Sony's PlayStation 3 console is now officially scheduled to launch in November.

The annoucement was made by Sony Computer Entertainment president Ken Kutaragi earlier today at the PlayStation business conference in Tokyo. The system, which will ship standard with a hard drive, is planned for a simultaneous worldwide launch within the first ten days of November 2006. The company had originally planned to release the system this spring. Kutaragi apologized for the numerous delays, citing copy-protection-related delays with the Blu-Ray disc medium.

The PS3 will also ship with a hard drive and the ability to play backwards-compatible games from both other PlayStations in high definition. Sony also announced at the conference that the PSP handheld will lower in price to $199 US at the end of March, which will pull it closer in price range to the DS, and especially DS Lite, which is currently priced at around $149 in Japan. Sony did not announce a PS3 launch price.

Today's annoucement means that the PS3 will likely ship in tandem with or just before Revolution. Although Nintendo hasn't set an official, or even general launch period, Nintendo president Satoru Iwata has stated he believes a launch before the all-important holiday shopping season is key to the system's success.

Source: 1UP.com