PS3 browser

[forbizzle]

I'm thinking about selling off my WII and getting a PS3 tommorow. I've been putting off getting a proper TV for a while, and the deals are good right now. And with an HDTV, I need HD content.

My main problem with switching over to the PS3, is that I will lose my WII Opera browser. Something that was surprisingly powerful, given it's platform. It's been able to stream shows from tudou, youtube and most other sites (Top Gear on the WII ftw), but it's WI-FI connection I believe is only 10mbps and it has had it's slow load times.

So my question is, does the PS3 browser hold up? How easy is it to stream content from my PC to my PS3? And will I end up watching all my podcasts at my computer desk now?

Also, does anybody in Toronto know a good place to get HDMI cable and an HD antenna/tuner?

[gabe_utsecks]

It's not bad.

Streaming flash videos can look a little blocky, and it constantly asks you for permission to run plug-ins (which is a little annoying) but other than that, it's pretty good, especially with a USB or wireless keyboard attached.

It should be very easy to stream files from your PC to your PS3. If you do have problems with streaming, howver, you can simply download files directly to your PS3's hard drive and watch them (or listen to them), which is really good for podcasts. Or you can transfer them to the PS3 with a USB thumb drive (or external hard drive).

[godmode]

Its nowhere near a full featured browser. If you use a lot of AJAXy sites, it just refuses to work a lot of the time. The PS3 also lacks RSS support, so you will doing your downloading on your PC.
For streaming, you cant go wrong with TVersity. It works a lot better than Windows Media center or whatever its called, and it can transcode so you can play almost any format.

[stubadub]

The browser on the PS3 is pretty bad. The browser for the Wii is good enough that I'd use it for Youtube in the living room, or occasional surfing from the sofa even though I have a laptop and a desktop nearby.

The PS3 is bad enough that I'd be tempted to wait even if I didn't have a computer in the other room.

[njshadow]

I don't mind the PS3's browser. It's sufficient for me. That's where I do most of my YouTube viewing cause' my computer is on it's way out. On the contrary, I think YouTube videos load quick and look fine. Plus, I can jam to the tunes on my HD while I surf the web. :cool:

[dolson]

First of all, the browsers are both very different from each other. Some things work much better on the Wii browser, some things work much better on the PS3 browser. YouTube works on both, just fine, if that's your main care.

The Wii does not have tabs, from what I recall (I haven't used it since I got my PS3).

The PS3 browser lets you download movies or music or pictures directly to the hard drive.

The PS3 browser can be navigated with a mouse and keyboard, but the Wii does have the Wii Remote.

I use the PS3 browser 99% of the time at home. It locks up often, but so did the Wii browser. I only used the Wii browser to read news and play YouTube vids, but PS3, well, I'm posting here right now on it. :)

Plus the display is much better in HD, easier to read, crisper images.. Hmm, actually I can't see any major reason why Wii's browser would be better, other than the occasional broken CSS/JavaScript (Twitter is the only example I have).

[nshady]

Do you really need to sell off your Wii to get the PS3? I'd advise you to hold onto it if you could - it's always nice to have more than one platform in the house.

[apswesthome]

about time Sony.

[ryudo]

You can use a USB Keyboard to browse on Wii and use orb to stream media from your pc to the wii.

but wii's browser uses an outdated flash some some sites like rev3 vids won't work.

This fall Wii will have tons of games lined up more so than it did from q4 last year going into spring.

and e3 is in 2 weeks to announce more.

[dolson]

Oh, and regarding streaming from PC to PS3, I don't know about Windows, but for Linux you can use MediaTomb or something. I stream a lot of content from my PC using MediaTomb, and it works pretty well. The only thing better that I've come across is a modded Xbox 1 running XMBC homebrew, streaming from Samba shares. :)

Do you really need to sell off your Wii to get the PS3? I'd advise you to hold onto it if you could - it's always nice to have more than one platform in the house.

I agree with this - you never know when the Wii will take the turn that the DS took, and start getting piles and piles of worthwhile games.

[dolson]

about time Sony.

About time Sony what??

[forbizzle]

Do you really need to sell off your Wii to get the PS3? I'd advise you to hold onto it if you could - it's always nice to have more than one platform in the house.

Good question. Not really, but I'd feel a bit better about collecting fancy electronics. I've got a pretty decent job right now, and nothing overly expensive to take my money. I seriously don't need to scrape together the money for a PS3 by selling off my WII, I just feel like I don't use it for anything right now and it'd be a bit much. Plus, I don't want to feel i have to justify it's presence by buying new games for it.

Thanks for all the answers so far. My last question on the subject, is does the PS3 browser have a zoom option, and how does full screen work for flash vids? Youtube on WII is definitely low quality, but you can zoom in nicely and toggle off the nav bars to get a full screen experience.

[dolson]

My last question on the subject, is does the PS3 browser have a zoom option, and how does full screen work for flash vids? Youtube on WII is definitely low quality, but you can zoom in nicely and toggle off the nav bars to get a full screen experience.

Hey again. Here's a bit of browser usage, outside of just your question.

Launch the browser, and it opens up nearly instantly (the Wii browser takes way too long to load, IMHO).

Hit Start and type in a URL, google.com, then hit Start again to close the window, and it will load the page.

Move the cursor (d-pad, left analog stick, or mouse) to the search field and press X (or left mouse button). Type in a search word and hit Start. Then move the cursor to the Search button and press X (or left mouse button).

OK, from here, you have your list of results. Go to the first one, then press and hold X on it. It opens up the page in a new window/tab. Press L2 to go back to the Google search results page. Move the cursor onto another result, and press and hold X to open it in a third tab. You can switch between the tabs quickly and easily with L2 and R2, or by pressing in the left thumbstick to get an overhead view of all open pages. This functionality has won be over, and makes using the Wii browser difficult, as I can never go back to untabbed web browser, even on a PC. :D

You can scroll the pages using the arrow keys of a keyboard, the right analog stick, the d-pad, or the left analog stick. I generally only use the right analog stick, as it's dedicated to page scrolling, while the others actually move the cursor. I think the Page Up and Page Down work as well, and probably the mouse scroll wheel (I don't use a mouse, only tested it once and can't recall).

OK, so say you hit a YouTube link from a forum post or whatever. It'll pop up asking if you want to run the plugin (Flash). Hit X to say yes. It'll load the video up. Put the cursor over the video, and then press in the Right thumbstick, and it'll automatically zoom to fit the Flash player to the full height of your screen. You can do this on images too, and if either are 16:9 or 4:3 ratio, they'll fill your entire screen (whatever ratio your TV is). The scaling isn't bad either. OK, so you can zoom in on any page, picture, etc by using the right thumbstick button, and in this zoom mode, you can zoom in or out further using the L2 and R2 buttons.

If you want to go back a page, hit L1, and as you would imagine, R1 would move you forward a page.

There are a bunch of configurable options as well, such as resolution and text size and stuff, so you can adjust it and get something that you're happy with.

All of this is from memory (I'm ACTUALLY on a PC at this time) so I might have mislabeled a button or two there, but it's really quite easy, and I'm sure it's pretty close if not accurate. I really like the browser a lot, and I don't understand why it gets such hatred from other people (I think I'm the only one of my friends who uses it extensively). Of course, I know a bunch of people who hate the Wii browser too, but I really liked using it before I had my PS3, so I kinda think you'd be in the same boat as me. I just wish they would fix the lockups, and the other issue is not unique to the Wii or PS3, and that is that Adobe/Macromedia's Flash is very old. This isn't something Sony or Nintendo directly can fix, as Flash for Embedded Devices is still stuck in the 7.0 era, while everyone else has moved on to Flash 9.0+. Thankfully, YouTube and other sites stuck with 7.0 - for now.

[forbizzle]

Thanks all for your help, very informative. I bought my TV and PS3 today, and I'm picking up HD signals over the air (god bless Toronto's giant phallus the CN tower). I still haven't put together my PS3, but I think I'll sell my WII when the new Guitar hero comes out in October.

And thanks for the Orb.com recommendation. That is an amazing platform, and they've even skinned the website for my iphone.