Anything i should know? (ps3)

Musty Pie

Musty Pie

Musty Pie

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I am looking at buying a ps3 this month to complete my collection of this gen consoles. And not being clued up on ANY playstation hardware (never owned a playstation 1/2 in the past) I was wondering if there is anything that i should know before forking out for one?

Whats the failure rate like? Is it actually worth all the money? Whats blueray like in comparison to HD DVD? (have the xbox HD DVD player) Is the online service any good?

I know these are all pretty vauge questions but i just want as much info as possible from people who have one/use one so i know what to expect.

I have a full hd TV (Samsung 1080p)
and a logitech Z-5500 speaker set which i use on my xbox 360 and TV
 
You'll need a HDMI cable and if you want surround sound an optical cable. Any half decent HDMI cable (£5+) should do the job, don't go too expensive.

I feel it's worth the money but i don't own a 360, it has plenty of imo very good exclusives so even if you don't use it for multiplatform games you should still get plenty of use out of it. They're both very similar beasts, capable of similar things just the PS3 has a lot of the 360s addons built in hence the higher price tag (wireless built in, high definition format playback as standard etc etc)

Bluray picture quality wise will be pretty much identical to HDDVD, the big glaring difference is that bluray isn't dead so you'll be able to pick up all the newer movies for it that aren't available on HDDVD.

The online service is functional, all online games work, you have a friends list that you can start voice chat with/send text messages, it also has a new chat room feature where several people can join and leave short text messages that will appear as a notification while you play. Advantages over Live would be firstly that it's free and secondly that the majority of first party games have dedicated servers, this allows for larger, low ping games (for example Resistance 1 supported 64 player servers). Disadvantages would be that it just isn't quite as polished as the 360 online experience, cross game invites if accepted don't quit the game and connect automatically, you have to quit the game, launch the relevant game and then accept the invite. Cross game voice chat isn't available 'yet' but isn't an impossibility.

The PSN isn't as advanced as live imo, but it's MUCH better than it was this time last year. Sony are constantly improving it and adding features.

[EDIT] Forgot reliability. The PS3 isn't failure proof but it isn't as prone to failure as the 360.
 
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The fail rate is absolutely fine, Sony will replace without much fuss within the warranty period and if you need peace of mind then there's Sony's own extended warranty for £5 per month, which you can take out AFTER the normal warranty has expired.
I bought mine when it was £400 and it's the best purchase I've ever made, I use it for all my media playback, watching telly (via PlayTv) and gaming of course.
That's only my opinion though, there's bound to be others out there who feel the opposite.
Blu ray is about the same as HD-DVD, some films better, some films worse, but it's all minor differences that only a discerning eye would pick up.
The PS3 online service is really good, the downloading can be slow at times, but for free it's certainly very good.
Online gaming itself is as good as XBL in my opinion.
 
Thanks for all the replies chaps thats pretty much answered everything i need to know.
Im probably going to get a bundle deal and then upgrade the HDD inside. Is there a limit to the size of the HDD that the unit can take?

Any suggestions on a HDD for size/cost/noise?
 
Basically any sata laptop drive will do, i typically recommend samsungs as i have had good experiences with the brand. I think there is a very small number of drives that are physically too big as in they don't fit in the drive bay but they're quite rare, haven't heard of anyone having problems with sammys.
 
You're probably best getting a 40GB PS3 then just buying a bigger size HDD.
You can change them easy enough and it doesn't invalidate you warranty.I've got a 200GB HDD in mine.
 
biron_w said:
You're probably best getting a 40GB PS3 then just buying a bigger size HDD.
You can change them easy enough and it doesn't invalidate you warranty.I've got a 200GB HDD in mine.
Click to expand...
The 80Gb ones do have a smaller energy footprint though, plus they come with a DS3 pad as standard, so you're not really saving anything in the long run.
 
yeah thats a very good point. Ill get an 80GB one just for the dual shock, and most bundles seem to come with an 80 gigger and a game for a reasonable price.
 
somthing I've noticed recently when sharing is turned on on my pc, the ps3 found the media player and can now stream all the movies/music libraries from my pc with no hassle or extra programs (just windows media player on the pc) over the wireless :D

tis awesome :p
 
With easter just gone, Theres a lot of good offers around at the moment, HMV are doing a good offer with killzone 2 and fifa for around 300 quid

Take a look here to compare deals : PS3 bundle
 
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HTMLHugo said:
ive just got my 1st PS3 and wanted to clarify this point.

does the surround sound not travel through the hdmi ?

ive got an optical lead so its not a problem just wanted to check ?
Click to expand...

Yes surround sound does travel through HDMI. In fact HDMI offers better sound quality than optical if your amp supports these new fangled HD audio codecs.

I recommended optical to him as he mentioned he had z-5500 speakers; these only support optical and digital coax as means for digital surround sound. Out of those the PS3 only supports optical.
 
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