A picture purporting to be concept art of Sony's next-generation console, the PlayStation 3, has been circulated on the Internet, showing a sleek silver console with a slot-loading DVD drive.

So, is this an early glimpse of the future of console entertainment? We have our doubts, since although we've been unable to confirm where the image originated, it doesn't appear to have been officially released by Sony - unlike last month's PSP concept images, which appeared in a presentation given by SCE boss Ken Kutaragi.

Indeed, a highly placed source within Sony told us that he'd never seen the concept design shown in the image before. Although he did concede that it "could be something Japan cooked up and hasn't shown us", he was adamant that he thought it highly unlikely that the image originated from within Sony.

So what we're left with, perhaps unsurprisingly, is a very clever and well-implemented mock-up of the forthcoming console, which probably bears no resemblance to the final product. It does look nice though, doesn't it?

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