Deal Hot Stuff

A Fantasic System and a Multimedia Powerhouse
This bundle finally completes my trio of next gen gaming consoles. As I started up the PS3, I must say I was initially impressed. The PS3 is a great compliment to any home theater enthusiast out there.

What I liked.

-Steaming video/mp3/pictures from your computer home network.

-Blu-Ray playback in glorious Hi Def. (Although I though HD DVD was better for consumers but that’s another story)

-Card readers for all you photo junkies.

-Built in Wi-fi.

-Free online play.

-Rechargeable battery built into the DS3 controller.

-No ugly power brick hanging from the back of the PS3.

-Ability to change out the HDD with ease.

-Much more reliable then the Xbox 360 but to say there are no issues w/ the PS3 is a lie.

-Exclusives like MGS4 and FFXIII sometime in the far distant future.

What I didn’t like.

-The fan kicks in at times. Unfortunately this is the previous 90nm chipset that was formerly the Motorstorm bundle. Although not nearly as loud as the Xbox 360, it can still be bothersome.

-Installs, Installs, Installs. Almost everything needs to be installed. You download a demo - install. You update your PS3 - install. You buy a new game - install. I’m a game collector with over 30 Xbox 360 games and can’t imagine how big a HDD I would need if they all needed to be installed. Plus, there are no noticeable difference in loading time or anything.

-Pathetic PSN content. The Xbox Live Marketplace REALLY puts the Playstation Network to shame. Not to mention it is noticeably slower. A firmware update on the PS3 can take up to 15 minutes while on the Xbox 360, it’ll take just about 15 seconds.

-The controller. Three generations of Playstations and they still can’t update the controller. In fact, the new L2,R2 buttons are very uncomfortable and unnatural.

With all that being said, the PS3 is not perfect but still an amazing system. Will it take over my Xbox 360 as my primary gaming machine? Absolutely not. In my honest opinion of 20 years of gaming, the Xbox 360 reign supreme this generation. However, thats not to say the PS3 doesn’t have any good games. I am thoroughly enjoying MGS4, Warhawk, and Hot Shots Golf.

If you’re looking to build upon your home entertainment center, I would highly recommend this bundle. Like I said, its a multimedia monster that’ll keep you busy for a very long time as you tinker with all the settings and features. It is the best and one of the cheapest Blu Ray players on the market. And of course, it comes with one of the most epic games this generation has to offer. But if you’re purely looking for the greatest library of games this generation, I encourage you to consider the Xbox 360.

Happy with my purchase
Just think this is a great overall system and a great value. You should probably know about the dualshock controller, the extra space, free online play, Metal Gear Solid 4 included, etc etc so I’ll try to mention other things I liked.

The free Pain game is a pretty fun party game. Simple concept makes it easy for casual gamers to try, and it can be a blast in multiplayer with a bunch of friends over.

The wireless controllers work beautifully. Wireless networking works great. However I wouldn’t want to chat with it. Might look into a bluetooth headset soon.

Online features are great. Spent about 2-3 days downloading trailers, demos, etc. That alone will keep you busy for a while, and you can try out some games.

Games, I’m not big into first person shooters (I have a PC for that), but there appear to be plenty of good hits coming out for PS3. Sales are catching up with 360. (12.8 million PS3 vs 19 million 360’s, and those figures are months old). So market share is not much of a factor anymore.

System was a snap to hookup. Only con is that it doesn’t seem to support both optical and Composite (via multi av port) audio output. Not worth dinging it a star though.

Why should you buy this bundle from amazon?
Why should you buy this bundle from amazon? The answer is simple really. You shouldn’t. For instance, when this bundle was sold at Wal-Mart for $499 mind, you could have gotten off and extra 100 dollars because they would have given you a free gift card with $100 charged on it. But since these douche bags bought them before any of us that actually wanted them for the reasonable price, I can’t really think of a good reason why you should. BUT if you willing to pay the extortionate price, I’d say go for it because it’s a good game from all i can see and the best system to date.

Overpriced Bundle
So, for $460 you can get a PS3 (40gigs) and the game.

Or, for $550 to $700 (depending on where you shop), you can get the special bundle that gets you and extra 40 gigs… and that’s it.

So, you’re paying $90 to $240 for 40 more gigs. This is stupid.

The perfect enterntainment console
First of all, this is my second PS3 console. I already own the original Sony 60GB PS3 version and for a long time, I have wanted a second one to have in my bedroom as a Blu-ray player and to play certain games I can’t play with my newborn around the house (i.e. Metal Gear Solid 4).

I love this console so much. As a media center, it does almost everything. It is the only gaming console to be fully Divx certified. And obviously, it plays back Blu-ray movies. In fact, it is probably still the best Blu-ray player you can purchase today. The gaming library has improved quite a bit since the original launch of the console.

I’ve been looking forward to Metal Gear Solid 4 for quite a long time. It was well worth the wait. I didn’t think I would be a fan of the Dual Shock 3 controller as I usually could care less for rumble but it actually works well with Metal Gear Solid 4 and it weighs more than the original Sixaxis controller. For me, it is the perfect weight, better than the Sixaxis which I always though was too lite.

I would have hoped they would have fixed a couple of annoyances by now. First of all, the USB cable is too short. You won’t be able to really play a game while charging your controller unless you don’t mind standing right in front of the tv. They should really make the USB cable longer. Why in 2008 is Sony still shipping the PS3 with composite cables? They could have at least shipped it with component video cables. It could be my imagination but it seems as if my 80GB PS3 is slightler less noisier than the 60GB I own. I don’t know if this means the 80GB uses the smaller cooler cell processor but it would be great if it did.

The 80GB hard drive can really fill up fast but fortunately, Sony was kind enough to allow a user to easily swap the hard drive out for any notebook sized SATA hard drive. I upgraded my Macbook Pro hard drive to a 320GB hard drive and transferred the old Macbook Pro hard drive to my 60GB Sony PS3. I may upgrade the hard drive on this 80GB PS3 soon as well.

Some people do not like the fact that the PS3 uses Bluetooth for it’s remote contol. For me, this is better since it allows me to hide the PS3 out of sight where it doesn’t clutter up space and also makes the console sound less audible while watching movies or playing games.

In summary, you can’t go wrong with the Sony PS3, especially when you order from Amazon. I also own a Nintendo Wii (sold my Xbox 360 because of the RRoD). I think it really compliments the Nintendo Wii a lot and fills in where the Nintendo Wii lacks. Aside from the gripes I made earlier, I also would have preferred if Sony would have upgraded the wireless controller to N instead of G. This would allow me to stream HD content wirelessly. But it’s not that big of deal because a lot of times, I just copy content to my PS3 hard drive. Oh yes, I have a large collection of PS2 games and so far, they seem to be working although I have not had a chance to try all of them.