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I am going to order a PS3 today and I have the God of War 160gb bundle in my sights. However I just saw there is a God of War 250gb bundle for $50 more. Is it worth the $50 to get the extra 90gb of storage? How important is hard drive size with the PS3? Given I play a lot of Rock Band and am switching from my Wii to PS3 for Rock Band because I cannot download songs on the Wii. I am also going to be playing the Final Fantasy XIV so I may have just answered my own question, but I would still like to hear your thoughts on it?

[update] Thank you for the input. I decided to go with the 250gb model, and FFXIV for the PS3, with netflix, FF and Rock Band I figured I would burn the space, plus I am using the system as my primary Blu Ray player for movies. I never thought of adding an extra hard drive so thanks for that!

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    Pretty sure you can add external hard drives to the PS3 at a later time. you can also replace a ps3 hard drive. Just commenting in case you weren't aware that its not now or never with ps3
    – Josh K
    Aug 26, 2010 at 18:44
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    Note: with netflix you can't actually save anything that is streamed, so that doesn't matter at all when calculating space.
    – Earlz
    Aug 26, 2010 at 20:45
  • Just a note: A 160 GB is really 149 GB and the 250 GB is really 233 GB, so the real diff is 84 GB.
    – Markus Hedlund
    Jun 20, 2011 at 8:56

4 Answers 4

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It really depends on your usage. Many PS3 games have a forced "install" where sometimes multiple gigabytes of data are copied to HD storage for fast in-game reads (looking at you Metal Gear Solid 4). As well, some games on PSN can be quite large, not to mention that PSN has a few full-fledged retail PS3 games available for download, as well as high def movies.

Having said all that, it looks like Rock Band song downloads are around thirty megabytes a piece, giving you space for ~500 songs on the 120gb model.

Also, the commenter above is correct, the PS3 (including the slim) can be upgraded with any 2.5 inch HD in the future if you run out of space.

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    Side note: 2.5 inch HDDs are sometimes called Laptop HDDs.
    – user2974
    Aug 26, 2010 at 21:02
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The main concern that would require a lot of hard drive space is alluded to by OedipusPrime above, which is full-size retail games installed on the hard drive.

There are a few reasons you might have a full retail game installed:

  • Forced install by a game for performance reasons (HDD is faster than the optical drive)
  • Full retail games that are downloaded from PSN
  • Voluntary install? I can't remember if this is allowed

The maximum size of a Blu-ray disc is 25GB for a single-layer disc and 50GB for a dual-layer, so particularly hefty games could easily take up a big chunk of your hard drive.

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  • Some games do have a voluntary install. Nier is one of them.
    – Mr. November
    Oct 20, 2011 at 23:43
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Market Analysis Go! For the following PS3 bundles listed, all are the slimar version with Internet-ready built-in Wi-Fi, 2 USB ports and HDMI + Bravia Synch output for 1080p resolution and connectivity between other Sony HDMI products, and Free PlayStation Network membership (not Playstation Plus).

On September 17, 2010 the PS3 Move Bundle will be released with a 320GB hard drive and PS Move, the Sony motion controller. For $399.99 on Amazon, you get

  • PlayStation 3 320 GB system
  • DualShock 3 wireless controller
  • PlayStation Move motion controller (wireless)
  • PlayStation Eye camera Sports
  • Champions Blu-ray game PlayStation
  • Move game demos disc AC power cord,
  • AV cable, USB cable
  • The Move Navigation controller (aka the PS3 version of the Wii nunchuk) is not included

The current 160GB and 250GB hard drive PS3 packages cost $299.99 and $349.99 respectively and include

  • PlayStation 3 system
  • Dualshock 3 wireless controller.
  • AC power cord, AV cable and USB cable.

So gigabytes per dollar spent is as following

  • 160 GB: $0.53 GB per dollar
  • 250 GB: $0.71 GB per dollar
  • 320 GB: $0.80 GB per dollar

In terms of memory usage, Rock Band and Guitar Tracks alone do not justify purchasing the larger hard drive. If you see yourself downloading PSN games or movies, then a larger hard drive is warranted. Furthermore Sony sees the PS3 having an eight to ten year lifespan. This is believable considering the PS2 had a lifespan of 9 years.

Considering you currently have a Wii, you need to decide if you want to continue to base your motion controller gaming around the Wii or the PS3 or use a combination of the two. I feel it is not worth jumping from the 160GB to 250GB bundles, but rather if spend the extra $100 and get the 320GB with PS Move. If you don't envision yourself downloading movies and games to the HDD however, the 160 GB might be best.

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    The PlayStation Move bundle has the Move Motion controller, but not the Move Navigation controller.
    – user2974
    Aug 26, 2010 at 21:15
  • @Powerlord, that is correct and I did not list the Move Navigation controller
    – Elpezmuerto
    Aug 27, 2010 at 14:05
  • This is more of a warning to everyone else who reads this and may not be aware that Move actually consists of two controllers.
    – user2974
    Aug 27, 2010 at 15:13
  • @Powerlord, updated accordingly to point this out
    – Elpezmuerto
    Aug 27, 2010 at 16:29
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The original PS3 shipped in a 20 GB model. Any games needed will work fine in that much space. The additional space might be nice for storing movies or music or something, so beyond that it's just preference.

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  • Didn't know that. Important point.
    – MGOwen
    Dec 1, 2010 at 1:03
  • Didn't it actually originally come in 60G and 80G, with a PS2 processor for backwards compatibility? Then they nerfed it, took out the PS2 chip, and gave it 20G and 40G drives to lower the cost.
    – JustJeff
    Jan 17, 2011 at 0:20
  • The original version shipped in 20gb and 60gb versions, with the 60 gb version featuring other bonus things like a card reader. My original statement was that there existed a launch PS3 with 20gb of storage.
    – McKay
    Jan 19, 2011 at 5:34

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