Posts filed under 'Console Hardware'
According to the the theinquirer.net, HD porn is on it’s way to the Xbox360.
A production company, High Def Home Entertainment (HDHE), in conjunction with Arrow Productions, is set to release “Deep Throat” in 720p HD. They will ship 2 DVDs, one standard low-rez and the other encoded with Windows Media (WMV) 720p files.
As we all know, the Xbox360 is the only mainstream home electronics device capable of playing windows WMV files.
The inquirer story recounts that:
Arrow was in the middle of cleaning it up when they found the original masters, so they threw out what they had done and used the clean copy. They ended up with the first new copy of the movie in decades, all in glorious HD. For the XBox360. Only for the XBox360.
There is also another story here discussing plans by another company, Lurid, to also provide porn in HD. They were showing off their latest setup at the AVN show this year:
Lurid was giving away an XBox360 on their stand because it is one of the only consumer devices out there that can do HD movies at the consumer level. In the above picture, they are streaming smut from a MCE05 PC to an 360, and as you can clearly see from the pictures, the quality is great. You can see every little [not a chance that this will make it in, so I will censor it myself], and the donkey too. Without Microsoft and the XBox360 team, we would not have true high quality filth, thanks guys.
Porn has been the killer app for film, vhs, dvds, and broadband internet access. Will it be the same for the Xbox 360 ?
Technorati Tags: xbox360, hd-dvd, hd porn, Deep Throat, Lurid, High Def Home Entertainment warning: some technorati links may not be work-safe
January 13th, 2006
As we discussed the HD-DVD add-on the other day, we had no idea that Blu-Ray was even a posibility.
But Peter Moore, Microsoft’s dean of all things Xbox, made some shocking statements to a Japaneese site called ITmedia. Moore was quoted as saying that Microsoft would offer their external DVD player in Blu-Ray format if somehow the standard war settled on Blu-Ray.
Microsoft reps were quick to go in to damage control saying:
“Microsoft firmly stands behind the HD-DVD format as the best choice for our consumers, the question of whether the Xbox 360 has the flexibility to adapt to consumers’ needs is a different issue entirely.”
The statment also mentioned that the Xbox 360 is:
“a future-proofed system–one that allows us to add features as consumers demand them.”
This next gen DVD format war will be interesting to watch - that’s for sure !
Technorati Tags: xbox360, hd-dvd, blu-ray, hdtv
January 12th, 2006
Peter Moore — Microsoft’s head of Interactive Entertainment — made some very bold statements at CES this year. Along with the HD-DVD announcement, Moore made the claim that 90% of Xbox 360 owners either have an HDTV or are planning on buying one within 6 months. His exact quote was:
“In fact, Xbox 360 is the killer app for HDTV adoption. It’s driving HDTV monitor sales. A recent study concluded that 9 out of 10 Xbox 360 owners have either purchased or intend to purchase an HDTV in the next six months. And 90 percent of them say that it was Xbox 360 that is the primary reason for making that purchase, 90 percent of them say it’s about Xbox 360.”
GamesDaily Biz and Ars Technia made mention of it as well. While all of us here have embraced the next gen console, and feel that getting an HDTV is a must, we do wonder if that 90% is accurate.
Technorati Tags: xbox 360, hdtv, hd-dvd
January 9th, 2006
Microsoft announced that it will offer an external HD-DVD drive to Xbox 360 owners. After much speculation and publicly battling Sony backed Blu-Ray DVD format, the news was received with a mixed response.
On the one hand, many analysts voiced concerns that a next generation console should support next generation media formats — something the Xbox 360 did not at launch. But adding an external device puts it in competition for those who may opt to use a standalone DVD drive, let alone from a competing format of Blu-Ray (which appears to have stronger hollywood support).
Statement by Bill Gates that “this will be the last format war” suggested to some that perhaps Microsoft would push for delivery based video content via their Xbox Live service. Gates told the Daily Princetonian:
For us it’s not the physical format. Understand that this is the last physical format there will ever be. Everything’s going to be streamed directly or on a hard disk. So, in this way, it’s even unclear how much this one counts.
And finally, over at the sportsgamer blog, they echo what many recent purchasers of the Xbox 360 must feel right now:
Just out of curiousity, how many of you that dropped $1,000 on an Xbox 360 bundle are going to drop another $1,000 on an HD DVD external drive for your Xbox360? I think I’ll pass, and it’s pretty stupid, even if it has Final Fantasy 23HD on it.
We’ll have to wait and see how this turns out :)
Technorati Tags: xbox360, hd-dvd, xbox live, blu-ray
January 8th, 2006
Great article in the WSJ the other day titled “A New Reason to Buy a High-Definition TV” ( article may require paid registration )
The writer, Nick Wingfield, makes a strong argument that xbox 360 and the future PS3 will help push sales of HDTVs.
As we’ve seen during this week’s CES, HDTV is front and center, and Nick mentions the Bill Gates keynote:
In a sign of how intertwined the next generation of game consoles is becoming with HDTVs, Microsoft executives — including Chairman Bill Gates in tonight’s keynote — at the Consumer Electronics Show in Las Vegas plan to disclose data showing that the company’s Xbox 360 system is helping HDTV set sales.
Retailers are confirming this trend of HD + Xbox360:
Retailers say the growing library of games in high-definition will help improve the selection of content available to HDTV owners, even as television programmers gradually improve their HD offerings. “People are starved for high-def content,” says Mike Vitelli, senior vice president of merchandising of Best Buy Co. of Richfield, Minn. “There’s no question [high-definition games are] filling a void.”
Overall great news for owners of HDTV and Xbox 360s. You can read the full story here
Technorati Tags: ces, xbox360, ps3, wsj, best buy, bill gates
January 6th, 2006
Have seen a few mentions of this, and finally saw the ‘problem’ in person. If you are running your xbox360 on a standard non-HD screen, the overall colors and saturation levels are just too dark. BBC news is running a piece quoting the Ubisoft boss Yves Guillemot as saying:
“I’m a bit disappointed that we didn’t see it when we were developing the game.” He goes on to say: “We have a problem on the 360, the screen is dark on some TVs and it totally changes the experience. When it’s dark, you don’t see where you have to go. We are looking to see if we can fix the code.”
Short of a fix, they recommend the unthinkable — to play on a PS2 or original Xbox: “When you play on an Xbox or a PlayStation 2, you start to see that it is beautiful…”
Just one more reason to pick up an HDTV :)
Technorati Tags: king kong, xbox360, ubisoft
January 1st, 2006
If you absolutely had to have an Xbox 360 this holiday season, you probably either stood in line for hours outside your local Best Buy, or paid 4X on eBay ! With inventory levels still relatively low most major retailers aren’t promising much until the end of January. But for those who want a few games, and maybe an extra controller, there are ‘bundles’ that can be found right now.
A couple of sites are pinging all the major off-line and online retailers looking for these bundles — and I’ve monitored them and have seen these ‘bundles’ pop up as a few times a day. Definitely worth checking out:
Gamermill: http://www.gamermill.com/thelist.php
Xbox.Clambert.org: http://xbox.clambert.org/
Good luck, and feel free to leave any tips in the comment field.
Technorati Tags: xbox360, ebay, hdtv, bundles
December 29th, 2005
Welcome to our site ! We will be revewing and covering all things HDTV & Xbox 360. As you probably know, the Xbox 360 is the first console to offer true HD output at both 720p and 1080i, as well as being optimized for 16:9 widescreen ratio.
So grab the RSS feed and check back soon, we’ll be launchind the full site in a few weeks.
And in the meantime we’ll be posting a few tips and nuggets as we settle in for the new year.
December 29th, 2005
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