PS3 vs. BD Blu-Ray Player

[Jugger Grimrodd]

Hey there,

Would you buy a PS3 over a Blu-Ray player? Which is the better way to go?

We were debating this at work today. Here are some of the points we came up with:

Pros:
* Will be updated to 2.0 eventually
* Gaming
* Media Streaming

Cons:
* Noisy
* Big
* More Audio Out options.

[Opus]

Originally Posted by Jugger Grimrodd

Hey there,

Would you buy a PS3 over a Blu-Ray player? Which is the better way to go?

We were debating this at work today. Here are some of the points we came up with:

Pros:
* Will be updated to 2.0 eventually
* Gaming
* Media Streaming

Cons:
* Noisy
* Big
* More Audio Out options.

• You will want to get a Blu-Ray Disc remote for the PS3 about 20 US bucks.

• Cool environment helpful. If the fan goes into the third speed it will be a detraction.

• Faster load times on the PS3 from power on to play than most stand alone BD players.

• PS3 comes with a gigbit ethernet connection so getting updates or streaming BD-live content is a nice option.

It is a viable option for sure if cooling will not be an issue. All depends on your set up and what you do. If you play PS3 games it is even a better fit. As for my set up, I have the PS3 set up for gaming and can watch the Blu-Ray collection in that room if I wish. In the main room I have a stand alone Sony Blu-ray player. I must admit that burning a CD to do updates on the stand alone player is a bit of a pain. Such is new technology. What may be a good option today will be old news this summer

For the younger guys getting gear and saving on gear it can be a real good option.

Side note: You can not Download the Sony Blu-Ray code updates and burn the CD to load them on a Mac OS. The Options does not exist. I have to use my old Dell for that. The wireless updates on the PS3 are quit nice.

[MarkFleser]

Definitely go with the PS3, it's not that much more than a standalone blu-ray player and you get a computer (essentially) you can even put linux on if you want. Media streaming is great, I use MediaLink and it works like a charm.

It's really not too terribly loud, after a while you just tone it out, I do, I hardly ever notice the noise. The extra stuff you get with the PS3 is well worth the little extra noise and bulk.

If you're in the market for a new TV too, keep checking out Best Buy, they keep having deals where you buy the TV and PS3 together and it's like getting the PS3 free. That's what I did last summer. I got the TV and PS3 for the normal price of the TV.

BTW: why is more audio out options a con?

[Yuiichi]

I personally had this decision a while ago and I went with a stand alone blu-ray player. My reasoning was:

-I already had enough game consoles (Wii and Xbox 360)
-I only have the TV speakers working on my setup, so the loudness of the PS3 would really count
-I couldn't care less about bd-live
-It actually fits on my media center shelf (I would have had to do some major moving around to fit in a PS3 XD)

So, yeah! Take that into consideration!

By your point "will be upgraded to 2.0 eventually", I take it you mean this as PS3 will and blu-ray players won't? In case you didn't realize, you can update blu-ray players. Most of them have an ethernet port on the back, so if you have a router close (or, even better, a house with ethernet wired in), that's no problem. If not, you can burn CD's (like Opus was saying) to update the firmware. It's a little more of a hassle, but it still works.

I don't know how it is where you live with home theatre stores, but I'd personally advise against buying at places like Best Buy. If you buy from an independent store, you can often get much better deals, as well as really knowledgeable employees. I buy all of my home theatre equipment at one independent store (Trutone, Inc) and it's all purchased at the wholesale prices.

In any case, you won't be disappointed with blu-ray - if you have a nice HD TV, it looks amazing

[Opus]

Excellent points Yuiichi and the newer blu-ray players coming out do have the Ethernet port. My player does not have that and my only option is to create a CD to do firmware updates. I see Jugger is in Canada as well so Trutone may be an option

Also consider if you do not have a 42" are larger HD set, then an up-convert DVD player would give you a very good quality video. Now if you are wanting to get into the uncompressed true audio part of the experience, then blu-ray all the way. Prices will come down as blu-ray marches own since it has become the de-facto standard.

Good luck.

[Galley]

The PS3 was the first Profile 2.0 BD player on the market.

[notabadname]

The Sony was (barely) first to market with Profile 2.0, quickly followed by Panasonic's stand-alone offerings. Panasonic actually had the first Profile 2.0 that also had decoding for Dolby TrueHD and DTS-HD Master Audio which are lossless, and are both 100% identical in quality to the studio master. Sony quickly released a software update to give the same capability. Today there are a lot of 2.0 choices, and who was first with anything is irrelevant.

If you don't have a game console, and you would like to have a multimedia option for gaming and movies, the PS3 is undeniably an excellent choice.

If you don't want a gaming console, then save your money and get a stand-alone player. If you have, or plan on getting an HDMI capable receiver, then save money and get a Blu-ray player without analog outputs such as the Panasonic's DMP-BD35. It is a top reviewed HDMI output Blu-ray player which costs about $100 less than is sister Panasonic's DMP-BD55 which includes 7.1 analog outputs in addition to the HDMI for people without HDMI receivers. If you don't have an HDMI receiver, you have to decode the signal in the player and send out the individual channels via analog for an "older" surround receiver to use it-thus the higher costs.

One other option, to be fair, is if you want a gaming console option, you can, for about the same cost, get the XBox arcade for $199 and a blue-ray player for under $200. A new PS3 is still $400.

Personally, I prefer the game selection on the 360, its games and outputs are 1080p HDMI also, like the PS3 (don't let old posts tell you differently- originally, the 360 was only 1080i and not HDMI - not the case now - all 360s ship with HDMI).

So it really is knowing what YOU want and YOU will use. There are a lot of excellent options and configurations.

[wfoster]

I'm not going to get in to a long winded lengthy reply. Just my opinion.

I would have to go for the Playstation 3. You then have the best of both worlds, a system for gaming and then also a system for watching your movies. I currently own a PS3 and it is very good. Yes, it may be big and bulky but it isn't noisy at all. My little opinion.

Regards,
Wesley.

[maddiesims1514]

I want to burn a PS2 game so i can play it in my PS3
I am gonna burn it using TOAST Titanium but does someone know if this should work if the game has copy protection or something?
Does someone know a way to do this?

[JeremyK]

PS3 By FAR!

Then you can play games as well... Trust me... When we wanted to buy a DVD player ages ago, we had the obvious choice of a cheap DVD player, or pay a bit more and get the PS2.

We are so glad we chose the PS2!