I f*ckING HATE SONY! >_<

[SignOfZeta]

Surely everyone knows by now that Sony hardware is constructed by blind goblins in Satan's own bottom?

I've not trusted Sony goods since the awful build quality of the original PS1. In fact the only company I trust now to make a sturdy machine is Nintendo.

Heh, the PS2 makes the PS1 look like the SNES. PS2s are insanely shitty. Then you have the 360 which is probably twice as bad as a PS2.

Reliable hardware doesn't exist anymore, not even from Nintendo. The Wii seems OK, but the DS, and DS Lite...I'm not sure I know of anyone that hasn't sent their DS to Nintendo. Mine has been there twice. To its credit, it didn't destroy any software.

[MissaFX]

Reliable hardware doesn't exist anymore, not even from Nintendo. The Wii seems OK, but the DS, and DS Lite...I'm not sure I know of anyone that hasn't sent their DS to Nintendo. Mine has been there twice. To its credit, it didn't destroy any software.

I've never had a single problem with my DS-lite.  Everyone else I know has a cracked hinge or some other problem (ok, I have 1 deal pixel in the top screen, bottom right corner, but it came that way)

I'd call the PSP the most reliable current generation machine.  The only real defect in the PSP is the 3 position power switch which gets "soft" over years of use.  It only costs 2 dollars and change (including shipping!) though to get a replacement switch including the whole board it is attached to for no soddering mess.

For full sized consoles though, they all seem to be expensive as hell and equally as cheaply built these days.

The PS2 and its disc reading errors reign supreme as the king of the mountain in this respect.

[nat]

That's a bum deal, Kitsunexus.

[Joe Redifer]

The PS3 seems pretty rock solid.  I haven't heard of any widespread problems with it like the Xbox360 has or the PS1 and 2 enjoyed.  Maybe Sony learned their lesson... a lesson that Microsoft has yet to learn.  I've had to have my Wii replaced due to overheating.  The cause is the 24 hour wii connect internet thing.  Basically when you turn your Wii off, the graphics card stays on (the Wii will show an orange light when it is off instead of red) because that is where the internet crap is.  It slowly fries the graphics card since the fan is off.  My Wii started displaying weird little black blotches on the screen that were ever-present.  Nintendo knew exactly what I was talking about and immediately sent me a new console.  I learned my lesson and do not enable Wiiconnect24.  No reason to anyway.  I rarely power up my Wii as it is.

[Keranu]

Yeah I absolutely hate Sony hardware, and it's not just limited to their game systems. The only good Sony product I've ever used is this Sony TV my brother has.

Joe, my WiiConnect24 is pretty much on all of the time and I never had that problem. I'm more concerned about it scratching discs since I have it up vertically, but so far so good for that too.

[nat]

If you use the POWER button on the console itself rather than the controllers to turn it off, it will power down completely (red light and all) even if you have Wiiconnect24 turned on. You have to hold the button in for a couple seconds. That's what I do.

I'm more concerned about it scratching discs since I have it up vertically, but so far so good for that too.

My Wii won't read discs if it is in the vertical position. It's been like that since the day I got it. Actually, it will read them 50% of the time. But if you actually get it to boot a game vertically, it always crashes with an error within a minute or so. It doesn't matter what game, it always happens.

There is no purpose to having it vertically anyway other than the fact it looks much cooler. It works 100% fine horizontally and doesn't have to fight the laws of physics while doing it. It just doesn't look as cool.

[Keranu]

I have it vertically because I'm too lazy to put the stand back in it's box . Plus it makes easier for plugging GC controllers and memory cards.

[nat]

I haven't had to use a memory card yet.

To be honest, I haven't even used the GameCube functionality either since I have an actual GameCube anyway.

[ceti alpha]

The PS1 and the PS2 are really quite crappy, but as Joe said, the PS3 "seems" to be OK. The 360 seems like it's just waiting to break down - the thing is loud as hell too - so you basically need to go out and buy that peripheral cooling unit to keep the machine from blowing up. However, the original XBOX is like a concrete block. It may not be the prettiest thing, but it is tough. The only major problem with the XBOX, that I know of anyway, is that Microsoft - in their infinite wisdom - decided to contract out 3 different manufacturers for their disc drives. The worst is the Thompson drive, which is the one I have and was the first drive manufactured for the XBOX. The Thompson drives tend to konk out and can't read most CDR media and they also will give you the dreaded "DISK ERROR" screen. Then Microsoft started putting in Phillips drives and that was a minor improvement. However, the Samsung drive is considered the best of all. It won't give you the "Disk Error" screen and it can read pretty much all media.

I don't really have too many problems with my Thompson drive though. I think it was Burnout Revenge or Gotham Racing 2 that gave me the error screen from time to time. The XBOX would start to read it fine though once it warmed up.

As for XBOX vs PS2 the XBOX wins hands down for graphics, controllers, XBOX Live and - most importantly - for the fact that you can mod your XBOX with XBOX Media Centre. XBMC is amazing and I don't know how I lived without it. I just have to get my wireless setup working again so I don't have the LAN cable running across the floor from my computer to the XBOX. It's so nice to not have to burn media on to DVDs.

[Turbo D]

I have a ps3 and its pretty solid. Haven't had any problems so far. Its seen many hours of gameplay. Since I've got it I've beaten resistance around 3 times, ratchet and clank around 4 times, beaten simpsons, and put a lot of hours into other games. I've also spent a lot of time online looking at porn, haha.

Although I haven't had any problems with my psx or ps2, I've heard a lot of people have. I even modded my ps2 myself 

[guyjin]

it had better be as solid as a rock, for as much as people pay for it. 

[Joe Redifer]

I don't really have too many problems with my Thompson drive though. I think it was Burnout Revenge or Gotham Racing 2 that gave me the error screen from time to time. The XBOX would start to read it fine though once it warmed up.

I think mine has the Thompson drive, but I don't remember.  What I do know is that it plays Burnout Revenge perfectly from a DVD-R and skips/crashes on the real thing.

[MissaFX]

I think mine has the Thompson drive, but I don't remember.  What I do know is that it plays Burnout Revenge perfectly from a DVD-R and skips/crashes on the real thing.

I have an issue with 2 PC-FX games like this where they will end FMVs early and sometimes crash on the origional, nearly defect free CDs.  But I made backups of them and the backups on Diamond Silver media play without any problem at all.  My only guess the presses are a bit weak and the backup has strengthened sectors which it can read more easly?  My Sega Rally disc on the origional XBOX also is like this where my origional disc often hangs and crashes during loading, but off a DVD-R it never crashes.  Again I am just going to fault the people that made the media since I cannot think of any other explanation.  The PC-FX sure seems a lot more sensitive about it though.

[rolins]

I've used my Slim PS2 v12 everyday for 3 years now. Never seen scratch on any of my discs, and mine is the model known for a weak laser.

[Kitsunexus]

I was actually just thinking about the XBOX drive situation the other day, for no apparent reason. There used to be a picture of all the drives lined up, as each of the drive trays looked different.

EDIT: Found it!




Here's one for 360, but I don't know what the best drive is: