Major PlayStation Home update tomorrow

A new start-up system and updates to the Wardrobe and Furniture browser headline a hefty PlayStation Home update going live tomorrow.

As detailed on the PlayStation Blog, update 1.55 introduces the following new features to PlayStation 3's social networking hub:

Start-Up

• Improved the layout, design, color scheme and text of the start-up flow.
• The start-up flow will now display a variety of information depending on how recently you last visited PlayStation Home.

Wardrobe and Furniture Browser

• When you are browsing through a category of items in the wardrobe or furniture browser we now display the name of the object you have highlighted.
• There is an option in the Menu Pad under "Options > Settings > Personal > Clothing / Furniture Names" to change this behavior: Off: Switches the display of names off; Selected: Displays the name of the selected object only (default); All: Displays names for all objects.
• You can click [L3] to display more information about the highlighted object. This will pop up a menu showing: name; description; image; whether it is a purchase, reward or part of the default inventory; date of acquisition (if relevant).
• In addition to the name changes the overall speed of the wardrobe and furniture browser has been significantly increased.

General

• Added an option to manually clear the cache of data that Home creates on your HDD. This can sometimes resolve problems that you might be having. You can find it in the Menu Pad under "Options > Settings > Personal > Clear Cache".

On top of that, the update also brings with it a few enhancements to the existing feature set:

Menu Pad

• There is an option to view "Help" from the carousel on the Menu Pad. This is only available to new users.
• There is an option to "Redecorate" on the carousel on the Menu Pad. This is only available when you are in your Personal Space or a Clubhouse that you own (i.e. somewhere that you can place furniture).

Loading Screen Tips

• Different loading screen tips are now shown depending on how many times you have visited PlayStation Home.

General

• Continued work to improve stability.

Aside from the update itself, there are various other new bits and bobs due for release this week. LOOT has updated its Active Camera, there's some Alice Cooper-themed tat up for grabs in the AAA Store, a new Ansa da Fone apartment from nDreams, virtual Billabong clobber in the Shopping Centre and a new Sodium2 track.