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How Does XBox Stand Up as a DVD Player?
Luddite Joe asks: "I'm planning on buying myself a DVD player for Christmas, spending maybe 200 bucks or so. I've also considered that I might buy an Xbox a couple of months down the road - but that's less certain. So I think to myself, the Xbox is a DVD player, right? If I hold off a couple of months and just buy the Xbox, I won't be wasting money on a DVD player that is almost immediately redundant. Keeping in mind that I'm buying more or less a low end, single disc DVD - how do the capabilities and quality of the Xbox as a DVD player compare? I don't want to sacrifice quality or features (or level of DVD compatibility), as I can get a pretty decent DVD for what I'm planning on spending."
The one problem with your setup is that there's no remote control included... to navigate the main menu, skip chapters, etc, you'll need to be at the computer.
Now, that's not a problem for me, for regular movies. I start up a movie, then sit back and watch it. But, for things like Anime, where the include beginning credits and end credits for each episode, sometimes 5-6 per disc, you might want to have chapter forward capability.
But, I have the same setup at home as what you described, and it works excellent... minus the decoder card, but a PIII-600 or higher kinda negates the need of a decoder card. Only drawback is you have to buy a software decoder (I'm talking from a Windows standpoint, not Linux.)
A Software decoder, like Intervideo WinDVD, is $39.99. For that amount, go ahead and waste a PCI slot for $10 more. I don't understand why Microsoft didn't just go ahead and include a software decoder built into the OS (Windows XP), and put those guys out of business.... they've already screwed Winzip, PKzip, WinAMP (although I still use it), Roxio (EZ-CD Creator), and others. Once you have the software decoder installed, Windows Media Player (I know, many of you hate it) justs references the drivers and uses them as if they were codecs.