The PlayStation 3's price is being cut by $100 in price. Full details inside...

Sony has announced that from today, the price of a PlayStation 3 in the U.S. will now be $100 cheaper - a price drop of 17 percent. A PS3 with a 60GB hard drive will now sell for $499 (�249, �369) - still $20 more than the Xbox 360 and twice as much as the Wii. An 80GB model will go on sale in August for $599.

The reason for Sony's price-drop has undoubtedly been the fact it has been trailing in sales compared to the Wii and 360. U.S. consumers have purchased 1.38 million PS3s since its launch last November, compared with 2.84 million Wii consoles. To date, Microsoft has sold 5.5 million units of the Xbox 360, introduced a year earlier.

Analysts have predicted that this price cut means that many consumers which would have chosen the Xbox Elite package (just $20 cheaper at $479) will now be convinced into shelling out the extra cash to get a PS3 instead. Wii sales, still significantly cheaper, will likely be largely unaffected.

However, Sony claimed as late as May that there were no plans to cut PlayStation prices. Questioned on any more future price-drops for elsewhere around the world, a Sony spokesman confirmed: "There are no plans for any other price cuts in other regions at this time."

Reports suggest that a price cut is now possible due to rectified production problems with a diode used in the PS3's Blu-ray player. Now these have been solved, the PS3 is now profitable, like the Wii (while Microsoft still loses money on each console sold). Whether this is still the case after this price cut is unknown.

More as it breaks.