News Microsoft quashes Blu-Ray rumours again

http://www.bit-tech.net/news/2008/04/03/microsoft_quashes_blu-ray_rumours_again/1

Again, Microsoft has come out and said that it will not be creating a Blu-Ray drive for the Xbox 360, squashing new rumours.

 

They lost, they should now support the winner.

 

Until I have a totally unlimited, totally unthrottled high-speed (20mbit+, and proper 20mbit, not "20mbit if you sit right next to the exchange and the moon is shining just right") internet connection, downloading HD movies is not something I wish to consider.

 

Sour grapes on the part of Microsoft. They had to compete on the consumer level (i.e. couldn't buy their way into the market, see the OOXML fiasco for more details) which meant that they had to compete on quality, price and features, and the general perception of the average consumer. They couldn't buy their way into the market, so they lost. Now they are hanging the market out to dry, just because they don't want to support a standard that they can't control/buy.

Typical Microsoft.

Andy

 

Lets look at it this way, which console doesn't even offer DVD playback? The Wii. I don't think I need to tell you how well that's selling.

The 360 doesn't need BR to compete with the PS3 as it has already shown, hardly anybody bought the HD player add-on compared to the actual number, because most people aren't really all that interested, they're more interested in, shock horror, the games.

 

Sour grapes maybe, but not being able to compete on quality, price and features? I have seen a side by side of BR and HDDVD on the same 40-odd" 1080 screens (Toshs I think) and, tbh, I really couldn't make out much of a difference, but that's just me. On price, BR players were cheaper than HDDVD, not that I ever saw. As to features, please correct me if I am mistaken, but wasn't HDDVD feature complete on release and isn't BR still being updated? Is the Profile2 for BR still to be released and aren't there suggestions it could cause issues with certain disc features on older profile1 players? With regard to the general consumer, most of the people I know, and would class as such, don't give a monkeys about BR or HD-DVD and couldn't even tell you who made which.

At the end of the day I would imagine that there was lots of money being thrown about by both camps and Sony won with the standard that they own/control.

@Paradigm Shifter

QFT.

 

all very well that they want to push their video download service.. but wait i don't really want to wait 6 hours for a movie to download (thats if my connection was fast) before i can watch, where as i could nip round to the nearest blockbuster, rent a blu-ray movie, put it in the drive, watch it and return it, before the movie would have downloaded. maybe way into the future downloading will be they way to go, but not just now due to the shoddy internet connection speeds we have right now!!

 

Surely, on a bigger picture, Microsoft aren't willing to pay Sony the royalties required to use BR? Seems ironic that M$ would have to pay their main competition to use the competitions format?

 

That's one of the reasons UMD failed, other studios didn't like using because it paid money directly into the pockets of one of their largest competitors. Plus it wasn't very popular.

BR is a conglomerate of many studios, and it's also the most popular of the HD formats now so studios have to lump it if they want to sell HD movies, which is the "next big thing" as far as video media goes.

 

I don't see the downloading of movies doing that well either, tbh. I'd rather own a copy of the film I can watch anytime instead of paying to download it and watch it within a certain timeframe.
I've still got DVD's I've bought and not got round to watching almost a year after buying them (still working my way through the Stargate DVD's, I've watched the first 3 boxsets and I've got 4 seasons to go - haven't bought season 8+... yet).

 

Aye, I hadn't even taken into consideration the 'rental' nature of the movie download service. That makes me even more opposed to it as a model for content consumption. I like owning what I pay money for - never been keen on the idea of renting something and then having a set time or number of plays before it's no longer mine. I've got loads of DVDs still to watch, also - All of Roswell, save the first couple of eps, all of Stargate save the first half of season 1... the list goes on...

 

I think its a Sony vs Microsoft thing. Otherwise Microsoft is very foolish not to do a BR add on for the X360. BR is one of the reasons why people buy a PS3. Most people I know think like; "hey a BR player with a game console build around it as added bonus.

 

+1 for the cleverness of this man.

A games console does not need a BR disc drive for it to compete, the games are superior (IMO) to the PS3's. So the ps3 can play BR? Big woop, its more expensive, and its online service is laughable, that and i dont even / cant afford a HD TV anyway!

 

The wii is in a completely different market to the 360 and the PS3. I don't think it would harm to have the blu-ray drive in the 360, it'd make it a more rounded home entertainment system.

 

like I have said before the idea of Digital Downloads which M$ is pushing is a nice idea but people will always want a physical version that they can hold in their hands and besides whats so bad about at least doing an add-on >_< people will buy it, I swear whoever their PR research is should be fired, they have been making mistake after mistake since day one. This is why I havent bought a console yet.....

 

in my book the 360 is too loud to be a worthwhile media playback device, i tend to watch my movies and the like fairly late on when other people are asleep, so tend to have them on fairly quietly, i just cant do that with the 360 as the fan noise gets in the way, the PS3 and to a lesser extent the old xbox are much better to play stuff back on purely due to them not being as noisy.

 

the hard disk in the Xbox360 is not user upgradeable (£90 for an farty small hdd is poor) unlike the PS3 you can replace the hdd (2.5 as i found out with guled on screws) or just plug one into the usb ports and you can save stuff onto there

 

I don't own a 360, but I'm so against the idea of BlueRay on it. How can you expect MS stump as low as to consider using BlueRay?

Sure the movie industry has been taken over by an inferior video format, but it doesn't mean MS has to convert their games to it. After all HD is much cheaper to produce. As for movies, I don't think they should even bother having a playback function. Downloading sure that makes much more sense than to have an Expensive BR.

 

If I had a 1080p TV then the deciding factor between the two consoles would be the blu ray player... However, I (and the majority of the market) don't and won't have one for many years to come, so DVD playback is perfectly fine.

Then again, in 5 years the PS3 will still be around, more of the market will have moved to HD TV's and blu ray will be the standard. In that time I doubt unlimited 20mbit cable will be readily available, so I do think microsoft will need to look at a form of HD playback other than downloads... eventually.

 

What's more convenient? Waiting multiple hours (easily 5-6 hours on a decent Cable connection) to D/L a true HD movie (20+GB I would guess) for 480 XBL points ($5, right?) or on your way home you drive to Blockbuster/wherever and have the complete HD movie w/ extra content all for around the same price or less (I guess that would depend on where you live, how old the BR movie was, if you had a coupon, etc.). I wonder if you could burn/copy rented BR movies?, something you could never do with downloadable XBL movies.....