PlayStation 3 is pricey and hot -- but is it worth it?

Byline: Eric Gwinn

Nov. 20--Sony's PlayStation 3 delivers the best visuals of any gaming system on the planet, but is the game-playing/Web-surfing/movies-and-music machine worth $600? Yes, if you're an avid gamer with a full high-definition (1080p) television, an HDMI cable, a broadband Internet connection, a dislike for playing games on your computer and patience to wait for more games to be made for the system. Otherwise, skip the PS3 or hope the price comes down. Visuals Seen on a television with 1,080 lines of resolution and a progressive-scan display method (in other words, a 1080p HDTV), "Madden NFL 07" for the PS3 looks much sharper than the same game for the Xbox 360. The PS3 can connect to a standard-definition TV, but this box was made for HDTV. There aren't a lot of PS3 games right now but that will change by summer. Plus, future games promise to be deeper and richer than games today because more gaming data can be held on the PS3's hard drive and on the discs that contain the games. Photos, music & movies Checking out the PS3's other features, I plugged in my camera's Compact Flash card and looked at photos on TV. They never looked so good. I easily copied a CD of music to the machine's hard drive, then connected a USB drive and copied my photos and tunes to it. Then, I surfed the Web, calling up Google and other familiar sites on my TV screen. Use a USB mouse and USB keyboard to surf the Web; using the PS3 controller to type in addresses or scroll a page is tricky. The Web-going PS3 has no obvious anti-virus program, though the machine's operating system is probably a mystery to virus writers (right now, anyway). Sony warns that if anything happens to your machine while you are using the PS3 Web browser, you're on your own. Finally, I watched standard and Blu-ray versions of "Kung Fu Hustle." The higher-definition Blu-ray disc players sell for $1,000, so Sony thinks its $600 PS3 with Blu-ray capability is a bargain. (A better bargain is to buy an upconverting DVD player and hang on to my DVD collection.)

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