HD-DVD Confirmed For Xbox 360 260
JorgeDeLaCancha writes "Microsoft has recently confirmed plans to bring an external HD-DVD drive to the Xbox 360. This has been previously speculated numerous times, with Bill Gates himself stating 'future versions of Xbox 360 will incorporate an additional capacity of an HD-DVD player.' Do consumers even want another format war?"
This makes total sense (Score:2, Insightful)
Same thing as PS2 Hard drive (Score:5, Insightful)
Yes, this makes total sense (Score:4, Insightful)
Especially when everyone knows that console add-ons are notoriously overpriced!
'Cause external add-ons are always market wins (Score:5, Insightful)
Who do they think is going to buy it? It's one thing when people decided to get a PS2 because they didn't have a DVD player. It's another thing entirely to expect people to buy an expensive add-on to an expensive system just so they can have a sub-par player of movies sold on an expensive medium.
MS should either have waited until they could cram the drive into the console, or cut bait on HD-DVD entirely. Their current strategy is a born loser.
And I say this as someone who likes the XBox, and fully intends to get a 360 at some point in the near future. I can't wait to see what the average "I AHTES TEH M$!!!11ONEONEONE" thinks of this...and I'm not even going to bother mentioning the...er, dubious...claim that the 360 is going to be the fastest selling console of all time.
actually it is a questionable move (Score:3, Insightful)
Shades of the PS2 hard drive debacle.
or:
Consumers, hold onto your wallets!
This makes things quite interesting for when the PS3 comes out with a Blu-Ray drive, which I'm sure will be sold at a near equal premium price. If the PS3 includes Blu-Ray as standard equipment and doesn't pull a "ps2 hard drive" flop, the PS3 will no doubt be well to the north of $399 but at least all users, including early adopters, will be able to play all PS3 games.
Cost? (Score:2, Insightful)
That being said, I can imagine that if the peripheral for the 360 is significantly cheaper than the stand alone PC or home player drives, that this will push the MS agenda of creating a huge market draw for the 360 longterm while also promoting the HD-DVD format. And MS has always shown that they believe in the "spend money to make money" philosophy, so who knows?
All I'm saying is that if you just shelled out $500 for a system and maybe a few "eh" games (still waiting on Oblivion), is a $200-$300 or greater purchase in your plans for 2006? Or maybe you're gonna get some more games.
Add-ons = failure (Score:3, Insightful)
But this is microsoft though, they may try to take a Halo game and put it on HD-DVD to try and push it since they can lose money left and right to force their way in.
HD-DVD (Score:3, Insightful)
The drive itself won't be for games, as really, the need is not here yet. How many games, besides FF style games need multiple discs? Even newer games, like NBA Live 2k5 are CD-style on the PS2 (Blue discs), so I would agree that, for the time being, a DVD is plenty of space. For a few select games, there will be some disc-swapping going on, but really, I don't remember the uproar about FF needing 4 discs and to be swapped durring the game.
On a PC, thats a little diffrent story. With 200+ GB drives becoming standard, software developers will grow to fill the space quicker then on the console. Thinking offhand, it would be nice to have a single disc for things like encyclopedias, maps, and MSDN. Even today, its rare to find a game that requires more then a single DVD (minus games like Command & Conquer that use multiple discs to allow game play on multiple machines)
I guess at this point, its way to early to claim either side has won, buts its funny to hear the FUD being thrown around (Sony, I am looking at you about the whole 1080p "True HDTV" thing)
M$ didn't close the door on Blu-Ray (Score:3, Insightful)
I think that is why they didn't try to squeeze the drive into the package of the next version (XBOX 361?).
Posturing and nothing more (Score:3, Insightful)
I would love to sell all the production gear and get a bunch of XL1HD cameras replace all the AVID stations with new Apple HD editing stations but the demand for HD content from the people that pay for it (companies wanting it produced) is less than 1 tenth of 1 percent. we get more wanting it shot on film than in HD or any aspect ratio other than 4:3. Granted we only do commercials here.
The need for HDDVD on a gaming system is even less. Almost all games dont even use a complete dual layer DVD.
Wrong question (Score:4, Insightful)
Do consumers ever want another format war?
And the right answer is: no
Re:Burnable DVD's (Score:5, Insightful)
I still am waiting for a format for burnable DVD's.
It's not really a format war if every DVD drive manufactured supports both formats. I used to think that, eventually, the industry would finally settle on one type of rewriteable DVD media (btw, I thought + would win), but it's now 2006 and there are no signs of either side giving in. Last year I've finally made my peace with this so called format war and bought a DVD rewriter. I've been happily burning my videos onto DVD and freeing tons of HD space in the process. Deciding on which type of media to buy isn't even really a concern to me anymore, I mean, what's the difference if every drive out there can read them both? Personally, I stick with + because it is technically superior. Anyway, people keep comparing the +/- to the old BETA/VHS debate, but there's one very important difference that many seem to overlook: the VHS and BETA players couldn't handle the competitor's format. As a result, consumers were forced to pick one over the other; and when they did, it was over for BETA. The +/- format war on the other hand, isn't likely to ever end because drives can easily support both types of media. With high quality drives from brands such as NEC going for approximately $40 bucks, just go out and buy one already and enjoy. There is no +/- format war.
Re:Do consumers even want? (Score:3, Insightful)
Ninety percent of the folks wandering around with their humvee sized shopping carts don't even know they're buying, only that it runs their humvee sized kid's new video game.
No.. (Score:3, Insightful)
I can't say for sure that an HDCP/HDMI output box is a sure-thing, but there was a lot of flexibility designed in up front, so i think its very possible.
What ever happened to competition? (Score:3, Insightful)
The better format--be that image quality, more supported titles, cheaper players, whatever--will win out. That's how it's supposed to be, and that makes it better for consumers because both formats will try to undercut each other, which means cheaper prices and better players.
Stop bitching about a format war! Welcome it!
Re:Same thing as PS2 Hard drive (Score:3, Insightful)
Sadly you may be right, though constant ram is generally a selling point to console developers. Either way I do remember N64's graphic chip upgrade that was actually used, though it was included in some games and cheap by itself.
It's not for games (Score:3, Insightful)
I like it because it will take up one shelf in my entertainment center instead of 2 (console + HDDVD player).
Re:no consumers don't want a format war (Score:1, Insightful)
I think it will fair better. (Score:3, Insightful)