I can’t believe this is $200 - Playstation Portal Review

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The PlayStation Portal isn’t Sony’s first attempt at putting the PlayStation experience in your hands, but it’s the first time they’ve built a device that’s ONLY capable of streaming from a living room console. Is it worth the price or have they created $200 worth of eWaste?

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MUSIC CREDIT
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Intro: Laszlo - Supernova

Outro: Approaching Nirvana - Sugar High

CHAPTERS
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0:00 Intro
0:45 Setting it up
1:45 Gaming on the Portal
3:37 Tour of the Device
6:24 Bluetooth
8:08 Battery
8:49 Why Wifi Five?
10:49 Some things it can't do
12:30 How is the Screen?

[dadi]

a friendly reminder that the PS Vita could do literally everything this thing could and also play it's own games, you could gamestream from a ps3 and a ps4 along with some games having support for using it like a wii u style controller, the vita also has an oled screen and bluetooth, as well as a much much longer battery life, still to this day, i cannot wrap my head around how sony managed to screw the pooch so hard on marketing the Vita, it took the steam deck for me to drop it as my main mobile gaming console, and even then i still prefer it for retro games, like gameboy and nes/snes titles.

[Syddy_]

people were definitely outraged about the dualsense edge's price, and the issue isn't that it's 200$ for a streaming only device, it's that it feels like it's a waste of the hardware, if it could stream ps+ games over the internet without a ps5 being required it would be fine but as is it feels like the portal could do more.

[Thorz]

That the portal cannot connect to streaming services like Sony’s own PS+ takes out all the joy for me. I cannot understand how Sony couldn’t include this!

[no]

The issue with this thing is not so much the price but how crazy limited it is. This makes its usecase super niche and feels like wasted potential. Remember the whole issue with the memory cards on the Vita? That one dumb decision held the device back quite a bit. The Portal's issues are like that, but multiple.

Edit: As someone else mentioned, the Vita can already do everything this thing can and more. The Portal is basically the "remote play" feature turned into a standalone device.

[RemizZ]

150ms latency is kinda atrocious considering you're staying in your local network. Even Stadia over the internet had 150 or better, local as low as 80 iirc. With how sensitive Linus is to input lag, it seems a little too focused on trying to find the good points and being okay with issues they normally wouldn't be. Even a Steam Link running on a (wired) Raspberry Pi 3 is better than that.

[adam_roman]

The price justification angle starts to fall apart when you remember there are dozens of portable Android consoles like the Retroid Pocket 3+ that are able to do the whole PS5 remote play thing for $50 cheaper, and they include the ability to run games natively, stream other services like Steam Link or Moonlight, and they don't need proprietary wireless audio like the Portal.

[kristopherthompson]

My BIGGEST issue with the portal isn't the price. It's the wasted potential. If it could stream ps+ games over just the internet, that would be a massive improvement. Combine that with the lack of Bluetooth, wifi 6, display out, etc. It is not worth 200 bucks for something practically anything with a screen can already do.

[HandsomeMariojump]

$200 is a lot of money, stop justifying this scam

[DuncDog]

Wifi 6 isn't strictly better on speeds, as described. It is, however, on compliant environments significantly better than 5 in latency, which is massive for this use case. 6e is similar, but just adds 6GHz support.

[Fast]

I'm a big fan of game streaming as well, but I have to say that my biggest issue with something like the Portal is just that it's not that much cheaper than a standalone device (Steamdeck, Android Handheld, etc.) that can also run Steam/Android/Emulation locally on top of streaming, to say nothing of the fact you could stream from a PC or Xbox as well. Sure most of them don't have an 8" screen, but I'd trade 1-2" of screen space and ~$50-100 more for the ability to play way more games.

I'm not sure how reasonable it would be to hit this price point, but if this was more like $100, maybe $150 I think it would be a lot more compelling but as it stands, I think it's just too close in price to full-fledged handhelds.

[UltraDraft]

150ms latency is craaaazy, I play on Geforce NOW from africa on a server in europe and they latency is just 60ms. how are you okay with 150ms latency in a local connection?

[kryzethx]

5:57 This is a pretty terrible argument on multiple fronts. For one, this is basically saying "The price is bad on THIS device, but it's even worse on THAT device" as if that makes anything better; two wrongs don't make a right lol. And who says people aren't outraged about the hundred dollar controllers? I'd argue we're still pretty mad about controllers costing as much (or more) than entire games at the 60-70 price point

[TASTYCASTY]

Im fine with the idea of cloud gaming. My issue is that the point of cloud gaming is to create a cheaper alternative if you cant afford a device that can actually run the games. However for this device you have to already own the more expensive item in order to even run this thing which to me makes it pointless for what most people want it for. Especially considering that if you want to just remote play like linus said you can get a backbone and use the remote play app on your phone

[AninoNiKugi]

I don't think the issue is the $200 pricetah. It's the very limited device that you get from it. I'm sure it'll be worth it for many people but for most, it'll be too limited.

[DovahVokuna]

This has to be the worst review of you guys to date. I returned the portal. People be aware what you are buying. These guys must of had a different kind of PS portal then me. It can do almost nothing. Sometimes i wonder who sponsors you guys.
I someone wants to buy it. Check a couple more reviewers. Know what your getting

[Yodagamer]

I think my biggest problem with this product is how locked down it is considering it seems to be locked down android hardware. I would love to have a tablet with these controls that I could watch netflix/YT/Etc, emulate other consoles, and access to the play store if I want to. They probably wanted to make sure every ounce of entertainment you get out of this product is from the product they make the most money out of. The second it gets hacked it will be far more compelling imo.

[Agent]

I can't believe Nintendo and Sony did a collab and made a new Wii U. Always knew it was possible.

[FSAPOJake]

The Wii U, which launched in 2012, had basically latency-free remote play on the gamepad.
The technology is there. Sony could have used bespoke hardware for this, but they just gave you a device to do the exact same remote play your phone can do.

[DaniPooo]

I hope the Portal can be updated over time and that it will eventually allow streaming games from the PS+ streaming service.

[maxhalogaming]

So if we wanna talk price, I got a budget Samsung tablet the other day for £130 (probably $150 for people in the US).
It comes with a 10inch screen with a resolution that's above 1080p, really good speakers, front and rear facing cameras, a really long battery life, and Bluetooth.
It's a better product than the Portal in every way, it can used for remote play and cloud gaming for multiple platforms and since anyone using remote play would already have a controller it means that for £70 less than the Portal I have a device that does it's job and so much more.