Hands on: Sony PlayTV review
Sony’s long-awaited PlayTV PVR bolt-on for the PS3 promises to finally turn the console into a genuine multimedia hub. But is the Freeview recording peripheral really going to change the way people use the PS3?
When the Play TV gizmo arrived in HCC Towers we jumped on it to find out for ourselves. It transpires that the PlayTV is a sizeable, rather ugly twin tuner-equipped adapter. It’s designed to let you watch and record Freeview channels using your console.
Sporting an aerial input and a single red LED, it connects to the console via a mini USB lead. It can be reasonably well controlled using the PS3 Sixaxis controller but if you have the PS3 Blu Ray remote you can use that with the button overlay provided.
An installation disc is included and the rotating main menu is a slick sight to behold as is the 7 day EPG (both are presented in HD) which displays a grid of channels alongside programme information. This can be used to schedule recordings of both TV and radio channels as as can the manual timer.
Recordings are accessed in the library menu and viewable as a list or as preview thumbnails. You can watch one channel while recording another or playback a recording while recording another. You can also pause live TV, in both cases fast forwarding and rewinding at up to 20x normal speed.
The recorded image is automatically upscaled (up to 1080i) depending on the resolution you’ve set your PS3 to and we had no complaints viewing all but the most poorly compressed channels. Sadly the unit lacks Series Linking, but at least its possible to play a PS3 game or Blu Ray disc while still recording TV with no discernable performance dips.
You can stream live TV and recordings via wi-fi to your PSP using Remote Play with OK results. Permanent transfer, however, requires taking them off the hard disk then converting them to the right format with third party software.
Ultimately. the Play TV can be considered an interesting gadget, but in truth the PS3 makes only a mediocre Freeview PVR.
Verdict: 3/5
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o.k., i did not see this story coming. it seems that in a desperate attempt to apprehension the italian beach going portion publicly in august, nuns and priests are now transporting an inflatable ‘convent’, which blows up to 98 feet in duration (now that’s a lot of hot holy air) to the beach where persons can come and make confession whilst christian musicians are luring them in with christian tunes (i’m viewpoint they are singing in italiano “i was sinking occupied in sin, a good from peaceful shore….”).the link is http:www.msnbc.msn.com/id/26057763/?gt1=43001i’m frustrating to imagine the confessions– “forgive me father as regards i have sinned, i righteous looked at a nearly naked woman on the beach, oops, i just looked at another more in the nude woman on the shore amend next to the door of the inflatable church… oops……” accordingly to the article there will be ‘night time activities in the inflatable convent from 10 p.m. to 1 a.m. not including mass’. o.k….. besides singing and confessions what effect be wealthy on in the blown up church? inquiring minds want to know. well it seems they will be saying the rosary (see below).it seems that people were blown away by the first attempt at this on sardinia a a handful of of weeks secretly— well in actuality the church had to abort itself as strong winds blew away the blow up church! back to the drawing lodge. undaunted various nuns are excited apropos their new beach the church. here is a small quote from the reuters article: “on the mediterranean coast, nuns from a convent near the southern italian city of naples have on the agenda c trick relocated to beach cabins to upon holidaymakers saying the rosary. an adjoining altar was circle up under two tents. [sounds delight in an in-tents ministry effort to me]”the concept of a beach-convent is something that is appreciated by vacationers and the nuns themselves,” priest antonio rungi, who helped spearheaded the leadership, told italian news intercession ansa.”—o.k. so right now i am outlook what about an inflatable cast at myrtle lido. we could do classes in recreational theology, lakeshore ministry, practice being angels by para-sailing and could carol multiple choruses of “michael row the boat ashore…” anyone ready to enroll?



