Thinking About Trading Xbox One For PS4. Opinions?

[darthmunky]

Don't want to start a "which console is better" debate but I'm trying to decide what is better for me. I've had the Xbox One for nearly 2 years but have only bought one game for it and didn't play much. I mostly use it for the media player, Youtube, and Netflix.

I know there are more games I'd play on PS4 but I'm wondering how the PS4 dashboard and media player compares to Xbox One's. Discuss.

[Stark]

I've not used the media player on the PS4, but the Netflix and Hulu apps are nearly identical last time I checked. The UI itself is gonna come down to preference mostly. It is an evolution of the PS3 XMB. They made it so if you hit up on the D-Pad you get to commonly used items such as Settings and Power (and Store, I think?) I don't like how lesser used things tend to get shuffled into Library at the far end of the list to the right. I prefer how you can pin apps to the dash on the XB1.

[Sarge]

It's a'ight, but I have no real point of comparison since I haven't used an XB1.

[ElkinFencer10]

I've had both since launch, and I personally think that the PS4 is definitely the superior system. There are FAR more exclusives on PS4, the multiplats tend to run better (that's not always the case, but from what I've read, they run at a slightly higher resolution with a bit more stable frame rate on PS4), and I think the controller is better (but that's straight up subjective personal preference).

The only area in which I feel the Xbox One is superior is with voice commands. It is, admittedly, nice to be able to tell my Xbox to turn on and tell it to go to a certain game or browse Netflix by voice command, and nine times out of ten, it works pretty well. The Playstation Camera's voice commands are garbage and clearly just shoehorned in last minute to match Kinect's features (which it doesn't do). Since Microsoft has basically abandoned the Kinect (even though they FINALLY got it to work well), I think that's mostly a moot point.

I say go PS4, but with the exception of exclusives, it's mostly just preference.

[Tanooki]

Having the PS4 would be an advantage to a point depending on need, also if you have an amazon prime account only Sony devices can have their app due to some shady exclusivity deal so that could be a factor.

I primarily use my PS4 the last year or so for movies and stuff and it has a really nice setup and output quality for movies on disc or streaming. The dashboard is fairly mindless, just tab over to the TV looking box, pick the tile for the service you want and you're in, that's about it really. Discs will just pop up on their own so you don't even have to look for those on their own primary bar icon when present. The PS4 remote I'm not a huge fan of for streaming, but it's partly my fault as I can't remember the buttons well and being bluetooth and very sensitive on the L/R buttons I tend to accidentally hit stuff if I move the controller, you may too, so I'd look for a remote (and I really should too.)

I think it has the nicer setup for streaming/disc based play. Don't need the fanboy war, so if games aren't a factor for you, then that's really it. Otherwise look for honest to god exclusive titles ONLY and not stuff popped on it+PC or all 3 (sony, ms, pc) and see if you care or not.

[ElkinFencer10]

If games aren't a factor for you, then why would you buy a game console at all?

[Sarge]

To have the option to play games. Games might not be a huge factor, but it is a small one for some.

I mean, my reasoning for buying a PS2 back in the day was to get a DVD player that also played games... although I have to admit that the gaming was my primary goal.

[Tanooki]

If games aren't a factor then there are reasons.

One could argue wanting a media streaming device without having to jack a tablet or a computer into a TV screen. The media options bound to your standard off the rack blu ray player are crap. They often aren't updated well or often enough, lag, low memory to store previous screens, pain in the ass to navigate, they're just annoying. A console at the least would have a more friendly, fast, and often updated environment and tend to have high quality disc drives to hand all the reading needed for console games which is a durability advantage, processing power and storage obviously too.

Games can easily be secondary if you only want like 1-3 games a year, something only made for it you really dig and can do off and on. I got mine awhile back on a wicked once in a blue moon type deal where I bagged the PS4 about a year if that into existence for $200 via ebay and selling off some extra boxed in games Costco did in a screwball re-seal bundle through Sony. I sold the junk off and got it down to $200 from $300. I don't feel bad in the least bit as I get a LOT of movie time on it and have enjoyed a few games too, but I've had notably less time gaming on it and amount of games over the PS3 as it's just less interesting than what my laptop can do since console games are strongly ported this generation and in better form.

[darthmunky]

The only area in which I feel the Xbox One is superior is with voice commands.

I didn't know my Xbox could do this!

Also, does the PS4 support external hard drives for watching movies? Like could I plug in a 4TB portable hard drive and play any type of video file in the media player?

[isiolia]

To have the option to play games. Games might not be a huge factor, but it is a small one for some.

At this point though, for the most part, you're looking at a significantly higher cost. There have been times when a console wasn't much more than a stand-alone DVD or Blu-ray player. Outside of an Xbox One S as a 4k Ultra player, I don't think that's really the case right now.

I know on release neither console was particularly impressive as a media player. Both have gotten better, but still. It does seem like the Xbox One is due to get VLC soon, which might make it a more robust option for playing back files.

While I own both a PS4 and an Xbox One, I mostly use my PS3 for Blu-ray/DVD/streaming.

Having the PS4 would be an advantage to a point depending on need, also if you have an amazon prime account only Sony devices can have their app due to some shady exclusivity deal so that could be a factor.

http://www.xbox.com/en-US/entertainment ... tant-video ?

That said, HBO Now does seem to only be on Xbox, for consoles anyway. Meanwhile, a number of other devices support it. Honestly, if the driving motivation is streaming content, paying 1/3 as much (or less) for a Roku or something probably makes more sense. The formats for playing off of USB are limited, but what a PS4 or something can play is limited as well.