Sony seems to have decided in their infinite wisdom that version 3.15 of the PlayStation 3 firmware needs to be a mandatory upgrade after all. Previously, the firmware update was just an option release that focused on the “PSP minis” ability to be played on the PlayStation 3.

Our sources are speculating that the decision to move the 3.15 firmware to mandatory might be in the fact that the next firmware update will likely have to have 3.15 already installed to function correctly. If this is not the case, our source say that it is possible that while it might not be documented, 3.15 might fix something else that Sony has found and now realizes that they need to get the update in place to eliminate problems for the user community.

It seems that other than a couple of new systems-oriented features like the data transfer utility and addition of the “minis” support, Sony does not mention any other fixes included in the firmware update. According to what we have read so far, there seems not to be any reason to update, as 3.15 has been stable for some time now.