so for those of you who have played played insanity on both mass effects, which one would you say is harder?
ive recently beaten me2 on insanity and was thinking i should beat the first on insanity as well
also is hardcore much easier in me1 than insanity?

I played as an adept on ME1 and it was easy. As no shields and no armour had to be taken down before biotic powers could be used, the harder enemies fell like flies. However, when i first player ME1 on Veteran I died more times then than I did on ME2's insanity.

ME1 for sure. I did not use the cover system in that game as much as I should have, but even then, how much health and how brutal the enemies were, one mistake and you were done.
 
ME2 was challenging for sure (Geth Hunters are the bane of my existance) but it was manageable...you had to figure it out, ME1 didnt have quite the depth and therefore you just had to be more careful, not more strategic.

I can see ME1 being harder just because the battle system was less refined in the form of cover.

" I can see ME1 being harder just because the battle system was less refined in the form of cover. "

Depends on your level. Mass Effect from level 1, insanity is brutal. My ME playthrough was at 60, as Infiltrator, with my talents such that I had infinite Immunity and Marksmanship. Took practically no damage, and never overheated with pistol. It was really boring.
 
Mass Effect 2, my first playthrough on Insanity was as a level 30 Infiltrator and I had quite a bit of trouble, most of the time due to retarded squad mate AI. The part that sticks out in my mind is going around the corner to the bridge in Thane's recruit mission. I ended up keeping my squad mates around the corner and soloing the first quarter of it. Later on I did a full insanity playthrough from level 1 as a Vanguard. I died a lot (most of the time due to screwing around with charge), but towards the end (after getting all the upgrades) the difficult was about the same. 
 
If I were to rate from hardest to easiest: 
Mass Effect (level 1) 
Mass Effect 2 (level 1) 
Mass Effect 2 (level 30) 
Mass Effect (level 60)

Mass Effect 1 is harder on Insanity. ME2 was way too easy, the only difficult part for me was the last part of Horizon.

ME1 hands down.The beginning can be very frustrating as you do not have the necessary skillpoints to be effective and your weapons are extremely inaccurate and there is more challenging firefights in it,but you get your Shephard leveled it starts to get really easy. If you are good at 3rd person shooters you should not have difficulties at ME2 if you use the correct ammo/powers for the enemies. And the difficulty gap between Hardcore and Insanity is not huge as a matter of fact my Hardcore run was more challenging to me than my Insanity. oh and i completed both of my first insanity runs in ME1 & 2 as a soldier.

" @laalipop said:

" I can see ME1 being harder just because the battle system was less refined in the form of cover. "

Yeah I totally agree. Insanity on ME1 is much harder because of this reason. "

I have to disagree with some of the other people here, as I found insanity in ME1 to be pretty easy, and it to be really hard in ME2. 

I found ME1 on Insanity with a lvl 60 Vanguard to be challenging but very doable.
 
However, I attempted to play through ME2 on Insanity a few months ago with a lvl 30 Vanguard and had an extremely difficult time. It was difficult enough that I've pretty much come to the conclusion that I'm not going to bother finishing it. In ME1, I feel like you can get by on your own after your squad dies even on Insanity, but in ME2, it's critical to keep your squad alive...which is not an easy thing to do. I also don't feel like a Vanguard is set up to do very well on Insanity in ME2 since the unique ability forces you to get up close to your enemies where things can go bad very quickly.

ME2 Insanity was harder simply for the fact that they have those infinite spawn points - there's no way to whittle down the enemy and press forward, you have to RUSH in, cross the invisible line, get shot and hope it works. 
 
Other factors:

• Ammo  - in ME1 you can hide in cover and take out the enemy kind slow and steady, even as an Adept you'll never need more than a pistol. In ME2 I found several spots where I would run out of Ammo all together, be forced to run out from behind cover to get more and die. 
• Melee enemies - Husks and Krogan in ME1, and the latter if far more dangerous. ME2 I found the Armor Plated Husks to be a huge pain in the ass, along with the Scions and Red Husks.
• Scaling - ME1 doesn't have it, lvl50+ you can tackle Insanity with relative ease (one or two bosses might be a challenge). ME2 you're better off starting Insanity at level1 because of how the game scales enemies to your level (so starting a NG+ at level 30 sets up the HARDEST game possible).

I must be in the minority. I think ME1 insanity was by far easier than ME2 insanity.

I agree with basically everything  Steampunkjin said.

ME1 Insanity is cake with an imported Shepard.

ME2 was harder than 1 in my opinion. When BioWare said they wanted to emphasize on the shooting they pulled it off, haha. Spamming a Singularity shit storm wasn't gonna help anybody now. lol

" ME1 Insanity is cake with an imported Shepard. "

As a new character ME1 insanity was easy as adept, as you could still use biotics on shielded targets. ME2 required you to remove the shields first, which was a pain. So ME1 was easier for me, although I died 30+ times to kill that blasted Krogan when saving Liara, he just kept running at me and hitting me or Liara.
 
"Surrender, or don't, that would be more fun" 

Those words are burned into my soul.

The problem I had with Mass Effect 2 was running out of ammo. I'd say they are around the same level, if it weren't for that.

I found ME2 to be harder on insanity but it probably mostly due to using a fresh ME1 import in ME2 and using an existing character in ME1.  But in general I think the game changes make it more difficult in ME2.  I had a few times where I had ammo issues in ME2 and being able to make a completely overpowered sniper rifle in ME1 helped.