According to GameStop, recent PS3 and Wii hardware shortages will continue for some time, both in store and online.
“I am not exactly sure that I have a total answer, obviously, it is a question that we ask the platform holders,” said the company during their recent earnings conference call. “Consequently, I can tell you that we do anticipate that we will be in that situation for the PS3 for another couple of months, unfortunately, because we could sell a lot more hardware than what we have on both that and the Wii platform.”
Fortunately for would-be Wii buyers, the retail store says it expects the Wii to be back in stock before the PS3.
As for why both consoles are in shortages? The “unprecedented demand” has left the companies “still scrambling to catch up from the December surge of hardware that occurred.” In December, the Wii set an all-time record for most consoles sold in a month in the U.S.
Result for: unprecedented demand
Carphone Warehouse has confirmed that following their price cut on 8GB model iPhones, the unit has completely sold out in all of the retailer’s stores.
A spokesman for Carphone Warehouse confirmed, “Our price promotion has given many more of our customers the opportunity to enjoy the iPhone experience.”
“Due to this unprecedented demand we have now sold out of the 8GB iPhone and we’re currently reviewing the stock situation.”
“In the meantime, customers can still purchase the 16GB iPhone at the standard price at The Carphone Warehouse.”
The retailer is now considering whether or not it wants to restock the item, with the cell network O2 stating the same thing. Both made the price cuts at the same time.
However, if you are still looking for the 8GB model, Apple still has alot in stock (they didn’t drop price), both online and at its retail outlets.
Result for: unprecedented demand
Iron Man, the Paramount blockbuster, has been selling very well on both standard DVD and Blu-ray since its release on September 30th but many Blu-ray buyers have been having problems over the last two days when trying to access the BD-Live features of the disc.
Paramount has issued a statement however, and it seems that the demand was higher than the studio had anticipated and the servers had been overloaded.
“The Iron Man Blu-ray went on sale Tuesday and due to the overwhelming popularity of the release an unprecedented demand was placed on the BD-Live connection. The disc represents a truly state-of-the art Blu-ray presentation with a first of its kind BD-Live application. As such, the heavy amount of traffic strained the servers due to so many people heading to the same destination. The bandwidth capacity was increased in preparation for the release but the demand exceeded all expectations so capacity was expanded dramatically last night and local servers were established worldwide to accommodate all the fans. The issue should be completely resolved but if anyone experiences a brief traffic jam, we have provided consumers with a menu option during disc startup that allows them to go directly to the movie main menu or continue to download the BD-Live features.”
