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[MegaKungFuRadio]

I'm all for multi disk games, some of us need all the exercise we can get.

I do wish they would fix the packaging for it, though, Blue Dragon stacked three discs on top of each other and Lost Odyssey had that PLUS a fourth disc in an envelope sleeve crammed with the manual.

Besides, Blu-ray has been the main selling point of the PS3 so far, and they still have trouble selling the machine. What do you think they would charge to license this functionality to their immediate competition? And for what? The 360 should be a gaming machine first and everything else second. The last thing MS should do is further fragment its user base by including a Blu-ray 360 to a pool that already includes systems with and without hard drives. As far as introducing another add-on for the sole purpose of playing movies... a separate player will end up being cheaper due to the licensing fees MS would have to pay. To get an idea of how successful add-ons can be, look no further than HD-DVD, Sega 32X, and Sega CD (I say while staring at my GameCube + GameBoy Player).

 

[Shao Kahn Brewing a Stew]

What a trollfest

 

[6.8]

I'd buy one. But I don't really care that much there isn't one, to be honest, cause I'll eventually get a PSTriple.

 

[gofreak]

Re. next-box:

Bandwidth for DD-only is more of an issue than just the speeds. iD is talking about needing 10s of GB, maybe 100+ GB for data storage (compressed) in iD Tech 6. The envisage artists having practically unlimited geometry and texture budgets, bringing the kinds of storage requirements more akin to offline rendering to realtime applications.

Even me sitting here with 20+ Mb/s is kind of left thinking DD-only wouldn't be practical - if those kinds of approaches and techniques ala id tech 6 gain traction and become popular. A disk would be easily the most practical and convenient way to get that amount of data from publisher to consumer, even those with decent broadband.

 

[Pristine_Condition]

Besides, Blu-ray has been the main selling point of the PS3 so far, and they still have trouble selling the machine. What do you think they would charge to license this functionality to their immediate competition?

They'd charge the same as everyone else gets charged, in all likelyhood. Sony doesn't control the Blu-ray Disc Association as much as some people seem to think. I doubt they'd risk a deal like that, which would move the format forward with Microsoft, over the PS3/360 "war," even if they could. The other major movie studios would be too pissed if they tried to do something like that.

Also, there's probably some legal reason why Sony couldn't charge Microsoft more to license the tech than they charge others. I'd imagine that would result in some anti-trust legal action.

 

[herod]

I wonder if the optical drive in the next Xbox might be as optional as the hard drive is today.

 

[Private Hoffman]

The other positive feature of Blu-Ray is that it's an expandable format.

I've read reports that there are working 200+ GB discs that are even compatible with the PS3.

So, should there arise a need in the future for more storage of that magnitude, Blu-Ray is capable of it.

 

[herod]

they need to improve the seek times considerably. Capacity is meaningless when games need to be installed anyway.

 

[PSGames]

Base 360 is 199. They could easily put a drive in for 100 and include a harddrive for a 399 price. Blu-Ray PC drives are selling for little over a 100 now and thats with retail markup.

 

[Private Hoffman]

Base 360 is 199. They could easily put a drive in for 100 and include a harddrive for a 399 price. Blu-Ray PC drives are selling for little over a 100 now and thats with retail markup.

It depends on whether the 360 would need additional hardware in order to be compatible with the blu-ray format.

IIRC, Blu-Ray spec requires two 1080p streams simultaneously to be decoded. It's currently unknown whether or not the 360's processor is capable of handling that.

The costs right now for Microsoft likely don't make much sense for them to add the drive plus whatever DSPs are required to handle the Blu-Ray spec...which would be very expensive for Microsoft. If in the future they come down considerably, and/or the PS3 starts doing considerably better, then they should consider it. I don't think Microsoft can compete at the pricing level Sony is at and be successful.

 

[Brimstone]

If I recall correctly, Blu-Ray has a picture-in-picture standard resolution of 720p. With HD-DVD it is 480p.

CELL is a powerful CPU. The 360 CPU couldn't meet the full standards of HD-DVD. Blu-Ray specs are even higher.

 

[Sydle]

Have you seen the size of most games? Beautiful, huge games like Prince of Persia, Banjo Nuts & Bolts, Halo 3, Fable 2, Gears 2, Pure, etc. fit on a DVD. RPGs have been multi-disk, but having to change a disc every 10 hours or so is hardly offending.

As for movie watching, I've been mostly content with digital download/streaming, and I'm looking to get a stand-alone blu-ray player (PS3) later on.

It depends on whether the 360 would need additional hardware in order to be compatible with the blu-ray format.

IIRC, Blu-Ray spec requires two 1080p streams simultaneously to be decoded. It's currently unknown whether or not the 360's processor is capable of handling that.

The costs right now for Microsoft likely don't make much sense for them to add the drive. If in the future they come down considerably, and/or the PS3 starts doing considerably better, then they should consider it. I don't think Microsoft can compete at the pricing level Sony is at and be successful.

Yeah, if Sony can't even do it (be successful; profit) then Microsoft doesn't stand a chance since they'd have to pay license fees and whatnot.

 

[Domino Theory]

X360 1.44M
PS3 726K

That's why.

 

[mood]

Because the market is still a drop in the bucket compared to DVD sales. Not worth it at all.

 

[MegaKungFuRadio]

They'd charge the same as everyone else gets charged, in all likelyhood. Sony doesn't control the Blu-ray Disc Association as much as some people seem to think. I doubt they'd risk a deal like that, which would move the format forward with Microsoft, over the PS3/360 "war," even if they could. The other major movie studios would be too pissed if they tried to do something like that.

Also, there's probably some legal reason why Sony couldn't charge Microsoft more to license the tech than they charge others. I'd imagine that would result in some anti-trust legal action.

You are probably right. I think I let the absurdity of a Blu-ray 360 cloud my logic.

 

[AranhaHunter]

LOL @ people saying there's no market for it

 

[BakedPigeon]

I'm sure Sony would just love it if MS put BluRay drives in their console, that way they would be moving backwards and they might catch up.

 

[Private Hoffman]

LOL @ people saying there's no market for it

There's easily a market for it. But Microsoft would likely have to take a loss on the unit in order for it to be competitive...and that's not in their best interests.

Like I said, it could happen in the future, but right now it doesn't make much sense from Microsoft's point of view. Especially when stand alone players are below $199 pricing.

 

[Truant]

hey my whole town chipd in an got me a xbox for x-mas whats a blu ray?

 

[AndyD]

think more carefully.

2x BD drives do 16x for DVDs. the 360 needs 12x. Am I still misreading your question? If so, you will have to be more explicit.

 

[dork]

because microsoft is focusing on the thing we want
























games

 

[madara]

Why buys BluRays?

I get them for free.

Ho, ho, what?

 

[Mamesj]

Would be nice if they waited until they can do a $100 add on. but by that time, a $100 player will be out, so nm.

 

[Xisiqomelir]

The current audio circuitry does not meet BD spec. Improving it to meet spec probably isn't worthwhile.

 

[PSGames]

It depends on whether the 360 would need additional hardware in order to be compatible with the blu-ray format.

IIRC, Blu-Ray spec requires two 1080p streams simultaneously to be decoded. It's currently unknown whether or not the 360's processor is capable of handling that.

The costs right now for Microsoft likely don't make much sense for them to add the drive plus whatever DSPs are required to handle the Blu-Ray spec...which would be very expensive for Microsoft. If in the future they come down considerably, and/or the PS3 starts doing considerably better, then they should consider it. I don't think Microsoft can compete at the pricing level Sony is at and be successful.

Blu-Ray PC drives are 100 with retail markup. Base 360 sales for 199. How could they not be price competitive in that scenario? Even if they need extra hardware besides the drive (which I doubt) they could still sell it for under 400 I would recon. Mass production of parts these things are cheap.

 

[Pachinko]

Short answer- They don't need to
Long answer- the 360 already has HD downloads of atleast broadcast hd quality AND you can play dvd's on the thing. For the majority of movie watchers right now that's "good enough" and for those that want to watch blurays? well they'll just buy a player be it stand alone or ps3.

Now on the other hand the next xbox is a whole new ball game but its also far enough off that it'll be a bigger deal to have a higher density disc format.

 

[Jswanko]

Well Microsoft thinks that the future of HD video distribution is digital. Right now they're in the lead for that market so why would they want to encourage people to use a competitors tech?

If the next 360 has an optical drive im sure it will be Blu ray, in the mean time however they want to encourage people to buy HD movies and shows digitally.

Also, it would cost time and money they dont need to spend.

 

[WretchedTruman]

It can't really incorporate itself into their strategy, at this point.

But for those who are assuming that Blu Ray is still in danger of being a niche market, that's....quickly becoming an urban myth. The next hurdle is overcoming DVD, which even cautious optimists are skeptical about, admittedly.

 

[AndyD]

Blu-Ray PC drives are 100 with retail markup. Base 360 sales for 199. How could they not be price competitive in that scenario? Even if they need extra hardware besides the drive (which I doubt) they could still sell it for under 400 I would recon. Mass production of parts these things are cheap.

Not MS style markup. If their hard drive markups are any indication, a 2x BD drive from them would be $150-200 easily.

But it seems the issue from others' posts seems to be MS may not be audio and video strong enough.

It can't really incorporate itself into their strategy, at this point.

But for those who are assuming that Blu Ray is still in danger of being a niche market, that's....quickly becoming an urban myth. The next hurdle is overcoming DVD, which even cautious optimists are skeptical about, admittedly.

The thing is that Bluray is ahead of the DVD curve at its same point in its lifetime. It does not need to overcome lifetime totals of DVD, just do well for itself. And it seems that its already doing that quite well.

 

[BeEatNU]

some err alot of the post in this thread is HILARIOUS!

The reason is pretty obvious why they didn't, it had nothing to do about a market being there for it....

 

[_Angelus_]

Because they don't need to? Its not like BR is burning up the charts to begin with.
Plus releasing another add on is just gonna piss off retailers when it comes
to shelf space anyways.

 

[whitehawk]

I would buy a Blu-Ray add on if it was reasonably priced.

 

[BSherrod]

There is a market for it, but not enough to justify the cost and licensing fees. It's simply not worth it and cancels the marketing strategy of the console at this point.

I would like to know why some people think putting the BRD would be so beneficial, I really don't see it.

 

[professor_t]

I don't know about you guys, but I personally would get a second job to pay for a console with a blu-ray drive.

 

[VAIL]

Because just like HD-DVD if it had "won" it's not the thing that will replace DVD. It's a stopgap solution for videophiles and there may be market for it, but not one nearly big enough for MS to give a crap about. Their goal is making the Xbox division a more profitable one, not a less profitable one.

 

[Nemo]

Because just like HD-DVD if it had "won" it's not the thing that will replace DVD. It's a stopgap solution for videophiles and there may be market for it, but not one nearly big enough for MS to give a crap about. Their goal is making the Xbox division a more profitable one, not a less profitable one.

You're saying if HD DVD would've won they wouldn't give a damn and not start producing all kinds of players including an ultimate built in HD DVD 360?

 

[Zen]

Because they don't need to? Its not like BR is burning up the charts to begin with.
Plus releasing another add on is just gonna piss off retailers when it comes
to shelf space anyways.

Bluray first 2 years outstrip DVD

Bluray sales dominate Christmas season

 

[Truant]

Ho, ho, what?

My girlfriend is a manager at a major retailer here in Norway. I get tons of free shit.

 

[GarthVaderUK]

I don't think it's worth the bother, it wouldn't be used for games and I doubt releasing a more expensive version of the 360 would be the most sensible thing to do right now.
I can see them putting a Blu-ray drive in their next console though, when it would be cheaper to do so and could be used for games.

 

[VAIL]

You're saying if HD DVD would've won they wouldn't give a damn and not start producing all kinds of players including an ultimate built in HD DVD 360?

No, because that was already in place.

 

[test_account]

BRD is not relevant to your game play experience.

Sit down, STFU and play games.

It is true what you say, that BRD isnt really that relevant to your game play experience, i agree, but if Microsoft should come with a Xbox 360 with a Bluray player, it would probably only be for the movie purpose only. Maybe some developer and/or developers could have made a game for the Xbox 360 that was on a Bluray disc, but i dont think we would have seen too many of these games because every Xbox 360 consoles wouldnt be able to play these games (unless they make a DVD version of the same game) :\

 

[senahorse]

Well given the fact that the 360 doesn't output HD audio and the thing is so damn noisy I am quite content with my PS3-Blu Ray player.

 

[iammeiam]

The HD-DVD drive I just bought this week for my 360 came with the 'limited' King Kong pack-in. The thing was available for a while before HD-DVD died, and a year later they're still shipping out what must have been early-production drives. I'm guessing the thing sold like crap, and that was back when both formats had players averaging well over $300. Now that you can get a good BR player for roughly $200 without much struggle, I'm guessing a BR 360 add-on would have to come in at maybe $100 to do decent numbers, and that's probably not feasible. Stuffing it inside the console, as has already been mentioned, would go against the drive to decrease price and cost.

(That said, I'm immensely enjoying finally having an HD-DVD player; the format's dead, which means no new movies, but there are tons of catalog titles to be had for about $6. Given that the BR format is still in the overpriced early-adopter state, a la early DVD, it's making the wait easier.)

 

[xS1TH L0RDx]

if there was a blu-ray 360, then the ONLY reason i would own my ps3 would be for mgs4.


that's kind of depressing... :-\

 

[_Angelus_]

Bluray first 2 years outstrip DVD

Bluray sales dominate Christmas season

Nice paper stats,videophile hard on material I imagine.
Its a marathon,not some quick money shot though. Let's see where BR is 3-5 years from now.

 

[kiUNiT]

LOL @ people saying there's no market for it

MKV FTMFW

 

[Sleeker]

Because there is a market for it, but its too young and they have to wait few years before they go after it.

 

[xSL4INx]

Because there's no need for it this current console life cycle.

 

[juicyfruitas]

Bluray sales dominate Christmas season

I had to scratch my head at the line in the article that said:

"Across the whole holiday season 3.7 million Blu-ray units were sold in Britain, and that doesn't include sales of Sony's Playstation 3 console, "

Britain sold 3.7 million stand alone BR units in the last 3 months of '08?

/mindboggled

 

[DustoMan]

To put this topic to rest, I'm going to point everyone to several posts on Chris Lanier's blog. Who is Chris Lanier? A guy that used to work at Microsoft in the Media Center division, and post periodic updates on what Microsoft is doing with Media Center, but he does talk about Microsoft's other entertainment devices as well. He's posted pretty much every time this 360 Blu-Ray driver rumor comes up and debunks it every single time. Microsoft have absolutely no interest at all in making a BD add-on for the 360.

This post talks about the gist of his argument, but he did do a "roll-up" post with links to everything he's posted on the topic here.

Fiction: Microsoft should support Blu-ray on the Xbox 360

I truly don’t understand why Microsoft would add Blu-ray support to the Xbox 360 at this point. When Microsoft added HD DVD support they did so by adding some four million lines of code to the Dashboard and had Toshiba manufacturer and sell the HD DVD drives at a loss. How do I know it was at a loss? Just look at the fact that the standard IDE drive was selling for far less than any other IDE HD DVD drive on market.

Toshiba didn’t make any money on the 300,000 that were sold and neither did Microsoft. Microsoft took the development time to add support simply to counter Sony including Blu-ray in the PS3. This was an extremely poor counter, but it provided a fairly cheap way for a consumer to add support for a next gen DVD format on their Xbox.

As that was the only real reason, what reason does Microsoft have now to do the same for Blu-ray? The war is over, Blu-ray won. Your not fighting that anymore. The Xbox 360 is nearly two years old with an approximate four year total turn-over time for the next console. Why add Blu-ray in any form to the Xbox 360?

The simple fact is that it’s not in Microsoft’s best interest to provide Blu-ray support in the Xbox 360. The drives are going to be too expensive as there is no reason to sell them at a loss anymore. Pair that with the development time for BD+ and BD-J, two technologies that Microsoft didn’t agree with in the first place and you have a recipe for no Blu-ray on the Xbox 360.

As for internal drives, that’s even worse. Going back to the drawing board, yet again losing money for an integrated drive that can only be used for movie playback. Remember, developers can’t use Blu-ray Disc’s as that you limit your market by some 18 million current Xbox 360’s (Microsoft also wouldn’t allow it either).

I strongly disagree that Microsoft already has some of these things planned and working as Derek Flickinger suggested on CE Pro yesterday. I don’t believe the Xbox 360 will ever have Blu-ray Disc support. As for the Xbox 720 or whatever you want to call it, I think it is too soon to say it won’t but I don’t think you can say it will either.