PlayStation digital recording comes to town

The PlayTV device is well worth the wait. Photo / Supplied

Convergence is the name of the game these days - and Sony's taking that to the limit with its PlayStation 3 console now able to play and record television shows.

A USB device called PlayTV plugs into the PlayStation 3, giving it two tuners like most digital video recorders on the market. That means you can watch one channel and record another - or both and do something else like, er, play games.

PlayTV works in high definition and gives access to the excellent Freeview high-definition service and its 13-day electronic programming guide, allowing users to schedule TV recordings for up to a fortnight as well as search upcoming content by everything from actor to style of show.

The existence of PlayTV was accidentally leaked by a Kiwi PlayStation exec more than three years ago, during which time other countries have been able to buy the device - and little ol' New Zealand was made to wait.

In a statement, Sony said that varying free-to-air digital broadcasting specs in different countries had meant there were technical challenges to overcome and that the "development process has taken longer than planned".

But as a result New Zealanders get a more advanced version of PlayTV than released elsewhere, with high-definition recordings, live chat with other PS3 users during shows and the ability to recommend shows to other PlayStation Network users - or friends on Facebook.

PlayTV goes on sale for $199 next Thursday. Those with a bit of technical knowledge and an older, low capacity PlayStation, will be pleased to hear that upgrading the console's hard drive is a fairly easy task to have enough free space to record high-def content.