“Sony has often won big by thinking small. Portable gizmos such as the Walkman, the Discman and the Handicam helped make this company the consumer electronics power it is today. But until now, it hasn’t tried to run that play with its most successful product of the past decade, the PlayStation line of video-game machines,” Rob Pegoraro writes for The Washington Post. “That changes Thursday, when Sony introduces the PlayStation Portable — PSP for short. This $250 device is Sony’s answer to Nintendo’s Game Boy and DS handhelds. It also represents yet another try by Sony to get into the portable-media market Apple’s iPod owns.”
“As a portable game machine, it’s a peerless piece of work, combining sharp graphics, deep game play and easy online connectivity. As a multimedia gadget, however, it’s a dud,” Pegoraro writes. “If you get a PSP, do yourself a favor and stick to the games. If you also want to listen to music and view your pictures, just get an iPod Photo or another music-plus-photos player.”
Full article here.
Related MacDailyNews articles:
Does Sony’s new PlayStation Portable (PSP) threaten Apple’s iPod? – March 14, 2005
D’OH!!!!
I love my iPod but viewing photos on a PSP beats the iPod photo hands down. The screen on the iPod is terrible in comparison.
But in the final analysis, <– Magic Word) I can display iPod photo pictures on a Television or any other video compatible device…the PSP can’t do that.
The PSP is made for games and it’s good for that
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Comparing the PSP to the iPod is stupid. Two different devices that do different things very well. For the PSP it’s games obviously, and the iPod with music. Most people who get PSP’s probably already own an ipod as well. One or the other won’t effect each other’s sales. The PSP will be a big hit among gamers. The ipod, well that doesn’t need an explanation it’s done fantastic and will continue to do so.
Rick V..
well..the media is STUPID.. big news there..
they think convergence is the future.. which.. of course.. it’s not..
It’s nice that with its 5 inch screen the PSP beats the iPod.. on photo viewing.. an ancillary feature on an iPod..
what does that say about SONY VS NINTENDO..
nintendo said.. we dont think media apps, etc are as important as games.. and sony wants to leverage all its movie/music properties so they build in all this other crap
so nintendo is right all along.. having a library of fun games is more important than compromising your system so you can re-sell all this content..
i’m sorry, but the PSP will not be fitting in anyone’s jean pocket anytime soon
I would ONLY buy a psp if it was made by Apple and synced with my .mac account – period.
I have owned many portable games consoles from the atari lynx (anyone old enough to remember that???) to the original nontendo gameboy onwards and over the last 10 years not one company has successfully convinced me thats portable games consoles are any better now than they were 10 years ago.
The ataris lynx had a colour screen about the size of the psp – just goes to show the total lack of innovation and new ideas in companys like Sony.
In my opinion, ONLY Apple is on the right track to solve the convergence concept – and to be honest, all the other companies know this and are waiting for what Apple is gonna do.. even the dinosaur that is Microsoft hasn’t a clue, if they had everyone would be using media centers (god forbid!!).
Even if the PSP has a bigger and better screen than the iPod Photo, that on its own will not make it better for viewing photos. SONY does not have iSync, iPhoto or iTunes and as any iPod owner will tell you, it is that software which makes the device better than any alternative. Even a Palm hand-held would be better than the PSP for photos because they are smaller and thinner than SONY’s device.
if they would have simply made the PSP use/play regular DVDs/CDs (or hell, even those mini DVDs and mini CDs) and let it watch DiVX, 3iVX, and other formats of movies, this thing would have KILLED!
I would have bought one in about 3 seconds and sold my iPod to get one.
but alas, we still get stupidity from Sony.
I won’t consider a PSP because Playstation hasn’t had good games since the first Playstation. PS2 is so overrated it’s disgusting.
I agree with the comment above, Nintendo has the right thinking… plus they make much better games than Sony these days. The only reason PS2 is popular is because kids are so gullible.
I don’t see this thing as any competition for iPod… it’s kind of silly trying to compare the two.
What none of these companies realise, and that includes Sony, Microsoft et all, is that the reason why the ipod is so successfuli is because it only does one thing – and that is play your music.
Throwing everything into including the kitchen sink into one portable device does not make it any better than the ipod.
‘Less is more’ is a a phrase that sums up Apple and the ipod – and it works.
Consumers have made their decisions and spent their money on a device that only does one thing – but very well. The ipod.
They do not want or need a device that does everything.
A mate of mine said the other day that the mobile phone is the device of complete convergence. I said to him ‘rubbish’ – the device for portable convergence is already here; it’s called a ‘laptop’ – you can not just ‘view content on a laptop you can ‘create’ content on a laptop – something you will never do on a mobile phone purely because of the form factor. The screen is too small to view any video content over a long period of time (try watching Lord of the Rings or ANY full length movie on a phone – I guarantee you will need glasses within six months!!).
At then end of the day a devices form dictates it’s function – if a psp is designed for games then it is obvious it needs a large screen so that you can see the games without fucking up your eyes!
you guys are stupid as hell! i have a psp an ipod photo and a nintendo ds a mac computer and a windows computer and by my experience the psp systems kick the ipod and,nintendo ds, and the games kick on sony not nintendo.they have some good games but cannot compare with sony, and the psp can sync with both mac and windows you just need additional software. the only complaint that i have about the psp is that the memory stick sucks and the nintendo ds has better memory because the game saves on the cartridge.