I can’t make up my mind on which one to buy!!
This should be IMHO as there isn’t a factual answer and it’ll probably be moved there. I’d say look at the games avaibale for the two consoles, esp. the ones that are considered ‘classics’ and try and determine it that way.
If I were you, I would base my decision on the game library. Because, after all, you’ll be playing games – not the specifications.
IMO I would choose the X-box. Mainly because of the specs, but also because having better specs and directx make it inviting for game producers to produce on.
Have you thought about buying both?
Moved to IMHO.
-xash
General Questions Moderator
Having the same dilema myself. Feels however like PS2 is coming towards the end of its arc, while XBOX is still in the middle of it. There are only about 2 games I want that aren’t available on the XBOX. On the other hand, I fear that supporting XBOX will lead to MS getting some sort of monopoly on console gaming in the future that will strangle diversity in gaming etc.
Prolly going to be getting an XBOX and then PS3 in a couple years.
to the OP: Why did you rule out the GameCube as a choice?
I myself have both systems and I find that I play games on the PS2 and watch movies on the xbox (via. xbox mediaplayer which we shall proberly not discuss any further).
I’m not the OP, but the fact that they’ve dropped the price to $100 suggests to me that they’re not going to be making games for it a whole lot longer (at least not Nintendo itself, the other companies still might. for a little while). That’s what happened with Dreamcast, so…
You’d be quite wrong in that assumption then elfkin477. Firstly, Nintendo has only dropped the price of GameCube once more than either Sony’s PlayStation or Microsoft’s Xbox. Since the price drop, GameCube’s sales have quadrupled, surpassing that of both PS2’s and Xbox weekly sales. Rumor has it SCEA is considering a similar price drop for PS2 in November because of the GC’s success. Would that imply Sony is leaving the hardware video game industry? Also of note, worldwide, GameCube has sold an equal amount of units as Xbox. Nintendo also has copious games in development for both this year and next. The situation is far from dire, as you seem to believe.
GameCube and the folks at Nintendo seem to have jumped on the bandwagon a bit late. If I were 5 and looking foward to Mario Bros. 18, I’d brobably consider it! It’s a bit weak!!
Comparing specs between the PS2 and Xbox isn’t very enlightening because the system architectures are so different. Is a fast Intel CPU better than a custom CPU that runs at half the clock rate but has two vector units that can multiply 8 floating point numbers per clock cycle? Depends how you use it.
That said, the best thing to do IMO is rent both systems and play the games you’re interested in on each system. Also think about DVD functionality and online play… do you already have a DVD player or will you be using the console to watch movies? Do you have a modem or broadband? Do you care about online rankings? Are you willing to pay for online console games? Etc.
Have you even looked at Gamecube’s library?
While I don’t own either system, I have two friends who purchased PS2’s only to later trade them in for Xboxes. Their reasons were pretty much the same. Xbox has a large hard drive, while PS2 has memory packs. If you play with any frequency, you will use up PS2’s memory packs eventually and have to keep buying new ones, whereas if you have Xbox you can save almost indefinately.
Do you play with a group of friends? For that reason alone my decision would be to get an Xbox. Four players at a time versus only two is a huge difference.
That’s why I bought a GameCube 
I don’t have an XBox, but I DO have a PS2 and a PSX. I don’t play the original Playstation any more because the PS2 is backwards compatible, that is, I can play all my old PSX games on the PS2 console. Since I’ve built up quite a library of PSX games, this was a major point in deciding which new console to buy.
The memory storage devices on Playstations are called cards, and a twin pack of PS2 (Sony brand) cards cost a little under $40 at Amazon. A single (Sony brand) card will retail for about $30 to $35, so it pays to look for that double pack. There are some third party card makers, too, but I’ve heard too many horror stories about their cards failing for me to trust MY valuable data to anything other than a Sony card. I have ONE PS2 card, and really don’t need another one. There’s quite a bit of storage on it.
Now, to play PS original games, you’ll need a PS original card. Unfortunately, the cards are not interchangeable. You need a PS2 card for a PS2 game, and a PS0 card for a PSO game. I have plenty of PS0 cards left over, so I don’t really know offhand how much they retail for, and I couldn’t find them for sale online.
These cards can be erased and re-used many times. I’ve heard that sometimes cards fail and wipe all their data, but I’ve never had that happen to me. That might be luck, it might be because I’ve only used Sony brand memory cards, or it might be a combination of factors.
And after all that typing, I’m going to have to echo ** Sethergh** about the game library advice. If therey’s one game or game series you HAVE to have, make sure it’s out for your console. The backwards compatiblity was nice, but I knew that the Final Fantasy series would only be playable on the PS, so I opted for that console.
Has Sony come out with the internal hard drive for the PS2? I’ve got a big empty bay marked “hard drive” on the back of mine, but I’ve never gotten a chance to use it.
I have both. I love 'em both, but if I could suddenly only have one, I’d keep the PS2. Much bigger library (including all the old PS1 games, which, despite being behind the times technology-wise, many of which are still damn fun to play), and (IMHO) more better exclusives. And as I’ve mentioned here before, I personally FAR prefer the PS2 controller, and still haven’t found one for the Xbox I’m totally happy with. That’s a nit-picky point, though. The extra controller ports built in to the Xbox are certainly nice, as is the internal hard drive, and its graphics DO seem to me to be a bit better, but it all comes down to the games for me. And the PS2 just wins on that account.
So, I’d recommend getting both if it’s at all feasible. If not, I’d personally recommend the PS2, based strictly on the game library. As far as a Gamecube… I dunno. People seem to like it, but I’ve played some games with it, still look through the library every once in a while, and while there are a handul of games that look like fun, there just isn’t enough there to excite me into getting it.
IIRC an external hardrive is stamped for release soon.
Buy the one you like the most…then buy the other for a song when Company X (or Y) upgrades or drops out. The rumor is that the PS2 is dropping to $150 (or $100!) around november, at THAT price, it’s something worth doing if even only as an experiment.
I’ve had an Xbox for almost two years now. I’ve got 10 odd games and feel if they ‘lose out’ as many fanboys want them to, I’ve got my money’s worth.
Further, with age comes patience, I’ve paid less than half what theses games would have cost at $50 per.