Sony arreglará PSPs con botón defectuoso

Sony Caves, Announces PSP Button Repair Program
Published: 02/22/2005
Written by: Alex Muniz
Sony Computer Entertainment has finally broken down and admitted that Japanese-model PSPs have a sticky problem. On a small fraction of the models, the square button closest to the screen sticks badly, the result of excess plastic left over from the molding process.

In reports translated from Sony Computer Entertainment’s Japanese website, the game giant is now offering a free repair program to any owner who sends in a PSP with a bum button.

Last month, Nikkei Business magazine estimated that 0.6 percent of the 800,000 units shipped in Japan through January 2005 possess the tricky square button.

Sony adds that the problem is nonexistent on PSPs produced in 2005 –good news for the millions in the U.S. eagerly awaiting the portable’s March launch.

The entire button repair program, however, appears to be a rare reverse-of-course for Sony. When the issue first surfaced in January, Sony’s explanation of the glitch was a tad different than it is today.

SCE President and Playstation brand creator Ken Kutaragi had declared that the button’s detection switch was intentionally offset to better accommodate the size of the portable’s LCD screen.

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“This is the design that we came up with. There may be people that complain about its usability, but that's something which users and game software developers will have to adapt to. I didn't want the PSP's LCD screen to become any smaller than this, nor did I want its machine body to become any larger,” Kutaragi told Nikkei Business in January.

More so than any sticky button could manage, Kutaragi’s remarks proceeded to frustrate some gamers, especially when he implied that to even question the company was akin to video game heresy. “I believe we made the most beautiful thing in the world. Nobody would criticize a renowned architect's blueprint that the position of a gate is wrong. It's the same as that,” snapped Kutaragi.

Fast-forward one month, and Sony’s contrite response to the PSP buttons’ performance should do much to quiet video game message boards, while setting up the PSP for what’s most important: A flawless U.S. launch.