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SpencerDaviesUk
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Rating:  4
Time with product: 11 Months
Strengths: powerful peice of kit, big screen, fits round hands well, wireless, movies via memory stick.
Weaknesses: sonys policy on dead pixels, the UMD format, buttons not responsive enough, loading times, battery, price for the machine, the amount of games availible.
Summary: First of all, before anyone looks at me and starts thinking im a fanboy becuase i have a different opinion..go away.Ive owned a PSP since july as i imported from the internet (back when they were allowed to import). When it first came i was so exited, i thought, yeh ive made the right choice here...That thought lasted about 2 weeks.For the amount of £205.49 i got the console with a 1gb memory stick, charger adapter, machine, etc and Rdige Racer game. Pretty good deal for a latest handheld i thought.Ill start with the negatives....When first putting in an game into your PSP, loading times are, well, painful if your a person who is used to quick loading times....to load one level on ridge racer almost took a minute...thats shocking in my opinion. Wireless, is something that is neccessary these days, you instantly think, yes, its gonna work well...it does to an extent....before your battery runs out. Battery on the whole is acceptable, but doesnt compare to Nintendo's offering of its DS. The only way to get good use of the battery is if you turn on power saving and wireless off and dont play games or movies and from the UMD drive and just play music from your memory stick with it.The UMD format (Universial Media Disc i gather) is essentially a mini disc form from sony again. Sometimes i wonder if Sonys aim is to create flawed formats...examples, minidisc, now UMD, beatamaxx, etc. The UMD discs are sealed in a plastic cover which is very tempermental. When i bought GTA: Liberty City Stories, the UMD did a "cave in" whilst playing in the drive. UMD Cave In is when you play the game and whilst playing it the cover that surrounds the disc itself caves in and breaks.The PSP system also supports movies via UMD too..officially anyways. Considering UMD movies cost £20 and they are the same as DVDS, why would you want to buy a UMD disc insted of a DVD disc? Also big movie companys are also pulling out of backing the UMD media for its films as its not "profitable" for them.Dead Pixels: i have two dead pixels on mine..Sony's policy is, if im reading it correctly here, has to be 8 dead pixels to be classed as faulty and be sent back...question: why does sony have to be 8 dead pixels to be sent back and nintendo's on their DS is only 1 to be sent back?Games: Ok, its been out since September in Europe, but there is still a very small amount of games for the machine. Is Sony abandoning it already?, who knows. Most games ive seen for the machine at the minute are ports from its big brother Ps2. Im still yet to find an origional game that has had the effort put in by its developers, etc.Price: Prices currently stand at a modest price for the machine, but i still think it could have more success it it was round the £110 mark as its still overpriced for what the machine is.Buttons: As most people know who have a Japanese PSP (i dont for the record, mine is American), they nag with the "X" button being too close to the screen, not being responsive enough, etc. Same can go for the analogue stick, it just doesnt feel right when you are playing the game with it. In General, the buttons are playable enough for the games, but not for long periods of time.Now ive got all the negatives out of the way, ill go to the positives.Its a lovely design, no matter what anyone says, its a sweet design, your hands (which mine are big) fit perfectly around the machine itself.The specs and graphical power of the PSP is immense from such a small machine, its about 10mhz more powerful than the Ps2. Games such as Ridge Racer looks great on the machine and id still say its probably the best looking game there is for the machine.The Screen is nice and large, excellent for playing your games, cant fault it..unless you have dead pixels on it lol.Movies like i say are officially only through the UMD drive, but some people (like myself) manage to get films and rip them to the memory stick and play it off that. However ristrictions in the PSP firmware are now preventing that. But its the best way if you can find the ways round it. Saves battery too.Wireless is also good for the machine for gaming...if you know networking pretty well, you can play people from around the world (via Kai Evo Xlink)..just rememeber to turn your wireless off when you dont need it ;).All in all, its not a bad machine, but in opinion, a below par offering from Sony...If Sony put more effort into the machine to making it an games machine insted of a multimedia system, costs wouldnt have been as steep and it would have been more viable for consumers. Sony should have also thought about the media drive, which is useful for absolutely nothing. End of the day, its your personal preferance, but if you want to get one for the playability, its not worth it, your best keeping your attention to Nintendo's DS or not buying an handheld at all. If you want one for the hell of it, go ahead, get one.
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nipn3ss
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Rating:  10
Time with product: 1
Strengths: Psp is great, has wireless card, internet browser, video player, music player, picture loading and UMD player
Weaknesses: it's slow at loading the UMD, but it's not unusual
Summary: The PSP is great. I take it everywhere with me, and I'm never bored. Whenever I have nothing to do, I just pop up my PSP out of my pocket.
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yikes
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Rating:  6
Time with product: 14
Strengths: Well built, the "wow" factor, good control, great LCD screen, fast access.
Weaknesses: UMD is super slow, the black finish/screen are smudgy/fingerprint magnets, LCD screen has lots of ghosting, poor RPG/strategy game selection now, slow to resize movie, and trouble transfer big files.
Summary: Where do I start? Pro: It is well designed and well built; Everybody who has seen it loved it; All love the clarity of the LCD screen; The controls are well organized, perfect fit; User interface of the PSP is top notch; MP3 playback quality is great; strong battery life; smart charging where it will auto shut off when full to conserve battery life (not sure, anyone confirm/deny?). Con: Accessing UMD is slow for both movie playing and especially games. Very annoying; The reflective black finish and the LCD screen are constantly full of oily smudge from fingers, gotta learn to live with it; Watching action movie on the LCD reveals lots of ghosting. Which means the LCD's response time is poorly slow. I did not expect this from SONY. Very disappointed; Also the movies are a bit on the dark side, making it a bit hard to see; Resizing a full 2 hr movie to PSP friendly size will take your PC at least 2 hours (highest quality on both video and audio); And then, good luck with transferring that huge 1.7GB movie file via USB2.0 cable to your PSP. It often stop 1/3 or half way. WTF. I only succeeded once and I don't know how it happened.; Poor RPG/strategy game selection out there. Heck, it has been out for years now, no? What's going on, SONY?; Got mine new and it is 2.01 firmware version, which means I can not downgrade it to 1.5 to play all those home-brew applications, utilities, games, and emulators. Which may make PSP shine as a real portable gameing machine that have value to keep.; And why does it have Korean, ..... but no Chinese language ? Oh well, that is my rave and ranting. Hope this helps. I may play with it for a bit and sell it.
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6.5
£211.93
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