psp region question

[xtekian]

i know this is a pretty random question to ask in this board, but it's quick and painless so here we go =)

a friend of mine got a psp from his mom awhile ago but didn't want it, so he's been trying to sell his psp. he's been asking for $200 (value pack + 1 game), but i think i can bargain him down to $150 for it. so basically, it's a pretty sweet deal. the only problem is, is that his PSP is from Hong Kong, and I live in the US. I was wondering that if i bought an psp game from the US, whether it would work on his hong kong version psp. does psp have regions, like dvds? finally, will i be able to change the language to english?

thanks!

[Sentinel]

There is no region locking at all for games on the PSP.  I brought mine last year in Hong Kong and I can confirm it works perfectly with both US and Euro games.  The UMD movies are region coded though, so if you do intend to buy official movies this may be of concern to you.  Frankly I prefer to encoded my DVDs to MPEG4 and view them via the memory stick.

As for languages, as all of the PSPs sold are identical (except the movie region) so you are free to choose whichever language you wish.

http://psp.ign.com/articles/561/561098p1.html

Edit: Added link with further information

[scorp]

If you are planning on viewing out of region stuff this site may have the goods to do it
http://www.afterdawn.com/  the psp section is in the forums just scroll down

[alecjw]

I'm not sure that the DVDs would work bacause there are two different formats of DVD - PAL and NTSC. In Hong Kong, they use the NTSC format - in the US, I think you use the PAL format. I'm not entireley sure because I live in the UK and I don't know much about American DVDs - I could be wrong.

[Carol Haynes]

PAL is used in Europe and Australasia

US uses NTSC

Most PAL players will play NTSC (provided regional encoding doesn't prevent it), but a lot of NTSC systems don't bother to support PAL.

[Sentinel]

I'm not sure that the DVDs would work bacause there are two different formats of DVD - PAL and NTSC. In Hong Kong, they use the NTSC format - in the US, I think you use the PAL format. I'm not entireley sure because I live in the UK and I don't know much about American DVDs - I could be wrong.

Bear in mind that the PSP doesn't use either PAL or NTSC, so all resolutions for all regions are the same.  You just need to set the correct transcoding settings in your chosen software to ensure the target resolution is suitable for the PSP.  The source resolution is irrelevant.