remjim

Sorry but I'm confused...what is that?

Is that the option if being able to watch TV with the 360 on in the background?

I was wondering if I should pre-oreder one. I've never had any problems with picking a system (or game) up the day they come out. It just involves a little standing in lin but I rather enjoy the excitement (Halo 2 at the Times Square TRU was a lot of fun).

Edison

VoodooExtreme posted some new screens of Project Gotham Racing 3 here. These are running on real hardware in HD resolution, they are from an older build of the game than the one shown at E3.

Yocke

I'm a bit biased over the whole software emulation thing. If they get it to work properly, they can make it work better than hardware, but I just hope they make my favourite games work.

joshd2012

New Interview over at TXB:

http://interviews.teamxbox.com/xbox/...d-Holmdahl/p1/

Some intersesting developments:

1) No digital video output (DVI or HDMI) support until later (if at all).
2) MS will possibly offer 1080p in the future.
3) Game audio will be compressed with Window Media format.
4) Wireless Internet Adapter will be USB
5) No comment on how Xbox owners will transfer game saves to Xbox360


The rest is pretty much restating everything we already know, and the whole "our system is better than yours" mindset. I do enjoy when they state that "Sony's flop calculations are wrong" and that "our GPU is better than there GPU" when the hardware isn't even finalized. But its what you come to expect with the mud slinging that is going on.

Chris_D

Anandtech has posted a very detailed look at both the 360 and the PS3 hardware for those interested.
http://www.anandtech.com/video/showdoc.aspx?i=2453

joshd2012

Great read (as usual from Anandtech). I've updated the PS3 FAQ with some of this new info.

mrpayroll

http://www.gamesindustry.biz/content_page.php?aid=9804

Future versions of Xbox 360 may include HD-DVD
Rob Fahey 14:40 28/06/2005
Gates confirms that next-gen console may evolve from its original spec

Microsoft chairman Bill Gates has confirmed that the company is thinking about future revisions of the Xbox 360 hardware already, and may incorporate a HD-DVD drive into the console at some point down the line.

Speaking at a joint event with HD-DVD creator Toshiba in Tokyo, Gates reaffirmed Microsoft's commitment to the standard - which currently faces a battle against the competing Blu-Ray next-generation DVD standard, created by Sony.

"The initial shipments of Xbox 360 will be based on today's DVD format," Gates explained. "We are looking at whether future versions of Xbox 360 will incorporate an additional capability of an HD DVD player or something else."

While the addition of a HD-DVD drive to Xbox 360 would allow future models to play HD movies stored on the format, it seems unlikely that the extra capacity would be available to game developers, since their titles would then not work on first-generation hardware.

Sony's PlayStation 3 is set to utilise the Blu-Ray system for both HD movie playback and game storage. Sony and Toshiba have held talks to try and establish a joint format for next-generation DVD, but these collapsed recently after Toshiba refused to accept Blu-Ray - which boasts higher capacity discs but is more expensive to manufacture - as the basis for the joint standard.

What's most interesting about Gates' comments is that they confirm that the first generation of Xbox 360 is likely to be joined over time by models with additional functionality - specifically, extra features which are designed to improve the system's abilities as a home media centre.


Chris

joshd2012

Hopefully, with the HD-DVD version they will add digital video output. I would probably pick it up if/when that happens.

fujishig

Hmm... well that dampens my enthusiasm for this a bit. I've been debating whether to preorder this or not, but if they're already planning an upgraded version later down the line...

sdcrym

Yeah, this seems like news that should be released a month or two before the new drive will be used, not a few months before the standard DVD console is even released. They're just hurting they're launch sales with a statement like that.

Save Ferris

I would rather have Blu-ray than HD-DVD.

lotsofdvds

I wouldn't let this deter you. I was reading an old EGM last night which talked about the DVD/hardware upgrade for the Sega Dreamcast that was coming soon. Sony claimed a huge number of features for the PS2 that never materialized. It's just all pre-release speculation.

Josh H

Definitely will give some more incentive to wait to anyone not overly impressed by the launch games.

fujishig

But... the Dreamcast died before the DVD playback could be implemented. If it had launced with DVD playback (not sure if the technology was there at the time), it probably would've helped the system somewhat.

Save Ferris

watching movies on a game console is passe

lotsofdvds

I can't see the benefits of bigger storage formats coming into play anytime soon. The majority of current gen games don't even fill up a single layer DVD.

joshd2012

I was in that boat too, until I read that GT4 took up most of a dual layer DVD.

Josh H

It's more appealing for people to be able to kill two birds with one stone: a new next gen system and an HD-DVD player.

As the article states, with a new version coming later we probably won't see any HD-DVD games as they wouldn't play on the original consoles.

Save Ferris

Especially with a hard drive, is it possible in the future that a game would come on 2 dvds? The first one 'installs' onto the xbox360, then from then on, you use the second DVD to 'play' with?

fujishig

Exactly... while the PS2 is far from an ideal DVD player, it was most likely the first DVD player many households bought, and the same should hold true for the new formats.

BTW, is there an HD-DVD consortium that they have to pay money to if they enable playback (similar to how they have to pay extra money to allow DVD playback)?

Josh H

Highly unlikely. Adding that feature would make it too easy for pirates to hack it so you could copy any game to the HD and play.

Plus there's really no reason not to just put it on 2 normal DVDs as was done in the past with CDs. If someone's too lazy to get up and change a disc once while playing through a game they have issues.

Josh H

I'm sure since it's a group of companies that developed it.

Chris_D

I definitely don't see it as an issue either. I think we'll get used to seeing the occasional 2 dvd game next-gen (maybe very rarely 3). It's still not quite the 2-4 disc games that were almost standard on the ps1 (well for rpgs anyway).

My vote is on blueray as a next gen movie format and I can't imagine 360 will waste their time on HDDVD. If Toshiba was really serious about HDDVD they would pay Microsoft (and Nintendo) a significant part of costs to include the hardware in their new consoles. Obviously they're not since the 360 is shipping with standard dvd.

jiggawhat

This puts the nail in the coffin on me buying the 360 this year.
I am definitely going to wait until this thing has some kind of next gen dvd support.

tenaciousdave

The article says MIGHT incorporate in the future.

I don't expect them to implement anything until there is a clear winner in the format wars, which probably means next gen.

GT4 is only 4.5 GB. Check the download sites.


From what I hear, the only game approaching the 9 GB mark is Oblivion: Elder Scrolls 4. Not surprising considering it has 50 hours of spoken dialogue.