioning the unit easier.

I thinkt hat the DS will sell more initially and keep strong, but there will be a turning point. The PSP will start out slower and once people see if it can compete in all three categories then it will pick up. Now all Sony would have to do to change my opinion is make the UMD a rewriteable format that sold on shelves, and everything would be different, assuming they have decent battery life on the thing.