Like a Jawa in the Tatooine sun, apparently Motorola managed to sell a whole bunch of DROIDs over the weekend. According to analyst Mark McKechnie at Broadpoint AmTech, they managed to move about 100,000 Droids during the opening weekend. Most stores moved at least half of their original shipments.

He also estimates that Motorola will sell one million Android-based phones in Q4 2009 alone (that includes the CLIQ). Looks like Motorola has something to celebrate.

The PS3 could face shortages during this holiday season if the current sales rate continues, according to SCEA chief Jack Tretton. He brags that PS3 sales have tripled since the price drop to $300 and the new slim redesign and says that it’s “conceivable” that these sustained sales could lead to some stores running out as demand outpaces supply.

The price drop alone has led to the PS3 outselling the Xbox 360 and the Wii. We’ll see what happens. Microsoft’s matching price drop for the Xbox 360 Elite might offset the discount, as well as the impending Wii price cut.

Looks like Sony’s PS3 Slim is paying off for the company. Sales of PS3 hardware at “top retailers” jumped 300% for the first week of September compared to the week before the system’s price was cut to $299 for the “slim”.

Yes, people are actually buying the console. This news surely makes the folks at Sony feel all warm and tingly, but that’s not it for good news. According to a survey by GamePlan Insights, five of consumers’ top 10 most-wanted games are actually on the PS3 (Gran Turismo 5, Final Fantasy XIII, God of War III, Assassin’s Creed 2, and Call of Duty: Modern Warfare 2).

Nintendo has been rolling in the Wii dough for awhile now, but it looks like their cash printing machine may be slowing. According to an earnings report filed today, the Big N posted a 66 percent drop in quarterly operating profit due to “slowing demand for its Wii console and a stronger yen.”

What’s surprising is how fast demand has fallen. Nintendo maintained that it would sell 26 million Wii consoles before the year was out alongside 30 million DS handhelds, so we will see what happens. DS sales have also slowed due to “increased competition in the handheld business from Apple’s iPhone.”

The MotionPlus may have taken a full year to arrive on the scene, but now that it’s here it’s doing pretty well. Overall video game sales dropped in June for the first time since 2000, but Nintendo can’t complain. 361,700 Wii consoles and 766,500 DS units shipped in June, but the big surprise is that the company also managed to sell 169,000 Wii MotionPlus units.

That’s not including the bundled ones like the one packaged with Tiger Woods PGA Tour 10 (that sold 272,400 units). Plus you have to take into account that Wii Sports Resort has yet to be released.

Looks like Samsung has a bit of a hit on its hands. Samsung has announced that it has sold 2M Samsung Jet handsets with pre-orders alone. For Samsung, this represents the largest handset order ever. The Jet runs Windows Mobile 6.1 Pro, with some serious capabilities like a 800Mhz processor and a WVGA AMOLED display. Those two features are superior to the iPhone 3GS. It even has decent looks.

The Samsung Jet also sports a web browser based on Webkit (like the iPhone and the G1), a 5MP camera and more. While Windows Mobile 6.1 is not your ideal dream touch-phone OS, we can hope that it’s upgradable to WM 6.5.

If you thought that Apple was having a hard time unloading all of those new 3G S units, you can rest easy. The gang at Cupertino have issued some stats that will make Apple fans breath a collective sigh of relief.

Those stats show that they’ve managed to move a million iPhone 3G S units over the weekend. That’s right, as usual, like lemmings to a proverbial cliff, tons of buyers flooded Apple’s stores for the new smartphone. It’s all looking great for Apple.

Palm and Sprint haven’t confirmed the numbers officially, but according to JPMorgan in a Wall Street Journal article, “sales in the first two days probably exceeded 50,000.” The figure was “aligned with expectations, but probably fell short of the 146,000 reported first-gen iPhone sales” during its opening weekend. And that was due to “capacity constraints in manufacturing.”

So it looks like the Pre launch was a success. Next weekend’s sales may put it all in perspective. It’s great news for Palm, but it isn’t all roses. We’ll have to see if new Palm owners are still having problems or not.

Microsoft has just announced that the Xbox 360 video game console has sold over 30 million units since the device was released several years go. Quite a milestone. Sales of the console have increased 28 percent this year alone, and over 20 million people are signed up to the Xbox Live network.

So what will Microsoft be showing off at E3 for the Xbox 360? We’ll have to wait and see, but likely we will be getting a look at the new motion-sensing camera, Metal Gear Solid 4 for the Xbox 360, and who knows what else? One thing is for sure, the Xbox 360 is kicking butt and taking names.

Despite a weak economy, Flat-panel sets are selling like hot-cakes. And Vizio is in first place among LCD TV manufacturers. The folks at DisplaySearch have some interesting new numbers on the flat-panel TV market, which has surged over the last year.

About 7.2 million flat-panel sets were sold in the first quarter of 2009, which is a 23% increase over the numbers from the first quarter of 2008. The numbers show Vizio’s market share at an impressive 18.9%. Higher-end brands like Sony and Samsung didn’t fare as well during the economic downturn and they saw their sales decrease compared to the same period last year.

If you’ve been paying attention to the gadget world you know that we’ve featured many turntables. Companies are making more and more. Seriously, people are spinning more vinyl. And according to the New York Post, Best Buy is thinking about selling vinyl records in their stores. Yes, it’s hard to believe.

Vinyl albums’ sales are growing. As much as 15 percent in 2007 and 89% more in 2008. The 2009 forecast is even better. And so Best Buy has started a pilot program in 100 stores. The results were good. So good that they are thinking about using as much as eight square feet in each of their stores to sell vinyl records.

The T-Mobile G1, has quietly hit a milestone. It has reached over a million units sold in the US alone, which is really saying something since it’s only been six months. It’s great news for the upcoming G2-HTC Dream Android-powered handset.

Sure, that’s nothing compared to the number of Blackberrys, iPhones, and Windows Mobile devices, but you can bet they have their eye on boostig that marketshare number.

The economy may be in the crapper, but Apple hasn’t really noticed. They just keep on keeping on, selling iPods, iPhones and Macs to a hungry public. Apple just reported a $1.21b profit on revenues of $8.16b, making it another record quarter.

This when Mac sales fell three percent compared to last year. Luckily for them it was offset by a three percent increase in iPod sales (mostly the iPod touch), while iPhone sales jumped 123-percent.

People really really love the Mushroom Kingdom. In the first week alone in the US, the big N managed to sell a whooping 435,00 DSi handhelds. Here’s something more amazing. In the month of March Nintendo systems accounted for just under 60 percent of all video game hardware sold in America.

This during a 17 percent drop in Wii sales during the same month. The news definitely gives Mario and Yoshi something to get excited about.

LG is proudly announcing that they have successfully made a lot of money off 20 million QWERTY cell phones around the globe. We don’t have any other breakdown on the data, like how many candybar, clamshell or slider form factors sold the most.

The most successful QWERTY devices include the enV series that sold over 8 million units in North America alone along with the Rumor series that sold 6 million units in North America. It’s quite a milestone for LG. You might say that the QWERTY bird gets the worm.