Extend Your PS2 Lens Life Using USB Extreme

Sony's Playstation 2, despite the release of its younger brother the PS3 and Microsoft's Xbox 360, is still the world's best selling console at 140 million units sold (mid '08). This undoubtedly means people are still willing to shell-out cash to experience the fun and excitement of PS2 games even though the PS3 has already been released. Of course this can be partly due to the fact that the PS3 and Xbox 360 sell for a few hundred dollars more. Point is though, being a 8 years old (the PS2 was released year 2000 in Japan), this predecessor to Sony's original "little gray box" is still a juggernaut in the console gaming world. That said, its safe to say that a lot of people are and will still be playing PS2 (and PS one) titles years from now and undoubtedly will bring problems of hardware failure due to overuse. Which brings me to the topic of my review- USB Extreme.

USB Extreme is an ingenious product that takes away the hassles and frustration of lens breakdown on the slim PS2. The USB Extreme software comes as a bootable disc that is played on the PS2 and works in conjunction with free downloadable software. It lets gamers who still enjoyu and are still attached to their PS2s play games off an external hard drive through USB connection instead of using the traditional game discs. The external hard drive is formatted using a utility on the downloaded USB Extreme software and with a DVD ROM and a PC, games are uploaded or installed on the USB HDD.

The USB Extreme which by the way is a derivative of USB Advance (for the original fat PS2), is a perfect way for PS2 owners to protect the laser of their consoles from regular wear and tear. Replacement lasers for the PS2 are hard to come by and cost quite a bit of money, so replacing them every two years can really put a dent on a gamer's entertainment budget. It also comes with advantages such as faster load times (it eliminates the need to boot from CDs) and saves you a lot of space. Imagine how many games you can store on a 200 gig hard drive. Having all the games on a hard drive can also save you the trouble of lugging-around a sackful of games on disks during travel. All you have to bring is the console, the USB Extreme disc and your USB hard drive.

The USB Extreme is the perfect product for die-hard PS2 fans like me who still find enough thrills with old PS2 titles and have no plans of upgrading to the next generation consoles any time soon.

AP - A man suspected in a series of rush-hour shootings near Dallas is a former Utah state trooper wanted on burglary and robbery warrants who apparently shot himself after a standoff with police, authorities said Tuesday.