PSP Slim - First Impressions
[2007-09-04]
If there is a company that needs some good news it's definitely Sony. After all those fiascos in the last couple of years, Sony desperately needed some good news. Fortunately for Sony, new PSP Slim may just be the product to finally provide some positive coverage.
We were able to procure the very first retail PSP Slim, couple of days before the official release. We got it as a part of the “Sony PSP Daxter Entertainment Pack” with MSRP of $200. This pack contains PSP Slim (model # PSP 2001), Daxter Game, Family Guy UMD (5 episodes), 1GB Memory Stick Duo and a charger.
Our first impressions are nothing but positive. While old PSP was definitely a decent portable game machine, new PSP Slim is very close to being the ultimate portable device. Instead of the detailed review we will just list main improvements over old PSP.
- It is noticeably lighter making it much more portable and pocket friendly. While it is smaller it is not perceptibly so, but any reduction is size even if it is 1mm only is always welcome.
- LCD display is even better that one on the old PSP.
- TV Out works great. Unfortunately, connector is proprietary so you will have to buy cables separately. Both component and composite cables will be available.
- Loading time is noticeably faster.
- Web browser seems faster too (probably due to the increased memory).
- Battery life seems better (our subjective opinion, we did not measure it exactly).
One thing working against the PSP is the selection of games. While Nintendo DS offers so many original titles, PSP library is still mostly made of washed out remakes or same old gameplay with a very little original and fresh content. Another area for improvement would be to make it easier to convert videos to make them playable on the PSP. Sony should either bundle some easy to use conversion software with the PSP or update PSP to support additional media formats (DivX for example). Imagine being able to record TV shows on your Media Center machine and move them easily to the PSP for later viewing!
To conclude, new PSP is much improved in every way and by keeping the same price points, Sony is making a serious play to grab some market and mind share away from the Nintendo's DS.