It looks as though Sony just can't catch a break these days in the news. Last week we learned that Sony was delaying the European launch of its PlayStation 3 from November 17 to March of 2007 along with the announcement that an initial batch of 500,000 total units would be available for the November 11 Japanese launch and November 17 North American launch. The launch delay/shipment reduction is due to Sony's problems with manufacturing blue laser diodes used by the Blu-ray drive on the PS3.

The two latest HD-DVD players that Toshiba announced at IFA are also coming to the US at a similar price point, but with different names.

LOS ANGELES, Sept 14 (Reuters) - Samsung Corp's Samsung America Inc on Thursday said it would make some improvements to its Blu-ray high-definition DVD players ahead of the holiday season.

The good news for US and Japanese gamers is that Sony PlayStation 3 will go on sale in the US as planned in November. The bad news for Europeans, Asians and Australians is that, because of Blu-ray manufacturing problems, they will have to wait until March 2007 before they can get their hands on a PS3.

Washington, D.C. (September 4, 2006) -- Pioneer says it has no plans to launch a combination Blu-ray/HD-DVD player.