How it will work: Blu-ray PS3 to PSP transfers

Since Sony‘s demonstration in Las Vegas, you may have wondered how the process of transferring Blu-ray movies from your PlayStation 3 to your handy PlayStation Portable actually ran. Details at the 2008 Consumer Electronics Show were flat-out dry, but thanks to new info running around, you’ll be able to see a bigger picture. More on the popular BD Live feature at the full story.

 

BD Live was previously announced as Sony‘s newest web content shindig for its next-generation console lineup, but it only recently made waves at the 2008 Consumer Electronics Show (CES) when one of its features – Blu-ray transfers from a Sony PlayStation 3 to a PlayStation Portable – made heads turn.

Initial info was scarce, however, so we scrounged up more details on Sony’s plans for Blu-ray portability, plus some answers to some speculations brought forth by digital media “cloning”. Thankfully though, we won’t have to use our ridiculous doodles to show the transfer process visually because the process itself was documented from Sony’s booth at CES 2008.

But first, let’s try to nail the facts: a PSP-formatted Blu-ray movie will eat as much as 1 GB of memory space and will be encoded at the PSP’s best quality thresholds – that’s using the H.264/MPEG-4 AVC format. Transfers are currently limited via high-speed USB port transfers using a standard USB A-to-B male-male cord, but offer just 3 – 5 minutes of waiting time.

Many are hoping for WiFi support despite the obviously slower transfer speeds, however. Four-digit code authentication will be used for security purposes; this is the only notable speed-bump during the transfer demonstration, for the process is a simple select, copy, and play procedure.

    
Plug the PS3 to a PSP, insert the Blu-ray disc, select the PSP movie, copy it over, and voila!

 
Sony’s given the impression that the transfer feature should be compatible with all Blu-ray movies. The general idea, they said, is that the transfers are supposed to work with all Blu-ray movies – or at least, that’s the hope. The company has also mentioned that low-resolution, portable versions of Blu-ray movies will only be readily available on-disc once Blu-ray 2.0 rolls out uniformly from both Blu-ray recording plants and movie publishers.

There’s an uneasy air surrounding that idea, though, because Sony has stated that the process shouldn’t store the movie on the PS3 hosting the transfer. Barring the possibility of on-the-fly conversions (standard conversions would need to store the movie’s data), this mean that older and current Blu-ray movies are unlikely to be candidates for Blu-ray transfers to PSPs, unless Sony comes up with some workarounds.

Digital rights management is another issue raised by speculative parties. Sony expressed that they do have plans of controlling the movie transfers, although the exact number of how many copies can be made have not been divulged. What is sure is that Sony will come up with a final DRM plan, but that’s yet to come.

Via PSP Vault