Good choice.
But honestly 80Gb isn't bad either provided you know which of your PS2 games you're gonna play on the PS3. You can check on the playstation website to see if they work Ok on the PS3 or not. ( only game I have with listed glitches is GT4 which is fine as the only 3 PS2 games I wanted to play on the PS3 are FF XII, GoW2 and Tenchu).

I have the Euro 60GB, so the decision is not the same for me, but I would like full backwards compatibility

I have a 20 GB, which pones.

I can live without wireless.

It was $499. Same as the 80 Gig they had.

Thanks everyone. I was sure it was the right choice. But when you give a friend advice, you want to know that you didn't miss something :)

The 60GB is a great machine, that's the model I picked up. That said, the 80GB would be fine for most people, it can run 80% of the PS2 games, including all of the bestsellers. But its always nice to ring up the 100%.

Enjoy those BluRay movies!

Definitely the 60GB. It's the same as the 80GB except with 20GB less....but full BC. Plus, you can always replace the hard drive later. The 60 is just better than the 80.

I expected them to sell it at a lower price, but yeah if he was not interested in Motorstorm and has lots of PS2 games, then the 60GB is for you. The 60GB is the best PS3 SKU.

 Too bad Sony got rid of it...seriously, I think that was one of the biggest mistakes Sony has made...

I agree. People do care about BC. It pissed me off that they've got rid of it, considering that the 80GB causes glitches to some games I own. Luckily I've managed to find one during the Holidays. I hope they bring it back.

Yeah...considering how low sales are in Japan (You know how the Japanese love their BC) I wouldn't be surprised if they're working on a software emulator behind the scenes and denying it...and then will pull the carpet out from under us and "surprise" us with a pretty decent software emulator. The 80GB is only half-software, it still has a PS2 GPU, which is why the 40GB doesn't have the software emulator.

But yeah, I wouldn't be surprised if they either released a software emulator sometime this year or they revive the Emotion Engine Chip into the PS3. I doubt Sony is going to stand for losing Japan...I'm pretty sure that's probably why the sales are so low in Japan too, the removal of the BC. The Japanese don't have the choice of the 80GB...they're forced to stay with the 40GB.

In a sense, Sony is already making the move to get the Japanese back, they're going to be releasing the 80GB MGS4 bundle everywhere I think...so the Japanese will be getting BC back. Still...they need to be working on a really good software emulator...doesn't need to be perfect as software emulators never are. Either that or revive the Emotion Engine Chip...I think those are the only two choices Sony has.