This just makes you feel old. Can you believe it has been 15 years since the original PlayStation was launched? How many of us spent countless hours playing games on this thing? It was launched in Japan 15 years ago today and in the US and UK a year later.

Sony then launched the PS2 in 2000, and it remains the number one selling game console of all time. In 2001 Sony relaunched the original PlayStation as the PS One. Of course the PS3 came after that. Here’s to many more years of good gaming.

Sony in Japan has introduced the smallest USB biometric scanner yet, for reading users’ finger vein patterns. This new smallest yet is called the FVA-U1. Sony labels the technology mofiria and says that it’s more accurate and secure than fingerprint readers since it relies on unique blood vein patterns in the finger. The FVA-U1 connects to PCs via USB 2.0.

Mofiria uses a CMOS sensor that reads scattered light through the finger that originates from a near-infrared LED light. The FVA-U1 should ship in Japan on December 18th. No word yet on pricing.

Winter is here so why not have a camera to match the season. Sony is offering a snowflake version of its DSC-TX1 compact camera for just the occasion. The special edition is available in Silver, Black and Pink. There’s no extra charge for the engraving, but Sony will only offer it during the holidays.

Some features include a 10.2 Megapixel compact camera, 4X optical zoom, Carl Zeiss lens, and a 3″ LCD touch display. Other features: 10fps burst mode, low-light capabilities and the 185 degree sweep panorama.

Some screen shots of a new update for the PS3 that shows Facebook running on the console have tipped up in Europe. Facebook has been available on the Xbox 360 for a while but hasn’t been offered on other consoles.

I guess Sony is finally tired of Xbox offering things that the PS3 doesn’t. Now that the PS3 has Netflix and will be getting Facebook; the Xbox has two reasons less to buy it rather than the PS3. There is no word on when exactly the update will hit.

Sony is releasing three new laptops, all part of the Vaio Fall-Winter Signature collection. The Sony Vaio VGN-FW590FFD comes with a 16.4-inch LCD display, 4GB of RAM, 500GB hard disk drive, a 2.53GHZ Intel Core 2 Duo P8700 processor and ATI Mobility Radeon HD 4650 graphics.

We covered the Sony VAIO FW Nebula, which features a 16.4-inch extra widescreen HD display, an Intel Core 2 Duo Processor, an ATI HD Graphics card with up to 1GB VRAM, up to 8GB of configurable RAM, up to a 500GB hard drive or 256GB SSD, and you’ll get 5.5-hours of battery life.

The last few weeks have seen several large recalls of products by consumer electronics makers. Sony is certainly no stranger to recalls and was one of the companies that recalled huge numbers of batteries a few years ago.

This week Sony announced that it was issuing a recall on 69,000 VAIO computer AC adapters model number VGP-AC19V. The adapters were sold with VAIO AIO computers, docking stations, VCG-LT and VGC-JS2 series computers, and VGP-PRBX1 and VGP-PRFE1 machines.

Like everyone else, right now Sony has a thing for 3D. They have big plans for putting the technology into your living room as soon as possible. The first application will be applied to the flat screen TV, but Sony is looking at all kinds of other ways to bring you glorious 3D. Take this small prototype for instance.

This thing will be revealed at Tokyo’s Digital Content EXP0 2009 on Thursday. It’s a 13 x 27-cm device with a stereoscopic, 24-bit color image measuring just 96 × 128 pixels, viewable at 360-degrees without special glasses. If this prototype ever becomes a reality, Sony sees its commercial use in digital signage or medical imaging and of course, as a 3D photo frame.

Check out Sony’s new thin-and-light VAIO X, but this is no ordinary VAIO X, it’s practically invisible. This guy made its debut at a press event in China today. A surprisingly transparent edition of the laptop. And before you ask, no you will likely never see this on store shelves.

So if you wanted to see it’s inner workings, this is your best chance. You certainly wouldn’t want to spend upwards of $1,300 for this thing only to take it apart. Of course, that is half the fun.

You know I admit that I wasn’t sure what to think of the PSP Go when I first heard about it. I have a few UMD games around and the thought of not being able to play them because of UMD not being part of the Go irked me. I guess that didn’t bother many buyers because in the days since the Go went official sales have gone up 300% according to Sony.

In addition to hardware sales climbing 300% since launch, sales of download games on the PlayStation Store have also climbed 200%. That means that gamers are actually buying games for the Go. The increase in sale isn’t in the U.S. only either.

Sony is about to drop its new Quad Full High Definition (QFHD) LCD display, the TRIMASTER SRM-L560, on the Japanese market. Be warned, it’s for those with huge bank accounts. The 56-inch widescreen monitor is based on a SI TI active matrix LCD panel and delivers an amazing native resolution of 3840 x 2160 pixels, 10bit RGB LED backlight and a 170/170 degree viewing angle.

The monitor also supports some other display modes like 4K/QFHD mode (4096 x 2160 or 3840 x 2160), Quad View mode (2048 x 1080, 1920 x 1080 etc), 2K/HD Zoom mode (2048 x 1080, 1920 x 1080 etc) and Native Scan mode with shift function for side cut images.

Sony’s latest all-in-one PC is the Vaio L This sexy all-in-one features Windows 7 support and also has its own multitouch capability for scrolling and zooming through content without any additional software. Sony’s custom touch portal, Media Gallery, lets you use touch to edit photos and videos.

The Vaio L series starts at $1,300 and goes up from there. The basic unit comes with a 24″ full HD display, Intel Pentium 2.7GHz dual core processor, 4GB RAM, a 320GB hard drive, a DVD writer and a GeForce G210M integrated chipset that handles both 3D and HD video decoding. You can pre-order today, with shipping happening in November.

It’s Breast Cancer Awareness month and to support the search for a cure to breast cancer many companies in the consumer electronic market are offering donations of part of the proceeds from some of the items they sell. The money donated will help support cancer research.

As you might expect most of the electronic devices that are part of the breast cancer awareness push from companies are pink. Sony announced a couple pink products today including the Pink W Series netbook bundle and the Rose Reader Pocket Edition.

I have a few external optical drives in my office that I use when I am working on my netbook. The things are a few years old and are not at all thin. The big drives also require power adapters while newer drives can be totally powered by the USB port. Sony has announced a new slim CD/DVD burner today called the DRX-S70U-W that is very thin.

The thin drive can burn DVD+/- R media at up to 8X speeds. The drive can also record to dual layer optical media at up to 6X speeds. Plain ol’ CD-R/RW discs can be burned at a speedy 24x.

I think most gamers knew that when the PS3 Slim was unveiled at the $299 price point that the other console makers would have to cut prices to compete. Microsoft shortly after matched the $299 price and Nintendo has now gone official with a new $199 price of the Wii.

If you have any doubts that the new price would mean robust sales for the PS3 Slim, let them go now. Sony announced that since the price cut went into effect three weeks ago the PS3 Slim has now sold 1 million units worldwide.

Sony’s DRC-BT30P is a pretty convenient device. Many of you have been waiting for one like this. Some features include answer buttons, volume and playback controls and they are available in a range of interesting colors, including black, white, pink and blue.

The Sony DRC-BT30P adapter puts you in complete control of your music without being physically connected to a phone and let’s you use your own headphones.