fresh on the heels of the recent Kutaragi statements on the vision behind Playstations 4 and 5, an Australian website claims to have insider information about the arrival of "PS4" which could be less than 18 months away. However, the story goes on to mention that PS4 will only differ from the PS3 in ...in the drive bay and in the attachment area.

A Sony Playstation insider, the source quoted by the Aussie website Smarthouse, claims that the new Sony device will be based on the same chipset as the PS3 and its main enhancements will focus on networking. We have even looked at a Sony home server based on Playstation technology. This would allow consumers to connect home automation devices to the Sony server while also delivering online gaming and access to an extensive movie and music library, said a Sony source.

The concept of a brand new Playstation console so soon after the PS3 is, of course, out of the question. What we could be faced with therefore, may be Sony's answer to Microsoft's XBox Elite. The report suggests that the new console will introduce a larger hard drive, a story which has been around for a few weeks now.

The new features mentioned in this story however, raise doubts over the necessity for a new hardware version of the Playstation as the hard drive used by the console is industry-standard and can be upgraded by the user while most other features could be introduced through a firmware upgrade.

Sony has declined to comment but it is surprising that it has failed to vehemently deny the story; a move which would have been expected considering any mention of a new hardware version of the Playstation is bound to damage sales of the PS3.