Another month, another new games console, or so it seems. Sony's Playstation 3 (PS3) has been hyped to hysteria and is the last of three 'next generation' games consoles to have been launched over the past 15 months.

Microsoft's now-veteran-like Xbox 360 arrived in December 2005 and Nintendo's motion-detecting Wii topped Christmas wish lists a few months ago. The question, now, is which one's best?

The bulky Sony PS3 weighs in at 5kg, the equivalent of precisely five-and-a-half Playstation 2s. It certainly looks the business though, with shiny black casing and silver trim and ‘PlayStation 3’ emblazoned across the top, or its side, if you stand the console vertically.

A lot of powerful technology has been packed inside the box too, including a Blu-ray drive and support for 1080p high definition (HD) video; currently the best picture money can buy.

While American and Japanese buyers are being offered two slightly different editions of the console, Euro-gamers will only be able to buy the all-singing-all-dancing PS3.

Although this means that desperate gamers won’t wind up settling for the cut-down version of the console (which only has a 20GB hard disk and doesn’t feature built-in Wifi or memory card slots), they will have to splash out a whopping £425 for a PS3 with a 60GB hard drive and the aforementioned extras. Putting things into perspective, a premium Xbox 360 pack costs £280 and a Nintendo Wii rolls in at £180.

However, the PS3 does have some fancy tricks up its sleeve. That 60GB hard disk is great for media functions such as storing music files, photos for slideshows and dowloadable content such as movies, demos and trailers.

The internal hard disk drive is upgradeable and it's also possible to play back and store media on external USB drives, so storage need never be an issue. Using Wifi, you can wirelessly connect a Sony PSP and stream media, providing you're in about a 10m range.

PS3 controllers are wireless and, like the Nintendo Wii, feature motion-sensing technology. At the moment there don’t appear to be many games that take advantage of the motion sensor in quite the same way as those that have been designed for the Wii Remote, but this could change.

Perhaps the PS3’s biggest advantage over its rivals is its Blu-ray disc drive that will play the new breed of high-definition (via HDMI output) movies. In our tests, the PS3 proved to be one of the best HD movie devices we’ve seen so far, even compared to dedicated Blu-ray and HD-DVD players. Unfortunately, the inclusion of this brand new technology is likely to be one of the main reasons why the console is so expensive.

We also have some reservations about the PS3 as an entertainment system. It can’t upscale DVD movies to higher definition formats in the way that many standalone players can and it can’t stream music or movies from a computer, yet. It is possible, however, that features will be added and issues resolved via free software updates, as we have already witnessed with the Xbox 360.

As always, it’s the games that will make or break the system. While the graphics are, at times, stunning, most of the launch titles are unlikely to blow you away in terms of playability.

However, PS3 has a release schedule that both Nintendo and Microsoft would be envious of, with key exclusive titles like Metal Gear Solid 4, Heavenly Sword, Devil May Cry 4 and Gran Turismo HD looking particularly promising at this stage. The PS3 is also backwards compatible with virtually every PS1 and PS2 game, although it won't 'upscale' the graphics into HD format.

So, the PS3 is the most expensive of the three by a long way and, as yet, good-quality software is very thin on the ground. However, there's no escaping how well Playstations have done in the past and in time, the PS3 could be console of choice.

See our video preview of the Playstation 3 .

Also consider
Nintendo Wii
The easy-to-pick-up controller system could well win console gaming a fresh following, but only a steady stream of strong software will get everyone bursting for a Wii

Microsoft Xbox 360
Fantastic gaming machine, but you need a lot of supporting hardware to get the most out of it

Sony Playstation Portable
Great for gaming, but a few niggles keep it from scoring top marks