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XBox (Games) Media

No HD-DVD For 360 In The Near Future 37

Posted by Zonk from the bigger-media-means-more-room-for-sequels dept.
While IGN originally reported that the 360 would see a HD-DVD update in 2006, they quickly released a response from Microsoft saying that as of the moment there are no plans for such an update. From the article: "Microsoft, in both America and Japan, has not announced anything regarding the possibility of a next generation DVD drive being placed in the Xbox 360 ... There are currently no plans to release an Xbox 360 equipped with a next generation DVD player."
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No HD-DVD For 360 In The Near Future More

No HD-DVD For 360 In The Near Future

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  • Well, duh... (Score:4, Insightful)

    by Oliver Wendell Jones ( 158103 ) on Thursday December 15, 2005 @11:47AM (#14265041)
    Noone wants to buy an Xbox 360 now if they know a better one is coming soon...
    • Exactly. MS wants you to buy the plain XBOX360 now. I wonder if the XBOX would be upgradable when the HD-DVD is released the week after everyone has bought the plain XBOX.

    • Re:Well, duh... (Score:2, Informative)

      by corcoranp ( 892008 )
      I agree. Another example of Microsoft's "clever" marketing. What's interesting though is that Gates made a comments back in July saying they were looking at incorporating HD DVD. teamXbox has a story on it here [teamxbox.com]

      The PS3 will support HD-DVD out of the box so Microsoft will have to support it at some point next year just to keep up with the PS3.
  • Well, I always doubted there would be a HD-drive version of the 360. An update this soon would split the install base of 360's again, which is already split between hard drive and no-hard drive users. This kind of move would be nothing short of economic suicide for Microsoft. I think it's much more likely that the 360 will go to multiple disk games (like the PS1 and GameCube have done in the past). Multi-disk games are annoying, but they don't split your userbase into different camps, leaving developers

  • This is a surprise HOW? (Score:4, Insightful)

    by WidescreenFreak ( 830043 ) on Thursday December 15, 2005 @12:03PM (#14265184) Homepage Journal
    Take a lookat the whole buzz around the 360. Not having an HD-DVD upgrade is a no-brainer.

    Look at it from the consumer's side. Why in hell would anyone want to buy a 360 *now* knowing that there would be a "better" version in the future? I'd wait a few months as well! Not only is it possible that prices would drop due to increased inventory, but there will be more games out and probably some bug fixes. So, even though I'm not one of those morons (I say that unapologetically) who feel this inexplicable need to be on the bleeding edge, waiting for a few months after something this new comes out is a good idea anyway.

    Now, look at it from Microsoft's side. They already have millions of 360s in circulation. They will kill their sales of existing systems if they announce an upgrade because people will wait. So, they could always offer an HD-DVD upgrade to systems that are out there, waiting to be purchased. But, then what about the bleeding edge people who just HAD to have an 360 NOW? They'll shout "unfair" (and rightfully so) and demand a retro-fit. Both of these situations are compounded because Microsoft said that they made the unit as compact as possible excatly to prevent people from getting into the unit. So, a certified shop (or Microsoft themselves) would have to do an HD-DVD refit. That would cost a huge amount of money.

    Either scenario would end up costing Microsoft a ton of money in both revenue and PR. Besides, this gives Microsoft the excuse that they needed to rush to market the Xbox 720 -- comes with HD-DVD! w00t! And as proven by the last craze, there are clearly millions of suckers who will buy it as soon as it's released just because they can. So, delaying HD-DVD on the Xbox will just produce yet more marketing and potential revenue from "re-purchasers" in the future because they now can use HD-DVD as their excuse to call the Xbox 720 the "next generation" console.
    • (This is totally tongue-in-cheek, so don't take it seriously, I thought we might be amused by some mid-morning facetiousness. :-))

      Look at it from the consumer's side. Why in hell would anyone want to buy a 360 *now* knowing that there would be a "better" version in the future?

      That's what I said about the X360 when I saw the Revolution and PS3!

      Now, look at it from Microsoft's side. They already have millions of 360s in circulation. They will kill their sales of existing systems if they announce a

    • You are all mistaken... the announcement that they aren't going to upgrade to some sort of next gen drive isn't the surprise... the surprise is that they are even commmenting on this... I can tell you how many times I read "Microsoft does not comment... blah blah blah...

  • Maybe (Score:1)

    by GmAz ( 916505 )
    Maybe with Blue-Ray discs starting Microsoft may be halting HD-DVD in the 360 to see how Blue-Ray will take. Microsoft may support HD-DVD, but it is still a money making company. If Blue-Ray makes money, they may switch to Blue-Ray.
  • Notice the wording of the Microsoft response: There are currently no plans to release an Xbox 360 equipped with a next generation DVD player. They didn't say HD-DVD, they said next generation DVD.

    Microsoft probably sees Blu-Ray gaining an advantage and don't want to trap themselves with a dead end technology. One of the reasons many people bought a XBox or PS2 was that the consoles also played DVDs, the newest media of the time. If XBox 360 had HD-DVD, but Blu-Ray wins the format war, many people wo
  • Sure, why would MS spend extra money (even if it is $5/console) to install an upgraded drive, when there's no demand and no movies to play (probably ever)? I think they see that HD-DVD is not gonna win. Still, it served its purpose: It made Sony really nervous about a repeat of the Betamax meltdown. Sony's commitment to put Blu-Ray into the PS3 was an act of war, not an act to boost its profits. Those drives are going to force them to sell PS3's at a huge loss, and right now they're crossing their fingers t
  • My first thought was that Microsoft may be looking to steal some of Sony's thunder by releasing their own HD-DVD next year.

    But thinking on it further, I just don't think there's a need for HD-DVD or BluRay yet. Sure, it might help with marketing, but I think it's still a bit too early to take sides. Most people probably don't even HDTVs yet, which defeats the purpose of an HD-DVD to begin with. Most contemporary PC games, which are more advanced than any console game, still fit comfortably on a single DVD.
  • The 360 will have enough space on their 9gb dual-layered DVD's for any game. The only reason why a next-gen DVD drive would be required is movies.
  • A few comments over the last couple days have been to the effect that few people own HDTVs.

    While that's true now, the things are at the commodity level ($299 for cheapo 27" HDTV) and I can't see why anyone wanting a new TV would buy SDTV any more.

    So, by the end of '06 people are going to be eager to get some sort of player that plays their DVDs and some sort of HD DVD. The guys at avsforum.com can argue ad nauseam about the technical merits of blue versus red ray but the consumer doesn't give a rat's 6, as
    • I agree. Although HD is available in all the major cities in the US, I think it is BluRay that will finally push HD into the mainstream. The enthusiasts all know the benefits of HD now, but once the general public is able to easily get HD on a disc, demand will increase.
  • Badly phrased, but a smart move by MS.

    The format wars aren't won, they haven't even hit the shelves at Hardly Normal yet.
    What most of the slashbots here haven't recognised is that the XBox 360 architecture is quite extensible.

    In fact, no matter how you look at it, the MS plan is to make the Core system upgradeable to match any other higher powered bundle. So no matter what support they add to the 360, it will be available for retrofit to older packages.

    Given that there isn't a HD-DVD/BD player on the marke
  • Even if they add HD, it would only support half or so of the base, so developers wouldn't want the smaller market, so they would continue releasing on DVD.

    I think that it would probably end up like the PC gaming market now, with games released on either multiple DVDs or a single HD-DVD.

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