When you buy a portable gaming device such as the PlayStation Vita, surely you know that you’re not just paying for the cost of the parts. There are all sorts of things to pay for aside from that, but have you ever thought how much the parts alone would cost? A report coming from UBM Tech Insights took on the arduous task of pulling a Vita apart piece by piece, and letting us know the costs of making one.
It looks as though the full cost of one of the 3G versions of these things is priced at $159.10. To give you an idea of how high or low that number is, the 3DS costs about $100 per unit. Currently the standing prices for a Vita is $250 for the WiFi-only versions, and $300 for 3G.
From the looks of things, Sony is pulling in about $90 from the WiFi-Only model, and about $140 from the 3G model. Now I have no idea how this translates to labor, production, and transportation costs, but obviously they are making some sort of profit off of this thing or they would be making efforts to change how things are being run. Seeing as I could buy a PS3 for that much, it seems a little on the excessive side, don’t you think?