PS3 from asia....is there any point?

hollywoodhoppy

hey everyone, thanks for readin this,i was talkin to a friend who can get me a PS3 from asia soon enough and it'll work out around the same price as it will be here on release date with two games, its the premium model. I was just wondering if there's any compatibility issues with say power supply (not the plug but the actual voltage) etc. or will it be any different than the model released here in march. Cause i may as well buy it now if its the same spec etc. cause there's very little chance of gettin one around release date here?

and has anyone heard of any major issues or bugs with the PS3 as of yet?

Thanks again

LookingFor

I have a PS3 from Japan. You can plug in any standard computer plug into the back and it will work fine here. The power supply is a universal one.

I presume if you are using a standard definition television, it will pass a NTSC signal which your TV would have to be able to accept. Otherwise if it is a HDTV, those resolutions are the same everywhere.

The only compatability issues you'll run into are with PS2 and PSone games (it'll only play those from the region your PS3 came from), and with European Blu-ray movies. A PS3 from Japan will play Blu-ray movies from the US and Japan, so you'd likely be importing those from the US if you wanted them (and with the dollar being so weak it can be pretty good value). PS3 games are all region-free.

Peripherals seem to be region free. Hard drives are standard and are obviously the same everywhere. I've used a US controller on my PS3 fine. I use my irish wireless keyboard and mouse with it fine.

In terms of online, I can use the US, Japanese and Hong Kong stores with my Japanese PS3. Technically I'm not supposed to be able to buy anything from them, but I've managed to make purchases on both the US and Hong Kong stores (european mastercards seem to get by). So downloadable content seems to be region free. In terms of online gameplay, some games allow play between players in different regions, but some (like Resistance), check the region of your machine and currently restrict you to playing with players from that region. The developers of Resistance have said they'd like to change that in the future, but just to warn you that in some games you may not be able to play with European or US friends using a Japanese/Asian machine.

The system firmware is the exact same everywhere. It comes loaded with all language options, even European ones already despite it not being available here yet. Everyone has the same options for loading other operating systems etc.

I'd say go for it, if the price is decent. If it's going to cost you the same as an Irish one, you might as well wait a couple of months perhaps, but you should be able to get it cheaper (or at least at the same price with delivery). The machines appear to be identical in every region except for PS2/PS1 and Blu-ray compatability.

hollywoodhoppy

Thanks a mil for that info, its always good to hear form someone who knows its just so that i find out all those little things before i go ahead and buy it, i have a HDTV so there shud be no probs, the blu-ray compatibility might be an issue and the online play maybe a problem ccause it could be the case that i get stuck playin online in asian games all the time and from my experience with my 360 it can be a problem with ping