Cam Cullen, Vice President, Global Marketing Procera Networks, ordered the new PlayStation 4 and followed closely the new gadget launch with series of device and network testing. According to his blog posting, the PS4 created a notable impact to broadband networks around the US, sending alerts to operators to keep an eye on the changing nature of gaming and game purchases going forward which interestingly will become part of their digital services game plan. The digital game downloads which replace DVDs provide both opportunities and challenges for MNOs - requiring them to cater for such sudden spikes in the network while providing opportunities to up-sell larger data quotas, offer QoS differentiated packages and provide more niche services for targeted end-user groups.
'It was Sony that suffered during this event more than the network operators. Beyond the reported Playstation network issues (which I suffered as well, see below), the impact on networks was noticeable, with as much as 17% of all HTTP-based download traffic on one network being tied to the PS4, and traffic peaks approaching 7 Gbps on one network. This first graph looks at Netflix traffic versus PS4 traffic on one network. As you can see, Netflix still dominates, but the PS4 is noticeable (hey, when your peak hits Netflix’s trough, that is something The PS4 was also the largest single contributor to HTTP-based downloads over the past 24 hours on that same network, registering over 17% of the download traffic as people updated the console and downloaded their initial games. This was where many issues were reported, with many consumers not able to login to the PlayStation Network to get their games, and if they could, the “play while downloading feature” left a bit to be desired for most games (I could play a few friendlies in FIFA 14)'
'Consumers seem to love the system, and I am a big fan of the system. Crisp graphics, great controller, even a very cool camera (not quite Kinect, but not as creepy!). I decided to go all digital for the console, and purchase no physical games, instead relying on Day 1 Digital delivery from the Playstation Store. Sony has done a good job with making it easy to purchase and download (and re-download if needed) content – games, movies, music, and even general applications. The launch day applications were mainly video streaming applications (which I investigate below). This shift towards “cloud” services has the potential to have a big impact on networks going forward, but in this case, the content provider suffered more than the broadband provider'. Read More 'Playstation 4 Launch: 24 Hours of Playtime'
