Casual musings on the PS3 Slim

Mike Bantick
Saturday, 05 September 2009 11:43

Entertainment

The new profile PlayStation 3 has arrived, and it is slimmer and less flashy than its predecessor, will it be these physical assets that see the PlayStation brand again rise to the top of the pile?  Whilst Sony will talk about a reboot of the console, the PS3 Slim when compared to the original is missing many things, some of this is good, some not so.

Side by side the differences are noticeable, but perhaps not as startling as the last time Sony went through this game console slimming process.



The new PS3 Slim has a flatter profile, and is slightly narrower and perhaps cleaner to look at but other than that, visually the biggest change is the move from shiny to matt finish, and a distinct lack of “PlayStation” wording, going instead with the new “PS3” logo font.



The PS3 Slim no longer caters for SD card inputs, and has reduced the USB input port count from 4 down to 2 (something that happened some time ago through a previous hardware revision}.



Booting up the PS3 Slim takes much the same time as the original, but – for what it is worth – shutdown time is much faster with the new iteration.

Audibly, whist the original’s sound output was whisper quite in comparison to early rival Xbox 360’s, the PS3 Slim reduces the operation noise again, making the experience of watching those quieter Howards’ End Blu-ray movies even more enjoyable.

Though you won’t be watching those Blu-rays, or for that matter, enjoying any level of high definition gaming with the enclosed AV cable connection, doing so results in a picture not much better than a PS2.  If you buy a PS3 Slim, negotiate an HDMI or at least Component cable with the sales-person.

Once the consoles are up and running there is a noticeable heat output difference between the two, so gone are the cooking eggs-on-the-case days with the new PS3.  This is obviously, mostly due to lower power consumption needs, much of which has been achieved by simplifying internal components.



The Emotion engine has been gone for a while, but the PS3 non-PS2 backwards capability is definitely now a thing of the past as is the aforementioned SD card input option and the ability to load Linux as an alternate operating system.

Sony have managed to sex-up the PS3 further, with a slicker design that retains the core PS3 specifications and, most importantly, at a price that will appease a larger percentage of the consumer masses.

Whilst it looks great, performs as well as it always has, the best decision Sony made with the new iteration of PlayStation was in the pricing department.  When the September sales figures hit the media we will see how well these decisions have been received.