VidZone Hands-On Impressions
VidZone is a new online music video service for PlayStation 3, and Sony offered us the chance to check it out. VidZone is an interesting new development in the world of multimedia convergence, as it will allow you to stream music videos for free to your PlayStation 3. The new service is set to...
VidZone is a new online music video service for PlayStation 3, and Sony offered us the chance to check it out.
VidZone is an interesting new development in the world of multimedia convergence, as it will allow you to stream music videos for free to your PlayStation 3. The new service is set to launch in United Kingdom, France, Ireland, Spain, Italy, Germany, and Australia soon, but we got to play with it ahead of E3, where the release date will be announced.
The new service is a 25MB installation that sits in the 'Music' tab on the PlayStation 3 XMB. Once started, it takes about 20 seconds to load up and synchronise with the Vidzone servers. The homepage then presents a selection of playlists that includes dance music, recommended songs and a chart, which is compiled from the most popular videos currently being watched on the service.
The main menu is where you can navigate through the actual videos. It's easy to watch videos on Vidzone--you just press the 'square' button on whatever's highlighted and the song begins to play automatically. It took about 2-3 seconds for each video to buffer on our office network, but the rest of the video streamed seamlessly from there.
Videos play in a small window by default, allowing you to navigate the menus and queue up more videos on the playlist. You can also go fullscreen by pressing select, and the video quality holds up well. The detail levels are just below digital terrestrial TV, and they're only served in 4:3 square format at the moment. Sadly, Vidzone has also said that it has no intention of supporting HD in the forseeable future, which is a real shame.
So how is this service supported, you may be thinking? Well, it's all ad-based at the moment, with small adverts appearing at the bottom of the screen at nine second intervals. There are also two banner adverts on the main menu screens, but the difference is these are actually click-able, taking you to the PlayStation Store to download the Mirror's Edge demo, for example. All of the adverts are placeholder at the moment, so we'll have to see what brands appear on the final store.
The music selection on Vidzone is actually pretty good--there are some gaps in terms of the very latest releases, but the back catalogue is comprehensive. Sony Music is one of the major partners, so you're in luck if you're a fan of Beyonce, and there are plenty of other big-name artists such as Michael Jackson, Kings of Leon, Elvis and Franz Ferdinand.
There's not a lot wrong with the Vidzone service, especially given it's free, and the ease of creating playlists and unobtrusive ads should make it a hit at parties. The service will even text you a link if you want to download the video or the ringtone to your phone, although you have to pay £1.50 for the privilege. Sony promises us that the full details for the rollout of the service will be announced at E3, and if you're a European PS3-owning music-lover, you'll definitely want to keep an eye out for it.
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