Hands-On With the PSP-3000

Eurogamer got a chance to take a look at Sony's latest hardware revision for the PSP. Their overall impression of the new model is positive, finding that a redesigned screen offers noticeably better graphics and higher brightness without affecting battery life. They also say the button pads may be slightly different, and the unit comes with useful firmware upgrades. "Elsewhere, our side-by-side comparison of the current PSP/PSP-2000 firmware, 4.05, and the new 4.20 firmware on the PSP-3000 reveals a 'USB Auto-Connect' option, which promises to automatically switch the handheld to USB mode when a cable is connected. It will do this from anywhere on the XMB, but it won't interrupt gameplay. ... The new-model PSP also allows you to play games on a TV by hooking it up with a special adapter (sold separately) and a composite cable, whereas the old one would only allow composite cables to display video, with gaming reserved for component output."

Comments

Custom Firmware

[Dracil]

And the ease of putting it on here will probably be the biggest factor that determines whether this will sell.

Re:Custom Firmware

[MobileTatsu-NJG]

*Allows the use of ISOs without needing the UMD (cures loading time issues with games)

Warez games.

If you rip the ISOs you can store a ton of games on an 8-gig card. No need to carry more than just your PSP and you get much better battery-life as well.

I got it now.

No you don't.

Re:Custom Firmware

[Spatial]

Warez games. [...] I got it now.

Really now. Backing up games I own is warez? Using the ISO instead of the UMD I own to improve loading times is warez? I bought all of the games. I guess the video and audio file playback functions are purely for pirates too, right? All you've got is a case of good old insufferable douchebag syndrome, buddy.

Warez old games.

Nobody gives a crap about any of those, not even the publishers. They're abandonware. The GBA or PSX games are the only ones that even come close to warez. And gosh darn, I'm such a dirty-dealing pirating bastard that I bought all of those too!

Of course, you're not entirely wrong; it's easy to play pirated games with CFW installed. But since Slashdot as a demographic seems to exclude most of the penniless 14-year-old crowd who actually does that, you're painting the wrong crowd with the wrong brush.

Re:Only one more thing they need to do

[donaldm]

Remember the MiniDisk? The UMD is just a MiniDisk with a Mini DVD and a rounded case. When The MiniDisk came out, it was touted by Sony as the replacement for the Cassette Tape.

The Mini Disk would have replaced the Cassette Tape however the payer was expensive compared to the CD player which eventually did replace the Tape Cassette. The MD is still around today and was a success in the Japanese and Asian market however it did not do all that well in the US and Western market. In many ways the MD was much more superior to the Cassette Tape since it could be recorded on many 100's of thousands of times compared to a few 100 times (if you were lucky) of the Cassette tape. Everyone remember the streams of tape lying on the road from stuffed tapes?

The UMD was a design that was quite good when the psp was first produced and 1.8GB was quite a reasonable capacity for such a small robust device. An open disk (ie. mini DVD) design would have been a catastrophe since it could be easily scratched. You basically have to jump on a UMD to do it damage and even then you may just crack the case and disk can still play.

It is difficult to say what could replace the UMD since even Flash cards today are no were near as cheap as what it takes to produce an UMD disk. On an interesting note you can put in a Memory Stick (Sony or other vendor) into the PSP to extend its storage capacity and if you have the right firmware you can put a lot of older games on it.

I think people should realise that the PSP like the DS a hand-held and given that the screen resolution does not have to be that high vendors don't have to produce high definition games for it hence the overall size of a game will remain within the 1.8GB capacity. Even DS games aren't any were near 1.8GB and I don't see the DS failing because of this any time soon.