SONY PlayStation 2 

SONY made their mark on the video games industry with the release of the original PlayStation in ’96 – They disrupted the industry and stood strong among SEGA’s Saturn and Nintendo’s hot selling Nintendo 64. SEGA responded by beating them to the next generation a year early with the SEGA Dreamcast released in 1999. Although it was a year behind, the PlayStation 2’s release was majorly hyped with reviewers ecstatic about the graphics capability, backwards compatibility, and ability to play DVD’s. Several versions of the PlayStation 2 were released over its 14 year lifespan where it took the spot as best selling console of all time.

On the back of the SONY PlayStation 2 you have several ports.

MAIN POWER: At the top right on the back of the system is a toggle power switch.

AC IN: Below the power switch is the power input port. The main power supply for the PS2 is internal, so all that is required is a common “keyed” 2-prong power cable.

DIGITAL OUT (OPTICAL): This port is used for optical audio cable or lightpipe. This allows 5.1 surround sound to be output to a properly outfitted stereo system. 

AV MULTI OUT: This provides Audio and Video output. The audio is stereo only and the video can be either composite rca (red, white and yellow), s-video or component. After the systems lifespan HDMI cables were also available.

EXPANSION BAY: Finally the right side of the rear is dominated by a large Expansion Bay door. This is where you could insert a Hard Drive for storing games. You can also attach the Ethernet Adapter here over the hard drive.

The rear of the PS2 Slim has been streamlined quite a bit to adjust for the reduced size. Starting from the left we see the first change that allowed the system to become slimmer, the power supply has been taken out of the inside of the original FAT unit and is now a 8.5 V brick style power supply witch plugs into the DC IN port. Next to that is the same Multi-Out AV port followed by the same Digital Out audio port. Finally we have a great new addition, a built in Ethernet Port, removing the need for buying an attach on like the original version. One other item of note are the two screw holes on the bottom left and right, these are for attaching the PS2 Screen to the system.

The glarring ommision from the back of the PS2 Slim is the Expansion Bay. This means that PlayStation 2 can no longer use the internal PlayStation Hard Drive. This did cause some negative waves as this made some games no longer compatable as they required the extra space.

DualShock 2 Analog Controller

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The DualShock controller is very similar to the original PlayStation 1 controller. If you played the original PS1 then you’ll be right at home with this one. The right side has a four button D-Pad instead of a D-Pad dial like other systems. The two analog controllers are stiffer and an upgrade from thier PS1 relatives and are now textured for easier grip. And the SONY green triangle, a red circle, a blue cross, and a pink square remain the same.

Interesting note: The controller’s designer Teiyu Goto had intended the circle and cross to represent “yes” and “no” respectively as common in Japanese culture, and thus typically used for “confirm” and “cancel” in most PlayStation games respectively, and placed similarly to the A and B buttons on the Super Famicom controller which had similar functions, while the triangle symbolizes a point of view and the square is equated to a sheet of paper there to be used to access menus. In Western releases, the circle and cross functions are often switched (circle to cancel, cross to confirm))

You also have two shoulder buttons L1, L2, R1, R2. And finally your select, start and analog buttons. The analog button helps compatibility with older PS1 games that were made for digital input (d-pad) only games.

As the name states the controller also comes with built-in dual shocks! Or rumble packs if you will. What’s nice about these is that they could be controlled individually providing a stereo, left and right effect.

SONY PS2 Network Adapter

Released with the PlayStation 2 Network, this adapter was attacked to the extension bay on the back of the original PS2 FAT models. It come with both dial-up phone jack and a high-speed ethernet port (that’s right, some folks still used dial-up). This came with an install disk that would place the connection software on a memeory card to be accessed by games. 

The adapter did not work with the updated PS2 SLIM models, but that’s OK, it came with a built-in ethernet port.

SONY PS2 Hard Disk Drive

This was a 40 GB Drive that could be inserted into the expansion bay on the original PS2 FAT models. It also HAD to have the Network Adapter attached (as seen in the picture) to provide power. This hard drive allowed games to store files on it for faster loading times and could serve as a back-up to save files on memory cards.

SONY PlayStation 2 Games

Being the best selling game system of all time can only be done with having some of the best games of all time, and a lot of them. The SONY PlayStation 2s graphic capabilities allowed developers to build any 3D world they wanted. Franchises that got their start on the PS1 and other systems were epanded upon with larger levels and much better graphics. With over 1850 games in the US alone, you find multiple games for any genre you prefer.

For the PlayStation 2, SONY moved away from the CD cases used on the PS1 and went with the DVD style case everyone knows and loves. These study cases have a clear plastic sleve to allow cover art to be slipped in. One the inside front cover there are clips that can hold full size manuals.

All first run games features a black stipe across teh top of the cover with the PlayStation 2 logo and the PS logo. Later, Greatest Hits titles would follow with a red stipe.

Trog Store SONY PS2 Products