What are the media functionality of the Xbox 360 and PS3 like? whats better?

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I am gonna have both at one point :p but i want to know whats superior for media functionality. I know PS3 has Blu Ray which i like but what about how they work with media, pictures, music, internet etc?

I am having trouble finding detailed comparsions and stuff on each console. Is the wireless media features good for example? I know 360 has Vista media extender support which sounds cool but i dont know how it works.
 
The PS3 I read is suppose to be the best for media, I have the 360 and it's half decent, but a shame it doesn't decode divx, xvid, etc but you can buy seperate HD DVD for the 360.
 
The PS3 uses an enhanced XMB interface that is better than the one on the PSP.

Now my PSP has better media functions than the 360 (apart fom the streaming).

The music player has more options, can deal with tags properly, album art etc.
The video player has more options, can deal with aspect ratios and other settings.

From what I have seen the PS3 improves on this.

What the 360 has at the moment is this MCE extender, which I don't think that many people use. At the very least you need windows media centre 2005 (not many computers came with this), or Vista Home Premium/Ultimate.

I am sure some people on these forums will disagree, but I don't think the media centre extender is something most people will know how to use or care about, especially when they realise they would have to convert their videos or do some transcoding (like a lot of people know what that is!!).

The PS3 doesn't have this streaming thing. They are going more down the location free player oute by storing the mdedia on the PS3 HD and then streaming it via your LAN or wifi or Internet to a PSP or other Sony Device with Location free capabilities. Again I don't think most people will know how to use this.

Most people will just play music or pictures or videos from a memory stick or Ipod or something like that. I think there is more features if you do this on PS3 at the moment. I don't think MS are concentrating as much on media player style functions as they are too busy selling video content in the USA, which gives them revenue, rather than developing better media player features that may stop people using Windows Media Player (imo).

All of these are just my opinion.


Ultimately the biggest problem on both machines is that the video needs to be a certain format. It all depends which websites start to release video in native formats for these devices. Many sites already offer video pre-formatted to ipod/psp formats. I don't know if the same sites are prevented from releasing them in 360/ps3 format at the moment, as this would conflict with the paid for content MS and Sony are pushing via there own online systems.


rp2000
 
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A £20 second-hand xbox 1 w/ XBMC installed beats the media functionality of both the 360 + PS3 (except the ability to handle HD if that is important to you)
 
rp2000 said:
The PS3 uses an enhanced XMB interface that is better than the one on the PSP.

Now my PSP has better media functions than the 360 (apart fom the streaming).

The music player has more options, can deal with tags properly, album art etc.
The video player has more options, can deal with aspect ratios and other settings.

From what I have seen the PS3 improves on this.

What the 360 has at the moment is this MCE extender, which I don't think that many people use. At the very least you need windows media centre 2005 (not many computers came with this), or Vista Home Premium/Ultimate.

I am sure some people on these forums will disagree, but I don't think the media centre extender is something most people will know how to use or care about, especially when they realise they would have to convert their videos or do some transcoding (like a lot of people know what that is!!).

The PS3 doesn't have this streaming thing. They are going more down the location free player oute by storing the mdedia on the PS3 HD and then streaming it via your LAN or wifi or Internet to a PSP or other Sony Device with Location free capabilities. Again I don't think most people will know how to use this.

Most people will just play music or pictures or videos from a memory stick or Ipod or something like that. I think there is more features if you do this on PS3 at the moment. I don't think MS are concentrating as much on media player style functions as they are too busy selling video content in the USA, which gives them revenue, rather than developing better media player features that may stop people using Windows Media Player (imo).

All of these are just my opinion.


Ultimately the biggest problem on both machines is that the video needs to be a certain format. It all depends which websites start to release video in native formats for these devices. Many sites already offer video pre-formatted to ipod/psp formats. I don't know if the same sites are prevented from releasing them in 360/ps3 format at the moment, as this would conflict with the paid for content MS and Sony are pushing via there own online systems.


rp2000

Thats a lot to chew on. I am interested in wireless media playback. But i also like the osund of PS3's superior media functions(built in card readers etc)

Thats a lot of info. I have Vista at home. Problem with MS is that they have a seperate standard for wireless media so device slike my Nokia N80 cant communicate properly without 3rd party software. The N80 can grab stuff from windows however. But windows cant grab stuff from the N80. DLNA devices work fine with the N80. IMO less wires the better.
 
The 360 is great for me media wise. My pc is XP, i've installed windows media connect on that, and it streams the 10gig of music effortlessly to the 360. And the 360 handles tags fine as far as i can see :confused:

Problem is you need your PC on to be able to do this obviously, which is why i've considered purchasing a USB hard drive to put all my music on that.

As for video's, anything i wanna stream i'll change it to wmv first then it works no problems. Think some software does it on the fly however, not tried it myself.
 
fdxd said:
Thats a lot to chew on. I am interested in wireless media playback. But i also like the osund of PS3's superior media functions(built in card readers etc)

Thats a lot of info. I have Vista at home. Problem with MS is that they have a seperate standard for wireless media so device slike my Nokia N80 cant communicate properly without 3rd party software. The N80 can grab stuff from windows however. But windows cant grab stuff from the N80. DLNA devices work fine with the N80. IMO less wires the better.

As yet I have not heard or read about any software that goes on your PC and acts like the xbox windows media connect that allows streaming from PC hard drive to 360. TBH I would prefer a way of viewing content that does not require you to leave your PC on. I have one of these NAS things and I am hoping I can somehow just connect to that using like windows file sharing, but I don't think either 360 or PS3 offers that yet.

I am fairly confident that the ps3 media playback stuff is going to get a shake up in the new firmware due on Friday. Better photo playback for start, they showed some demo at one of these game shows that allowed all sorts of photo playback modes with cool transistions and 3d effects. Will try to find a youtube link.

btw, you lazy PS3 owners get into this thread and explain to me how the ps3 to pc integration works. Otherwise I may actually have to go to google and search myself!!!


rp2000
 
PC connectivity on the 360 is pretty neat, streaming your mp3s and (only wmv) videos is good. If my tv wasnt mounted directly above my pc and plugged into my pc I would have my 360 plugged into my router and use it to play all of my DVDs and convert any other video i have to wmv to be able to watch on there...

The remote I havent tried, but I assume this works with the video playback and ofc dvd, this is a nice feature and the 360 is a nice looking bit of kit to put anyhwere in your home (maybe one only problem is the noise from the fans!)

Cant comment on the PS3 as I dont have one :P
 
Just found this:

http://www.gamer411.com/blog/42


This implies you cannot move files from PC to PS3 directly!! This guy has setup an IIS server to do this, which I can do, but that seems like way too much hassle.


The PSP had a USB connection and when you activate it it just showed up as a usb mass storage drive and you dragged the files onto it and they saved to the memory stick in the PSP. I was expecting something similar to this on the PS3 tbh.

I am guessing there is ps3 to psp connectivity so will it be some crap like, connect PC to PSP to move files to PSP. Then connect PSP to PS3 and transfer files.

To be honest, direct file transfer from pc to 360 Hard Drive is not supported on 360 either. BUT, as this was available on the PSP I cannot understand why they cannot implement something similar with PS3 to PC via USB or LAN.


I think I was expecting an easy way to move media onto the 60gb HDD in the ps3. We all have memory sticks and ipods and usb HDD we could use, but I think most people's music/video collections sit on a PC hard disk or FileServer/NAS. Would have been nice to move them files in 1 step, rather than 2.

Anyone with a PS3 able to confirm these limitations? JUMPURS? JoeBob? ElRazur?


rp2000
 
Tony Williams said:
You're better going for a htpc, on budget if media is a big thing for you.


Well, I have a NAS, and a macmini already for media and HD stuff. Just wondered if I could use some of the functions on the PS3 similarly.


rp2000
 
As the 360 is a Media Center extender, you can connect to your PC and view photos, play music and watch WMV/MPG files (plus DivX using free software but it's a bit wonky at the minute).

You can do the same (bar DivX) by plugging an external HDD into the USB port on the 360 but your videos will be presented as one big list rather than individual folders.

I believe the PS3 can do all the same things (photo viewing in that Polaroid slideshow thing seems a bit better), you can watch H.264 MP4 files which I don't think the 360 will do. Obviously, the PS3 won't accept WMVs.

The PS3 has card slots in for viewing your digital photos but I'm sure the 360 can do the same if you plug your camera in via USB, too.
 
Does anyone else find the media connect functionality on the Xbox 360 really slow? I press a button and it literally takes 20 seconds for the Xbox 360 to respond. I've tried looking in the performance settings and apparently my 802.11g network falls just short of being able to stream TV. So why it's so unresponsive around the menus, I just don't know.

The range of codecs supported is also disappointing. Come on Microsoft, both AAC and H.263/H.264 are industry-wide standards - support them!

It's a shame, because the idea is really good.

No idea about the PS3's capabilities though.
 
ic1male said:
As the 360 is a Media Center extender, you can connect to your PC and view photos, play music and watch WMV/MPG files (plus DivX using free software but it's a bit wonky at the minute).


nothing wonky with playing back divx or xvid, works perfect
 
xbox 360 would probably edge it as it has media center extender on it.
Though if you don't have a media center PC that really doesn't matter, and in which case i would probably say the PS3.
 
The ps3 can have linux installed, so it can play pretty much anything really, wether this is an option for most i dont know :)
 
blairw said:
The ps3 can have linux installed, so it can play pretty much anything really, wether this is an option for most i dont know :)

I thought the linux thing that you can get (yellow dog?) has no access to the graphics chips etc? Wouldn't that be needed to playback hd/divx etc content?


rp2000
 
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