The Wall Street Journal reports Sony is to launch two PlayStation 4 models come 7 September 2016-- while the company already confirmed the "Neo" 4K/UHD-capable upgrade, it will also announce a slimmer version of original console.
The story comes after images of the slimmer PS4 (aka "PS4 Slim") appeared on UK auction site Gumtree. The auction was first discovered by a Twitter user, before a person claiming to have bought the auctioned machine posted more images of the console in various states of boxing and unboxing on gaming forum NeoGAF.
Further confirming the existence of the machine was Eurogamer's Digital Foundry, whose journalist managed to get an own photo of the PS4 Slim. Judging from the various images available so far, the console appears to be a European model with a 500GB HDD.
Moving back to the WSJ story, the report claims Sony has already cut production of the current PS4 ahead of the announcement event, suggesting the slim model will replace the launch PS4 as the standard version. Which would not be too surprising, since Sony has done exactly that with all its games consoles since the very first PlayStation.
As for the PS4 Neo, back in June Sony Interactive Entertainment CEO Andrew House told the Financial Times the upgraded PS4 will "sit alongside and complement the standard PS4.” This means both versions of the consoles should receive the same games, if with "a very large majority" of titles having extra features for the higher-end PS4.
Microsoft is also following a similar strategy with the Xbox-- E3 2016 saw the company reveal a slimmer version of the Xbox One, dubbed the Xbox One S, and a more powerful upgrade called Project Scorpio.
Go Sony to Sell Updated Model of Standard PS4 (WSJ.com, subscription required)