[PCWorld]

Post your comments for Are Sony's PlayStation 3 Updates Getting Old? here

[bjbj]

Why are you criticizing a company for updating its console? I don't think a company should have to apologize for trying to add new features and improve the user's overall experience.

[EatingPie]

I own a release PS3. Since then many of the updates have fixed gaming and networking issues. But there have been so many features added, it's a completely different -- AND FAR BETTER -- beast than I originally purchased.
Folding@Home, for example, was an update. HDTV Video streaming was another update, something that was basically impossible at first, has become one of my most-used features Do you know I can play most HDTV streams seamlessly? That includes streams coming from Europe, which are encoded at a non-US-compatible frame rate (50hz/25fps), and unplayable to any US TV... except through the PS3!
But, instead of recognizing how great this is, you make Sony's support of MANY popular codecs -- allowing almost anything you download from the Internet to play on the PS3 -- sound like something terrible! What is going on here?
Sure, this is just a point release, JUST LIKE ANY OS. Features and bug fixes. Do you complain about Mac OS X when they do this? Or Windows XP/Vista when they do this? Or your preferred flavor of Linux when they do this? I'm betting no, and there's no real difference here. (And you need to keep in mind that the PS3 is a Linux box at its heart.)
All in all, sad to see an article complaining about a good thing happening. Very very sad indeed!
-Pie

[Nynja]

Are Matt Peckham One-Sided SONY Bashing Blogs Getting Old?
YES. I expect better from PC World. Goodbye, I'm done giving your crappy site hits.

[buzzard2]

I agree with all of the above comments, that this is a silly article. How could you expect a company to predict all future hacks in advance, as well as keep up with updated technology without releasing a new system? That is the beauty of having firmware upgrades. Obviously, Microsoft nor Apple get it right the first time either, since they are still adding patches to XP and Vista, ipods and iphones.

[harry674]

I am not Playstation fan..i own XBOX and 360 . but if the technical jargon confuses the Author PCWorld should be hiring more technical writers.

[ricksterd64]

I have owned my PS3 for well over a year now and look forward to updates. This means to me that the money I invested in my expensive gaming console was money well spent as the company is taking and active role in enhancing the interface and fixing bugs. How could anyone look at an update or fix as a bad thing. Just a petty thing to complain about.

[skyknyt]

I don't think this is a dumb article (and I'm a hardcore PS3 owner, I even bought my friend one for christmas), but I disagree with the foundation of it. I think Sony is releasing the updates the same as always, it's just the gaming media feels obligated to devote an article to EVERYTHING in order to justify its existence.
This isn't a knock at you, Matt, just that generally speaking the gaming media (and internet news in general I suppose) has to update its frontpage for every tiny update to make sure those hits keep rolling in so the ad revenue doesn't drop and things don't go all EGM on them.
PS3 system updates are pretty much the epitome of non-news (I'm still holding out for the update that lets us play PSP games on our PS3 without a PSP, now THAT'S news!), but it's January and the biggest gaming release is a PS2 game. Well, to be fair, Ar Tonelico 2 is a pretty gorgeous game, but it's not exactly a big month for game news so far.

[mattpeckham]

And check out the guy's other one-sided Sony piece!
http://www.pcworld.c...ticle/155483/issonysps3reallyasinkingship.html
The audacity! The bombast! The nerve! :)

[Pacman22]

The article does exactly what it was intended to do, which is get hits for the website. PS3 bashing is the flavor of the day and has become a big trend. I wouldn't even be surprised if M$ owns shares of PCWorld. In the electronics world you should be praised for giving any free improvements to your product, because typically, they force you to buy the next model to get the latest and greatest. Since I view photos with family quite a bit on my PS3, I can't wait to show this off. They were already impressed by the original photo slideshows.

[bjbj]

This is starting to become ridiculous. People writing anti-PS3 articles over the good things that Sony is doing. Sony is going to have a press release for each update so their users can be informed of what is being done to improve their experience. It's not like it's going to hurt anyone to see a Sony PS3 Firmware Update link on a web page. It's there for those who want to be informed and can easily be passed over by those who don't care. I don't know why the PS3 has become the target for so many bloggers. The Xbox 360's reliability issues don't seem to get near as much publicity as the PS3's price tag or its so called "failings" and neither do the tons of people who get bored with the Wii after the novelty effect wears off and its owners find the selection of games to be lacking.

[mattpeckham]

So asking questions is off limits now, too? Typing "Should Microsoft Charge for Xbox Live?" is tantamount to bashing Microsoft? Come on guys, don't play to the stereotype. Tell me I'm nuts with a reasonable argument and I'll listen carefully, but type "you're ridiculous (insert console)-hater" and who do you expect to persuade?

[stoltobot]

"All I know about DivX 3.11 is that it's a codec that'll let you view a particular sort of ripped video file."

How exactly did you land this job again? Do you know anything about computers and the internet? Where have you been for the last decade? I think you should go back to school.

[breez]

This article suck.
Are you really complaining about updates that give a system more features and enhanced functionality?

[mikebarton]

I find it very refreshing (ha) to get refreshes so frequently. Kind of like the opposite of Microsoft. By the time they get a new OS out the game has moved on. With 2.60 for PS3, it was like they were reading my mind. I chose PS3 over Xbox 360 based on the comparison in this blog and followed on by upgrading the PS3 drive to 7200RPM/320GB ($70) yesterday (so simple; why so complicated Microsoft?) to store photos so that I can view them on my HDTV easily. So the Photo Gallery add-on was the mind-reading part. It is very PS3, but speaking of some nitcpicking... it was probably rished out a bit as it cannot even scan a external drive to add photos. In fact, I would rather just keep photos on the external USB drive, but Photo Gallery seems to wan to copy them internally. No biggie with the 320GB but you should have the option. One other thing: When I copied over the 27GB of photos it took forever -- er, four times as long as it took Windows to do the same. Need to fix these things, Sony. But, otherwise, love the new Photo Gallery.

[domanii80]

I do like updates, they create added value for the product and prove the manufacturer cares for its audience. I don't mind frequent updates. I like to have new features instantly, instead of waiting for bundled updates.
The author does not seem to add a lot of importance to the Divx update. This used to be for me a way to backup video, at the same time reducing the size. Nowadays size does not matter anymore, but I still have a large collection of Divx files which I can now watch on the PS3, which is great.

[mattpeckham]

I find it refreshing too, Mike, I just wish Sony wouldn't turn every obscure patch or odd feature into a biweekly event.

[Kalx]

Yea because I love to buy a game then wait for months for a Bug fix.

[VeteranGamer]

PLEASE, PLEASE, PLEASE!! Enough with the bashing!! It's not working, we still love Sony. This is a good update. Perhaps it's not the "perfect, fix-all problems" patch, but it is a beautiful imaging tool. Just look at it!! I can see you putting something down that is BAD for your system, but these updates are is good. And their will be others that make it better. Get over it!! And 140MB is NOTHING these days. Please do your homework and stop sounding like a jealous teenager!! Boy has this magazine gone down hill...

[sig1043]

The article (even with an apparently technically challenged author) was spot on. There are an excessive amount of patches when compared to the competition. To me that says that Sony shipped an unfinished product. Sony isn't releasing a plethora of patches because it is reading it's users' minds, Sony is releasing the patches because it is trying to catch up to the competition. Its a pretty bad mindset that is infiltrating the internet-gaming market of late. It is really apparent with the crash and burn of a lot of over-hyped MMO games of late (as was alluded by the author).
I am not sure if the developers are over-reaching themselves in trying to make something with more features than they can actually deliver or if the corporate suits are under-estimating how much it costs to put out something cutting edge these days. Either way, the result is products being pushed out the door before they are truly ready for the consumer market with the mindset of "we can work out the bugs once we have made a little money."
Sony, and the rest of the gaming industry, really needs to focus on making great products, not greatly-hyped products that don't deliver.