I'm thinking about getting back into the videogame scene. I like the PS2 and Xbox. I've tried looking at all the different pros and cons, but here is one thing I haven't seen anywhere, how good are they as DVD players? Are they great game machines that are low end DVD players or did they take the time to make them good in this aspect, too.

Also, do you need to buy a memory card for the Xbox, or does the hard drive take care of that?

Thanks.

The Xbox was recently reviewed on ign.com as a dvd player and came out standing strong. The PS2....I have played movies on my PS2 although I do not use it on a regular basis for this purpose as I have a stand-alone player. I watched the 1994 version of Miracle on 34th Street and it played fine. I would highly recommend obtaining the s-video connector for either system...or component in regards to the Xbox.

http://gear.ign.com/articles/316429p1.html




You can store your game saves on the hard drive for the Xbox games....you will need a memory card should you want to take your saves elsewhere without carting the system around.

This is in reference to djones' sig:

I thought Mayberry was in North Carolina ?!

I use the PS2 as a dvd player. Seems to work fine. It's not a high end dvd player with all the bells and whistles. It does have optical out. What I like about the PS2 is that it is small and fairly light compared to the XBOX, so I take it on vacations with me so can use it in the hotel room. The XBOX is just too big to be taking around. I haven't tried a dvd on my XBOX yet so I can't comment on the quality.

I recently did a side by side comparison of a the same dvd being played on my ps2 and my sony dvp-s360 standalone player both connected via S-Video to my wega. The only apparent difference was that the colors seemed a bit brighter and crisper on the DVD player where as they seemed a little dark and slightly oversaturated on the ps2. Overall the PS2 performed very well. It was hard to tell but the regular player had a slight edge but not by much.

Somewhere in Ohio and the quote for Barney Fife are separated as they are not meant to be together.......


Somewhere in Ohio....1956 If you have seen the movie "Mischief".....great movie.....the beginning starts with this lead in for the movie!!!

Fanaka--

Another thing you should know before deciding (and you probably already encountered this while doing your research), is that you will need to buy a remote for the XBOX in order to "unlock" it's DVD movie playing capability. I don't have it, but I think it costs somewhere in the neighborhood of $30-$40.

I'm hoping, sometime soon, that somebody finds a way to unlock this by other means.

djones - thanks for the clarification. I was not familiar with that quote belonging to a movie.

The Xbox remote costs about $29, and contains 2 parts: the remote itself, and a small remote sensor, which plugs into one of the joystick ports, to receive the signal. This extra part might make it a bit more difficult for 3rd parties to make a clone of it.

Well it's safe to say you'll want the remote for the PS2, it has driver updates on it and, well, who the hell wants to control their DVD player with a game controller?