PS3 Crushes UK Console Sales Record

But it looks like there is still plenty of stock left over.

Any fears that the PlayStation 3 would suffer because of its high price point and the bad press surrounding the console in the run-up to the launch are out the window now that the system has had the best opening ever for a console in the UK.

The PS3 sold a massive 165,000 units over its first weekend, according to numbers reported by Chart Track. This crushes the openings of both the Wii, which sold 50,000 in its first 12 hours last December, and the Xbox 360, which sold 70,000 units in its first weekend in December 2005. The PS3 still wasn't as fast the as the PSP, though, which sold 185,000 at launch in September 2005.

Sony has been taking a beating in the popular and specialist press in the weeks running up the launch, mostly as a result of its decision to hold back on the European launch of the console, the high price of the system, and the company's decision to change the hardware specifications, breaking PS2 backwards compatibility for some games.

The company is heavily promoting the PS3 in all traditional media, with cinemagoers and TV watchers being inundated with commercials for the system over the weekend.

Sony said last week that it had 220,000 PS3s ready for the launch - far more than either Microsoft or Nintendo were able to have in time for theirs.

"A launch is only a day in time and that's not necessarily the end of the argument," Sony's Ray Maguire told MCV before the launch. "What we're trying to do is make sure we can get enough stock coming in during the launch window to ensure that we don't go out of stock."

Doing the maths, it's clear that Sony has not sold out its initial launch stock. So the question Sony and everyone else will be asking is, where does the PS3 go from here?

Alex Wollenschlaeger
Editor, Kikizo