Official Xbox 360? Thread...Part Deux

[NFS4]

QWERTY keypad and Spring Update official:

http://www.engadget.com/2007/04/09/xbox-360s-qwerty-thumb-keyboard-is-official/
http://www.engadget.com/2007/04/09/xbox-360-spring-2007-dashboard-update/

 

[spacejamz]

Originally posted by: Kev
Surprise surprise. I got a defective GH2. The green button just decided to randomly stop working. It seems like everything I buy for the xbox 360, including the system itself, is just some of the shoddiest put together electronic garbage I've ever come across in my entire life. This is pathetic.

the star power thing on my controller is jacked...sometimes my star power gets activated as soon as it is ready while the guitar is not tilted and other times I will tilt the guitar and takes about 5 seconds for it to kick in while tilting the guitar...

 

[EKKC]

the inclusion of messenger is pretty nice. it'd be awesome (maybe distracting, but awesome nonetheless) to receive IMs during a game session

 

[Nutdotnet]

Originally posted by: Kev
Surprise surprise. I got a defective GH2. The green button just decided to randomly stop working. It seems like everything I buy for the xbox 360, including the system itself, is just some of the shoddiest put together electronic garbage I've ever come across in my entire life. This is pathetic.

Then sell it?

 

[ric1287]

Originally posted by: Nutdotnet

Originally posted by: Kev
Surprise surprise. I got a defective GH2. The green button just decided to randomly stop working. It seems like everything I buy for the xbox 360, including the system itself, is just some of the shoddiest put together electronic garbage I've ever come across in my entire life. This is pathetic.

Then sell it?

selling broken items usually doenst go over to well. I am on my 3rd 360, treat them perfectly, and they die. Only bad thing about the system

 

[Queasy]

Originally posted by: bigrash
do they normally include an update on backwards compatibility for old xbox games (the ones not yet compatible) with these updates?

No. They are updated separately.

 

[Queasy]

I was kind of meh on the Spring Update until I read this:

Also, Johnson said that downloading speed through Xbox Live will be more efficient, perhaps up to three times faster in some cases (not just for Background Downloading, but any downloads).

If that is true, that rocks. I could care less about IMing and the rest of the updates are nice little fixes but not anything mind-blowing.

 

[bucwylde23]

Originally posted by: Queasy
I was kind of meh on the Spring Update until I read this:

Also, Johnson said that downloading speed through Xbox Live will be more efficient, perhaps up to three times faster in some cases (not just for Background Downloading, but any downloads).

If that is true, that rocks. I could care less about IMing and the rest of the updates are nice little fixes but not anything mind-blowing.

Hmm, that's actually something that has been bugging me for a while. My downloads are always slow on XBL. The arcade games seem to take way too long to download for ~50mb files. I'm not using wireless and it's definitely not a slow network connection. (at least on my end)

 

[Aikouka]

As long as I can download fast off the net, my XBL downloads have always been fast. The first part being that sometimes my intarwebz likes to go from 4MB DSL to 128kbit ISDN .

 

[geckojohn]

nice, the intarweb is k3wl

 

[Don Vito Corleone]

Originally posted by: ric1287

selling broken items usually doenst go over to well. I am on my 3rd 360, treat them perfectly, and they die. Only bad thing about the system

Do you play it a lot? I've had my 360 for a year now, with no problem, and I'm always curious about people who've gone through multiple units. They clearly have a reliability issue based on the number of people with problems, but I wonder whether it requires a ton of use to reveal itself. Mine is sometimes on for a max of 10-12 hours a week, and other weeks not at all, so perhaps I'm just not a heavy enough user to bring out its flaws.

 

[R Nilla]

I just read this in IGN's article about the upcoming Spring Dashboard update:

Streaming media from your PC through Windows Media Connect will also get a couple of additions this spring. Included in the update are codecs for H.264 and MPEG-4 formats, expanding the list of supported formats which was previously limited to only WMVs, a big boost for those of us that like to stream movies from our PCs to watch on home theaters. Once that movie gets started, or if you're watching one you downloaded, you'll be able to switch the aspect ratio to Zoom, Letterbox, Stretch, or Native on the fly.

I didn't see this mentioned in the engadget article. Also, the IGN article mentions that there are 1,600 changes in the Spring update (albeit most are minor, superficial or probably not even noticeable)!

 

[ric1287]

Originally posted by: DonVito

Originally posted by: ric1287

selling broken items usually doenst go over to well. I am on my 3rd 360, treat them perfectly, and they die. Only bad thing about the system

Do you play it a lot? I've had my 360 for a year now, with no problem, and I'm always curious about people who've gone through multiple units. They clearly have a reliability issue based on the number of people with problems, but I wonder whether it requires a ton of use to reveal itself. Mine is sometimes on for a max of 10-12 hours a week, and other weeks not at all, so perhaps I'm just not a heavy enough user to bring out its flaws.

overall, my 360 gets around 2-3 hours use per week on average. I'll play for a few hours a day when a new game comes out, and then not touch it for weeks. At this point, i am afraid to play it as i know it will probably break for no reason again

 

[bucwylde23]

Originally posted by: DonVito

Originally posted by: ric1287

selling broken items usually doenst go over to well. I am on my 3rd 360, treat them perfectly, and they die. Only bad thing about the system

Do you play it a lot? I've had my 360 for a year now, with no problem, and I'm always curious about people who've gone through multiple units. They clearly have a reliability issue based on the number of people with problems, but I wonder whether it requires a ton of use to reveal itself. Mine is sometimes on for a max of 10-12 hours a week, and other weeks not at all, so perhaps I'm just not a heavy enough user to bring out its flaws.

MS should include a usage meter to tell us how many hours our 360 has been on.

 

[Queasy]

Originally posted by: R Nilla
I just read this in IGN's article about the upcoming Spring Dashboard update:

Streaming media from your PC through Windows Media Connect will also get a couple of additions this spring. Included in the update are codecs for H.264 and MPEG-4 formats, expanding the list of supported formats which was previously limited to only WMVs, a big boost for those of us that like to stream movies from our PCs to watch on home theaters. Once that movie gets started, or if you're watching one you downloaded, you'll be able to switch the aspect ratio to Zoom, Letterbox, Stretch, or Native on the fly.

I didn't see this mentioned in the engadget article. Also, the IGN article mentions that there are 1,600 changes in the Spring update (albeit most are minor, superficial or probably not even noticeable)!

Hmmm. I wonder if that means Divx/Xvid support or not. Based on past history...I'm leaning towards not.

 

[Eug Wanker]

15 Mbps HD H.264 support is totally awesome.

Anyone know the supported containers yet?

 

[blurredvision]

Ya, I like the new supported codecs as well.

 

[five40]

Originally posted by: R Nilla
I just read this in IGN's article about the upcoming Spring Dashboard update:

Streaming media from your PC through Windows Media Connect will also get a couple of additions this spring. Included in the update are codecs for H.264 and MPEG-4 formats, expanding the list of supported formats which was previously limited to only WMVs, a big boost for those of us that like to stream movies from our PCs to watch on home theaters. Once that movie gets started, or if you're watching one you downloaded, you'll be able to switch the aspect ratio to Zoom, Letterbox, Stretch, or Native on the fly.

I didn't see this mentioned in the engadget article. Also, the IGN article mentions that there are 1,600 changes in the Spring update (albeit most are minor, superficial or probably not even noticeable)!

You just made my week. I have been hoping for this feature. For the last couple of weeks I've been thinking about getting an iTV just so I could play H.264 but now I don't have to. Saved me 300 bucks and it's one less device to worry about.

 

[five40]

Originally posted by: Eug Wanker
15 Mbps HD H.264 support is totally awesome.

Anyone know the supported containers yet?

I'd love to know all the details as well. What is the max bitrate it'll support and what about surround sound. Once I get those details.....time for a couple of 750GB drives.

 

[Darkstar757]

It has been confirmed Xvid and Divx playback!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

 

[Queasy]

Originally posted by: Darkstar757
It has been confirmed Xvid and Divx playback!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

OH SNAP

well...maybe more like oh snap and not OH SNAP.

link

# H.264 video support: Up to 15 Mbps, Baseline, Main, and High (up to level 4.1) Profiles with 2 channel AAC LC and Main Profiles.
# Added MPEG-4 Part 2 video support: Up to 8 Mbps, Simple Profile with 2 channel AAC LC and Main Profiles.

only 2 channels. I'm caught between excitement and disappointment.

 

[arod]

kinda funny than the "big" update that ms is pimping is the one thing i think people will care the least about (the msn integration)

the marketplace blade will be very nice and a welcome addition (and very much needed with how much stuff is on there now). i do hope (but am not expecting it) that they would revamp the look and feel of it to make it easier to navigate. media center looks so much better than the 360 ui does.

http://i.i.com.com/cnwk.1d/i/z/200606/media/eb_mce_017.png
something like this (and it would need a few modifications) i think would be much nicer for the movies section... and something similar for tv shows.

the background downloading stuff is going to be very nice as well for those huge demoes and hd movie downloads but will depend on how its implemented.

Overall it adds alot of little things but there is still much more stuff that needs addressing. I just hope they dont waste all the dev time for the fall update and get the browser in as the "big" feature.

 

[bucwylde23]

For anyone interested in Gamefly on the east coast, they just sent me this email:

Starting this week, you may notice that the return address on your GameFly mailer will be Pittsburgh, PA. We're pleased to open this new shipping location as part of our continued effort to improve mailing times for GameFly members across the entire United States.

Initially, we are launching this new distribution center for only a small subset of our members (including your zip code), so we can complete our testing and training efforts. Over the next several weeks, we'll broaden the reach of this new distribution center to more members.

This is good news :thumbsup:

 

[Queasy]

Gears of War Update and "Annex" out today!

Later today, a Gears of War auto update is going to be available. I am not sure of the exact time, but here are some of the details of what the AU contains:

In Annex, gamers seize victory by keeping control over key map locations, or objectives, long enough to collect a winning number of points. Every map contains two to five identified objectives available for capture, with one objective active at a time. Objectives are based on map weapon-spawn locations and have a potential value of 60 points toward either team's score. Teams collect those points by maintaining ownership of an objective until all 60 points have been distributed. Every second that a team controls an objective, the team gets one point. When an objective falls to zero points, the next objective is selected at random.

And while defending their objectives against the onslaught of Xbox LIVE opponents, gamers may notice the following minor adjustments to "Gears of War":

*
VGA Cable Support: Monitor resolution widths greater than or equal to 1280 now render as letterbox. In particular VGA users running at 1280x1024 will now see the game in full 720p (1280x720) resolution in letterboxed form.
* Adjusted Assassination Multiplayer Gametype: Leader no longer has to unlock weapons and now has to be executed to die.
* Adjusted Boomshot: Splash damage to be more effective rendering targets down-but-not-out
* Adjusted Hammer of Dawn: Aiming will be more forgiving of moving targets
* Adjusted Roadie Run: Reduced frequency of accidently grabbing cover while running
* Kill Message Ticker: Ticker can now be seen while down-but-not-out and spectating
* General: Addressed a number of possible exploits in multiplayer

Hit www.gearsofwar.com for further details.

Again: I don?t know the exact time the AU will be released, but I?ll try to post a comment (or get e to do so) when it does go Live.

Edit: Remember, this is a rolling release. That means that it will take a few hours for everyone to get the prompt once we start rolling it out.

 

[R Nilla]

Originally posted by: Queasy
Gears of War Update and "Annex" out today!

Later today, a Gears of War auto update is going to be available. I am not sure of the exact time, but here are some of the details of what the AU contains:

In Annex, gamers seize victory by keeping control over key map locations, or objectives, long enough to collect a winning number of points. Every map contains two to five identified objectives available for capture, with one objective active at a time. Objectives are based on map weapon-spawn locations and have a potential value of 60 points toward either team's score. Teams collect those points by maintaining ownership of an objective until all 60 points have been distributed. Every second that a team controls an objective, the team gets one point. When an objective falls to zero points, the next objective is selected at random.

And while defending their objectives against the onslaught of Xbox LIVE opponents, gamers may notice the following minor adjustments to "Gears of War":

*
VGA Cable Support: Monitor resolution widths greater than or equal to 1280 now render as letterbox. In particular VGA users running at 1280x1024 will now see the game in full 720p (1280x720) resolution in letterboxed form.
* Adjusted Assassination Multiplayer Gametype: Leader no longer has to unlock weapons and now has to be executed to die.
* Adjusted Boomshot: Splash damage to be more effective rendering targets down-but-not-out
* Adjusted Hammer of Dawn: Aiming will be more forgiving of moving targets
* Adjusted Roadie Run: Reduced frequency of accidently grabbing cover while running
* Kill Message Ticker: Ticker can now be seen while down-but-not-out and spectating
* General: Addressed a number of possible exploits in multiplayer

Hit www.gearsofwar.com for further details.

Again: I don?t know the exact time the AU will be released, but I?ll try to post a comment (or get e to do so) when it does go Live.

Edit: Remember, this is a rolling release. That means that it will take a few hours for everyone to get the prompt once we start rolling it out.

Nice, I'll have to give this a try. I've never been a big fan of Gears online; I'm not very good at it and I find the gameplay to be awkward at best for death match. Respawning is a welcome incentive, however.