Can you swap the internal 360 DVD drive with this one, and have it work?

P.S. The laptop drive adapters are about $5-10 on eBay. The work fine for laptop drives (obviously), and I’m guessing they should work fine for this drive as well.

Yes it does indeed, it a single plug solution for slot in dvd drives for most laptops, and carries data and power at 12v,5v and ground. There are many different versions of the adapter, but there is usually an input from a psu to a floppy or regular molex connector as seen in the link i added (in white).

i recognised the plug as soon as i saw it lol. Only technical issue is the front tray? - Is it bare with just the silver besel attached, and also are there regular tapped screw holed on the sides of the drives for mounting in a drive cage.

The circuit board pictured above looks like it just houses the Usb to IDE element as well as providing power from the internal mini Psu. The drive could have been made a lot smaller if it didnte need the 12v 1 amp power, but this cannot obviously be provided over usb.

no the adaptor doesnt carry the power. the back of the HD player has the power. The HD dvd connects using the mini atapi connector to the IDE using the adaptor. The power connects directly to the DVD. If the adaptor does not work (which it should), I would still take it all apart and connect it internally to my internal usb connectors on the motherboard. This way you can still use it as an internal device.

Quick question, could you tell us the exact version of WinDVD 8 you are using. I see that it is the platinum pack, but as of now the WinDVD website states that HD DVD and Blu Ray support must be purchased seperately - with no details as to how. Was it the Japanese version by any chance? A build number would be fantastic if possible.

Well done! I had already pre-ordered the device (despite not actually owning a 360) on the basis of using it as a cheap entry into HD movies. :) - as soon as Europe gets shipments (now December 1st I believe) I shall be in happy HiDef land! :)

the board looks like what the imac uses of course i dont know if you can get one from an imac

What about HDCP? Do we still have to buy an HDCP video card + monitor pricey combo??

Dude that looks awesome, I assume the disc drive itself is a standard 5.25″ drive that can be put inside a PC shell. If so I just found my new drive =D..

Also can this be used to play xbox/xbox360 games if its pluged into the 360, and for that matter can the xbox 360’s internal dvd drive be replaced by this drive?

AlexL,

I have my HD DVD drive connected to my 360.

You cannot put a xbox360 game disk in the drive. It tells you to put the disc in the 360.

Having opened my 360, the connectors on the back of this drive (with or without the circuit board) do not look the same as the drive already in there. Just eyeballing it, it certainly would not be plug and play.

Gar

The Japan version he is using is downres to 960 x 540 so its 540p. It works and anyone can do it. Full hd program is yet to be released.

woohoo i have some Atapi 50 to 40 pin adapters i stole from some laptop CDrom drives, so it looks like i’m going to have a HDDVD drive in my pc. now i can’t wait to gut a sony to get a bluray drive too.

I hope to god they ship an Xbox 360 with an internal HD drive… but oh well still a lot cheaper than a damn PS3 or Blue ray drive.

http://www.avsforum.com/avs-vb/showthread.php?t=748426&page=1&pp=30

It DOES work and it is working on real commercial HD-DVD’s now. It’s not perfect but it plays movies TODAY.

Here’s a thread on AVS Forum. Including a uncropped picture of the Batman Begins Tumbler that includes the full desktop screencap showing the WinDVD 8 Plat (Japan version) playing in a window and the file directory listing of the Batman Begins HD-DVD (retail U.S. release).

Here’s the real question. Does that Microsoft addon board that’s attached to the internal OEM Toshiba HD-DVD drive have the AACS functionality built into it or is it built into the drive? Someone needs to try connecting the drive directly to PC IDE and seeing if this method still plays back. If not then I’d say the AACS info is built into the PC board with the MS stamp on it like the Toshiba Flash ROM in the HD-A1 has the AACS on it and not on the NEC drive inside.

Hey Bill,

Way to win the format war.

Thanks.
HD-DVD & Toshiba

The HD-DVD Drive dosen’t need drivers in windows XP, mine works fine, you DO need drivers if you want to access the HD-DVD File system though, but without the drivers DVDs and CDs work fine, as it shows up as a normal DVD drive (more or less)

Only XP ? no one feel lucky and try within linux? :)

“Buy American. Support our Country, our Companies, our Future.”

So they can keep screwing us over? Yeah, I like that idea.

“#Gav 2 hours, 20 minutes ago

Only XP ? no one feel lucky and try within linux? :)”

I have suspicions that you will see somewhat similar results as for the Mac. Linux is by far OS that supports the most hardware out there. It even supports Apple stuff that Apple no longer supports.

Plug and play in linux really is plug and play, I’ve plugged in some really weird things on my boxes and in Windows I’ve had some headaches, in Linux I just get a nice little box asking me if I want to boot/activate the unit.

Mind, wireless USB/PCI cards are easier on windows, but Linux, put plainly, sucks when it comes to WiFi.

h8GWB, turn your hardware acceleration down to none in your advanced video settings and print-screen grabs will capture direct-x displays fine

h8GWB: Regarding the black area in any DVD software on any system - that’s because the OS is taking a dump of memory off of the display adapter for the visible screen are. Video is usually sent to another portion of that memory, and the display adapter composites the system display and the video frame together before sending it out to the monitor, so as far as the operating system is concerned, there isn’t anything in the space that would otherwise represent the video… it’s done that way, not for copy protection (though I don’t doubt that copy protection will soon be yet another thing that will be embedded in that whole mess), but because it’s easier to tell the display adapter that there’s a frame of (H,W) pixels that it needs to display at (X,Y) and then fill the contiguous buffer, than it is to split the scanlines out yourself and stick them into the appropriate regions of memory.

As far as Mac OS X, it says on apple website that their next OS (10.5, Codename Leopard) will support HD DVD, so it will only take some time for apple users to get their hands on working HD DVD software for Macs.

“Slightly off topic, but how did you get the DVD window to show anything but a black field when you took the desktop screenshots?”
Go into Display Properties–>Settings–>Advanced–>Troubleshoot, set Hardware Acceleration to none, take screen grab. Ka-ching!

whats the point of this if you can only get 560p?
seems kinda useless for me, considering PAL dvds have not that much less resolution …

Buy American. Support our Country, our Companies, our Future.

Thanks Xbox!!!
===========

Toshiba’s American?

Games wouldn’t work from 360 on Windows, remember, 360 isn’t x86! You would need an emulator.

“umm, lets do the math
Xbox 360 premium pack @ ~400 USD + Xbox 360 HDDVD player @ ~200 USD
vs.
Sony PS3 (high end) @ ~600 USD

*cough*, no contest, *cough*

PS3: BluRay / Dvd Player, Bluetooth 2.0, WiFi, 60 GB HDD/

Look at what you are getting for your money!

(im sorry in advance if any of the prices listed are not correct, but i am sure they are)”

Bluetooth doesn’t matter when there’s already another form of wireless, and the wireless headset for 360 doesn’t suck. As for the HD movies, at least Microsoft gives people a choice. It does suck 360 is short on hard drive space though.

*cough* fanboy *cough*

I have both a Mac and a PC, plus I have a 360 and the HD-DVD drive. I first tried it on OSX, the Mac wouldn’t even recognize it. I then booted the Mac into XP Media Center with bootcamp and it recognized it but WOULD NOT install the drivers. I then plugged the HD-DVD drive into my Athlon tower and booted into XP PRO, it recognized it but again would not install the drivers.

I tried it on 3 operating systems and 2 different machines, NONE WORKED!!!

yeah its all a bunch of crap why dou you even belive the hype its just a stunt to take away from the ps 3 release everyone should know that the ps3 is the fourfont of new gaming and will hold that record for a long time and why would any of you people believe cheap is better cheaper is not always better you get what you pay for xbox 360 hd drive and toshiba hddvd crap bluyray is going to be the standerd in hd players why would al the major companies be jumping on the banwagging if it wasnt i would not bet against it and if i were you i would put stock in it i am and we will see 5 years from now who was right!! sony no match the best of the best!!!!

To Sony Fanboys, i’ve been a Sony buyer for as long i can care to remember, got TVs, VCRs, DVDs, Receivers, PSX, PS2, PSP, you name it, love RPGs on PSX and PS2, but when i witnessed the how the PS3 is looking so far, the launch line-up, the graphics (you just can’t compare Resistance to Gears of War, GoW alone could crush the PS3 in a snap) and the pricepoint, i am not afraid to say the PS3 may well repeat the story of the NeoGeo, or the Dreamcast.

Now, dont get me wrong, i love my Dreamcast , still have it in my living room, and is not like the PS3 is doomed already, is just i don’t think it will be the great console we hoped it to be, plus they still have a long road to travel to get their online gaming system up to par with what is available right now…

Asi que jumpmancerros, nada de “hype”, ni nada de “fourfront”, y mucho menos nada de “bluyray is going to be the standerd in hd players”, eso si es hype, megasonyfanboy, hehehe

MADSAT

” PS3 is doomed already ” you have must of been born with only one side of your brain , you must be the dumbest person on the face of the earth only a nimrod would even posses the that kind of ignorience to say something like that give me a break the dreamcast failed in so many aspects there were so many problems with that system and why it failed! so please and for gears of war one game alone can not carry on a system everywhere you go you have people selling there xbox 360 ebay local paper ads even when i was driving around my block on saturday i saw posters of people trying to sell there xbox360 as if it were for garage sale ! ps3 is on its third generation gameing system and will be around for a long time and the ps3 is by far the most advanced system out look at japan look at the turn out it was a mad house mr pricepoint ebay is selling preorder ps3 preorder ones for about 1700 $ give me a break people have no limit when buying a qaulity system! quality please how can you compare a true hd system gaming system with a fake hd one like i said there is only two manfacutres sony and toshiba who have hd players not microsoft and toshiba does not even compare to the quality or performance of bluray 50gb storage on one disk double side of course 1080p 5.1 surround sound please nothing compares to it! so dont come in with your nonsense trying to compare it to a piece of crap dreamcast!!! or xbox !!!! to ps3

lol! i can never understand the mentality of fanboys. foaming at the mouth spouting OMG PS3 IS THE PWNSOR!!!!!!1111oneoneone11. you have no first hand or even reliable reviews of blueray vs hddvd yet you’re happy to pretend you know. sony have had a shit 2 years and they’re going from sucky to shit.. samsung is owning them in all their tradional markets, so we’ll see if their delayed console will manage to live up to the hype..

jumpmancerros23: With all due respect, could you perhaps incorporate a little punctuation into your writing? At the moment it just looks like a stream of ill-informed conciousness.

Or, frankly, ill-informed everything.

An HD medium simply refers to ‘high-definition’. That’s currently set as being either 720p or 1080p, and the fact that there are two different definitions for ‘high-definition’ itself clouds the issue further.

Both HD-DVD and Blu-Ray are not in themselves capable of producing ‘high-definition’ - they are simply capable of storing sufficient amounts of data to store media in HD-format for an acceptable amount of time. It doesn’t matter if the device supplying it is external or internal, or whether it’s Blu-Ray or HD-DVD.

…and frankly, given that a vast proportion of folks don’t quite get HD yet, it doesn’t matter one iota.

The fact that eBay has pre-order PS3s (or at least a tenuous promise of getting your hands on a PS3) doesn’t mean anything other than supply vs hype and demand. Xbox 360s sold for ridiculous sums of money when they came out as well.

The bottom line is content. If you feel you can’t live without next-gen, get whatever systems which do what YOU want to do with them, be it a 360, a Wii, a PS3, or any combination of past, present, or ‘next’-gen.

tory is smart. He actually has sense embedded into his main memory. It must be shared memory, which would explain its superfast awesomeness!!!

All who oppose Microsoft… no one cares but people who pledge their hard-earned money(sigh) to an inanimate object. A name is ethereal.

Personally, I have the 360. I like Halo too much to go with Sony on this one. Last-gen, I had all the big consoles. Once I got my copy of Halo 1&2 for Xbox, I was hooked. So, that worked out magically, since the 360 is, in terms of comparison, a fairly powerful system, and in the middle lane for pricing.

Still, PC could completely rip both of them to their doom with an appetite to spare. Try soon-to-be 2400p with 64AA!!(muah ha ha ha ha ha).

Someone said Xbox 360 was not “true” hd? Please, like your PS3 is…. so dim-witted, you fanboys.

PC> PS3+XB360+ Wii+ the USA’s “electronics”(like that’ll ever happen)

I’d just like to say AMEN to Tory, this person has it dead on.

I never killed the discussion I just stated my opinion but when you get little kids who work at McDonalds trying to oppose you and say you probably cant afford a ps3 i have to step in and say you killed the discussion with all you lame tackles and so called facts and assumptions as stated in the beginning of the discussion it was about a hd drive for your pc I have stated that in my remarks until all of you had step in and talk about gaming and Sony and blue ray which not fail in the future and will be the leader in hd drives and players guarantee so when my stock in bluray rises and you get fired at McDonalds and burger king maybe I will lend you some money !!!! Blu-ray Disc

Blu-ray, also known as Blu-ray Disc (BD), is the name of a next-generation optical disc format jointly developed by the Blu-ray Disc Association (BDA), a group of the world’s leading consumer electronics, personal computer and media manufacturers (including Apple, Dell, Hitachi, HP, JVC, LG, Mitsubishi, Panasonic, Pioneer, Philips, Samsung, Sharp, Sony, TDK and Thomson). The format was developed to enable recording, rewriting and playback of high-definition video (HD), as well as storing large amounts of data. The format offers more than five times the storage capacity of traditional DVDs and can hold up to 25GB on a single-layer disc and 50GB on a dual-layer disc. This extra capacity combined with the use of advanced video and audio codecs will offer consumers an unprecedented HD experience.

While current optical disc technologies such as DVD, DVD±R, DVD±RW, and DVD-RAM rely on a red laser to read and write data, the new format uses a blue-violet laser instead, hence the name Blu-ray. Despite the different type of lasers used, Blu-ray products can easily be made backwards compatible with CDs and DVDs through the use of a BD/DVD/CD compatible optical pickup unit. The benefit of using a blue-violet laser (405nm) is that it has a shorter wavelength than a red laser (650nm), which makes it possible to focus the laser spot with even greater precision. This allows data to be packed more tightly and stored in less space, so it’s possible to fit more data on the disc even though it’s the same size as a CD/DVD. This together with the change of numerical aperture to 0.85 is what enables Blu-ray Discs to hold 25GB/50GB.

Blu-ray is currently supported by more than 170 of the world’s leading consumer electronics, personal computer, recording media, video game and music companies. The format also has broad support from the major movie studios as a successor to today’s DVD format. Seven of the eight major movie studios have already announced titles for Blu-ray, including Warner, Paramount, Fox, Disney, Sony, MGM and Lionsgate. The initial line-up is expected to consist of over 100 titles and include recent hits as well as classics such as Batman Begins, Desperado, Fantastic Four, Fifth Element, Hero, Ice Age, Kill Bill, Lethal Weapon, Mission Impossible, Ocean’s Twelve, Pirates of the Caribbean, Reservoir Dogs, Robocop, and The Matrix. Many studios have also announced that they will begin releasing new feature films on Blu-ray Disc day-and-date with DVD, as well as a continuous slate of catalog titles every month.

try to speculate on these facts and tell me if all the major companies are just simple minded as me when they two are going to use blu-ray!!!! and for me i dont believe i am millionare but i dont think working at costco as a manager making 70 thousand a year with no college degree is not to shabby! and yes i will be able to purchase one at work at 699.99 bundle pack with some extra goodies is pretty dam good give me your address and why not i will buy you one since i am nice guy and i know your income at mcdonlads put you in a bad spot to buy one so enjoy all your lame attacks on me for just simply stated my opinnions and dont loose site of what the really topic was hd player for your pc(so who really killed the topic me or you !!!!! MERRY CHRISTMAS!!

Dude your TV is Sony 50 inch, well mine is an 82″ Mitsubishi LCoS and guess what! Im only 18 and dont have a job but I have successful parents, oh and I’m going to collage soon so I dont care for any of you posting flaming comments about my 82″ HDTV.

lol excuse my spelling im typing while watching The Man Show on G4TV its kool!

I will go out and buy one the INSTANT someone figures out how to use this drive for HD-DVDs on my Macbook Pro. Yeah.

Does anyone know if the beta OSX Leopard software has the HD-DVD player built in?

jumpmancer reminds me of the college-milk-boy from Tokio Drift. “Wow, you can read the manual”.

I think he is despaired and just needs a friend or someone who cares about him..

self-disqualified

However the fate of HD-DVD and Blu-Ray, I say cheers to this “hack” (not a hack) and thanks for helping in driving the prices of HD-DVD players down!!!!!

Ehh, you know, in 18 months to 2 years we’ll have a clearer picture of who exactly wins the HD-DVD vs. Blueray battle, if Blueray wins and I have to dump my $170 360 add-on box due to a lack of support, I’m not going to lose a whole lot of sleep over it. Whenever you jump headfirst into new tech like this, you have to realize there’s always the chance it’s going to fail and you’ll have a nice doorstop for your troubles. In retrospect, a $170 doorstop rates pretty far down the line as far as other tech I’ve jumped into over the years.

You know i’m in on this. Subscribed with Google Reader.

“Sony will win the war.”

Sony are at WAR with us? RUN!!!!! (seriously though, put your mp3’s away…)

Thanks for the love.

Hey jumpmncer, your sony shares are on the up, at last, and you helped! Maybe one day Sony will reward you.

guys, hi-def, hi-schmef, here’s a tip: If you can, get a projector. Your friend gets a 100′ TV, you pull your projo back an inch and voila, 110′. You’ll always have a bigger TV, as long as you have space.

This is cool. Although it looks like a lot of work having to transfer the HD-DD card from one unit to another.

remember the mini disk !

Buy American. Support our Country, our Companies, our Future.

Thanks Xbox!!!
===========

Toshiba’s American?

===========

No but doesnt PRC stand for peoples republic of china

uds son increibles!!!!!, los felicito. you are fantastic. congratulations

Joker5….I think PRC stands for ‘People with Real Children workers’…could be wrong though.

I think that “Blue_Ray” or Blue Gay will be a nice little market. But Bubba that goes and buys a DVD from Wal-Mart for 5 dollars and is happy with his AMPEX DVD player will not spend the money for a BLUE Ray player or want to replace his collection of 200 movies. I purchased a Mini Disk player back in 1997 and I loved it, but it was a pain in the ass to make mix disks b/c u had to go real time to do it. IT never caught on and I still own it, but it gathers dust. I use my Creative Zen to listen to music. I can encode a MPG file to 780i and play it on my computer with my hardware setup. It works. I never was a gamer so XboX and PS3 whatever they can do, don’t do it for me. I have lots better things to do with my money than spend $600 for a mindless game box. Blur Ray or DH DVD, when your are old your eyes will not be able to tell the difference and your blown out eardrums will not be able to listen to Dolby10.1 THX DTS stuff.

There is no superior system, only a superior demand.

Get a Wii. LOL

There you go:
http://www.avaxhome.ru/software/windvdplatinum8final.html

After reading all these posts I was imagining where God came into all this (please don’t get offended by this - its just a semi-comical-pseudo-religious-comment):

Do XBox360 fanboys goto XBox Heavens, Do PS3 fanboys goto PS3 Heavens?

I wondered if there was a heaven with black cooling fins, black grilled gates and halos made out of black plastic with the RGB PS logo and a big Sony sign at the back. I also dreamt of the equivalent XBox360 heaven with white and green lining everything in sight, pictures of bill gates, a green halo and a big microsoft sign with a hyperlink to open up an instance of the Windows Vista heaven.

- I hope you understand what I’m trying to say… if you don’t… don’t worry… neither do I!

This fan stuff is getting pretty boring and almost evangelical. However, I do respect the fact that they are your own opinions and thank you all for expressing them so millitantly.

I don’t remember this problem when I was deciding to buy a Sega Master System or a Nintendo Entertainment System (NES), but we never had the internet back then. I bought the Sega because I wanted to play Alex Kid in Miracle World and Sonic the Hedgehog, and not Super Marios Bros. But hey I never debated it with anyone. I think this conversation is testament to the internet and its contribution to harmony and world piece - i’m rambling!!

Getting back to the point {I keep digressing}

In terms of Console Wars: The console with the cool games will win. These are things like Gears of War and Halo 3 (xbox360 - correct me if I’m wrong) and whatever the “PS3 only titles” are for the PS3. technical ability, gfx and sound are not the only factors.

In terms of Format Wars: I think MS and Sony have a lot to say in this as gamers will be a big factor in deciding the outcome, as standalone players will be less attractive; with their high prices and limited functionality compared to the consoles. Who will win - no one knows - and no one can really predict. But all I can say is if you want your favourite format to win the format war just advertise it, tell your mates, make a website, start a fanclub and make a TV station about it. But please… please… don’t get into very hurtfull and saddening debates as it is really sad to see such a really good post digress into a slag-off session. Be constructive not destructive :)

i will end with a quote from a hippy I met at a legalise c********* conference in Nimbin, NSW, Australia:

God gave us peace, love and harmony when he/she/it created the Earth and the Universe around it… why destroy it… chill… be happy your here… thats the real miracle!

KG -
Obviously you don’t keep up with the news. The last update for the 360 enabled 1080p, also if you do a little research you’ll find that the real reason anyone wants HDMI is mostly for audio during HD-DVD playback. HDMI connections offer very lttle upgrade of picture quality if any, and some displays convert the digital signal back to a analog signal meaning that component looks better. I also have both, hooked up to a Toshiba 72mx196, and for you saying that the PS3 blows the 360 away should really be reconsidered.

Here, you can start your research here. http://dpad.gotfrag.com/portal/story/35372/?cpage=1

One last thing 1080i60 = 1080p

Mike -

Please read the link I provided It will make you rethink your comment on PS3 having better look ing visuals at 1080p. As of now we really don’t have anything to compare to on the 360 so we won’t be able to test.

I couldn’t find a link but yesterday while reading erview of PS3 vs. 360 launch titles I seem to recall gamespi.com giving the nod to the 360. Also I don’t see a problem with comparing PS3 launch titles to current release titles of the 360, because IMO the only thing that delayed the PS3 is BLU-RAY. And, if you were to do that then the 360has advantages in THPS, COD3, and a few others I can’t recall.

I really don’t care either I just do like fanboys 1 sided opinions.

And, yes 1080i60 = 1080p30 if your TV correctly deinterlaces the pic. Sorry I wasn’t clearer.

Well, I finally managed to read my way through this thread, and have to say thanks to all those who have provided meaningfull information. (mind you, flame wars make for a fun read too).

Personally, i can’t wait for the xbox hd-dvd drive to be released here. As an early adopter, it seems by far the cheapest way to view HD media right now.

Something to think on also is that all HD drives are first generation drives. The technology is new in both HD-DVD and BD, which means ther are going to be ‘niggles’ with whatever option you go for. Another looming issue will be wear and tear. Watching lots of movies is very taxing on the drives, and the result is that these drives WILL cook themseves to death in a few years time. How many people remember killing the dvd drives in their ps2 from watching all of those new fangled dvd thinges? Id rather have to relace an external drive in a couple of years time, rather than replace a whole ps3.

Anyway, thats my two bits worth. All i want is some good content to make use of my HD TV. Unfortunately, HD on the PC (my prefered option) is a bit of arse right now, with no hope in sight untill the manstream gfx cards get kitted out with hdcp as standard, As it is, 130 quid for an xbox add-on seems pretty damn cheap to me.

BTW - for the fanboys here, checkout hardcoreware.net:

http://www.hardcoreware.net/reviews/review-348-1.htm

There’s a great article there headed ‘Playstation 3 vs XBOX 360: A Developer’s Perspective’

…here’s a few snippets for those who can’t be arsed to click there

“Being a video game developer (I develop for both, Playstation 3 and XBOX 360) people ask me almost daily which platform I think is better. These are my personal feelings, in no way does this reflect my employer.

Short answer: XBOX 360.

Long answer: Price, performance, visual quality, game selection and online support. I think the XBOX 360 wins in every category.

Price: This is obvious; the XBOX 360 core is only $299. The PS3 is around $499 for the 20GB version. It comes with a hard drive, but you don’t need a hard drive to enjoy a lot of great games on the 360 so I think it’s fair to compare both core systems.

Performance: On paper, the PS3 is more powerful. In reality, it’s quite inferior to the 360. Without getting into too many details, the three general-purpose CPU’s the xbox360 has are currently FAR easier to take advantage of than the SPU’s on the PS3. I suspect a few years down the road some high budget, first party PS3 exclusive titles will come out that really take advantage of the SPU’s and do things the XBOX 360 can’t, but I don’t think the console is worth buying based on this speculation (for some it will be though, we’ll have to wait and see how these games turn out).

Graphics: The XBOX 360 is a clear winner. The GPU is more powerful. It has more powerful fillrate, and far more pixel and vertex processing horsepower. Part of the reason is their choice of memory, and architecture of pixel and vertex procesing. I can’t get into details but the same vertex shader will run much slower on the PS3 than the XBOX 360. The 360 also has a clever new way rendering high definition anti aliased back buffers. To accomplish the same effect on PS3 is prohibitively expensive. For this reason I think many games will have no choice but to run in non-HD resolutions on the PS3 version, use a lower quality anti aliasing technique, or do back buffer upscaling. The end result in all cases is going to be noticeably worse image quality.”

Hi,
after all, in case you finished your unproductive flame wars and had time to to test a mini 50p to IDE 40 adapter, did it work?

mike

Just my 2cents on the 360 vs PS3 thing, PS3 still has a jump up being that the 360’s output is analog and PS3 offers analog and digital (via HDMI). Personally I don’t care, I am a fan of a PS3 but it’s going to take them at least a year to get off their feet and even then there will always be things the 360 will do better. Unless Amazon does a weekly run of non-core 360s (175$ sounds about right), probably won’t buy one until I at least get my hands on a PS3 and some good games (which won’t be coming out until next year anyway).

- Tony R.

Meanwhile, the Wii sneaks in while the 360 and PS3 duke it out with games and gameplay. I like eye candy just like everyone else, but Nintendo pushed more units than the PS3 already and they make a direct profit from each console sale. To top that, they are known for making games that are addicting and challenging. Who cares if the graphics aren’t as good….

The best bang for your buck out there is the xbox 360 core system. Its 299 and is far superior to the WII. Lets see, more game selection, at least 2 times the processer power and a gaming network that is established.

So a WII for $250 or a xbox 360 for $300. I will spend the extra $50 and get a far SUPERIOR SYSTEM!!!! Although if money was no object I would like to have all 3 systems,

XBOX 360 wins with my funds.

Would this fly?

Xbox 360 HD-DVD Peripheral
Above mentioned hack
Sapphire HDMI (HDCP Enabled) Radeon X1600 PCIX Card
42″ HDTV

Would that work, cause I was looking at one in the store, and the guy told me that if I am thinking of just pluging it in the computer not to bother because the microsoft rep told them it won’t work (HD-DVD Player).

Does any one know the bare minimum requirements for a pc to run an hd dvd movie using this player?

Still haven’t heard a definite answer to the Linux question (wouldn’t it be funny for someone with PS2 Linux Kit to have this on their PS2), or a true PS2 hack, or the already asked PS3 hack, or the Wii (of course with the PS2 or the Wii you could only get 480p and on the Wii only Dolby Pro Logic and then on the PS2 regular Dolby Digital or DTS) or even a hack for the 300-hr TiVo® Series3™ HD or some other high end av device (might need a USB to Firewire adapter). As mentioned earlier the XBOX 360 with the launch of this add-on MS released a patch for 1080p and just yesterday patched problems with it. Some tv’s don’t support 1080p over component though. There is a VGA cable for the 360 (true no DVI or HDMI nor any planned that I know of, just like I don’t think there are any VGA or DVI cables for the PS3). As for HD-DVD vs Blueray discussion I say HD-DVD drive for 360 yes, ps3 yes, other than that wait. I hope it doesn’t go the way of VHS vs. Betamax. Though legal issues are stopping dual format drives unlike what happen with DVD-R/RW and DVD+R/RW.

Just a quite note for anyone who says that either of these formats is “off the reel” - what the director shot…

I just finished a short film (24 minutes) and transferred it to HD for color correction and effects work… the finished film, with really simple compression, is 365GB.

So if you can squeeze a 2 hour movie, plus features, onto a 25-50GB disk, it’s got at least 6:1 compression on top of whatever ours had to begin with (I think it’s 3:1 or 5:1)… So both blu-ray and HD-DVD are intensely compressed. Think Cheeseburger into a bullion cube.

So as long as both formats are supporting the same resolutions (1080i, 1080p), I doubt you’ll be able to really see much difference between them except for the quality of the codec, which can constantly be upgraded with firmware updates, etc.

I think it’ll come down to a) if more studios actually sign on to one or the other, and b) who’s player comes down the cheapest in cost… that was the deal with BETA… the Beta players were hellishly expensive until it’s last leg anyways. So Beta was doomed. VHS sold it’s technology to everyone, so players kept getting cheaper and cheaper.

I’m definitely considering picking up an XBOX HD-DVD drive in the meantime so I can start picking up the discs and watching them… if there was a PS3 in sight, I’d probably get one too. I doubt there’ll be stock until mid-spring 07 at minimum.

And the XBOX / PS3 arguments are as illuminating as the PEPSI / COKE arguments. I drink both… depending on the day… or whatever restaurant i’m at serves.