Background

The PlayStation Portable (PSP) is Sony's newest handheld device. Not only can you play video games on it, but you can also listen to music, view pictures and most importantly, watch video on it.

One of the most prominent features of the PSP is its display. It is a 4.3 inch LCD screen, perfect for playing videos in a widescreen format common to most DVDs.

The PSP has two storage devices: the Universal Media Disc (UMD) and Memory Stick Duo. (Note: Sony has made many different types of Memory Sticks. Only the ones with Duo in their name work with the PSP.)

The UMD is a Sony proprietary optical disc capable of storing 1.8 GB of data in a small package. This is 3 times the capacity of a standard CD. In addition to video, these UMDs can also store PSP games and Audio. These discs are read only, like a CD, and are only produced by Sony at this time. There is no way for anyone, other than Sony, to make their own UMDs at the moment.

The UMD video discs include DVD-like features like alternate audio and video tracks, scene selection chapters, subtitles, slow motion and fast forward. Sony has already announced a number of UMD Videos, a list of which can be found here.

The Memory Stick Duo (MS) is a Sony proprietary flash stick capable of story up to 2GB of data in an even smaller package. The largest MS holds a little under half the capacity of a DVD. These sticks come in all sorts of sizes including: 32MB, 64MB, 128MB, 256MB, 512MB, 1GB and 2GB. These flash cards are writable and anyone can read and write to these cards either using their PSP and a USB cable or a Memory Stick reader. In addition to video, these memory sticks can also store saved game data, photos and audio. A list of memory sticks can be found here.

More technical details about the PSP video format can be found in the forums Memory Sticks.