In the last few days we’ve been shown glimpses of what the future holds for the next generation gaming consoles from the likes of Microsoft and Nintendo. At this year’s Electronic Entertainment Expo, we’ll should also hear more from Sony.

Consumers can expect the new game consoles to be extremely powerful and include features that will make them the center of your digital entertainment hub. The most prominent feature is wireless connectivity, which will allow consumers to access the Internet, share photos and music and watch DVD movies.

Earlier this year Nintendo announced Revolution, the successor to its GameCube console. Its main focus was wireless connectivity and backwards compatibility with GameCube games. Unfortunately, the system isn’t expected until sometime in 2006, missing the critical holiday shopping season.

Microsoft confirmed earlier this week that its next generation console, XBox 360, is going to pack so much power, that they expect it to become the center of your digital life, featuring a 20GB hard drive, three PowerPC processors, a custom graphics chip and wireless Internet access for using Xbox Live. Moreover, the most important news to come from Microsoft was the fact that XBox 360 will be here just in time for the holiday season, giving Microsoft a potential huge lead in the console battle.

Finally, while Sony has been rather quiet on details of its Playstation 3 unit, they have confirmed that their next console will feature Cell technology that is being developed together with Toshiba. The new technology will pack 10 times the performance of the today’s personal computers. Sony expects to begin shipping the system sometime in 2006.

The Electronic Entertainment Expo will take place May 17 through 20 in Los Angeles.






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