Chapter 5. UMD Movies on the PSP

So there I was, sitting out back in the shade with the earbuds in my ears and the PSP propped up on my belly, a beverage near my elbow and a gentle breeze tickling my hair. I was watching Napoleon Dynamite, which is a hilarious film, and every so often, I laughed out loud. This caught the attention of someone who was hanging around behind my neighbor's house; he wandered over and asked what I was doing.

"Watching a movie," I replied.

"On that? What is that?"

I gave him a brief, encapsulated description of a PSP, which he likened to a portable game console from a competitor of Sony's. "No, it's not at all like that," I said. "The PSP has dedicated 3D graphics hardware; it's got better controls; and it lets you do more than gaming, like movies and stuff."

"Why would you want to watch a movie on that?" he wondered.

Admittedly, he got me thinking: Why would I want to watch movies on my PSP? The screen isn't exactly as large as one you'd find at a multiplex, and the audio doesn't shake the ground from 16 speakers and a subwoofer the size of a conversion van. It's not even a television-size screen, and it makes my wimpy two-speaker "home entertainment system" look like a THX system. So why would I want to watch movies on the PSP?

"Well," I said to the neighbor's acquaintance, "I'm here, outside, on this nice day instead of cooped up in the house."

"Good point," he said.

"I can take it anywhere," I added. "Have you ever seen a good movie on a plane?"

He thought for a moment. "No, but I don't fly that much."

"Doesn't matter," I replied. "Never in the history of flight has a good movie been shown on a plane. Besides, the PSP is ideal for movies, with a crisp LCD display perfect for high-quality video. The earphones keep it private, and the selection of films is fantastic, even if two major studios did recently announce the cessation of support for the UMD format."

He backed away. "I have to go ... um, wash ... um ... my car's"

"Furthermore," I said, "The screen has a 16:9 aspect ratio, for widescreen viewing, and the UMD format offers DVD-quality video."

"I think I hear my ... uh, brother calling"

"The intuitive controls allow you to jump from scene to scene, fast-forward, reverse, and define a segment of video for looping playback."

I looked down at the screen to demonstrate, and he made his move. He ran away, back to my neighbor's house, and slammed the door behind him. I heard a loud click as he set the lock.

Hmm, I thought. Guess he didn't want to know about the ability to play MPEG-based movies transferred from a computerbut that's for a different chapter anyway (Chapter 7, in fact).