Who owns a PS3?

[Raider704]

I'm thinking of picking one up before the 60gb's are gone. Never owned a ps2 and would love to catch up with the Final Fantasy games I missed, among new PS3 games.

Are the graphics as amazing as people say they are?
Do you need an HDTV to get the full effects?
Is it worth it?


Any review would be greatly appreciated.

Thanks!

[golfermatt91]

if you have a hdtv its worth it.

[BCUS28]

I've had one for a few months now, it's AMAZING.
The PS3 has:

-Blue-Ray player
-all contollers are WIRELESS
-4 USB slots
-INTERNET Browser, that's right, on your TV screen
-Stores music, videos
-Blue-tooth (someday I'll get a bluetooth headset for online gaming)
-Playstation Store - free game demos, free video demos, trailers, and some cool games you can buy on the spot and it gets placed on your systems hard drive. Also the store gives you add-ons to games.
-System Updates over the internet, basically these are performance or system or game enhancers. Add-on content for games also, such as adding more course, say, to a racing game. So just because a game comes out, doesn't mean thats what you get, with these updates extra course, levels, etc can be added to games!
-HOME- this will be coming out soon, and is a virtual world where any online PS3 user can roam about and chat with other people, even have your own pad and have trophys of games you have the best score at sitting on your mantle. It's pretty cool stuff. There's probably a video on the internet somewhere that you can watch regarding this.

There aren't a crap load of good games right now, but all of that will change in the future. So for all of you out there that feel the need a PS3 and are missing out, don't fret, it's still early for all of this. As for TV, I played it on my 32" CRT for a month and then I went to BB and picked up a HDTV and am very pleased at the superb picture quality of programs and output of the PS3. So to answer atleast one of your questions, YES, IMO it is not worth it to buy a PS3 with out a HDTV. They need to go hand in hand, playing a PS3 on an older model TV really defeast the purpose I think.

Now picking a HDTV for you is not the easiest thing in the world to do, so do your research.

LCD's:

-No real threat of screen burn in at all.
-Slow response time (you basically see blur when watching or playing fast action things like sports or say a racing game on PS3). Recently, however, these have been getting much better and response time may eventually become a thing of the past with LCD's.
-Very good picture quality.

Plasma's:

-succeptable to burn-in (when static images such as station logo's, tickers, or stationary pictures are present for long periods of times). Because of this many will say Plasma is not the choice for gaming or using it for your computer. Plasma's should also be ran through a "break-in" period, where for the 1st 200 hours or so, run nothing but a program that has no ticker, no station logo, no widescreen bars on the top and bottom of the scree, well you get the picture. Most put in some kind of DVD and run that for a week or so, all day all night.
-Supurb picture quality
-No response time at all, no lag or blur when watching fast action events or playing on PS3.



With all that said I went to BB planning on getting a 47" Westinghouse LCD a few months ago, I think it was going to be around $1500. After looking at all of them I realize the smaller, 42" Samsung Plasma blew this one out of the water, it cost the same. Dam TV is less than 4" thick at any point, sweet.
So I walked out with the Plasma and in the beginning I had issues with image-retention (not burn-in), but I have about 1200 hours on the tv so far, and I really don't have a problem anymore with IR.

Bottom line- PS3 and an HDTV is a must in my opinion. I prefer the Plasma because of the superior picture quailty, and the PS3 really shines on it, it's a great system.

[Raider704]

Thanks for the replies, and thanks for the very informative post BCUS. Is the blur on LCD's bad, or really noticeable? I kinda obsess about little imperfections/glitches. Not everything, but for example if a video I'm watching has the audio off by like 1/2 a second and the mouths dont sync up with that they are saying, I just cant watch it.

[BCUS28]

Thanks for the replies, and thanks for the very informative post BCUS. Is the blur on LCD's bad, or really noticeable? I kinda obsess about little imperfections/glitches. Not everything, but for example if a video I'm watching has the audio off by like 1/2 a second and the mouths dont sync up with that they are saying, I just cant watch it.

I hear you, I and everyone else wouldn't be able to deal with off-sync audio. I've never watched an LCD and saw motion blur, so I'm not sure if it's one of those bearable problems. For example on my specific hdtv, any and all scrolling tickers jump, like a little skip (barely noticeable), so its bearable, I don't even see it unless I look hard.

But in general, MOST hdtv's have some kind of little problem, or even big problems. Don't skimp out on a cheap TV, you will regret it. Join a forum or two and start reading posts to learn more about what you want in a TV.

I'll post a few links to some good HDTV forum sites shortly.

[BCUS28]

If you're interested in researching for HDTV's and even PS3 stuff, these sites are informative.

AVSforum.com
HighDefForum.com

I'm sure there are many out there, but these are the onses I spent alot of time on, just seeing what I could learn.

[Raider704]

Thanks for all your help man. I too did a little searching myself and am learning a lot.

[02ViperACR]

PS3 is very good ... i have X360 as well ... id say PS3 is the best ... hopefully Resident Evil 5 kicks Booty on it!

C