As with Sony’s recent hardware revision of the PlayStation 3, manufacturing costs were diminished by about 30 percent. The electronics giant may break even with its gaming console anytime soon, according to a recent iSuppli report.

Currently, the Play Station gaming rig is not on the top of the hill anymore. Having Microsoft Xbox and especially Nintendo Wii as fierce competitors, these are hard times for Sony to keep up with them and protect itself from the economic recession.

As such, the current version of PlayStation 3 takes less money from Sony’s pockets to manufacture, as the company was losing $200 with every unit they were selling. Much of this significant loss was recovered through game-title sales and royalties.

According to the iSuppli report, the cost of one unit of the PlayStation 3 is currently $448.73. This is quite an achievement, as the first generation, which had had a manufacturing cost of $690.23per unit.

The Play Station 3 currently has a price tag of $399 in the U.S., which is about $150 higher than its rivals are. Still, Sony managed to gain 16 percent share of the gaming console market.

A researcher at iSuppli pointed out that the decrease of manufacturing costs is natural, as the supply and demand factors lower hardware prices over time. He added that the study only calculated manufacturing costs, without software and box contents.