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PSP Opened up and Exposed

Pascal writes "After delivering some classic first impressions of the PSP last Tuesday, including some interesting loading time tests, the happy thugs at Lik Sang have now respected their tradition by opening up the PlayStation Portable. If you ever wanted to know how Sony puts such a powerful hardware inside such a small casing, there is a huge picture gallery of the guts over at Lik-Sang.com"

12 of 308 comments (clear)

  1. Overheard by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 4, Funny

    "I feel so naked!" -- PSP

  2. If you .. by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 5, Funny

    If you view the photos in reverse you can see him put it back together.

  3. Still no indication of battery life by z3021017 · · Score: 4, Interesting

    I think we can safely say the PSP sports graphics and games equal or greater than what the Nintendo DS offers.
    However, the deciding factor for many would-be buyers (myself included) is still the battery life, and not one article says anything about it.

    --
    Bored? Visit my exciting counter page!
    1. Re:Still no indication of battery life by El+Camino+SS · · Score: 4, Interesting


      4-5 hours for Video watching through UMD.
      4-6 hours average for gameplay through UMD.
      4 hours with headphones and 50% volume, no WIFI and highest screen brightness (180 cd/m2).
      6 hours with headphones and 50% volume, no WIFI and lowest screen brightness (80 cd/m2).


      It has been my history that manufacturers usually exaggerate and say that the battery life of anything is double what it really is. This is true for gameboys to flashlights. With that little piece of knowledge, this battery life is not as good as everyone thinks it is.

      I would say that I would be taking a book along with me as well, just in case.

    2. Re:Still no indication of battery life by rsmith-mac · · Score: 4, Interesting
      Speaking of the PSP's battery life, I'm getting a bit concerned about heat from the unit. The first thing that caught my eye is that in one of Lik Sang's PSP photos, you can clearly see what resembles a heat vent on the top of the unit, which throws up an orange flag immediately. Then when today's article came up, they had a picture of the battery which is rated 1800mAh@3.6V. Already being an owner of a GBA SP, I wanted to see how it compared to that and the DS, so Lik Sang has a picture of the GBASP and DS batteries which come in at 600mAh@3.8V, and 850mAh@3.7V. So all things considered, the PSP's battery is roughly 3 times the power of the GBA SP, and a little over 2x that of the DS.

      That taken in to consideration, this is where I really start to get worried about heat. If we take the 4-6hour battery life at face value, we'll say that the PSP runs about half as long as the GBA SP. But when we also take in to consideration the battery differences, we're talking about the PSP effectively burning though power at (2x3=6) times the rate of the GBA SP. Obviously there's a huge difference between the two with that large LCD(so not all energy leaving the system will be heat energy), but still, doesn't all this energy it's burning through have to go somewhere? I doubt Sony has created a hand-held laptop in terms of heat, but after an extended play session, are we going to have to worry about the PSP being warm to the touch(i.e. will it be warm enough to discourage long play sessions)?

      As someone interested in buying a unit later on, this has me seriously concerned that the PSP is going to be the first mass-market portable game device where heat is a concern.

  4. Removable Wireless Antenna by GameGod0 · · Score: 5, Interesting

    It looks like that antenna attached to the wireless chip can be removed, I wonder how long it'll be before we can wardrive with a PSP?

  5. Re:Servers these days: no respect for Slashdot... by SilentChris · · Score: 4, Funny

    "I always wonder when people take apart these toys if they ever manage to put them back together in anything like working order."

    I do, but there's always exactly 2 screws extra. No more, no less. Oh, and maybe an extra gear (like when I took apart my Perfection game when I was a child).

    They always still work afterwards, though. I wonder if engineers add a few extra screw just so people like me can remove them. ;)

  6. Re:I've stopped predicting things by Lumpy · · Score: 4, Interesting

    what you fail to notice in the DS grasshopper is that the DS will play all the Advance games without a problem.

    therefore if you buy someone the DS and there are no DS games available for them they like they can start playing it the second they open the box with their advance games.

    and yes, the advance games on the DS are much smoother and certianly more playable.

    super monkeyball in particular is much more playable on the DS. it almost seems that the game is taking advantage of the higher speeds to give me smoother gameplay. I can finesse the ball with greater accuracy now.

    and yes, I instantly yanked the cartridge out and ploped it in my SP... there is a definite playability difference between the two.

    the PSP has a ton of distance to catch up to the DS. they did not come out of the gate with hundreds of games that will work on the unit from the older platform.

    my SP is now deligated to playing my old gameboy and gameboy color carts.

    the only thing I pray for.... they do NOT bring the nightmare that is pokemon to the DS.

    --
    Do not look at laser with remaining good eye.
  7. Ideas to think about in the new "Portables War" by El+Camino+SS · · Score: 4, Interesting


    -Sony has won the adult part of the portables market with its sleek styling and functionality... question is, is there even an adult market for these things to begin with?

    -Do we need yet another proprietary media format? When can we burn on it? When can we buy it?

    -Are audiences really going to want to buy their media on a proprietary format when a portable DVD player is so cheap these days, and works with your home disks? Saying that smaller is better was important in the 80s... I don't think that holds today. Matter of fact, is anyone going to buy a movie on this thing? Will they be offering anything besides FF:The Spirits Within and Akira for the otaku?

    -The interactivity of the DS is well known, the interactivity of the PSP not so much, why?

    -It's obvious that Nintendo knows where it is going, but I am not so sure about this. Their primary point is that it is "sleek." I am not sure that being sleek is my main desire to having a portable.

    -I am not really excited about a disk drive anything in my carry around equipment. It may be an unfounded fear these days, but still, it is there.

    From what I have seen from both Nintendo and Sony, they are trying to make a quantam leap in the portables market, and right now, my money is on Nintendo. Still, they need to do something before I buy either one. They both have side features, but shiny and features is a seriously Japanese thing, and Nintendo has held its own with their focus. So I go with 'Tendo.

    After all, who uses their Xbox to play movies? Anyone? Who will use their PSP to play the ten songs that their memory stick can hold or look at digital pictures when the camera already has a screen, and shows them without running it through a PC? Picto-chat? Honestly Nintendo, if you are close enough to picto chat you are close enough to chat for real. That is more fun.

    Some of these things on both machines make no sense. Maybe they make sense if you are Japanese. I don't know what some of these things are for.

  8. Re:This suprises me. by Troed · · Score: 5, Informative

    That's a myth. It's a popular myth, but it's still a myth.

    List of consoles sold at a loss: Sega Saturn, Sega Dreamcast, Xbox

  9. Why I'm getting the DS instead of the PSP: by GFLPraxis · · Score: 5, Interesting

    While the PSP has better hardware, the Nintendo DS has:

    1) Better battery life (10 hours vs 4 hours in game)

    2) Game cards (Who wants to spend extra money on a memory card, and who wants to carry a bunch of disks in their pocket? I perfer to be able to save to the game media)

    3) Touch screen. Without joysticks, how can you possibly play FPS on the PSP? The DS has the touch screen, which works like a mouse on Metroid Prime: Hunters (near-perfect control- I love the touch screen).

    4) Cost. DS is $150, PSP is $200. Add to that the cost of the memory stick ($30 minimum) to the PSP, and the fact that an extra battery costs $50 (to equal the DS's battery life), means you get a much cheaper system with the DS.

    5) Stability. That exposed screen must be very easy to damage. The flip-open DS design is a good protection. Plus, the PSP has a CD drive, you know how easy it is for those to skip with a little bump, and break with a good drop.

    6) Nintendo games rule :)

    Just my opinion. I've done some research into the topic.

  10. how do they fit all that power in there? by Allison+Geode · · Score: 4, Funny

    the answer to that is "by taking out the battery."