Xbox Price Drops to $200

ProfBooty writes: "Just two days after rival Sony Corp. cut prices on the PlayStation 2, Microsoft has announced they are cutting Xbox pricing by 33% to $200. Nintendo still has no plans to cut pricing on the Gamecube. Now is definitely a good time to be a gamer with all 3 next-gen systems at $200. Too bad i just bought a Playstation 2 yesterday." I'd like to know if anyone has succeeded in porting a Free operating system to the Xbox.

Comments

Cost Question

[Carbonite]

What are the current production costs for the PS2, Xbox and Gamecube?

Which companies will be making money ate the reduced prices and which will be losing on each sale?

Re:Cost Question

[morhoj]

The most definately lose on the price of the actual system, but all of that money is re-couped in game licensing. Or, in the case of M$FT, the chance for monopolizing your TV too :)

Re:Cost Question

[scott1853]

I can't remember what site I read it on, but it sounds like Sony can now make a profit on their boxes due to better manufacturing processes.

Re:Cost Question

[sammy baby]

The X-Box is definitely losing money on each sale. I don't have any hard numbers, but I'd be very surprised if they were even breaking even under the original pricing scheme.

I read an article somewhere that said that Michael Dell, upon hearing Microsoft's offer to build X-Boxes for them, essentially laughed it off. "So, let me get this straight: you want me to build these boxes and sell them at a loss? And make up the difference in software - which I don't sell?" Does anyone else have a reference for this?

Re:Cost Question

[deft]

at the initial retail price of $299, Microsoft has been losing anywhere between $76 and $105 on every Xbox sold.

thus, they are now loosing from $176 to $205 bucks each box!

Re:Cost Question

[seann]

it was slashdot

and both chips are now on the same chip.

Re:Cost Question

[MrFredBloggs]

Best reason to get one yet! Add linux development/support, convert $200 to £'s properly (ie dont just switch the symbols) and maybe i`ll take it a bit more seriously!

Re:Cost Question

[nat5an]

It was in Wired when the XBOX was the cover story I believe. I believe his quote was "I don't want to be in the razor business if I can't get in on the blades." Or something.

The story is here http://www.wired.com/wired/archive/9.11/flex.html? pg=1. It also discusses how much Microsoft was initially losing on the boxes ($100 - $110 I believe).

Re:Cost Question

[Anonymous Coward]

Losing money? Maybe if you look at just the Xbox itself. But the console is not where the money is. They'll make it all back in the games.

Look at what companies did with cellphones. Sure, you get the phone for free, but you need to pay us $20/month to use it.

Re:Cost Question

[ryanr]

There's no reason to think that they would be losing the same amount of money of each box now. Production costs will drop as they improve the process, parts get cheaper, etc..

It's common for clone makers when doing a school contract for a couple of years to price the machines at a loss up front. The first several months that they sell them will be at a loss. However, they know that the prices will quickly catch up by then, and they'll be making a nice profit.

Re:Cost Question

[km790816]

That's assuming that productions costs are the same now as they were in September/October.

I doubt it. With both Intel and Nvidia moving well beyond the technology in the XBox (and I forgot to mention the hard drive manufacturer) I'm sure the cost of materials and the production cost have gone down.

Don't get me wrong. I'm sure they are still losing money.

Re:Cost Question

[Anonymous Coward]

Microsoft tells this sort of info to people who spell 'lose' with two o's?

Re:Cost Question

[Anonymous Coward]

Losing money? Maybe if you look at just the Xbox itself. But the console is not where the money is. They'll make it all back in the games.

I will say one thing though. I can't blame anyone for pirating these games at the prices they go for these days. $50? Somebody's on crack. I remember buying games as a kid for my Atari for $20 or less. No wonder I spent my teenage years pirating computer games... there's no fucking way I could afford them.

Re:Cost Question

[birder]

This may not be the case. What is the price of the xbox that stores pay vs the markup MSRP of $200 or $300. Does Wallmart pay $150 for an xbox and sell it for $300?

If MS drops the msrp price $100 why should they absorb the $100 and not a part of that only?

Re:Cost Question

[binaryDigit]

Keep in mind that while other component prices have decreased, memory has sharply increased in this time frame (and keep in mind that all the xbox's sold at launch were obviously produced before the launch, some even months before, so memory was even cheaper). So while I'm sure it's cheaper, it's probably not as cheap as you might think. Good thing for M$ that they didn't put an lcd in the thing, then they'd really be hosed.

Re:Cost Question

[dtfarmer]

The X-Box is definitely losing money on each sale

Microsoft loses money on each Xbox sold.... therefore, they really aren't losing much money now, are they? (at least not in Japan or Europe)

Re:Cost Question

[NeMon'ess]

Prices have been $50 since about 1990. The first 16megabit cartriges were expensive to make, or at least used as a justification for charging fifty bucks. Prices have stabilized, though. Sure DVDs are cheaper to make than carts, but development costs are much higher. A game that took eighteen months to make in 1990 would now take two years. I hope you bought a few computer games instead of pirating every single one just because you could. The music analogy is simple, support the artists you can afford to. Otherwise you're just a scummy pirate enjoying himself at the expense of others.

Re:Cost Question

[binaryDigit]

Keep in mind that M$ needs the retailers way more than they need M$. Retailers don't make a lot on the consoles themselves, and if M$ tries to eat into their already slim margins by foisting part of the price cut on to them, then they could balk and simply use the shelf space for PS2, which they know will sell. The absolute last thing that M$ needs now (since sales are under estimates and there is a perception that they are on their heels) is to have any of the major retailers drop the xbox. This would hugely undermine confidence in the platform, and in this market, perception is everything!

M$ will absorb the loss, because they must. They have more than enough in the warchest to fund the thing for as long as they want to. That's the "beauty" of M$, with such huge resources behind them, they have play in the sandbox until _they_ decide it's time to get out (anyone here old enough to remember the early days of cdrom and who championed the format for years until everyone else caught up?)

Re:Cost Question

[scowling]

When a manufacturer drops the MSRP, that entails a drop in the wholesale price.

In the software trade, resellers get a credit back from the manufacturer for what they have on hand -- or sometimes even what they've sold in the last month or so.

I don't see how it would be any different with console manufacturers. I guarantee that Electronics Boutique is sending inventory numbers to Sony and Microsoft and waiting for their sales reps to stop by to verify them.

Re:Cost Question

[56ker]

Will they be cutting the price in Europe and Japan even more too? After cutting the price already once a further cut may just end up making people think they're getting desperate though!

Re:Cost Question

[iocat]

Prices already dropped somewhat in Europe. In terms of their costs, you can spec out yourself what it would cost to make a machine using a 733PIII and a 40 gig hard drive with 64MB RAM. It's pretty cheap...

Re:Cost Question

[Hoser McMoose]

I don't know that Microsoft's costs would have changed all that much.

Both Intel and nVidia sold MS some fairly low-production-cost chips. In the case of nVidia, they don't even make these chips, so they've got to pay whatever TSMC or UMC charge, and given that these were relatively low cost chips to begin with, the cost that TSMC/UMC charges isn't going to decrease too much. Even if the price does decrease, nVidia may decide to keep the extra profits for themselves, and keep charging MS the same amount. MS is pretty much locked in to using nVidia chips for the lifetime of the X-Box, so nVidia isn't really forced to lower their prices.

As for Intel, they were producing a dirt-cheap chip (a low speed Celeron processors built on a .18um fab line). They could (and possibly already have) decreased costs easily by switching to a .13um fab line, but that's only going to be a marginal decrease in costs given that it was a pretty cheap chip to produce in the first place. Further cost cutting measures are going to help less and less. To top it off, while the original chip was a run-of-the-mill Celeron die, which Intel was making in HUGE quantities, soon this chip will be a low-volume specialty part as Intel moves all it's Celerons first to a .13um fab process (they may or may not be able to use a standard .13um Celeron die for the X-Box, I dunno), and now they're moving to a completely different architecture (Celeron's will become semi-castrated P4s).

Same thing pretty much goes for the hard drive and DVD drive. These producets were all fairly low-cost models ot begin with, and cost cutting just isn't going to trim too much off the bottom line. What's more, in all of these cases MS is outsourcing production of each part to different OEMs, each of whom are going to look for a piece of the pie. I'd even hazard a guess that many of these OEMs took the contract with virtually no margins in the hope that this would turn into a very large volume deal, which it hasn't.

The one area that they can probably really cut costs down is memory. The memory that they're using is DDR400 memory, which used to be a pretty rare specialty part only for graphics cards, but now is becoming a LOT more commonplace and would probably have decreased in price significantly.

So, long story short, production costs probably have decreased somewhat since the initial release, but I doubt that they've dropped very significantly. My guess is that the drop in production cost is quite a bit less then this new drop in retail price.

Re:Cost Question

[macinslak]

Ahhhhhh, Linux on XBox. That would most certainly be the kiss of death for that platform. It would make me quite happy to know that Bill is losing $100 every time me or one of my 10^6 closest Linux pals gets a new PC/DVD player/PVR. And that's not even counting the people that would use it as a PC after someone figures out how to make it boot regular Windows.

Re:Cost Question

[malfunct]

Yeah but those estimates are more than a year old. I am sure prices have changed by now on the components. MS probably has a $100 loss figured in to the price and decided that at $200 they are still only losing the original $100 so they can swing it without changing predictions. And sales should go up so thats a good thing.

Re:Cost Question

[clontzman]

Memory costs have increased somewhat, but the Xbox only has 64MB of RAM. 64MB RAM chips are still less than $10, so I doubt that's hurt them at all.

Bottom line is, in the quantities they're buying, costs of manufacture should be substantially less than eight months ago.

Re:Cost Question

[ivan256]

Loosing $150 per console requires the sale of somewhere between 15 and 20 games at full price to break even. It'll be a long time before a significant number of Xbox owners have that many games, and I'll bet most of them never will.

Re:Cost Question

[ShavenYak]

I remember buying games as a kid for my Atari for $20 or less.

I remember $25-30 being average. Now add the effects of 20 years of inflation. $50 is actually reasonable. Now figure it out as a percentage of your weekly income. In the early 80's my weekly income was about $10. It's substantially more now.

Re:Cost Question

[DoctorHim]

The last estimate that I saw (Xengamers) was that they estimated the CURRENT production cost of the Xbox was $235. That number seemed awful low to me 2 weeks ago. Now it has much more credence in my eyes. Also, all companies inflate their "COGS" in manufacturing these consoles. It's one of the oldest accounting tricks in the book to reduce your tax liability.

Re:Cost Question

[Anonymous Coward]

I'd rather not buy an Xbox and have Micro$haft lose about $400 for each box collecting dust.

Re:Cost Question

[Dr. Spork]

This sounds wrong. The first result of the price drop will be a buying spree for people who have lurked on the sidelines, undecided about which game system to buy. I'm quite certain that Xbox sales will be more than 33% faster after this price cut, so the retailers gain from this.

The fact Sony dropped PS2 prices simultaneously is the only thing that stole the fire from this announcement. Still, if Microsoft stayed at $300, Xboxes would certainly be put on the back shelf and considered a has-been that no sane person would buy on impulse, given the huge exhibit in the front of the store featuring $199 PS2s.

Re:Cost Question

[binaryDigit]

The first result of the price drop will be a buying spree for people who have lurked on the sidelines, undecided about which game system to buy

Right, but how is their choice any easier now than before? You still have to decide between the $199 xbox or $199 ps2. I could see though that since you're paying $100 less, your less concerned about making the "wrong" decision since the penalty has dropped by $200 (purchase xbox, hate xbox, purchase ps2, not counting money from selling xbox of course). I don't think I agree with the sales increasing by that margin though, a spike yes, 33%, I don't know. But I definitely agree that M$ would be hosed had they left the price alone and ps2 went to $199.

Which brings up an interesting point about Sony, why didn't they drop prices earlier? Had they done the price drop say a month before xmas, could tbey have slaughtered xbox, lost more money short term, but gained in the long term. Or, are they thinking that M$ has deep enough pockets that they would have simply just lost money while M$ would not have backed down anyway?

This is really turning into a very interesting horse race, even more so than previous console wars since the players are HUGE (not just gaming companies) and have tons of resources and even more corp. pride.

Re:Cost Question

[ijablokov]

Not so, they renegotiated parts costs from many of their suppliers (including Nvidia), and are currently looking at moving more production offshore to Asia-Pacific. So the loss per unit will essentially stay the same within 3-6 months by these measures.

Re:Cost Question

[GodInHell]

Got it backwards kiddo, Xbox is playing catch-up to PS2 on the price drop.

This is the ancient game of 'one year post release, drop the price by one hundred' next year the PS2 will go to 100, and microsoft will still be on the side lines not quite getting it.

Of course it dosen't help that all the native talent quit MS shortly after Xbox made it out the door.

The MS issue here is that they have presumed too much in their decision to take on Sony, whose cash reserves make MSes look like a child's savings account. There is a reason that a hard drive was not delivered in the PS2.. because people are willing to pay for it seperately. And I will, happilly even, do so when they release the ethernet/HD combo. Why? Because I've watched MS do this before, sneak into an area and pander their two bit crap as free gold for a few years until they've scared off the competition, and then they use that new control as a lever. You don't get a free ride anywhere. If you're getting something for free, check for the Brilliant 3d Projector. Linux is free right? Nope, you're doing pro-bono QA and system compatability testing.

Given a choice, I'll go for the volunteer work over the extortion.

Want to use our network? Gotta use out browser. Oh.. and our browser isn't available on all those operating systems we don't like. Want this service, you gotta commit baby. Yeah, don't worry.. I love ya, just turn around and grab your heels.

Bah.. Give me Freedom, or you can shove your data stream.

-GiH

Re:Cost Question

[symbolic]

What's the difference between what M$$$ is doing and a non-US company that dumps their products at below cost? The legislators scream when non-US companies do this, but seem to offer nothing more than a wink and a handshake when a company like M$ does it. Granted, Sony and Nintendo are both non-US companies, but they provide competition, and with respect to M$$$, short of any real punitive action for its monopolistic practices, competition is the next best thing.

In the short run, consumers are getting a good deal when MS sells the Xbox for less than it costs to produce. In the long run, however, if it leads to the demise of competitive alternatives, everyone loses (except M$$$ of course).

Re:Cost Question

[Anonymous Coward]

Gosh darn, thanks for your very informative and on-topic answer! Whatever would we do without your speculation!

The question was, who makes money and who does not. MS most definitely loses money, as they were losing money even under the priginal price. Sony likely makes money, the hardware has been out for a while, costs are recouped, manufacturing less expensive, plus they get all the groovy licensing revenue.

Next time, at least PRETEND to be factual, as opposed to panning a non sequitor.

Re:Cost Question

[Acous]

the graphics chip is the most expensive. its somewhere between a geforce 3ti and a geforce 4ti, make sure you add that into your calculations.

Re:Cost Question

[cancrman]

Sony didn't need to drop prices earlier. They were selling pretty much every PS2 they could get out into the retail system around xmas. Remember that there was a shortage of xboxes then too. Quite frequently shoppers who wanted a video game system for the holiday had a choice between a PS2 and a PS2 because of the relative scarcity of xbox and gamecube units.

Re:Cost Question

[Cheeko]

Virtually every console manufacturer sells systems at a loss for the first year or two. Its just the way the market works. They get the systems out, then make money on licensing and games. Eventually once costs come down the consoles begin to turn a profit themselves. This is similar to the cell phone market where companies eat the cost of the phone and give it away for free (or cheap) and make money on the service.

Re:Cost Question

[caspper69]

Actually, the memory they are using is DDR200 (PC1600) which (at least in the beginning) was supplied by Micron. DDR400 wasn't even a glimmer in the memory manufacturers' eyes when the XBox was designed.

Now if you're speaking about the memory on the graphics chip, well, there is none. The XBox uses a UMA (unified memory architecture). However the nVidia chip itself runs at 350MHz (I believe).

Don't know why I bothered to reply. I bought a Gamecube.

Re:Cost Question

[Isle]

It's a chip. Even the expensive ones doesnt even cost 10$ to produce.
The expensive part is development.

Personally I think Microsoft is earning a little a every box, but not enough to cover the development efford. Only the gamesale might do that.

Re:Cost Question

[killmenow]

I know it's off-topic, but...

Linux is free right? Nope, you're doing pro-bono QA and system compatability testing.

And just what are Windows users doing? Paid QA? Either way, you're doing QA because commercial software houses are regularly releasing beta software to production. I've had less trouble with 0.x versions of Linux software than 3.x and up versions of commercial equivalents.

With Windows, you're paying to be a tester.

Re:Cost Question

[caspper69]

The MS issue here is that they have presumed too much in their decision to take on Sony, whose cash reserves make MSes look like a child's savings account.

If only that were true. MS has more cash than NEARLY EVERY company in the world, hands down. Sony may have more revenues, but it costs money to produce TVs, DVD players, Computers, etc. M$ doesn't pay a whole lot to produce CD-ROM's and the miniature manuals they include with their stuff. With the exception of the XBox and input devices, M$ doesn't "produce" much of anything (and even a large portion of these devices are outsourced).

Here is an interesting article about M$'es cash: Interesting CNN Article. To quote the article: "At the end of last year, according to the company's most recent filings, its cash (and short-term investments that can be converted to cash in less than a year) totaled a whopping $38.2 billion. The Microsoft juggernaut continues to generate another $1 billion a month, putting the total cash today well above $40 billion.

This is a mind-bogglingly large pile of dough. No other nonfinancial firm has more liquid money at its disposal, and only a handful of banks do. It's more cash than Ford, ExxonMobil and Wal-Mart have combined, and nearly four times as much as Intel, the tech company with the next largest cash balance. It is enough to buy the entire airline industry -- twice. Or all the gold in Fort Knox, four times over. It is enough to buy 23 space shuttles or every major professional baseball, basketball, football and hockey team in America. It is an enviable stash. Who wouldn't love to have a bank account like that?"

What do you think about that??

Re:Cost Question

[denshi]

You probably read it here:

http://slashdot.org/article.pl?sid=02/04/06/133725 0&mode=thread&tid=127

And to develop your argument, I point out that 'better manufacturing processes' here means "fit everything onto a single chip". The importance of that cannot be understated -- moving from a multi-chip board to a single-chip design means you no longer have to design, build, and test all the wire traces between chips, which is the large repeatable cost per unit (chips are essentially free once designed). And the single-chip integration means the yield comes way up, as you have only one point of fab failure, as opposed to n chips and a connecting board....and yield is *everything* in electronics.

A basic history of electronics demonstrates, repeatedly, how process changes like the above makes and breaks market share. For example, C&T, after IBM released the PC, figured out how to condense the 13 chips that ran the motherboard into 1 (the 'chipset'). As a result, C&T could build IBM PC boards cheaper than even IBM, and lo and behold, the PC clone market was born.

The only funny thing here is that Sony didn't drop the price sooner. They can probably make PS2s for $40 now; the DVD Consortium licensing might be one of the largest costs in the machine.

Re:Cost Question

[jerky]

The MS issue here is that they have presumed too much in their decision to take on Sony, whose cash reserves make MSes look like a child's savings account.

I just looked up the profiles of SNE (Sony) and MSFT (Microsoft) on the Yahoo finance site. Sony reports $6.6B in cash, Microsoft reports $38B in cash. In other words, Microsoft has almost 6 times as much cash as Sony -- $31 billion (billion!) more.

Re:Cost Question

[martyn s]

Don't be so sure they were losing money under the original price. People think this is a really fun and interesting fact to know, but I haven't seen it confirmed and it just seems like a big myth to me. I can't imagine the Xbox costing more than 300 dollars to make.

Re:Cost Question

[martyn s]

I suppose you think it's logical that lose is spelled with just one 'o'.

Re:Cost Question

[martyn s]

Actually, even though the Xbox price drop was 'officially' announced after the PS2, the news first broke about the Xbox, and sony was just fast enough to make it official before Microsoft did.

Re:Cost Question

[jasonbw]

I believe when the SNES was introduced, Nintendo actually promised all it's games would cost $30. If im not mistaken, they kept to that for at least the first 2 years (zelda and i believe metroid both where $30, though third party games ignored that, i think i spent $45 on SFII)

Re:Cost Question

[Anonymous Coward]

It's not just the games sold, you also have to take into account all the licensing fees Microsoft collects from game makers + the sales of development platforms and such.

It's not as simple as selling the box and then selling the game to make up the loss

Re:Cost Question

[adamjaskie]

Lets see...
$40,000,000 / $100 = 400,000,000

We only need to buy 400,000,000 XBoxs to cut that stockpile down a bit!

FEAR US BILL GATES!

Re:Cost Question

[Anonymous Coward]

Don't forget Moores law or Romer's increasing returns to scale. As time goes on and the more they sell the cheaper they are to make.

Re:Cost Question

[karnal]

You also have to look at assets (although, generally the more liquid a company is, the better...) as well, if you are speaking of the wealth of a company (or a person, for that matter.)

Now, I'm not trying to be smart-alecky, since I don't know their holdings either. But the assets for each company are probably vastly different.

Re:Cost Question

[Manitcor]

Just for a frame of reference (All prices quoted from Price watch):

Intel Pentium III CPU at 733mhz $82

Nvida nForce 420-D (Could not locate price chip only comes on integrated motherboards cheapest integrated motherboard is A-bit NV7M) $87

64 meg DDR Ram (No 32 or 64meg chips available price for a single DDR PC1600) $18

Seagate U 20gb Hard disk (20gb Platter only one side is used resulting in 10gb) $64

Standard 10x DVD-ROM (X-Box uses Thompson drive specially made and has a max speed of only 8x) $45

USB Based Game Controller (Microsoft Sidewinder) $12

Total $308

This isn't exact and I had to substitute hardware and of course these prices are not volume prices. But consider that this list does not include the casing, and cables and the AMD Hyper bus on the motherboard. I don't think there is anyway even with volume discount MS is making any money off these boxes. The way prices are dropping however they should be making money on them in about 12-24 months. Maybe less.

Re:Cost Question

[Mark Pitman]

An article from Wired:

But despite these huge investments, and the enormous volume, console manufacturers and retailers stand to make little or no money from the systems. Published reports say Microsoft will lose $100 on every Xbox it sells. Instead, profits are reaped from the 12 games that are typically bought for every console.

And that was at the original $299 price.

Re:Cost Question

[Warped-Reality]

um, are you on crack?
$40,000,000 / $100 != 400,000,00
40,000,000 / $100 == 400,000

Re:Cost Question

[nelsonal]

Don't forget production costs, which are likely about $30 per unit. Also the retail markup which is probably between $25 and $50, means that microsoft only collects about $150 to $175 per unit before unit costs. This ignores advertising and development costs, which are probably pretty high per box since they were origianlly expecting to sell about a million more units.

Re:Cost Question

[adamjaskie]

Heh oops. That was meant to be $40,000,000,000, the amount M$ has in reserve. I calculated right, typed wrong.

Re:Cost Question

[Anonymous Coward]

You're both wrong because you should be using $40,000,000,000 (that's billion) and not $40,000,000 (that's million).

Re:Cost Question

[martyn s]

Did you know that those original figures included the fact that the Xbox division was paying the OS division of Microsoft almost 100 dollars for use of the Windows kernel? Don't believe everything you read.

Re:Cost Question

[Phil Wilkins]

Whatever gave you the impression that english is logical?

Re:Cost Question

[Anonymous Coward]

Doesn't matter. It is the Gillette razor marketing model. They send you a free razor, and you have to pay $2 per blade forever. Same with inkjets...I would bet you could call HP and talk them into sending you a free printer, because they know you will be buying two $35 ink cartridges every few months for years to come. All MS and Sony want is market share, and that adds up to more software sold = royalties.

Re:Cost Question

[EverDense]

In the early 80's my weekly income was about $10.

Holy cow! you were getting $10 pocket money a week?
I knew my parents were ripping me off.
Just wait you two, just wait and see the kind of
old peoples home I dump you in.

Re:Cost Question

[Snoopy77]

I believe that the PS2 out sold the XBox 4 to 1 last month and uncomfirmed reports that even the PS1 out sold it.

Re:Cost Question

[Anonymous Coward]

Wasn't it Apple that championed the CD-ROM even more?

Re:Cost Question

[byran lei]

>This sounds wrong. The first result of the price drop will be a buying
>spree for people who have lurked on the sidelines, undecided about
>which game system to buy. I'm quite certain that Xbox sales will be
>more than 33% faster after this price cut, so the retailers gain from
>this.
>
>
You talk like this is going to cause some sales spike of Xboxes. You couldn't be more wrong. If the PS2 was beating the crap out Xbox in terms of sales at $299.99, what do you think the PS2 is doing to do the XBox at $199.99? The XBox will soon be joining the Commodore CD32 as being one of the crappiest ideas ever concieved.

Re:Cost Question

[Anonymous Coward]

HA HA HA that is so true

Re:Cost Question

[mentin]

I wonder where you have read this BS.

Re:Cost Question

[martyn s]

Well, in fact my question was predicated on the assumption that English is *not* logical. His comment implied that people who spell lose with two o's are inherently stupid. I was merely pointing out that knowing how to spell lose is no indication of raw intelligence.

Re:Cost Question

[Anonymous Coward]

Those $30 Atari games were likely programmed by one guy in a month or two. The "artwork" was by the same guy.

Re:Cost Question

[Anonymous Coward]

The PC Clone market grew long before there were 'chipsets' that condensed the IBM motherboard designs. I used to have a whole heap of clone XT motherboards, and they all used the same stock off-the-shelf LSI chips (those 80xx series Intel chips) as the IBM motherboard. In fact, they generally used exactly the same chips, down to the TTL gates, and where they were placed. I had one schematic and could use it to troubleshoot a whole handful of the motherboards out there.

(but don't let me scare you with talk of component level troubleshooting, 'geeks.' Go back to copying MP3 files....)

Re:Cost Question

[Anonymous Coward]

Apple has always been first at everything.

Just remember that and you'll know the entire history of the Personal computer.

you stupid zealot.

Re:Cost Question

[DarkZero]

If MS drops the msrp price $100 why should they absorb the $100 and not a part of that only?

The Dreamcast tried that and received a big, loud "Fuck you" from retailers. Expecting retailers to absorb a financial hit in addition to the one created by the X-Box's poor sales is an insult, as well as a perceived sign that the X-Box is on the same death row that the Dreamcast was on when it did the same thing. The entire idea does nothing but lessen sales to retailers and undermine the confidence that the consumers and the press have in the system.

Re:Cost Question

[Anonymous Coward]

Would you apply this same analogy to a 2mb video card???? why then should you for a video game.

Re:Cost Question

[Anonymous Coward]

Well, actually I think that people who claim to know Microsoft's production costs to the nearest dollar are inherently stupid. People who confuse 'lose' and 'loose' are just annoying.

Re:Cost Question

[Glonk]

To top it off, while the original chip was a run-of-the-mill Celeron die

Why is this such a popular misconception? Having 128KB L2 cache doesn't make it a Celeron.

It is a Pentium III, with 128KB L2 cache. There IS a difference. Pentium IIIs have 8-way associative L2 caches, Celerons have 4-way, which has a performance delta of about 5-10% between them.

It's not a run of the mill Celeron, it's still custom, which throws off a huge chunk of your post.

And they don't use DDR4000 memory, it's simple DDR200 (PC1600).

And I'm very sure the yields have improved dramatically on the XGPU chip in particular. When it was first made the fastest desktop GPU on the 0.15u TSMC process was 200MHz, and it's now 300MHz. Nvidia tweaks the cores around so performance doesn't change but yields should improve, and TSMC constantly improves their 0.15 process as well.

The HDs and DVDs will also drop in price.

You seem to think that because most of the components were "low cost to begin with" it wouldn't make much difference. All of those price drops add up pretty quick.

Recent estimates I've seen placed production costs on the Xbox today at $225-$300 per box, which means they were breaking even or making a profit for a bit on the hardware...

Re:Cost Question

[dunstan]

Depends entirely on how recoup of the development costs is loaded into the pricing model. The actual physical cost to build is probably under $100 (but I'm prepared to be corrected). So improving volume really does drive down the unit "cost".

Essentially the declared cost to build each unit can be massaged to be whatever you want it to be.

Dunstan

Re:Cost Question

[Anonymous Coward]

Wow, I guess that means that Apple posted the first Naked and Petrified Natalie Portman post.

They're even cooler in my book now!

Re:Cost Question

[GodInHell]

It's been awhile since I looked this up, but back around March 19th when MS had the PS2 tossed out of cebit, I looked up their revenues and head counts;

To quote:
Microssoft: Employees: (last reported count): 47,600 For the six months ended 12/01, revenues rose 13% to $13.87 billion. Sony:
Employees: (last reported count): 181,800

For the nine months ended 12/31/01, revenues rose 6% to Y5.712T (Yes, 5.712 trillion yen, or about $44.2 billion US)

So yes, let's see the 'Unending Resource' of Microsoft bring this 'little' company down to size.

So.. their revenue is equal to microsofts 'massive' stored cash.

oh, and if you're keeping track, Sony makes 3 times Microsoft's yearly revenue.

-GiH

Re:Cost Question

[Dr. Spork]

My point still stands. They will sell twice as $200 Xboxes than $300 ones. That means more revenue for the store.

Re:Cost Question

[ShavenYak]

The difference is, that a video game is not just hardware, it's software or intellectual property also. Perhaps a better analogy would be to compare the price of video games to the price of movies or CD's, which have increased faster than inflation since the early '80s.

Also, another poster mentioned that the old Atari carts were programmed by only one guy, so they should have been cheaper. This is true, but we also have to keep in mind that the game programming world of 1980 was a lot different than now. That one guy had a hell of a lot of work to do, and it wasn't point-and-click.

I just figure the greater cost of the artwork and music on today's games balances out the much lower cost of production, and I think games are still relatively speaking as good a deal now as back then. Of course, now that I'm working for my money, I'm a lot less likely to spend it on a game, so while it's the same deal, my perception of the value has changed a bit.

Re:Cost Question

[Hoser McMoose]

Why is this such a popular misconception? Having 128KB L2 cache doesn't make it a Celeron.

The misconception comes from the fact that it's the same damn die! In fact, the Celeron and the PIII were the same die as well, the Celeron just had 128KB of it's cache disabled. The processor used in the XBox was also from the same die, and also had 128KB of it's cache disabled, however they disabled the cache in such a way so that it was still 8-way set associative.

Ohh, and 8-way vs. 4-way set associative typically makes about 1% difference in performance. The associativity of a cache is a matter of diminishing returns, and going much beyond 2 or 4 way doesn't give you much. Just how often do you expect that you'll need more then 4 chunks of 32-bytes at exact 256KB intervals but not the chunks of memory right beside them? It's pretty rare. I know that Anand made a little claim of a 10% performance increase, but he probably couldn't even explain what set associtivity is, let alone make an argument as to why it would make a 10% performance difference.

You're probably correct about TSMC's yeilds improving, but do you think that nVidia paid TSMC for the bad dies in the first place? Nope. TSMC eats the loss when they've got poor yeilds, and reaps the profits when they have good yeilds. At best they're only going to pass on a small percentage of the saving to nVidia, who in turn are probably only going to pass on a small percentage of their savings to Microsoft.

Next correction? Oh yeah, the memory. The X-Box uses Samsung K4D263238M-QC50 chips, although it could probably use some other identical chips from other manufacturers. You can find info about this chip from Samsung's website. Here's the link. As you can see, it's DDR memory rated for 200MHz, for 400MHz effective performance. I suppose it's not really "DDR400", and it's certainly not "PC4200" memory, however it IS 200/400MHz DDR.

article wrong...

[deft]

actually, nintendo does plan to cut its prices in response to this. all 3 manufacturers are at 199 (not 200.

nintendo feels pressure to drop their price so that they can retain hold of the childrens gaming market, which they revere so much.

Re:article wrong...

[bucky0]

Can you provide a source for that? because there was a press release reacently that said they WOULDNT be dropping prices. Also, they aren't stuck on the child's gaming market, that's a misconception. How are resident evil and Medal of honor child's games?

Re:article wrong...

[Anonymous Coward]

Sony also put out a press release not too long ago saying they wouldn't cut prices at or during E3, and then did it anyway 2 days ago. In any case, Nintendo would be better off sticking to the kids market because it's what people expect of them. Porting Medal of Honor and getting RE doesn't exactly change their market, except for those few people that will actually buy a console just for RE.

Re:article wrong...

[Anonymous Coward]

I love how whenever someone correctly states that the GC is mostly a child's console, there is always that one person who brings up RE and MOH. First of all, RE is really old, and I don't see why anyone in their right mind would want to replay it again. Secondly, that is a whole of two games, how about the rest of the GC titles? It's all kiddie stuff.

On the GC, its difficult to think of adult game titles whereas on the PS2, its difficult to think of child game titles.

Re:article wrong...

[Anonymous Coward]

Judging from RE sales in the US, it's not just a "few people". There are others coming, though; Eternal Darkness, Metroid, and several more. The "kiddie console" thing...I just don't really know where it comes from. It wasn't really true with the N64, and certainly wasn't descriptive of the SNES.

As far as the plans for a price cut, it's right here: http://www.cnn.com/2002/TECH/ptech/05/14/sony.play station.reut/index.html

"In early April, a senior Nintendo executive told Reuters the company would reconsider its GameCube pricing if Sony announced a price cut, especially to the $199 level. "

Re:article wrong...

[Anonymous Coward]

What's wrong with childres games?

Re:article wrong...

[Anonymous Coward]

Nothing, I was just stating that most GC titles are targeted more toward children. That doesn't mean I can't have fun playing SSB Melee sometimes.

Some Console Thoughts

[perl_god]

Im soooooooo sick of people saying that GC is kiddy and crap. That is a very lame way to defend PS2 or XBOX. Anyway, I was at school in the computer room and my friend started bragging about how he thinks that PS2 is better than Gamecube because it has better games and GC is babyish (some people are so arrogant). So, i said he was full of sh!t and that Gamecube obviously has better games than PS2. It turned into a verbal war with nothing being achieved. Then i decided to visit Slashdot. I saw the news headline 400,000 Gamecubes sold in Europe so i clicked on it. When i saw the words "23 years is the average age of a GameCube owner" i grinned. I asked my arogant friend what he thought the average age for GC owners was, he said "um, 5". So i showed him the news article and as he was reading it, his face went bright red like a tomato. I asked him if he still thought GC was a kiddy system with baby games and he just said "SHUTUP!!!". Straight after school we went to EB and he traded in his PS2 for a GC and Wave Race. He said it was the best Game he had ever played and regrets ever buying a ps2. I told him about all the awesome games that are on the way and he nearly cried. He told all his friends about it and they all came over and played Wave Race. All 8 of them said that they were going to buy one tommorow. If it wasnt for PGC then 9 people would have missed out on what is clearly the BEST CONSOLE EVER!!! now all i need is Star Fox Adventures and i'll be in heaven!!!

Re:Some Console Thoughts

[NorthDude]

Im soooooooo sick of people saying that GC is kiddy and crap.

And I'm so sick of people's post wich are so kiddy and crap...
Sorry, but your comment was sounding like YOU are 5 years old.
"My console is better then yours. No it's mine, NO IT'S MINE! bouhouuhouuu... SHUTUP! bouhouuhouuu"


Yes, I meant to flame. But if you want to be taken seriously, post objectives comments and try to talk intelligently. People don't give a dawm about what flame war you had with your friend at school. By the way, you said he was arrogant, but so you were. Sorry for being rude, I had to say it.

Re:Some Console Thoughts

[raddan]

This is, by far, the funniest thing that has ever been posted to /. A maximis ad minima.

Re:Some Console Thoughts

[TuxLuvr]

This is pretty damn funny; too bad it's stolen from planet gamecube!

Earth to perl god: some of us read game sites, too.

Re:Some Console Thoughts

[Anonymous Coward]

Was that joke a little too subtle for you?

lol...

Re:Some Console Thoughts

[Anonymous Coward]

if you want to be taken seriously, post objectives comments and try to talk intelligently. People don't give a dawm about what flame war you had with your friend at school. By the way, you said he was arrogant, but so you were. Sorry for being rude, I had to say it.

Hey NorthDude, leave the kid alone! This was a very funny post that made many of us smile. Just because you have the word Dude in your nick do you see me accusing you of being a tool? No, you're a tool because you can't spell and because you're too busy talking shit to realize the (accidental?) hilarity of the post.

Re:Some Console Thoughts

[Anonymous Coward]

If you want to be taken seriously, learn to fucking spell.

Re:Would all the "experts"

[Anonymous Coward]

What do you mean?

This drop indicates that MS is getting killed by Sony. Good riddance to that POS!

Wonder who shot first?

[Matey-O]

Did Sony drop prices due to the Xbox rumor (which has been out for a few weeks now) or vica versa?

(Oh yeah, and let the bitching about crummy games, ugly console, and hamfisted controllers commence!)

Re:Wonder who shot first?

[Libertaine]

well from this http://story.news.yahoo.com/news?tmpl=story&ncid=7 0&e=2&cid=70&u=/cn/20020515/tc_cn/microsoft_trims_ xbox_price

"John O'Rourke, director of games marketing for Microsoft, said the price cut had been in the planning stages for several weeks and denied it was a reaction to Sony's move, although he acknowledged Microsoft originally planned to announce the cut next Monday, before the Electronic Entertainment Expo trade show begins in Los Angeles. "

Re:Wonder who shot first?

[CynicTheHedgehog]

According to Penny Arcade, Sony accelerated their price drop plans leaving Microsoft with no choice but to follow suit. This is a real kick to the groin for Microsoft, whose consoles haven't been doing as well as they thought and cost more to produce. Sony's probably recouped their initial losses, but I doubt Microsoft has.

Yay Sony, I guess.

Re:Wonder who shot first?

[dev_sda]

Sony officially announced their price cut first. Both companies were waiting for E3 to officially announce the price cuts, but Sony couldn't help themselves.

Re:Wonder who shot first?

[shadow303]

Your mention of a groin kick made me picture Bill Gates getting nailed in the jewels. Thank you. Happy thoughts like that really brighten my day.

Re:Wonder who shot first?

[Kitu-mijasi]

Sony isnt scared of the XBox, they have reached the 30 million mark, so they thought now its a good time to cut the price.

Re:Wonder who shot first?

[Anonymous Coward]

And your actually saying "Bill Gates getting nailed in the jewels" made me visualize it too. Oh happy day.

Re:Wonder who shot first?

[dev_sda]

Exactly. Sony just decided it was time to mess with Microsoft.

Can't really blame them either as now Microsoft is losing something in the neighborhood of $300 on each Xbox sold, rather than $200, and with the flagging interest from developpers in making games for that console, the Xbox is starting to lose any hope it had of taking a major market share away from Sony.

Re:Wonder who shot first?

[Anonymous Coward]

Can't really blame them either as now Microsoft is losing something in the neighborhood of $300 on each Xbox sold, rather than $200, and with the flagging interest from developpers in making games for that console, the Xbox is starting to lose any hope it had of taking a major market share away from Sony.


lol, where to start. First, $200 is the most insane estimate I've ever seen for the amount of money MS might be losing on each XBox console at $300. The most detailed estimate I've ever seen figured it at $23 (cost of $323 for components and manufacturing), which, even if they hadn't cut costs, puts it at $123 after the price cut (notice still less than your estimate before the price cut).

As for flagging developer interest, I guess that explains why every week more developers announce that previous PS2 exclusives will now be available on X-Box as well, and why X-Box exclusives are still being announced periodically. Not to mention the games that will be PC/X-Box or PC/X-Box/PS2, some with the first release being on the X-Box with PC/PS2 releases trailing as much as 6 months.

Re:Wonder who shot first?

[big_cat79]

The PlayStation 2 consoles had already received price cuts in Japan (a coupla-three months ago I think). It was only a matter of time before they cut them in the US. With the big gaming convention next week, this seems like a logical time for them to announce it.

Re:Wonder who shot first?

[Anonymous Coward]

I'm sorry, but I think of Bill as a fellow man first and an evil monopolist second, and picturing him being kicked in the jimmy just causes me pain.

Posted anonymously - I know it'll get modded down.

Re:Wonder who shot first?

[Anonymous Coward]

Not me. It reminded me rather of the "Kick to the groin" series of strips on seanbaby.com. Perhaps someone could coerce him into modifying one of those strips to have Billy G's head grafted onto the groin-kickee's body?

Free OSes on the X Box

[QuantumFTL]

Isn't there some kind software authentication on the X Box that keeps just any x86 program from being executed on it (i.e. it only allows registered games to play)?

Might this not be a problem with porting?

Just a thought.

Re:Free OSes on the X Box

[scott1853]

If they do have authentication, I don't think it could be easily built into silicon, or at least wouldn't be worthwhile or architecturally correct to do so. If it's in there, then it's just in the stripped down OS that's running the box, which could be easily modified or simply erased.

Re:Free OSes on the X Box

[randomErr]

XBOX uses a modified Win2000 kernal. The executables are encrypted. The BIOS is specfically work only with the XBOX kernal.

There are a couple of projects out there to resocket new BIOS chip but nothing finalized.

Most of the RD is focusing on how to make the executable with the XBOX os. The reason why is because the XBOX OS is stablest of the Windows line and is already optimized for the hardware.

Still, it would be fun to see how an XBOX Linux compares to the current Sony Linux.

Re:Free OSes on the X Box

[Havokmon]

Isn't there some kind software authentication on the X Box that keeps just any x86 program from being executed on it (i.e. it only allows registered games to play)?

Good question.. Has anyone tried burning a CD/DVD with something like Opera on it, and throwing an autorun in the root dir?

Re:Free OSes on the X Box

[Anonymous Coward]

kernel, not kernal.

Re:Free OSes on the X Box

[Anonymous Coward]

but do you masterbate regularly?

Re:Free OSes on the X Box

[Anonymous Coward]

there IS Authantication (or i should say MS Signing, similar to what drivers for [insert your favorite windows platform here]).

the new thing on the market though is the fact that some HW developers have started work on the (in)famous MODCHIP for the XBox. There are 2 confirmed chips, and those will be available soon... for more info check www.lik-sang.com, they have some info about those. I beleive that once those are working/installed, there shouldn't be too much problem in developing something like loadlin-XBox to launch a little vmlinuz with a nice little initrd and such..

Just my $0.02

Piss it away!

[Leme]

And *now* they're losing even *more* money per box. This will of course broaden the userbase of the XBox but it still won't even come close to what the Playstation platform is doing. I'm curious on how long Microsoft will gut this one out.

Re:Piss it away!

[Ubergrendle]

My guess is till version 3 of X-Box. I suspect Microsoft was anticipating taking a bath on the first release, positioning it as their enterance into the "home entertainment hub". If their stragey is not working by the 3rd release (where they've streamlined engineering/manufacturing/advertising) then they may exit. They pursued a similar strategy with their peripherals market (success) and broadband/satellites (failure).

Now is definatly a good time ...

[dbretton]

Now is definatly a good time to be a ...

Spellchecker?

Re:Would all the "experts"

[Anonymous Coward]

Was going to get killed? Look at the numbers, the PS2 is a year and a half old and still outsold the X-Box 2 to 1 at both Christmas and since then. Screw 2/3 of the cost, I don't think anyone's still going to buy it, maybe they should try 1/3. No one's going to trust a device made my Microsoft, and consumers have spoken with their wallets.

What?

[funkman]

I'd like to know if anyone has succeeded in porting a Free operating system to the Xbox

Not to troll - but, What the hell purpose would that serve? Give Micr$oft more money?

Re:What?

[Anonymous Coward]

Where's your revolution, man?
Where's your need to understand?

(-5, Slashbot) for the idiotic use of $ and mispelling Microsoft too.

Re:What?

[jerrytcow]

Not to troll - but, What the hell purpose would that serve? Give Micr$oft more money?

Because for $200 it would be a nice machine. 733 MHz P3, 300 MHz geforce (geforce3 I think), 100 baseT, DDR RAM, 8 gig HD, DVD drive.

Re:What?

[Marx_Mrvelous]

I don't know if you realize this, but MS loses at least $200 per unit that they sell. So, porting say, Linux to it and use it as a desktop, you just cost MS $200. Bad troll!

Re:What?

[inburito]

Microsoft is losing money on each XBox made hoping to recoup it in game licensing. By buying one of these and using with linux exclusively you effectively take away money from microsoft. Then again they have some 40 billion in bank..

Re:What?

[strags]

On the contrary. Articles have been written regarding the viability of the XBox as a server. Since they're so cheap, you could (perhaps) install BSD/Linux and use them as a web farm.

Since MS is making a loss on each box sold (they expect to make up the difference in sales of games), this, if anything, would be a damaging blow to MS.

Re:What?

[Anonymous Coward]

MS is losing money for each console unit sold.
Actually, with this new price cut, they're losing BIG MONEY with each unit sold. Like, a few hundred dollars per unit. There's no way they can consider recouping their costs on game licenses any more.

Re:What?

[CrazyDuke]

If I remember my info correctly, it has been estimated that MS was losing $50 for every X-Box they sold. With the price drop, that would now be $150. There is also a sort of sadistic thrill in buying MS's hardware, having MS lose money because of it, and putting the OS that MS seems to hate so much on it.

Oh, and a 733mhz fully functional PC for $200 would be nice...

Re:What?

[wik]

How much heat do the XBoxes generate? Are they going to become unstable if you put too many in a warm room? I have never seen an XBox, but I remember hearing about a lot of heat-related problems with the PS2 when it first came out.

Re:What?

[scott1853]

Actually, since they lose money on every box sold, as long as you don't buy games, you can get a decent little PC for $200 and take money away from MS.

Re:What?

[selderrr]

this has been elaborated on quite often :if you want to hurt them, DONT buy the box for two reasons :

- promotion. If they can claim to have sold so many million boxes, they win on your purchase due to market share increse, even at a loss.
- an XBox on the shelve hurts MS more than one in your living room : imagine PS2 sold out, and tons of XBoxes still on the shelves. Now that's bad publicity !

Re:What?

[SpamJunkie]

I don't know if you realize this, but MS loses at least $200 per unit that they sell. So, porting say, Linux to it and use it as a desktop, you just cost MS $200.

This has been said before, but it needs repeating. While it may cost Microsoft $200 when you buy an Xbox it costs them $400 when you don't.

Re:What?

[Anonymous Coward]

And not a bad desktop machine it would make.

What are the specs? 733 Mhz P3, 64 meg RAM, 8 gig HD, nVidia graphics (what chipset?) with TV-out (can you run it on a monitor?), all for $200.

Re:What?

[Anonymous Coward]

I wonder if anybody has ever done both "Micro$oft" and the cool^H^H^H^Hdumb ^H trick in the same post.

If that ever happened...err...

Re:What?

[Matey-O]

Blockquoth:

PS2 sold out, and tons of XBoxes still on the shelves. Now that's bad publicity !

Wha? Like last christmas when the Cub and the Xbox were sold out and the _Parker_ (podunk) Colorado Target had no less than _60_ PS2's lined up on the top shelf? If one little store had that many PS2s laying about, how many unpurchased PS2 are OUT THERE?

Re:What?

[Anonymous Coward]

A better way to cause Microsoft to lose money is to not buy an XBox. Then it will sit on the shelf and Microsoft will be out 100% of the production cost (actual number widely disputed).

Re:What?

[Anonymous Coward]

Why - do they have one built sitting in a warehouse waiting for you?

Moron.

Re:What?

[BlaKnail]

They lose money by producing units...when you buy one, you are giving them some money back...
Let the thing rot on the shelf, and MS REALLY loses some money then.

Re:What?

[Anonymous Coward]

Yes and they lose 400$ if you DON'T buy it. So not buying an Xbox is a kick in the teeth and the groin.

Re:What?

[Anonymous Coward]

Even though the loas is expressed "per unit", it's not like Microsoft makes the boxes one-at-a-time.

They make them in large runs, and there's an enormous amount of sunk costs in engineering and so on.

Therefore any XBox sold is less of a loss than an unsold XBox.

Re:What?

[Anonymous Coward]

Go onto Ebay, you can get about the same setup for about the same price. The graphics chip won't be anywhere near as good, but then again I am willing to bet the drivers for the custom xbox GPU will suck complete ass so you are probably better off just buying the cheap PC.

Re:What?

[Aexia]

>>Since they're so cheap, you could (perhaps) install BSD/Linux and use them as a web farm.

Then MS could sue you under the DMCA for circumventing their profit protection technology.

... unless you buy a copy of Halo for each and every XBox.

Re:What?

[jafac]

Buy one used on ebay then. Who cares if it has no games to run if you're going to plop Linux onto it.

Re:What?

[Marx_Mrvelous]

You and the other comments are all wrong, it's a lack of understanding economics. I'll reply to you since you're not an AC.

If MS produces 1,000 X-boxes at a loss of $400, they lose $4mil if no one buys any.

If MS produces 10,000 X-boxes at a loss of $200 each (every one was purchased), they lose $20mil.

So, which way do they lose more money?

Re:What?

[Marx_Mrvelous]

The other comment is right... If you buy one, MS loses $200, but then they produce one more. Net loss of all X-box purchases goes up $200. Learn economics ;)

who dropped first the price first? not really sony

[deft]

its also worth noting that sony did drop their prices first, but only in response to information that microsoft would be announcing a price drop at E3 later this week.

microsoft dropped their price this week to match sony's pre-emptive drop, to minimize the advantage they would have through this press and buying cycle.

Finally, a market not easily....

[CHUD-Wretch]

dominated by The One.

It's great to see that Microsoft doesn't always win.

Video Gaming is one market where people actually seem to like variety. I love it.

-=CHUD-Wretch! (just got a gamecube and Resident EVIL!!!
RE sold me on game cube...something about exclusive rights to remakes and new games really roks me)

Re:Finally, a market not easily....

[Anonymous Coward]

really? that's what you're going with?

How long has MS been in the market? One console generation and it's already neck and neck with the others. How long would it take someone else to startup a company and get as much clout and power in the console market? Let alone sales...

Re:Finally, a market not easily....

[Bonker]

Hmmm... Microsoft vs. Sony

This is like rooting for The Empire to wipe out The Borg...

Sony isn't quite as blatantly evil as Microsoft, IMHO, but they are one of the major forces behind both the RIAA and the MPAA. When you buy a Playstation, you're contributing to a pool that eventually helps to lobby for laws like the DMCA and SCSSA

Re:Finally, a market not easily....

[Black Aardvark House]

The video game wars usually seem to have only two combatants, though.

The original warriors were the Atari 2600 and Intellivision. There were others, including Colecovision and other Atari systems, but these two ruled the roost.

In the 8 bit times, the NES and Sega master System ruled.

In the 16-bit world, you had Super Nintendo and Sega Genesis.

In the 32/64 bit arena, you had Nintendo 64 and Sony Playstation. The Sega Saturn floundered and died an early death.

Now, we have/had four competitors, the two dominant being Nintendo Game Cube and Sony PS2. The Dreamcast crashed and burned and it looks like the XBOX might be heading in the same direction.

Yes, the people enjoy choice, but it's only big enough for two main systems.

Re:Finally, a market not easily....

[Anonymous Coward]

False dichotomy.

The right choice is not to buy any console.

Re:Finally, a market not easily....

[EnderWiggnz]

If you consider 25 million vs. 1.5 million units deployed "even", I've got some great shares in this energy trading company to sell you.

Re:Finally, a market not easily....

[Anonymous Coward]

"Yes, the people enjoy choice, but it's only big enough for two main systems."

Well, the market is many times larger now than it was back in the 80s. There's no rational basis for your statement whatsoever -- a console that's positioned correctly can be profitable even if not in the #1 or #2 slot.

Re:Finally, a market not easily....

[Anonymous Coward]

The Dreamcast crashed and burned and it looks like the XBOX might be heading in the same direction.
Can you give us some kind of possible logic behind that comment?

The Xbox is selling well, there's something like 250+ never-before-seen Xbox games going to be announced at E3, and the "killer apps" are yet to come (Knights of the Old Republic, Project Ego, Enclave, etc.)

Is that just wishful thinking on your part?

Re:Finally, a market not easily....

[Artifex]

I guess that makes Nintendo the Daleks.

Remember their practices in the 80s?

"You will obey us - we are the superior beings!" (content policing)

"EXTERMINATE! EXTERMINATE!" (attitude to unlicensed companies)

In the Borg vs. Dalek vs. Empire depate, I'd have to go with the Empire... some human individuals could retain identities apart from what they belong to, and might even be "happy." In real life, however, I've been staying with Sony, so far.

Re:Finally, a market not easily....

[dead sun]

Except Dreamcast was a competitor of the N64 and the Playstation, not the newest generation of consoles. The launch of the Dreamcast was scheduled for late 99. Years before Xbox and it's ilk.

Re:Finally, a market not easily....

[CHUD-Wretch]

This is like rooting for The Empire to wipe out The Borg...

Who else but The Empires and Borgs of the world could afford to do something as huge as

develop a hardware system, produce the hardware, software dev kits,
set up and maintain relationships with developers, retailers, press, non-standard media, support
the system globally, AND make a PROFIT so they can afford to do it all over again in 3 years!?

Sounds like a lot for the average LUG! ;-)

Side Question, have any home-brewed VG systems been semi-mass produced lately?

-=CHUD-Wretch (who is still pissed about the troll mod for snickering @ MS in an "anti-MS" forum of all places....what is this?! a shareholders meeting?! hehehe...)

Re:Finally, a market not easily....

[Alan Partridge]

...and play games on your Windows PC? No thanks. It's the PS2 or the GC for me.

Re:Finally, a market not easily....

[Anonymous Coward]

In the 32/64 bit arena, you had Nintendo 64 and Sony Playstation. The Sega Saturn floundered and died an early death.

Now, we have/had four competitors, the two dominant being Nintendo Game Cube and Sony PS2. The Dreamcast crashed and burned and it looks like the XBOX might be heading in the same direction.


The PSX changed the console market, basically, to the point that what would've been a successful console when compared to it's predecessors (or when put up against other competitors) looked like a failure next to the PSX (the N64 is largely considered a failure, despite something like 30 million units sold, because the PSX sold something closer to 100 million).

I think Sony opened up the market for a 3-way console market without really needing any failures, because they've given themselves a much broader market than any console received before. The Dreamcast died more because of Sega's previous failures than because of it's own lack of merit as a console (Sega needed a quick cash infusion, which is not how consoles generally work).

Other than that, the numbers indicate that Nintendo may take the #3 spot in the US and the #2 spot in Japan and Europe, with MS in #2 in the US and #3 in Japan/Europe, though that could all change or solidify at the end of this year when the holiday season hits and many of the currently announced titles are on the shelves.

Re:Finally, a market not easily....

[Anonymous Coward]

Unless, of course, you like simulators.

Re:Finally, a market not easily....

[Alan Partridge]

well, they're not games by definition. Yes, I do like simulators - I like simulated driving in GT3 A-Spec on the PS2 and I do my simulated flying in X-Plane on the Mac. I do my simulated anti-gravity racing in wipeout fusion on the PS2 of course... and my simulated conversations on Slashdot.

Re:Finally, a market not easily....

[Anonymous Coward]

yeah, your probably contributing to alien breeding as well.

Re:Finally, a market not easily....

[jafac]

Yes, the people enjoy choice, but it's only big enough for two main systems.

No, it's big enough for zillions of systems (especially if there were such a thing as cross-platform game development) - but wall street only likes a company that dominates it's market. Apparently a stock is only worth investing in if the company is a monopoly.

Re:Finally, a market not easily....

[Anonymous Coward]

I thought Sony WAS the Empire in that geek-a-thon analogy.

Is it just me, or have we finally reached the point where Slashdot is just full of "Superman could beat up Batman" posts?

Price hasn't dropped enough

[prock307]

Even if the price were $-200, I still wouldn't buy it! (meaning the store paid me $200 to get the X-Box off of their shelves to make room for better things)

Re:Price hasn't dropped enough

[VEGx]

Actually, I might... and not just one... but it all depends if I could recycle them (without any cost). Obviously, I wouldn't keep any of these cursed things.

Xbox security

[Anonymous Coward]

Microsoft has worked very hard to ensure that that never happens (non MS licensed software running on xbox.

PS One at $50

[taya0001]

Sony also announced that the PS1 will be sold for $50. Also memory cards for both the ps1 and ps2 will be much cheaper than before. The question is will PS2 inventorys become depleted for the next few weeks while all the people that waited for the price drop go out to purchase a PS2

This guy deserves kudos!

[stevenbee]

One of the many reasons I love /. !

Typical /. comment

[alen]

MS is going down. They can't sell any of their junk and have to cut the price to comptete. Soon the losses will mount and they will stop selling the crap box. This is the start of MS downfall. Did I miss anything?

Re:Typical /. comment

[CodeMonky]

The part where we call you a stupid ass troll.

Re:Typical /. comment

[Anonymous Coward]

You forgot to use "Micro$oft" (the dollar sign is very important) and the "^H" feature (which is really over^H^H^H^Hunder-utilized).

Re:Typical /. comment

[Anonymous Coward]

Yes, the all important "^H", which explains nicely to the reader: "Hell yeah, I'm kickin' it OLD SKOOL! RE-KO-NISE!"

ummm

[Ty]

Now is definatly a good time to be a gamer with all 3 next-gen systems at $200 Umm anyone else remember the days when game systems were all under $100?

Re:ummm

[caspper69]

There are also people who remember when a gallon of gasoline was $.40 and a new car was $2,000. For today's money, $200 isn't bad.

Re:ummm

[Anonymous Coward]

Umm anyone else remember the days when game systems were all under $100?

umm anyone else remember that that only happened about 4 years after the release of the NES and Sega Master System? It's not like the systems were below $100 less than a year after release (ie where X-Box is now at $200). NES was ~$400-450 for it's first year+.

Re:ummm

[Reductionist]

For Christmas of 1981 I received an Intellivision from my parents which at that time was still selling for its launch price of $250 dollars, which adjusted for inflation is around $515 today. By comparison, an Atari VCS/2600 sold for around $129 in 1981 or roughly $266 today.

Games? Most retailed at around $30 back then.

Oh.. And 5.25" floppy disk drives sold for about $500 back then, or roughly $1030 in today's dollars.

Re:ummm

[Anonymous Coward]

Maybe so, but gas wasn't $.70 and cars weren't $5000 in 1989, but then again, gas and cars haven't changed much, if at all but game consoles have, at least technologically.

Re:ummm

[Anonymous Coward]

I paid $129 for my 2600, and damn, if it still ain't the best console around!

Still waiting for game price competition

[WillSeattle]

While all three box manufacturers are stuck at $199 USD (while Japan, the EU, and Canada sell them for less) - one wonders when the game price competition will start?

My son said that two kids at school are waiting to buy xBox games when the price drops below $40 USD, since they have to use their own allowance money.

By my calculations, MSFT has to sell 10 games at $50 USD to break even on the price subsidy of the xBox. Nintendo still has a profit on both box and games, and Sony is just at breakeven due to manufacturing efficiencies on the 2.5 yo PS2 with clear profit on the games.

-

Re:Still waiting for game price competition

[deft]

While all three box manufacturers are stuck at $199 USD (while Japan, the EU, and Canada sell them for less) - one wonders when the game price competition will start?

yes, sony is considering an price drop, while microsoft is relying on the strength of its game library to allow it to sell games at the current price.

From an msnbc report:
While Sony Computer Entertainment of America President Kaz Hirai said his company would consider lowering prices on the games it publishes from $49.99, O'Rourke said Microsoft has no plans in that regard.
"Great games are what gamers want and they're willing to pay for those," he said.

Re:Still waiting for game price competition

[Anonymous Coward]

By my calculations, MSFT has to sell 10 games at $50 USD to break even on the price subsidy of the xBox.

What are you, fucking retarded? You're saying they have to sell $500 worth of games to break even on a console they're losing (at the absolute most) $150 on?!

Even after you figure in replication costs, some money to the publishers for the 3rd party games in your lot of 10...even if that take up half of the $500 (it wouldn't), they'd still make $100...they don't need to sell 10 to break even!

Re:Still waiting for game price competition

[Anonymous Coward]

Some money to the publishers? Are you fucking retarded? The publishers and programmers aren't making these games out of the goodness of their hearts. They get the lion share of the profits while Microsoft gets a huge royalty out of what's left. Probably $20/game. So yes, to make up for their $200/console loss they need to sell 10 games.

Re:Still waiting for game price competition

[mjpaci]

They don't get $50 for each $50 game sold. Licensing is where they get their money, maybe $5 per-game?

Re:Still waiting for game price competition

[Anonymous Coward]

I've been waiting for a viable gameboy to drop below $100 CDN...still waiting...

Re:Still waiting for game price competition

[WillSeattle]

The publishers and programmers aren't making these games out of the goodness of their hearts. They get the lion share of the profits while Microsoft gets a huge royalty out of what's left. Probably $20/game. So yes, to make up for their $200/console loss they need to sell 10 games.

Thanks, AC - couldn't have said it better myself.

I've been in gaming since the dawn of time, as one of the original SMOGs, so it's nice to see that some people understand the mechanics of the business.

And those dev kits aren't cheap ....

-

Re:Still waiting for game price competition

[Anonymous Coward]

It's actually somewhere between $5 and $9, for all 3 players, depending on who you talk to, and whether they're prepared to give you an accurate answer. This little magic number is one of the industries closely guarded secrets.

Re:Still waiting for game price competition

[Artifex]

Sony's been rereleasing some of their flagship games at $20. Ironically for your situation, these are all titles that appeal more to older kids or adults, like Final Fantasy X or GT3.
However, this should increase the downward pricing pressure on used game resellers. Unfortunately for Sony, this is also going to delay sales of new releases, as people are going to be more likely to fill in their libraries with the older titles, and wait for the markdowns they are led to expect will happen from now on.
So... good news ahead for consumers, not-so-good news ahead for vendors.

Re:Still waiting for game price competition

[Leeji]

While all three box manufacturers are stuck at $199 USD (while Japan, the EU, and Canada sell them for less)

I heard about that "better" price drop in Canada, but was dismayed by my visits to FutureShop Canada and Walmart (in person.) All systems cost $299 Canadian, only $10 (Canadian) cheaper.

Re:Still waiting for game price competition

[adamjaskie]

They are cheaper in Canada? KEWL!! Good thing I live close to Canada!

This says it all right here

[Tebriel]

http://www.penny-arcade.com/view.php3?date=2002-5- 15&res=l

Re:This says it all right here

[Anonymous Coward]

not really because toys r us is honoring reciepts up to 30 days old

Sony lies.. but i suppose they all do

[TimeTrip]

What I thought was interesting was that Microsoft announced a price drop last week to $199, and Sony vehemently denied that they would follow suit.. and so what does sony do? they cut the price before microsoft does.... strange

http://ps2.ign.com/articles/358/358880p1.html

Whatever you say sony... :P

Re:Sony lies.. but i suppose they all do

[cxreg]

Technically, they didn't "follow suit" since they cut the price first. And despite what they said, it was well known that a price cut was coming. You never pre-announce a price cut because sales dry up!

Re:Sony lies.. but i suppose they all do

[Anonymous Coward]

Yeah, people like to bag on microsoft but Sony is probably the worlds biggest screw of a corporate machine. They truly are into everything and they truly muscle their way around as they are lying right to your face.

Re:Sony lies.. but i suppose they all do

[Anonymous Coward]

marketing genius. drop the price and don't announce it beforehand. if they announced it they would be following the lead instead of being the lead. a nice kick to microsoft while they are down.

Re:Sony lies.. but i suppose they all do

[Anonymous Coward]

it was well known that a price cut was coming.

no shit, the console's been out how long now? The US was the only market in which they hadn't cut the price yet (then again, same with the X-Box, despite being out significantly less time).

amount of x-box losses

[deft]

at the initial retail price of $299, Microsoft has been losing anywhere between $76 and $105 on every Xbox sold.

thus, they are now loosing from $176 to $205 bucks each box!

Re:amount of x-box losses

[Anonymous Coward]

A healthy dose of codeine would do you good...

I know you'll never take me, Don't even think you'll break me, Be sure you'll never take me I'm gonna make you see!

Re:amount of x-box losses

[Boone^]

But production costs may have changed since the first original estimate. loss per box is something that these companies hold close to their chest.

Xbox Linux

[Bob9113]

The Xbox Linux Project is currently working to port Linux to the Xbox. It appears that the primary hurdle is getting past the hardware based authorization system, which does not allow unapproved software to run.

Re:Xbox Linux

[Bob9113]

I pulled the trigger on the submit too quick - here's some more good info:
Quick overview of an ideal use for the machine.

Only $199 a pop and every unit I buy costs Microsoft money? Most excellant! How long till they begin firing volleys of lawyers at The Xbox Linux Project? Any bets on which 4 letter law starting with "DM" and ending with "CA" they'll invoke?

Re:Xbox Linux

[bob_jordan]

Surely the primary hurdle is getting microsoft to sell you an Xbox minus OS for less then $199.

Bob.

Re:Xbox Linux

[linzeal]

Wait, wait, are you telling the readers of slashdot that microsoft actually made something secure?

Re:Xbox Linux

[baba]

Good one! No mod points, unfortunately...

I wonder if you could get another refund drive going. There is no third party OEM bundling excuse this time, hmm?

Re:Xbox Linux

[sharkey]

primary hurdle is getting past the hardware based authorization system

Huh. I would have thought the primary hurdle would have been getting the Green Screen of Death right, so it would look like a factory X-Box sitting in a Lawyers-R-Us kiosk.

Re:Xbox Linux

[jonathan_atkinson]

Quoth I from the XBox Linux Project Homepage, as one of their goals.:

"Circumvention of the Xbox security"

Seriously, are they trolling for DMCA lawyers or something? Could this have been worded in a more incriminating manner? Seems a little silly to me; I think it's a worthy project, as if I could use the XBox as some sort fo server at only $200 a pop, I'd be there like a shot. However, I can't see this project lasting more than a few months before MS kill it off. Shame.

--jon

Re:Xbox Linux

[ChiPHeaD23]

Hmmm... From what I gather there's a new modchip (or two) out there that allows an xbox to run unsigned code... Of course, the primary aim of this device is so people can play pirat^H^H^H^H^H BACKUP copies of their games, but running linux sounds like a good reason to have legit stores sell this.

Try here for some info.

Re:Xbox Linux

[Artifex]

I don't understand how the DMCA applies to running free software on any machine. Please clarify? If you're talking about getting around the encryption in the box, I think that can only be applied if the effect is getting access to content.

Re:Xbox Linux

[Bob9113]

I do not know that I can convince myself that the following is a valid argument, but all that Microsoft has to do is convince the Xbox Linux Project team that it is sufficiently plausible on the surface to keep a judge from throwing it out on first site (IE: that they would have to defend themselves). With that in mind, here goes:

On second thought, I don't think I will post my argument. IANAL, I am not an expert on the DMCA, there are probably a dozen people here who could poke numerous holes in my argument, and many more who could produce a similar or better argument - but still - it is sufficiently compelling that it would intimidate me. I think I would rather not post it publicly, as it would crush me if it wound up being used. Feel free to contact me at the above email address (rot13 means rotate each letter 13 spaces through the alphabet, wrapping from z to a), tell me a little about who you are and what you do and maybe point me to some of your Free work if you are genuinely interested.

Again, I don't really believe that my argument is earth-shattering, or even better than what any first year law student could present, but I can see little upside in posting it here, and it would destroy me if someone used it.

Re:Xbox Linux

[Noobie]

I remember reading that M$/USA is allready hunting those who claimed to have made XBox modchip.. I hope they don't end to be fugitives. :(

Re:Xbox Linux

[ijablokov]

They make their $ margins on software... Just try to stay away from the sublime Halo, PGR, and DOA3.

Re:Xbox Linux

[klui]

I'm surprised nobody has added what has been mentioned in prior XBox stories here. People who want to see the XBox go under shouldn't rush out and buy them because Microsoft is losing money; rather, they should not buy it. If enough people purchase XBoxes, the product may reach critical mass that probably will reduce its production costs even more. Critical mass will also create the mindset of the XBox is successful, which will create more legitimate sales. It doesn't matter if most of these machines aren't used for native games--the statistics will spin to say that XBox is successful.

Re:Xbox Linux

[claar]

On second thought, I don't think I will post my argument

Your Honor, I had a perfect argument for why the Xbox Linux Project was breaking the law, but the slashdot box was too small to contain it..

Re:Xbox Linux

[taniwha]

If enough people purchase XBoxes, the product may reach critical mass that probably will reduce its production costs even more

I design hardware (and software) for a living - there's no way M$ will get their production costs down on the current xbox hardware (BTW check out the gamecube to see people who have a clue about integration). Their biz plan depends on making money back on their cut of the titles they are selling - every box you buy and don't buy software for hurts M$'s bottom line - this is SOP in the game console world.

Of course M$ is a very big company so as long as the non-gamer sales of xboxes is a few % they probably don't care, but if it goes up to say 50% (people building farms ... I'd love to load up that linux/verilog farm of xboxes for chip design) M$ have a problem on the order of the various cheapo internet terminal people (Idreama?) who's business model involved giving hardware away cheaply and making it back on the back end with services and didn't anticipate a large part of their sales going to linux hackers

Re:Xbox Linux

[tb3]

Sure, they can encrypt their own crap. It's your stuff they can't secure.

Re:Xbox Linux

[Anonymous Coward]

Its FUN to make up stuff that makes no sense and isn't even MILDLY funny, isn't it?

Can we get a "Slashdot-Groupthink Approved Troll" moderation comment please? If only for archiving purposes 20 years from now when people go "How the hell did people get to thinking this way?"

I'd like to know if ...

[Darth Yoshi]

I'd like to know if anyone has succeeded in porting a Free operating system to the Xbox.

Someone has to break the encryption on the DVDs first or make a mod chip that lets you boot unencrypted CDs. Hasn't happened yet, but it's only a matter of time.

Then you have the problem of adding a keyboard and mouse to the Xbox. But that should be too hard.

But aside from the bragging rights, who cares.

Re:I'd like to know if ...

[Anonymous Coward]

They have already made a mod chip. Stores are shipping them on the 20th.

Re:I'd like to know if ...

[delta407]

But aside from the bragging rights, who cares.

Hmm... a 733 with good graphics hardware, built in networking, and Linux for $200. It can run headless (i.e. without a monitor, keyboard, or mouse) and fit into a smaller area than any similar configuration. It can run with simply a power cord and an Ethernet line.

Sounds like it would make a decent little file server, web server, or even a terminal server -- I guarantee X would run better on an Xbox than on a 486-75. Plus, for $200, it's quite a bargain. (Mosix cluster, anyone?)

Re:I'd like to know if ...

[Anonymous Coward]

The X-Box's only run authorized code has been cracked. Modchips have also started appearing in Europe and will be available in the US in 1-2 months.

Re:I'd like to know if ...

[Anonymous Coward]

Um, it HAS happened already, just check here
And the DVD's aren't encrypted, they're (just) signed (which is almost as bad), but copying, and ripping (eg. downgrading movies so they'll fit on a CD) works.

Re:I'd like to know if ...

[Sentry21]

Someone has to break the encryption on the DVDs first or make a mod chip that lets you boot unencrypted CDs. Hasn't happened yet, but it's only a matter of time.

Someone else linked to copyxbox.com, which itself has links to such places as xboxmods.co.uk, which appear to prove you wrong (not that I'd think you'd mind).

Yay.

--Dan

too bad...

[hummer357]

too bad that the machine doesn't sell very well over here in Europe ;-)

we deserve those price cuts a lot more!!

Sony is way cheaper then xbox

[Steveftoth]

Don't forget that it's cheaper to make new PS2 boxes as compared to making older PS2 boxes. A month or so ago they finally got both the processors onto one chip. This will reduce the cost of the box. Probably isn't in the current boxes being sold, but they will be. So basically, since sony designed all the HW themselves it is easier to integrate all the HW to reduce cost. (PS2 on a chip?)

I wonder what the consoles would cost if the had to be sold at cost to the manufacturer.

The new Metroid had better be good.....

[globaljustin]

otherwise, Nintendo will not be able to compete. Ok, I'm not a troll, Metroid is not sole factor in Gamecube's existence, but it's an integral part. My question is, with this price drop eventually price Nintendo out of the market? I think Microsoft's plan is to lowball (for lack of a better word) Nintendo, price it out of the market with the X-box, and then go head to head with Playstation with the X-box II. Nintendo as an anti-microsoft hero???

Re:The new Metroid had better be good.....

[Anonymous Coward]

Mario, Zelda, Metroid, Pokemon...

Re:The new Metroid had better be good.....

[Anonymous Coward]

It is realy hard to lowball Nintendo out of the market since they have the handheld game market tied up and were smart enough to put a game system that actualy makes money and has great exclusive games. I'm a PS2 man myself and it is funny to see Microsoft stuck in the middle with a system they are practicly giving away and making no money on. But they have done it many times (MSNBC, MSN, UltimateTV) and have been able to use their OS monopoly to keep them afloat. Kind of begs the question what would happen to them if they didn't have that.

Re:The new Metroid had better be good.....

[Anonymous Coward]

First of all, the total console game market (in dollars) for the world last year was about half that of the handheld market, which Nintendo owns about 95%. The Gameboy is Nintendo's biggest money maker, and can support them for a long time.

Second, Nintendo generates more money per software title sold for it's systems because of the fact that Nintendo itself is the biggest developer of titles for it's systems. The ether develop them in house, or out source it, but don't have to pay licensing fees to anybody because they already own the characters. Also, Nintendo has the most recognized stable of characters and IP to develop from. Mario, Pokemon, Metroid, Zelda are all huge cash makers, and with the return of Final Fantasy to Nintendo products, it takes away one of Sonys preimer license.

Side note: the Pokemon franchise, between movies, game carts, and licensed merc (tshirts, toys, etc.) made almost as much money than the entire console industry last year.

Right now at $199, Nintendo is not selling the GC at a loss, unlike the XBox.When the system first came out, there was a slight ($20 max/console) loss while they optimised production and got significant chip yields from the manufactures. There is speculation that at this point, Nintendo could sell for as low as $150 with a profit. The XBox on the other hand, is still selling at a loss, and not selling very well. According to Electronics Boutique, the GC has been outselling the PS2 and the XBox for the last couple months, especially since the release or Resident Evil, and with the release of Metroid, Zelda, Mario and StarFox on the horrizion, that trend might just continue.

Oh, and did I mention all the Sega games comming out for the GC (Phantasy Star Online 1 & 2 and the complete Sega Sports line up anyone?). Nintendo is doing far getter than anyone gives them credit for.

40 billion in the bank

[Donut]

Amidst all of the discussions about how much money MS will lose on this, y'all might want to remember this discussion and ponder whether or not they can afford it.

Donut

Re:40 billion in the bank

[Lumpy]

Ok, let's do a little bit of education...

Microsoft has 40 billion in the bank not because they make good products, not because people love throwing money at them, and NOT because they will fund non-money-making projects.

you get big $$$ by making good investments, and sound business decisions like cutting the cord on ultimate TV because it doesnt sell, Webtv because it doesnt sell, and if the Xbox doesn't make them $$$ in a hurry... it also will die. It's sound business to make dead and bury anything that is a drain on your companies bottom line. The companies that doent use their heads to control expenses and profits?? They end up as the rest of the dot-bombs... horrible failures because they were poorly run. (YES PEOPLE, 99.997% of all business failure is due to the moron at the steering wheel of it... dont believe me? then you're one of those morons that drove a company into the ground.)

Yes microsoft will throw the Xbox overboard if it doesnt meet the required projection models. the price drop is an attempt to adjust the projection model.

Re:40 billion in the bank

[Rupert]

How much money does Internet Explorer make? That seems to have been around for a while, despite costing millions in development and generating zero revenue.

Re:40 billion in the bank

[spoon42]

I haven't said it before, so I'll say it again for the first time:

Microsoft is probably the best / worst example of how business works anymore. There's a lot of handwaving and creative accounting saying "Lookie! Billions in profits and cash on hand!" covering up substantial liabilites that go unreported through quirks in the law. What, our employees hold $200B in stock options we'd have to pay if they asked? If we fuck something up, and the stock drops, and 1% of our workers decide to cash in and quit, and the stock drops that much more... Wowee, lookit that house of cards... but PAY NO ATTENTION TO THE MAN BEHIND THE CURTAIN. It's Rule No. 1 of "American" "Free" "Market" "Capitalism".

fuckit.

Re:40 billion in the bank

[dloolb]

You have to remember that this is MS and the ordinary business models do not apply. Bill Gates does not care if they lose 100$ or 300$ per console, as long as he wins or his competition suffers. I predict that before Christmas MS will start the next price war and drop there price first, this could easily be done; there will be more games available, and at an even lower price it will start looking good for those who would use the hardware for other projects. This of course will be followed by Nintendo and Sony crying foul for predatory pricing.

Re:40 billion in the bank

[JatTDB]

That's the "good investments" part...it certainly succeeded in rendering Netscape mostly irrelevant. And just because it brings up the heart of the antitrust stuff...it's part of the OS development, really! ;)

Re:40 billion in the bank

[Rupert]

If you look at it that way, MS dropped UTV too soon. They should have held in there until the MPAA et al sued Replay and Tivo into oblivion.

Re:40 billion in the bank

[fatgraham]

i thought that ms werent doing the xbox for profit (not primarily)

*i* thought microsoft wanted to get into the other parts of your house. get under your tv, make a "record tv" product for the xbox (im sure it wont take much effort for them to develop a tv-in adapter etc)

$30 for the tv recording program that plays on your already existing XBox with its "xxxxmb hdd", or $300 on Tivo (which doesnt play dvds, or games)

from there, they could do interactive tv, (web surfing email etc)

*thats* what i thought the xbox was all about, microsoft want to get out of your pc and into your toaster(v2.1)

Re:40 billion in the bank

[ihoppancakes]

You dope.

Re:40 billion in the bank

[JatTDB]

I don't see how that really follows from what I said. UTV doesn't provide the constructive resonance that Windows and IE have. UTV is a product in a market that is not directly related to their core business, which is why they didn't have much problem with dropping it. They weren't going to be able to use UTV as leverage for other products, at least not in any reasonable time frame. They realized the whole "convergence" thing hasn't happened yet, and is little more than a dot on the horizon. Thus, it wasn't a good investment.

Also, it's not just about shutting other companies out of markets. It's about money and control. If they let the MPAA sue Replay and Tivo into the ground, they'd just be handing the MPAA precedents and such for when they get around to attacking UTV. So, keeping UTV for that purpose would have been all negatives and no positives.

Re:40 billion in the bank

[Anonymous Coward]

You pay for Internet Explorer when you pay for Windows. It's all been wrapped up under one big price tag.

Re:40 billion in the bank

[Kris_J]

From Segabase, regarding the Sega Saturn:

"From 1993 (year of greatest profit) to 1997, Sega had gone from a net yearly profit of about US$230 million (1993) to a net loss of about US$389 million (1997). This means that Sega had lost about US$620 million in five years, or about 1/5th of the company's entire net worth back in 1993. Sega would lose another US$450 million for fiscal year 1998, pushing that composite loss to US$1.07 billion - or about 1/3rd the company's net worth back in 1993, when it was at the height of its success. For those of you outside the United States., that's about ¥81.6 trillion in Japanese currency or 1.14 thousand million euros in the European common currency. "

So a series of bad decisions about gaming consoles in a three-player marketplace lost you US$1 billion over 6 years in the mid-ninties. Today, Microsoft can problably manage twice the loss in half the time if it makes enough mistakes of the same magnitude.

Re:40 billion in the bank

[Anonymous Coward]

Microsoft has nearly enough liquid cash to buy Sony outright. Sony has nearly 54 billion $ (7 trillion yen I think)in assets and M$ has 45 billion in liquid assets. Since Assets = Equity + Liability and Equity= common stock + Paid in Capital excess+ Retained Earnings. One would theorize that M$ could easily just buy the entirety of the Sony common and treasury stock outstanding if they wanted to (if the gov lets them). So M$ really can't possibly loose this battle which is probably the scariest thing in business today.

Re:40 billion in the bank

[jweatherley]

You pay for Internet Explorer when you pay for Windows.

What if you're running IE on MacOS?

Nintendo and Toys'R'Us

[FortKnox]

Quick FYI - Toys 'r' us is giving the consumer back their $100 if they bought an XBox (or PS2) within 30 days of the price drop.

Also, when do you expect Nintendo to drop their prices? If the N-Cube was $100-$150, I'd pick one up in a heartbeat...

Re:Nintendo and Toys'R'Us

[techstar25]

Circuit City has always had that same policy(to refund the difference after a price drop). You might have seen the commercials.

Re:Nintendo and Toys'R'Us

[jnewmano]

Ha, and if they didnt let you do this you would have angry customers returning their $300 xboxes and playstations. Most retail stores do have at least a 30 day return policy and most employees will be fairly lenient out to 45 days, at least where I work at a large nationwide retail store.

So not only would you have people returning out of the box merchandise they would continue to walk into the store and purchase a brand new console at the discounted cost. Nothing better than having a dozen opened consoles that you'll have to take the hassle to send back to the manufacture.
Overall it is just good business practice, if you're shopping at a place that wont just give you the money within 30 days you ought to be shopping somewhere else.

Re:Nintendo and Toys'R'Us

[Anonymous Coward]

never. the last article stated that nintendo had no plans of a similar price drop. $200 I guess is cheap enough for them, and it's not like it's that much worse than the others, all it lacks is a dvd player, which are pretty cheap for computers these days.

Re:Nintendo and Toys'R'Us

[Robotech_Master]

In my experience, most retail places will adjust prices if they go down within thirty days. Circuit City will adjust them by 110% of the difference if it goes down, or if you find someone offering it cheaper.

Re:Nintendo and Toys'R'Us

[cicatrix1]

This goes not only for the console, but for controllers and memory cards (which have also been reduced by about $10) as well.

Re:Nintendo and Toys'R'Us

[alexhmit01]

Expect a Nintendo price drop shortly. Nintendo has stated that they would drop prices if Sony dropped to $200. Sony has dropped to $200. Now, nothing requires Nintendo to make good on their threat, but harming their credibility hurts them in future threats (Game theory 101).

My personal feeling is that Nintendo will drop prices in Sept./October at the latest. They need to have their price edge for the next holiday season. Dropping now doesn't give them the impace of a holiday price drop, and they aren't really ready to push the Gamecube until they have a Mario game out.

Even without a price drop, I'd expect a $200 bundle of Gamecube/Mario Sunshine or something similar.

PS2 + one free controller

[Hatter]

EBgames.com has a deal running where you get a PS2 and a free extra controller for $199 + $6 second day air shipping. Pretty hot deal.

Where did you buy it?

[Wind_Walker]

Too bad i just bought a Playstation 2 yesterday

If you bought it at Toys 'R Us, you can get back $100 if you kept your receipt and bought it within 30 days.

I think it's a great move by Toys 'R Us to keep people happy.

As for Nintendo, they're going to drop their prices at E3, I guarantee it. They stated back in April that if Sony dropped their price, Nintendo would follow suit and drop their price as well. I'm predicting a price drop down to $150 or $125. But, if they really wanted to make a splash, Nintendo would release a combo package of the Gameboy Advance, Gamecube, and the link cable that goes between them for $200 (a feasable price).

It won't matter, though. Nintendo is going to 0wn this E3, and this whole year. With new games coming out for all these franchises...

• Super Mario Sunshine
• Legend of Zelda
• Metroid Prime
• Star Fox Adventures

...as well as newcomers like Resident Evil 0 and Eternal Darkness for the "mature" ones out there, this will be the year of Nintendo.

Re:Where did you buy it?

[Anonymous Coward]

If you bought it at Toys 'R Us, you can get back $100 [planetgamecube.com] if you kept your receipt and bought it within 30 days.

I think it's a great move by Toys 'R Us to keep people happy.

Ummm, most stores have a 30 day return policy on everything. If you just bought it yesterday and they won't refund the $100 then take it back and demand a full refund and then go buy another one for $199. I don't know where you guys shop, but I've never had a problem doing that at any major electronics store.

* Super Mario Sunshine
* Legend of Zelda
* Metroid Prime
* Star Fox Adventures


BFD. Nobody plays those lame games anymore anyway. Christ, Mario Brothers is so lame. And Zelda? Maybe if I had NOTHING better to do but pull out my NES I might play that piece of shit game.

Re:Where did you buy it?

[srvivn21]

Gee. Read Penny Arcade much?

And I quote:

It was said that we'd see [Nintendo GameCubes] at around the one-fifty mark, but who knows if they'll be satisfied with a fifty dollar difference between themselves and their competitors, which cuts their prior advantage in half. You know what I'd like to see? I'd like to see 'Cubes sell at one-fifty or one-seventy-five, and include a GameBoy Advance with that little cable thingy that hooks them together. I mean, I'm just talking. I have no idea if something like that would even be feasible, but it seems like a fantastic way to differentiate themselves.

Perhaps it was just a good idea that multiple people came up with simultaniously. Perhaps "Tycho" stole your idea. Who am I to say?

Re:Where did you buy it?

[Anonymous Coward]

Plenty of stores do this. I think it would be the exception to the rule if they did not give you the difference ONE DAY later! I would not shop at such a place. Examples: KMart, WalMart, Zellers

Re:Where did you buy it?

[Anonymous Coward]

Perhaps its sooooooooo bloody obvious that my 6 year old asked that question two minutes after watching the news story on TV last evening.

Porting a free OS

[ehiris]

I'd like to know if anyone has succeeded in porting a Free operating system to the Xbox"

No. Life's short, play more.

Re:Porting a free OS

[e_AltF4]

> No. Life's short, play more.

Running Linux on XBox might be more fun than playing to some folks (looky here !)

XBox Hacked (and Linux)

[nherc]

I submitted this info days ago... but there are at least 3 mod chip makers who have just released chips to open up the xbox. The mod chips allow unsigned code to run off of any media dvd-r,dvd-rw,cd-r,cd-rw.

More xbox mod chip info.

This will (very) soon lead to a xbox linux distro.

Re:XBox Hacked (and Linux)

[n6mod]

So here's a thought.

The unmodified Xbox can't boot unsigned code. (insert handwave over detils here)

What is the Developer agreement like? Could an official XBox developer publish a title, complete with paying their tax to Micros~1, that was nothing more than a TFTP boot loader?

-Z

Losing money never hurt Bill

[b.foster]

It is a testament to the arrogance and sheer power of the Microsoft Corporation that lowering the X-Box price (and thus, losing any semblance of profit they would ever make on the device) will hardly make a dent in their bottom line.

Let's take a trip down memory lane and think about all of the other money-losing ventures that the pundits thought would be the death of Microsoft:

• Microsoft Bob. An absolutely horrible idea with an even worse execution. M$ spent millions developing and promoting it, and didn't sell more than a handful of copies.
• Internet Exploder. Originally intended to be sold at a profit, the IE group has cost Microsoft tens of millions of dollars in development and support costs. What they have created is a money pit crafted from insecure, non-modular spaghetti code. Many observers (such as ESR) expected IE to implode under its own weight around the release of version 4.0, but it never happened.
• UltimateTV. Microsoft's lame attempt to make a Tivo and sell consumers a crappy version of the Tivo service at the same high monthly price as Tivo somehow didn't pan out. Go figure.
• Mac support. As it stands, Microsoft has not recouped its development costs on any release of Office for the Mac. This should not come as much of a surprise, as they offer steep bulk/site discounts to educational institutions on these products.

As you can see from the above examples, Microsoft's sole goal is to dominate the computer industry by creating products that lose vast sums of money, but "hook" the consumer into their services and upgrades. This is why we need more than Linux and OpenOffice to compete against them; we need government action. We're already beating them in the marketplace, but that doesn't matter when they have infinitely deep pockets from which to draw funding.

And that, my friends, is why Sony and Nintendo have a formidable enemy in Microsoft. Neither company has the cash reserves to compete with Microsoft on such an unlevel playing field, and neither one seems likely to survive in the video game arena for long without help from Uncle Sam.

Re:Losing money never hurt Bill

[dada21]

Microsoft doesn't have infinitely deep pockets -- people thought the same of Xerox in the photocopying industry (where are they today?), General Motors in the auto industry, and on and on. A good business man always spends a lot on R&D, because that allows them to make their marketable products better by incorporating features.

I'm glad Microsoft is around and doing well in business, everything they do trickles down to more business for us. Buggy operating systems? Keep them coming! Half the business comes in to support their shit code, the other half of the business comes in to install OSes that don't have the problems. Win, win, if you ask me.

When Microsoft goes the way of General Motors or Xerox or any one of the number of companies that were feared to be monopolies (and it will, probably in the next decade), you guys will be bitching and moaning about government regulation for whatever is the next huge company, even though you don't have the brain capacity to realize that these companies are doing great things for the economy as a whole.

Go forth and compete. Stop jerking off to porn and reading your little comic books, how about working 100 hours a week on what you think the market wants -- Microsoft won't prevent you from taking out a loan, running an ad campaign, and shipping a better product, so why aren't you doing it?

Maybe its because its easier to complain and ask the government for help, even though all it does in the end is hurt all of us through newer regulations that only HELP those we wanted to hurt, and HURT those like us.

*shakes head* I'll never understand how geeks want government out of privacy and copyright, but want them involved in regulation. It never ceases to amaze me that the Socialists of the 50s and 60s have gotten EVERYTHING they wanted politically, and nobody cares enough to realize how much farther ahead we'd all be in a truly free market economy...

Socialism Leaves All Servants Having Dreams Over Triumphs...

Re:Losing money never hurt Bill

[AJWM]

Actually it's starting to.

If MSFT loses too much money in one area (say, subsidizing XBox sales), they have to cover it with either increased revenues from one of their cash cows (like MS Office) or by playing accounting games with the cash reserves they have on hand, so as to meet quarterly revenue targets.

They're being (or were, don't know the current status) investigated by SEC for playing accounting games with cash reserves, so they're less likely to do that, and their cash cows are running into (some, but growing) competition from the likes of Star/Open Office, etc, etc.

The thing is, even though they've got a ton of cash on hand and could probably subsidize X Box sales from now until doomsday, if their quartely revenues don't show sufficient growth (and they've been hard-pressed to do that, lately), investors will start to bail and the stock price will drop. This in turn discourages investors further, makes employee stock options worthless so they'll demand higher salaries, and so on in a downward spiral.

Bill himself no doubt has enough stashed away in other investments that he'll never really hurt in that sense -- except that he really, really hates to lose.

Re:Losing money never hurt Bill

[IronTek]

I think you're wrong. First, to keep my cred, I don't like Microsoft and I'm a Linux user. However, I hate ignorant people that spout of incorrect assumptions without thought of what they're speaking of even more than I hate Microsoft.

Microsoft Bob: While it was a horrible failure as a product, it did teach Microsoft much about human computer interaction, what their customers want, and how to market products better. End the end, it was probably a pretty cheap "failure."

Internet Explorer: Probably saved Microsoft's ass. Had they not given it away, and made the user not have a choice whether or not to have it, they could have lost ground on the desktop as well as on the internet. They would not be the company they are today if it weren't for a free IE. Further, IE is not under danger of an implosion. It's not that horrible of a browser...while I prefer Mozilla, IE does feature stability in key areas that I wish Mozillla would (and it will...eventually)

Ultimate TV: This was a premature release and not well thought out, no doubt...but it will pave the way for their takeover of the home entertainment center when the XBox 2 (or whatever) combines the XBox with UltimateTV. The product itself may be a failure, but the next incarnation of the XBox would not have been/will not be possible without the work done on Ultimate TV

Mac Support: Not only have they made money on the Mac (what have you been smoking), but they're the largest seller of applications to Mac users! Further, at least up until the last version of Office for the Mac, programs like Excel and Word used the same core as the PC version, so the development costs consisted of wraping up the engines that drive the programs to work with the Mac.

Now shutup, go get a helmet, and hope that other companies out there can keep them in check.

Re:Losing money never hurt Bill

[merlin_jim]

I have a quick comment amount Microsoft giving away stuff for cheap: Purposefully selling a product at a loss is not illegal. Using a monopoly to shut out other markets IS... so, selling XBoxes at a low price (or even free) is not illegal, neither is giving away Internet Explorer.

Now, if Microsoft were selling XBoxes or giving them away, and they were engineered so that a TV that has an XBox connected to it cannot also have a PS2 or Gamecube or console system Y connected to it at the same time, that would be illegal. Or if Microsoft made, say, televisions instead of Operating Systems and engineered their TVs to only work (well) with Xboxes, that also would be illegal.

That said, I think that it definitely counts as unfair market practices, just not under the scope of current law. But I don't think government subsidies of the gaming industry is the answer...

I don't know what the answer is, but I don't think thats it. Maybe changing the law so that using money gained from a monopoly to establish a monopoly in another market is illegal... something along those lines...

Re:Losing money never hurt Bill

[Anonymous Coward]

1) Nobody with any sense thinks that a failed product or two would be the "death of Microsoft". Not while they have Office and Windows.

2) The TV stuff has been a ridiculous failure so far for them, with billions of dollars of bribes sent off to various cable companies and nothing to show for it. UltimateTV and WebTV are just a couple aspects of it, but their battle with AOLTW over control of Interactive Television continues. (Maybe Interactive TV is a huge load of crap that will never catch on anyway, but that hasn't stopped a quadjillion dollars invested in it since the early 80s.)

3) ESR makes HTML 2.0 webpages and probably still to this day never understood what Netscape and later MS were up to with WWW browsers. Why does anyone pay attention to this dullard?

Re:Losing money never hurt Bill

[Anonymous Coward]

* Microsoft Bob. An absolutely horrible idea with an even worse execution. M$ spent millions developing and promoting it, and didn't sell more than a handful of copies.

Horrible idea? I don't know about that. It basically took the AOL approach of hand-holding the user. It got a bad rap as being lame so nobody wanted to go near it and it died as a result. In reality it was a pretty neat idea. Everything was easily laid out in a way that the average user could understand. If anything, it was ahead of its time. If it was released today I guarentee you it'd sell a million copies easily because you could stick it on your mom or grandmother's computer and she'd be able to find her way around without fucking around with the desktop interface of Windows which can be quite confusing.

Re:Losing money never hurt Bill

[Anonymous Coward]

how much farther ahead we'd all be in a truly free market economy

Yeah. We'd have a one gigantic corporation that produces everything.

In "truly free market economy" a successful company thrives, gets even bigger, assimilates or destroys all the start-ups and will eventually dominate the whole market. Then you don't have free market anymore. That's why we need government regulation. I can't vote corporate board members. I can vote politicians. They are the lesser of two evils.

Re:Losing money never hurt Bill

[Anonymous Coward]

You make a good point, but will burn in hell for your sig.

Re:Losing money never hurt Bill

[Anonymous Coward]

You dont think that Sony has the financial backing to compete against Microsoft? You're out of your gord. The Playstation is the #1 moneymaker for sony, and they are willing to dedicate whatever they have to defend it. Remember, Sony is one of the biggest electronics makers in teh world, a major music producer, movie studio, and TV studio. Yes, they have the money and the wherewithall to fight to the last breath

Re:Losing money never hurt Bill

[ksheff]

But neither of those businesses, while they were dominant in their industries at one time, ever had the profit margins that MS enjoys. Not to mention, honest-to-God competition that couldn't be denied access to the market via licensing agreements. Imagine if GM had a law passed that outlawed new car dealers to sell anything other than a GM product. Sure, you could still buy something different in Canada, and then go through the hassle of any import taxes, etc., but only die-hard anti-GM people would go through the trouble.

Re:Losing money never hurt Bill

[Anonymous Coward]

Microsoft won't prevent you from taking out a loan, running an ad campaign, and shipping a better product, so why aren't you doing it?

Tell that to Be...

Re:Losing money never hurt Bill

[qurob]

Mac support. As it stands, Microsoft has not recouped its development costs on any release of Office for the Mac. This should not come as much of a surprise, as they offer steep bulk/site discounts to educational institutions on these products.


Microsoft is simply doing Apple a favor, and keeping Apple as a 'competitor'.

Re:Losing money never hurt Bill

[eyez]

Stop jerking off to porn and reading your little comic books,

I would *NEVER*. They'd get all sticky.

Re:Losing money never hurt Bill

[lysurgon]

Go forth and compete. Stop jerking off to porn and reading your little comic books, how about working 100 hours a week on what you think the market wants -- Microsoft won't prevent you from taking out a loan, running an ad campaign, and shipping a better product, so why aren't you doing it?

No, that's where you're wrong. If you were actually to compete with M$ on any of their many playing fields, you would inevitbly face some of the anti-competative business practices which the company has already been convicted of implementing. Extortion-like pricing, custom-crufted code and underground whisper campaigns are only a few of their dirty tricks.

I'm all for free enterprise and entrepeneurialism. In fact that's why I dislike M$, because they discourage these things. But if you don't have any checks and/or balances, two bad things occur:

1) Only that which profits will survive. This is an ok (though not great) way to run a business, but it's no way to run a society. The maxim that "everyone in pursuit of their self-interest generates the best common good" has been roundly disprooved in history. This is because all people are not created economically equal, and hence many people's self-interest trumps that of others for highly arbitrary reasons. Furthermore, there are a great many things that a society should have that should not be profit motivated. Roads are a good example. The interstate highway system makes no money, but without this vital infrastructure commerce would fail. Defence is another example. You don't want your army going out to the highest bidder. This is why citizens collectivize to mutually provide funds (aka taxes) so that these social institutions can be run in absence of profit motivation.

2) Without checks and regulations on a market, you're likely to have a highly unstable situation. Die-hard lesse faire advocates will tell you that things will eventually even out, and this is true, but it would take many generations for a stable global economy to emerge (if it ever did) from the chaos of an unregulated market.

Look, anti-trust law was instituted for a couple of good reasons. On the one hand, it prevents monopoly companies from abusing consumers (e.g. selling tainted meat or fixing the price of oil). It keep's them honest. Secondly, it forces them to innovate, since they cannot retain market dominance by controling the market. A monopoly market occurs when one player controls the entire game. Therefore it make a lot more sense to have a player who is (at least in principle) working in the best interest of citizens, aka the government, in control, and let this player make sure everyone plays fair. We have a teacher watching the kids play at recess, and the teacher steps in to tell bullies to play nice.

The truth is that right now M$ is more economically powerful than you, I, or perhaps even the entire aggrigated slashdot community. Ergo, should they decide to focus their wrath on me for whatever reason, I'd like someone to be there to keep them off me.

In the end, the fatal flaw of free market idealism is the incontrovertable fact that the most important elements of life bear only a tangential relationship to the profit motive.

Re:Losing money never hurt Bill

[Wildcat J]

so, selling XBoxes at a low price (or even free) is not illegal, neither is giving away Internet Explorer.

Actually, using your monopoly position to undercut the competition by dumping your product on the market well below the market price is illegal, as I recall.

-J

Re:Losing money never hurt Bill

[dada21]

"Big Oil" was never broken up by government -- they were broken up by their own shortsightedness. The regulations that government instituded to try to control Big Oil had actually helped their competitors take over the reins, and in fact, the companies that fell would have fallen regardless of "anti-trust" regulation.

Can anyone name ONE monopoly that truly exists in a monopolistic fashion that was not brewed by the government, or wholly subsidized by the government?

True monopolies don't exist in a free market. The only monopoly we battle every day is the federal government, and anyone with common sense can see that.

We're all just too lazy to want to try to compete with those with better ideas, more desire to work, and the drive to succeed...

Re:Losing money never hurt Bill

[God Virus]

Your an asshole for that sig...

Re:Losing money never hurt Bill

[Anonymous Coward]

Hmm, let's look at those numbers
Sony:
market capitalization -- $50.4Billion
revenue -- $59.0Billion
profit margin -- 1.8%
cash on hand -- $6.62Billion

Microsoft
market capitalization -- $298Billion
revenue -- $27.7Billion
profit margin -- 23%
cash on hand -- $38.7Billion

Yes, you are right, Sony could stand toe to toe with Microsoft, LOL! In reality, Microsoft could buy all of Sony and still have enough cash to pick up Nintendo on the side. Sony might be willing to fight to the last breath, but their last breath would come just as Microsoft gets warmed up.

Re:Losing money never hurt Bill

[scm]

Microsoft Bob: While it was a horrible failure as a product, it did teach Microsoft much about human computer interaction, what their customers want, and how to market products better. End the end, it was probably a pretty cheap "failure."

And the project still lives on as the Office Assistant in Office.

Re:Losing money never hurt Bill

[Anonymous Coward]

> Internet Exploder. Originally intended to be sold at a profit, the IE group has cost Microsoft tens of millions of dollars

IE was written by SpyGlass. The contract devised by MS lawyers specified that SpyGlass would recover their development cost by being paid a fee ($5.00 I think) for every copy _sold_ by MS.

Now we see the real reason that it was given away for free. Of course it is now an integral and non-optional part of Windows and thus should be a contributor to the sale price, but MS is likely to grasp onto every dollar it can and let 'partners' go down the tube as they always have done.

SpyGlass sued and lost.

Re:Losing money never hurt Bill

[Kintanon]

And that, my friends, is why Sony and Nintendo have a formidable enemy in Microsoft. Neither company has the cash reserves to compete with Microsoft on such an unlevel playing field, and neither one seems likely to survive in the video game arena for long without help from Uncle Sam.



I'm afraid you are mistaken about a great many things. This is one arena where Sony could crush MSFT like a bug. They made a nice profit on every single PS2 produced. They have made back their development and production costs several times over at this point. They can drop the PS2 down to cost and not worry at all about it. Even after this price drop they are still making money off of the console. And Sony may not have the liquid cash that MSFT does, but they have an empire that spans across MANY MANY markets. And if MSFT pisses them off, you many not see any more Sony PCs with Windows on them. I think Sony could easily put together a deal with Redhat or someone else to get a customized version of Linux on their systems. Sony has PLENTY of clout in many marketplaces ranging from consumer electronics to who knows what else. Nintendo on the other hand may take a small loss in sales to the Xbox, but I doubt it will affect their bottom line all that much. I personally believe that there isn't room in the market for the Xbox. It's targetted directly at the population segment that the PS2 is targetting, and that market segment isn't going to abandon Sony for anything less than a MASSIVE improvement in both system performance and gameplay. The Xbox just ain't got it. Maybe by the time MSFT figures out the console game in 5-10 years Sony will have begun a decline and opened up a spot for the Xbox^2 or whatever, but until then I'm sticking to my PS/PS2.

Kintanon

Re:Losing money never hurt Bill

[jwkane]

Except MS doesn't have a monopoly in console systems. If they used the monopoly that they _do_ have (how on earth.. why not) Ok, lets say MS included a "free" Xbox with every purchase of WinXP. A strange notion that will never happen, but watch where it goes:

Obviously illegal since they have a monopoly. They may or may not increase the price of XP to cover the additional cost; that isn't really relevant. By attaching an xbox to their monopoly product they consume the console market (more truthfully they consume the portion of the console market which overlaps the OS market). This is clearly unfair competition (it quite literally cannot be competed with).

Suppose now that Sega had included a copy of Redhat with the Dreamcast and boosted the price 20$. Not illegal because Sega does not have a monopoly in the console market and Redhat does not have a monopoly in the OS market. Customers wouldn't like it, but they arn't forced to buy Dreamcast.

A huge portion of the OS consumers are forced to buy MS. Anything MS 'includes' with the OS that is a viable product in it's own right is an abuse of their monopoly position. That includes an Xbox, that includes a web browser, and that includes media players.

In a better world we would see "Windows XP" on the shelf at Kmart for x$, MS Explorer for y$, MS Media Player sitting next to it for z$, Internet Explorer... We would be able to buy what we want. The full API of the OS would be published and we would have a fair market.

It's not going to happen, because $$ runs the world and MS has barrels of it. Wait for the verdict, see MS get it's bloody paws slapped and join the cynics.

Re:Losing money never hurt Bill

[Wildcat J]

Well, what you said is definitely true. However, you're addressing the issue of price with regard to tying. Anti-trust law not being my field, I am working on a general knowledge of the laws. That never stops /.ers from making sweeping statements, though, right? ;)

Selling the X-Box at a ridiculously low price to undercut Sony and Nintendo is a luxury Microsoft would be afforded due to their monopoly in other areas. They are not competing based on their merit, they are using predatory pricing practices to take control of the market and squeeze out their competitors. Now, a smaller company like Sega or Nintendo, whose revenue is derived largely from said market, doesn't have the ability to take these massive losses just to wedge their way in and force others out (one might argue that Sony, being a mega-corporation could do the same as MS, but that's a different debate). I'm fairly certain that this sort of pricing violates anti-trust law; it's certainly highly anti-competetive behavior. This is what I was addressing with my earlier comment.

-J

Re:Losing money never hurt Bill

[merlin_jim]

Actually, using your monopoly position to undercut the competition by dumping your product on the market well below the market price is illegal, as I recall.

I think its a little touchy... in the XBox case, they don't have a monopoly in the market. But, as I learned not long after I posted this comment, product dumping CAN be illegal, but its also hard to prove in court. One of the reasons the states went after the intrinsic bundling of IE with Windows as opposed to product dumping in the recent court case.

Re:Losing money never hurt Bill

[jwkane]

Good point. I'm curious about some of the edge cases. Redhat Linux is available for free (clearly a ridiculously low price), if Redhat somehow aquired a monopoly in *any* market (plush penguin futures?) would they suddenly become guilty of predatory pricing?

A more interesting case would be the dot coms. Huge piles of VC spent in attempts to take over the online 'market'. Mapquest gives away a service for which we were once accustomed to paying. Presumably there were companies offering similar products at a cost. MQ undercut the price and 'stole' the market, paying out for it's regular losses from a sizable bankroll. I find it difficult to conceive of MQ's actions in aquiring their monopoly as illegal.

The only 'classic' examples I can find are along the lines of oil tycoons taking over oil barrel production and using that aquisition to maintain their oil monopoly, or pricing their product at a loss at one gas station in order to bankrupt nearby competition.

My theory is that selling a product at a loss in order to destroy all existing competition may not be illegal unless/until you inflate prices or use your newly aquired monopoly to help maintain an existing monopoly. Might be wrong, probably am. But as Amazon has managed to demonstrate, selling at a loss can somehow become a buisness plan.

Next-Gen consoles?

[Mindjiver]

Ok, maybe Im stupid but I don't see how the consoles you can buy today can be called next-gen consoles?

Shouldn't they be called current-gen consoles, with PS3, XBob2 and GameCube2 being the next-gen ones?

Don't buy one yet

[trauma]

It's only a matter of time before MS starts bundling the Xbox free with Windows.

Re:Don't buy one yet

[Treeluvinhippy]

Don't quote me on this, but I think they already are. The native OS is already a striped down Windows or so I've heard. Hey if this is true this negates the "It's impossible to remove IE from XP" argument.

PS1 is now 50 bucks

[British]

At 50 bucks!

50 bucks??

Heh. I wonder if the PS1 at that price will now completely make people shy away from buying the Dreamcast at 50 bucks and buying a bunch of cheap games.

Of course, go to any given store and there's about 1000 cheap PS1 games and about 2-3 crappy DC games if you're lucky.

doesn't matter much to me though. I bought a PS2(something I never thought I'd do) 3 weeks ago just because I grew impatient with the PC release of Grand Theft Auto 3, and now I'm scouring Kmarts and such to look for PS1 games dirt cheap for my amusment, growing tired of playing Counterstrike on my PC.

I'd say it's a win-win situation for any cheapskate gamers who's only choice was the $50 dreamcast and its not-so-great game selection.

Re:PS1 is now 50 bucks

[TellarHK]

Wow. You should have kept waiting. I found out last week that GTA3 for the PC has a release date of 5/20. I'm saving my pennies and got a GeForce 3 Ti 200 for $119 at Best Buy in anticipation.

Re:PS1 is now 50 bucks

[NeuroManson]

For $10 more you can get a Gameboy Advance, which, for a new system, kicks ass for the sheer number of games available when you take into account that it plays all Gameboy titles dating back to 1989 (almost twice what you have from PS1)... Only drawback is that the 3D stuff is reeeeallllly lame on the GBA, harkening back to the SNES... But for a handheld, it's pretty impressive...

Re:PS1 is now 50 bucks

[Anonymous Coward]

The problem is that you can't get a Dreamcast for $50. The $50 Dreamcasts sold out instantly, driving the prices of _used_ Dreamcasts up as high as $80 for a while. Used machines have come back down, finally, but I haven't seen a new one since the day of the price drop.

Re:PS1 is now 50 bucks

[Anonymous Coward]

Couldn't agree more about Power Stone, awesome
game.. check out Power Stone 2 also if you haven't already

for those who baught before the price drop

[seann]

Check for Price protection in your retailer, see if you can get the difference.

They usualy offer 1 week to 1 month protection.
give it a shot.

It's not funny anymore...

[Soul-Burn666]

I understand that typo-nitpicking karma whoring is fun, but it's already boring.

They don't make so many mistakes... And well, it doesn't matter... Every story on /. has it's "typo-typo" posts...

I understand that it's fine when you're ACTUCALLY FUNNY, but just rating a _generic_ "typo" post as Funny makes it hard to trust posts modded funny.

Re:It's not funny anymore...

[nherc]

Sir, I ACTUCALLY concur.

Re:It's not funny anymore...

[Anonymous Coward]

Your attempt at humor are wasted, as he doesn't "trust posts modded funny." Before laughing, he examines them carefully to ensure that correct moderation has occurred.

Re:It's not funny anymore...

[Anonymous Coward]

that wasn't a typo. compare the words:

definitely
definatly

"i" is nowhere near "a" and the e just disappears completely. looks like a spelling idiot to me.

Re:It's not funny anymore...

[Anonymous Coward]

OMG TIPO POSTS R SO GEY

Re:It's not funny anymore...

[Anonymous Coward]

Five moderators disagree with you.

Re:It's not funny anymore...

[Anonymous Coward]

Every story on /. has it's "typo-typo" posts...

That would be "has its 'typo-typo'". Better luck next time.

Re:It's not funny anymore...

[Soul-Burn666]

You are evil.

I don't think it's about choice

[Steveftoth]

I think that the gaming market is controlled by the japanese. Not the companies, but rather the people. If a game system is blessed by the japanese public, then it will do well. Otherwise it is doomed to fail. Maybe back in the 70's you could get away with it, but today if they do not like your games, then you are screwed.

Re:I don't think it's about choice

[Anonymous Coward]

The Nintendo 64 never did very well in Japan. It was essentially saved by strong sales in the US (mostly because of Pokemon games).

Re:I don't think it's about choice

[Anonymous Coward]

That's somewhat true. However, don't forget that the Sega Saturn was MUCH more popular than the N64 in japan (think rpgs). I don't think MS actually believed that the xbox would do very well over there.

Re:I don't think it's about choice

[Steveftoth]

Nintendo 64 never did well in the US either. It only had a few games worth buying. The PSX owned the home market from 1997-2000. The N64 coasted while the GameBoy and Pokemon racked in the sales.

Interisting fact:Nintendo started as playing card company.

Re:I don't think it's about choice

[Steveftoth]

The saturn was more popular then the N64 in japan, but the PSX was even more popular then the Saturn. I think that the reason that the Saturn wasn't that popular in the US was that at that time there was a revolution in PC gaming that drew away from the consoles. America seems to have the largets base of PC gamers and at that time, Doom 2, then Quake came out which IMO drew attention from the saturn which was largely a 2-d system. (esp. when it came out)

Re:I don't think it's about choice

[Anonymous Coward]

The console gaming market is traditionally determined by the japanese market, but that doesn't mean it has to be. The total population of Japan is roughly 3/4 of the working age (18-64) population of the US. Certainly it's an important market, especially because once you get the boxes to japan it costs less to distribute them throughout the country than it does to do the same in the US and because it is a fairly large population (working age population roughly 87 million). The marketing age targeted by Sony and MS for consoles is roughly 16-24, which is ~16 million people in Japan, ~39 million in the US. Basically, market saturation in the US would surpass Sony's worldwide PS2 sales to date, which are already pretty much beyond most previous consoles.

Of course, the fact that Sony has basically completely changed the market for consoles with the PSX and PS2 means that MS' sales for the XBox, which are astronomical compared to most other consoles, look rather shallow.

Re:I don't think it's about choice

[Steveftoth]

MS sales do look shallow because the market is so large now. And they also said in their own words that they would have sold more consoles by now then they actually have. They planned on having twice the amount sold by now then they actually have sold.

I want to have a good reason to buy one, but so far they have only give me one or two crappy ones. I want to get HALO, but I also want to be able to play it online without using a hack. I want to play Morrowind, but that's only on PC so far ( I don't trust bethsoft after the whole Daggerfall debacle, I never want to have to patch their games again ).

Atari could to have had it all, but they messed it up like 17 years ago. Nintendo beat them to the toy stores, and that killed them. ( For the history imparied, Nintendo was sold as a toy and not as a computer which is how it got to the front of the pack , remember ROB the robot?)

I just don't get it.

[RatBastard]

I just don't get the whole obsession with getting Linix to run on an XBox. Why would you want Linux running on (what many people here claim is) a crappy PC? Why turn a powerful console into a 3rd-rate PC?

And you can bet your butt that anyone who does manage to get past the XBox' boot encryption system is going to get their ass sued off by Mircrosoft.

Re:I just don't get it.

[antitribue]

It's not the third rate PC thats the point. The point would be that Microsoft keeps releasing there "latest and greatest" products (XP, Win2k Advanced Server, ect...) and you can still set compairisions with a linux box running on a pentium 90.
Sure you are going to spend countless hours moding code, and burn out at least one or two xBoxes trying to get past boot encryption but when it comes right down to it,

Using the x-box as smtp server is just FUNNY!!

Re:I just don't get it.

[bastard01]

Not a third rate computer, this box actually has some good parts in it, for example it has pretty much the southbridge of the nForce chipset to control the soundboard, and the networking, which this is a very solid components in it, for more details on what it can do, nvidia actually placed performance details at Here. I also believe that this card is comparable to the Geforce 4? but I am not quite sure on that. Could someone confirm/deny this?

Re:I just don't get it.

[juggla]

The one and only reason I would run Linux on an XBox: Knowing I have a Linux box that Microsoft lost ~$150 to make.

Re:who dropped first the price first? not really s

[Orii]

Actually, Sony had mentioned a few months ago that they would be announcing a price drop at E3. They may have moved it up a little for tactical reasons, but they have been planning the drop itself for a long time.

It's a first for Microsoft...

[FearUncertaintyDoubt]

...dropping the price on anything. Here we see the effects of competition. Microsoft doesn't have a monopoly on game consoles, and PS2 isn't susceptible to FUD attacks, so MS has no choice to actually compete in the proper way. By lowering price.

The question is, what will be MS's strategy for the Xbox2? They can't beat PS2 (and maybe not even gamecube). So they will go back and come up with the marketing strategy to win the console monopoly in the next round. They could give their Xbox2 away for a pittance, and hope to get such a large user base as to strangle PS3. But to really kill it, they also need developers to not develop games for the PS3. If they can accomplish both of those they have a shot.

Re:It's a first for Microsoft...

[Shisha]

How about if the EULA on Windows XP 2 (or NET or whatever they call the new version) said:

Thou shalt not develop programs for other systems than those with Windows. Please visit www.microsoft.com to purchase a developers license at the appropriate cost.

what is wrong with these console makers???

[Lumpy]

Atari slit their throats by drastically cutting the price of thier Jaguar, 3D0 died this way and sega died this way.. Hell Nintendo has never resorted to price Whoring (yet) and they are all that is left from the big console wars of the late 80's early 90's. Sony knows better, but then they already have more than a year's lead on the Xbox.. and With rumors of the PS3 and it's possibility of existing in 1Q 2003... Xbox still hasn't a chance.. I dont know if the winner will be Sony, but I do know that nintendo isnt gonnat get hurt at all... Hell they survived their nintendo64 nightmare...

Re:what is wrong with these console makers???

[Boing]

Atari slit their throats by drastically cutting the price of thier Jaguar, 3D0 died this way and sega died this way

Those systems didn't fail because their prices were cut... their prices were cut because they were failing already.

Sure, price-cutting is usually a last-ditch attempt to save a dying system, but that doesn't establish that the cutting itself makes systems fail. Quite the contrary, it is usually at least partially successful in improving the sales of that system. The Dreamcast may have ended up in the toilet, but when the price was first cut, it had a startling boom in sales. If I remember correctly, there were even rumors that Sega might decide to reopen the manufacturing plants, though nothing ever came of it.

Re:what is wrong with these console makers???

[ZaMoose]

Nintendo has never resorted to price Whoring

No, they've just fixed prices, induced intentional game shortages, screwed developers, intimidated retailers and misled consumers about the advantages of 16 bit consoles

But no price whoring there, no sir!

How quickly we forget what a monster Nintendo was in the late '80's...

Re:what is wrong with these console makers???

[NanoGator]

"With rumors of the PS3 and it's possibility of existing in 1Q 2003..."

Um no, it will NOT exist in 2003. It will, at the earliest, show up in 2005. (2006 is far more concievable) Sony would drive themselves out of business if they were to introduce a new system this soon.

Also, Id hardly describe the Nintendo 64 as a nightmare. It had tons of totally kick ass titles. The Playstation had tons of CRAP. It had its share of cool games, dont get me wrong, but it did not have a single Miyamoto quality game.

The XBOX has a very good chance, mainly because they have a company that will stick with it. The point of competing in the video games market is to make tons of money, not to be number 1. Sony could end up being in more homes than MS, but that doesnt mean it wouldnt be worth MS's while.

What MS needs to do, though, is create a spinoff game company dedicated to making Nintendo-Quality game titles in house and exclusive to the XBOX. The list of games for the machine needs to distinguish the system, vs. being a 'see, we have that game too!' system. Think about it. If MS makes kick ass games only on their own system, then the difference between $200 and $300 isnt as big if you know you are going to be well supported.

As for Nintendo, I doubt they are dropping the price for another few months. They dont need to. The GameCube stands on its own. If the other machines have to cut their price to stay in competition, then it means that Nintendo is doing very well for themselves.

Re:what is wrong with these console makers???

[badasscat]

"Atari slit their throats by drastically cutting the price of thier Jaguar, 3D0 died this way and sega died this way.. Hell Nintendo has never resorted to price Whoring (yet) and they are all that is left from the big console wars of the late 80's early 90's."

Huh?? Uh, this is just the way the console world works. I bought my N64 for $129 - you think that was the launch price? No, the N64 had dropped in price by that point in time just the same as the SNES, NES, and every other console by every other manufacturer ever made has. This is just what happens when sales start to slow, competition starts to heat up and consumer expectations start to catch up with you. Console prices always drop - whether the console is a success or not (you're not going to sit there and tell me Sony slit their throat by dropping the price of the PSOne to $49 or that Atari did the same thing when the Atari 2600 hit that price 8 years after it had broken the 20 million unit sold barrier).

"Hell they survived their nintendo64 nightmare..."

Another bit of revisionism that's always bothered me... Nintendo sold more than 35 million N64's - just a slight bit fewer than the SNES - and made a huge amount of money on the system. The N64 was hardly a "nightmare" - it was a highly profitable system that sold quite a bit better than most people seem to think. In fact, it made a lot more money for Nintendo than the PS2 has so far for Sony, by a longshot. And that despite the "price whoring" you say Nintendo has never engaged in.

Nintendo is hardly a saint of a company - go back through history and they've engaged in their fair share of bullying and monopolistic business practices, for which they've repeatedly defended themselves in court (sometimes sucessfully, sometimes not). What they do know better than any other console manufacturer is how to make money. And that includes using price drops to entice customers.

Re:what is wrong with these console makers???

[ZaMoose]

That depends on what you mean by "Miyamoto-quality". Metal Gear Solid, Xenogears, Final Fantasy VII and IX, Chrono Cross, Gran Turismo 1 & 2, etc. were all high quality games.

Did you mean "PSX had no platformers up to Mario64 snuff"? That I might assent to, although Ape Escape stands as one of the most inventive and entertaining 32bit platformers out there.

Re:what is wrong with these console makers???

[Anonymous Coward]

This isn't any reflection on the quality of N64 games, Miyamoto, et al...

BUT: There was never a single game for the N64 that made me say "I want a N64"

I'm sure there are some great games for it, but they just weren't my cup of tea. The PSOne had a number of games that made me want the system. It really was that simple.

Um, "next-gen" systems?

[Wakko Warner]

If they're available now, aren't they current-gen systems?

- A.P.

Penny Arcade Take

[cow_licker]

Is right here as well as some commentary by those crazy guys here.

I still holding out for the Gamecube to drop. Nothing can compare to nintendo's first party games that will be coming out soon.

Linux on the XBox

[PhilJackson]

'd like to know if anyone has succeeded in porting a Free operating system to the Xbox
Do we know if M$ has taken any special steps to stop another Os bieng used? Depending on thier licence wouldn't we be breaking the law by putting a *nix on it?

Re:Linux on the XBox

[Fat Casper]

What sort of license comes with a piece of hardware? I agree not to reverse engineer this box so as to build my own and sell them at a lower price... Except that we already know that you can't sell it for less. The only problem is that once the OSS community gets itself in gear to really take advantage of MS' subsidy, MS will stop shipping boxes. They're already losing money anyway, what're a few warehouse fires added to that? I loved this article, though. That's real pretty.

The price of gasoline

[Anonymous Coward]

Over here:

1 liter (0.26 US gallons) costs 7 euros ($6 USD)

Re:The price of gasoline

[Anonymous Coward]

Don't forget the 45-50% car tax included in the price of each new car.

Re:The price of gasoline

[Anonymous Coward]

Quit whining. All that money is going for a good cause like public health care and transportation.

Re:The price of gasoline

[Reductionist]

Ummmm.. That would be something like $24 a gallon which just doesn't sound plausible to me. I was in Germany two years ago and it was around $3.50 a gallon. The most expensive gas in Europe at the the time, in the UK, I believe was around $4.50 a gallon. Somehow a six-fold increase in prices in just two years doesn't seem very likely.

Re:Losing money never hurt Bill -- mac soft

[selderrr]

Last time I heard, the MS Mac BSU was a profitable one, which is one of the reasons MS doesn't cut their budget (they can't shut it down alltogether due to that monopoly thingie in court)

Putting on asbestos suit...

[dissonant7]

I recieved an Xbox about 2 months ago as a graduation present have been nothing but impressed with it. Hate on it all you want for that MS logo, it's wonderful technology and a damn good value. For
You can have your PS2 and your anti-MS rhetoric, I'll cast my lot with the better games, the better technology, and the better value and enjoy my Xbox.

Re:Putting on asbestos suit...

[Anonymous Coward]

Now think how much sweeter that would have been if it was bought today! You could have gotten 2-3 more games. Competition is good, reguardless of who is behind it.

Re:Putting on asbestos suit...

[filmcritic]

Amen brother! I have an Xbox and Dreamcast, and I'm seriously considering a PS2 now that the price fell. It's all about gaming! I spend most of my free time playing games so I really appreciate "wars".

PSone

[binarytoaster]

The PSone also dropped in price a few days ago to $49. This is seriously making me look at my 300 bucks that I have left and wonder if I can survive on 20 for the rest of the summer :P

The issue with the Xbox is there just aren't that many good games out for it... the PS2 on the other hand...

A little off topic, but...

[CrazyDuke]

Why all this talk about porting a specific version of linux to the X-Box? Why not just rewrite the BIOS so that it will think it is a regular PC and accept any OS, including your favorite distro of linux? The thing is pretty much a bargan bin PC with a 733mhz PIII and an nforce chipset with slightly better graphics.

Re:A little off topic, but...

[Anonymous Coward]

an nforce chipset with slightly better graphics

And what are you going to do with an nforce chipset on a linux machine? It's not like there's an abundance of 3D games for Linux.

And no, Tux Racer doesn't count.

Re:A little off topic, but...

[misfit13b]

from the h07.org faq:

The Xbox is a standard PC, isn't it?

Actually no. The Xbox lacks some PC components (second IDE channel, keyboard and mouse interfaces, CMOS-RAM, CMOS-RTC, BIOS, ...), has some others in addition (a PIC controlling buttons, LEDs, RTC, ...) and differs in implementation in some aspects (kernel in ROM, boot sequence, hard disk partitioning, ...). That means that you cannot just insert your RedHat/SuSE/Mandrake/Debian CD-ROM into the Xbox and install Linux.

Re:A little off topic, but...

[karlm]

From Bunnie's analysis (web.mit.edu/bunnie/) , it looks like the encrypted ROM is decrypted by the southbridge. Hopefully the encryption is a stream cipher (oh happy day if it's a data-independant stream cipher) so they can use trial and error to get OpenBIOS comming out of the southbridge. Bunnie is working on using an FPGA to read the output of the suthbridge. The stuff was slighlty over my head, but that's my understanding of the current state of the art in XBox BIOS hacking. (Is the BIOS loaded 8 bits at a time into RAM, or what was that full-duplex 9-wire bus protocol comming out of the southbridge?)

Bunnie says he's working on his thesis right now. MIT's thesis due date is the 24th, so hopefully we'll all see a lot more work on the Xbox BIOS in the next couple of months.

Re:A little off topic, but...

[CrazyDuke]

second IDE channel
This is a problem because?

keyboard and mouse interfaces
*cough*USB*cough* although there will probably need to be a converter connector to the xbox's USB jack. The support can be written into the bios.

CMOS-RAM, CMOS-RTC, BIOS
And what is that pretty, encrypted, 1MB chip on the board? It boots a kernal during the power up sequence? Then it looks for a program to boot? Well, gee, isn't that what the bios does? And since there will have to be some soldiering anyway, why not put a cmos on the board with the mod-bios chip and soldier that to the X-Box?

That means that you cannot just insert your RedHat/SuSE/Mandrake/Debian CD-ROM into the Xbox and install Linux.
No duh, of course it will have to be moded or a hack found.

Just some thoughts. I wish I had enough money to splerge on an X-Box just to mess with it.

SONY's Greatest Hits

[Tsu-na-mi]

In some ways, this has already begun. A few of the best-selling PS2 games are being reissued at $20 each, including the excellent Gran Turismo 3 and Twisted Metal Black. A number of older games can already be found at discount prices. However, the $50 price point seems to work for most games, and I don't see that changing any time soon.

Re:Mirror

[Anonymous Coward]

Woo hoo! That was funny... TWO MONTHS AGO! Come on, come up with something new. Although this is a more modern looking mirror, I liked the old fashioned one better.

Sorry about that...

[dissonant7]

Somehow half my comment disappeared..

After "For" insert the following:

... ~$300 (after adding the DVD pack and the Advanced AV pack) you get a highly capable DVD player that outperforms many similarly priced standalone units (ask Sound & Vision magazine), a HDD based music jukebox (standalone units cost $500+), and a powerful gaming system complete with network play, Dolby Digital 5.1 & DTS, and component video.

Granted the game library is smaller than PS2, but many of the titles are absolutly amazing (Halo, Rallisport Challenge, Morrowind, Munch's Oddysey, Jet Set Radio Future, DOA3, Project Gotham...)

Okay continue statement...

Re:Sorry about that...

[antic]

I've almost finished Halo on Xbox and it is an absolutely superb game. Best game I've ever played on a console, and close to the best considering PC games too. The atmosphere and images are very good.

Picked up a second controller the other day, and had a first go at co-op mode -- loved that too.

Can't wait to try the multiplayer stuff (4 xboxes x 4 controllers = 16 player multiplayer - nice!).

Haven't got any other games yet, but the Xbox itself runs very quickly and I've been quite impressed generally at the MP3 ripping/storage features too.

(No, I don't work for Microsoft.)

Quick link

[Anonymous Coward]

Here's a quick link.

Free Operating System...

[Jace of Fuse!]

I'd like to know if anyone has succeeded in porting a Free operating system to the Xbox.

Oh COME OFF IT! Good god... Some devices make really cool boxes for hacking and putting alternative operating systems on, such as, oh -- wait. Just computers.

The XBox doesn't really serve the desktop computer market. It's a game machine. Just like a DVD player is a movie machine. You don't run linux on your DVD player, and you certainly don't need to run it on your XBox.

Sure, people have done it with a Dreamcast, and that's been HOW useful, exactly? Not at all. If you were to screw up the XBox with linux, you would not only have a useless port on the XBox, but you'd have a useless XBox as well.

Shesh. Some people.

sorry fellas...

[gTsiros]

...if you think that m$ is actually losing money selling the XBox, you are seriously mislead...you've fell for the oldest trick "oh we sell it so cheap we're selling it below costs! buy it now!"

id=10+5

Re:sorry fellas...

[aderusha]

actually, the console manufactures have traditionally priced their consoles at or below manufacturing cost for over a decade, starting with the NES. it's a razor and razor blades thing (or ink jet printer and ink refill thing) - lose money on the original unit, then change lots of $$ for the games/razor blades/ink.

XBox

[Anonymous Coward]

Does anybody know if NetBSD has been ported to this yet?

Nintendo = no price drop land (good)

[GweeDo]

People seem to assume that the Gamecube is an inferior piece of hardware, therefore it should be cheaper than the Xbox or PS2. I personally own a Cube and think the exact oppisite. Sure it doesn't play DVD's (but according to recent market survey's people are buying game system to play games, not watch their movies). It is also very important to not that Nintendo doesn't appear to be out to win the "console war". They are out to make a lot of money. This is something they have done successfully for years and years and years. Even in the time of the N64 they where raking in millions. Heck, last year was their most profitable year ever and they expect to only gain on that this year. Nintendo (and their shareholders) don't care if the Cube has the most sales worldwide (though I am sure they wouldn't mind). They want money...and they do that better than any console maker out there!

Re:Nintendo = no price drop land (good)

[Artifex]

Sure it doesn't play DVD's (but according to recent market survey's people are buying game system to play games, not watch their movies)

This may be true about the first game console you buy, but when you go to make your second (or third, etc.) you should be aksing yourself, what does this give me that the last one(s) didn't? You can bet that parents are looking to stretch their dollars a bit more, and something with DVD playback for the same price is a no-brainer when adding consoles to kids' rooms. Heck, that was my biggest excuse at the time I bought the PS/2, before the other two consoles were out: there may not have been many games out, but I was sure tired of watching DVDs on my computer =)

By the way: the PS/2 is the only one with DVD playback out of the box. Sure, you have to use the joystick to control it unless you buy one of the remotes, but still... XBOX's DVD remains a $30+ "option."

Fact is, since I already have a PS/2, I'm interested in the games that XBOX and Gamecube can provide. So far, I don't see anything really worth having, and I would need multiple games for a platform before buying it. (If you buy a console when there's only one game you like, you're nuts, anyway - your effective cost is console+game just to play one game) When I heard about the A.I. games that were supposedly going to be out at the XBOX launch, I was all set to buy... but they seem to have been vaporware =(

Re:Nintendo = no price drop land (good)

[Anonymous Coward]

Nintendo openly stated that the GameCube wasn't up to the XBox or PS2 on launch. They've also stated that their primary focus is the GameBoy Advance, so it doesn't really matter how the GameCube does. Of course, why anyone other than Nintendo develops for the GameCube given these two statements is beyond me.

Re:Nintendo = no price drop land (good)

[sean23007]

Go ahead and rape my karma for this, but your entire post, especially the conclusion, begs the following questions:

What would you be saying if Microsoft were only out to do the exact same thing? Would the situation be different?

Re:Nintendo = no price drop land (good)

[Grip3n]

"Sure it doesn't play DVD's (but according to recent market survey's people are buying game system to play games, not watch their movies)."

Actually the opposite is true in Japan. I thought this was rather well known, but I might as well bring it to your attention. One of the biggest selling points to the PS2 was not that it was the newest, greatest console at the time, but it was also an inexpensive DVD player. The DVD Players in Japan are rather expensive, and it was actually less expensive to purchase a PS2 and use its DVD feature then to actually purchase a dedicated DVD Player. Nintendo somewhat handicaped their market in that the Gamecube lacked the DVD support.

Re:Nintendo = no price drop land (good)

[insta]

Nintendo somewhat handicaped their market in that the Gamecube lacked the DVD support.

That isn't quite true. Panasonic (I think?) has a Gamecube/DVD player that is supposedly selling quite well in Japan/Europe.

Re:Nintendo = no price drop land (good)

[drinkypoo]

I don't know about the xbox, but the PS2 is an extremely crappy DVD player anyway. The video output quality is nowhere near that of my $130 Apex player, which has a region hack even.

Of course you could get the import gamecube which plays DVDs from playthegames.com for example; They have one with a modchip which plays DVD regions 1-6. Forget how much it is, but it's cheaper to buy an apex and a gamecube.

Re:Nintendo = no price drop land (good)

[XBoyAdv]

Yea, it is Panasonic and it is only a Japanese machine right now.

Too bad i just bought a Playstation 2 yesterday?

[Junks Jerzey]

Too bad i just bought a Playstation 2 yesterday

Why "too bad"? Yeah, the Xbox has cooler tech, but your options for games a pretty limited. The drought is pretty scary.

Xbox 2 Out in September ?

[sien]

There are rumours at the Inquirer here with sources from Digitimes here that the price will be pushed down on the components and something new will be released in September.

Perhaps with the use of such commodity parts it might be possible to have a new Xbox out each year.

The would have strange consequences for a console, would consoles have to say for Xbox 2004 only ? PS 1 or 2 is one thing, but one every year would be another.

Re:Xbox 2 Out in September ?

[NeuroManson]

Depends on how you define a second generation console, the Playstation went through many iterations before finally arriving at the PS1 miniconsole... I doubt, since they don't give any specifics, that this is anything more than Microsoft reducing the size of components used (like chee, how about the controller?), in order to keep the costs of building/shipping the units down... Another possibility is to replace quick to fail components (such as the DVD drive that was failing on a fairly large number of units, which tainted the Xbox record almost immediately) with sturdier models, improve other issues such as cooling, scaling the mainboard/power supply, and of course modify the mainboard to prevent various hacks from being done (like Sony did when modchips appeared...

Re:Xbox 2 Out in September ?

[Anonymous Coward]

Most of the rumours point towards a redesign similar to PSX->PSOne for the XBox, not an XBox 2002 in the sense of actually changing the feature set or improving performance. Therefore it'd be an XBox, just smaller...

They can drop the price as much as they want...

[gergi]

but i still wont' buy one. Ignoring the fact that I refuse to buy any MS products, in general, the real holdback of the XBox isn't the $300, now $200, pricetag... it's the games. Halo is a fine game. If I wanted a FPS on my TV, it's probably one of the best. Unfortunately for MS, I have many more and better FPS games on my PC and consoles, in general, aren't well designed for FPSs.

Re:They can drop the price as much as they want...

[Anonymous Coward]

I don't understand why morons like you post stupid comments like this. Who cares? Nobody. I'm super glad that you don't want to buy an Xbox. That's really specfuckingtacular. Why the fuck did you post it? Are you really that much of a retard that you think anyone gives a shit? Where's the idiot that's going to mark your post up as Insightful? Who is going to read your post and think "wow, I haven't considered that before"? How can you write a paragraph without saying anything useful whatsoever?

Please stop posting such inane comments. Save your energy for when you have something useful to say.

No says Microsoft!

[toupsie]

I'd like to know if anyone has succeeded in porting a Free operating system to the Xbox.

Uh, having you been reading Slashdot lately? According to M$, it is a violation of law for a user to substitute the OS of computer for another that was not sold with the computer. Since the xBox is nothing more than a computer squished into a home entertainment unit, this should hold true as well.

Be safe. Be good. Be right. Never use a viral operating system on a computer that was originally sold with a Microsoft OS. You are not buying a computer but permission from Microsoft to use a computer which they can revoke at anytime according to the EULA.

It's the games, not the console

[Otter]

For me (an adult who fires up a game of Doom or Tomb Raider every so often but is hardly a 'gamer'), what kept me from buying a console for years wasn't the up-front cost but the prospect of dropping $50 a pop on games. When the Dreamcast fell to $50 last Christmas, I bought one and picked up some $5-10 games on E-Bay, probably from kids running out to buy an X-Box. Given my general no-longer-young suckiness (it took me three nights of trying to finish the last stage of the Jet Grind Radio tutorial, the rail to over the mailbox to rail to rail over the overpass to the top of the bus shelter sequence), that's plenty for me.

The $200 price caught my attention for a second but it's back to the $50 games. Besides, how would I decide which of the 34 snowboarding games to buy?

Re:It's the games, not the console

[Anonymous Coward]

Here's a tip:

If you have a K-Mart going out of business near you, check their video game selection. We've got two stores closing in the area and one of them has an excellent selection of PS2 games at 50% off. I assume that the X-Box games would be as well, but my store doesn't have any X-Box stuff.

This isn't a solution to the $50 game problem, but it's a good temporary source of cheaper games.

Re:It's the games, not the console

[pjp6259]

If you have do not already own the original version of the game, I'd get SSX Tricky.

Re:It's the games, not the console

[KirkH]

You have a good point, but take a look: six months to a year later the games for the newest consoles start to drop in price as well. You can already find the launch titles for the Xbox at $29.99 at most places.

Re:It's the games, not the console

[Anonymous Coward]

You are right. I am a big xbox fan, but the best deal on a console is the Dreamcast. Great system, great price, great emulation, and easy to find isos.

Re:It's the games, not the console

[Kris_J]

In Australia Sony are heavily advertising their PS2 Platinum range at A$49.95 (I think). Meanwhile, your local pawnbroker has games in decent condition for around A$30-$A45. The weekend before last I picked up a new copy of Fantavision for A$11-something, even though I haven't actually bought a PS2 yet.

(If the price drop has made it to Australia then I'll probably have one by the end of the day.)

Console price goes down Game price goes up.

[BagOBones]

Hmm looks like the same thing they pull with ink jet printers.. Reduce the cost of the unit and increase the cost of the consumable.. The cost of games for these new systems are getting close to $100 CAN

Re:Console price goes down Game price goes up.

[Anonymous Coward]

Strangely enough, at least in this part of the US, prices for games are roughly equivalent between PC, X-Box, PS2, and Gamecube. The only reason the PS2 really has any lead in this is because they have more older, 'bargain bin' games available, and the ability to play PSX games (which are definitely bargain bin now).

Re:Free OSes on the X Box-- DCMA??

[ntsucks]

Does resocketing a new BIOS chip constitute a DCMA violation? Is so, this would not be legal in the US and soon in the EU. Of course, that never stopped anyone. Trouble is how do you trade silicon on a P2P network.

Hmmm... This is interesting

[thedbp]

I guess its easier for M$ to reduce the cost of hardware for the user when they don't have to pay their own outrageous licensing fees.

Oh man...

[Anonymous Coward]

Could you imagine a beowulf cluster of these?

Mmmmmm, xbox cluster. *drools*

Do it yourself console system

[CaffeineAddict2001]

Put the guts of a laptop in a nice looking box, and make holes for the game ports, sound ports and TV adaptor.
Then, modify the linux kernel so it is suited just for playing games straight off the CD.
I hear thats what the PS2 is but I have no clue really =)

Re:Do it yourself console system

[Artifex]

Put the guts of a laptop in a nice looking box, and make holes for the game ports, sound ports and TV adaptor.
Then, modify the linux kernel so it is suited just for playing games straight off the CD.
I hear thats what the PS2 is but I have no clue really =)

Then you heard wrong. =) The XBOX would be the closest thing to a converted PC, using an actual x86 CPU and an NVidia GeForce derivative. Both of the other systems use proprietary cpus and sound chips.

Re:Do it yourself console system

[smart.id]

I don't believe a PowerPC chip is proprietary. The GameCube uses one, as do Macintoshes.

Re:Do it yourself console system

[Anonymous Coward]

Thats true...and we all know how un-proprietary the mac platform has been over years ;).

Re:Do it yourself console system

[Artifex]

You're right. I was just thinking of the huge other chips in the system, and forgot to double check =)

Re:Do it yourself console system

[i_am_nitrogen]

Actually the huge other chips in the PS/2 are also not proprietary; there's an ARM CPU, and two MIPS CPU's, all three of which are fully compatible with the standard ARM and MIPS instruction sets for their respective CPU models, and there's the graphics chip, which is Sony proprietary, but as I recall modified from some SGI designs. Some of these things I refer to as chips are on the same die.

Re:Do it yourself console system

[Phil Wilkins]

Err, although both the EE and the IOP are MIPS derivatives, neither could be accurately described as a standard MIPS core. Also, there's no ARM in there.

Pretty much every chip inside the PS2 is a custom job, except for the RAM.

Re:Do it yourself console system

[i_am_nitrogen]

I do believe I recall a friend telling me there's an arm stashed in there somewhere, or maybe it was an sh... anyway, he's one of the guys who's doing the ps2 linux port for kernel 2.4/2.5 in his spare time, vs. the "antiquated" and messed up 2.2 tree that ships with the linux kit.

Re:Do it yourself console system

[Phil Wilkins]

Trust me, no ARM, no SH anything. Two MIPS cores, and two vector units, are it as far as processing goes. Although you could almost class the DMA controller as a processor.

Top five lamest arguments of the console war

[Toddarooski]

1. You shouldn't buy a GameCube because it's a kiddie console! (Only kids like fun games, apparently...)

2. Micro$oft is evil! Therefore you should support Nintendo! (Unless it's being said with irony, then it's clever.)

3. Don't buy an Xbox becuase it's just a stripped down PC! (Oh, no! It's got a CPU and a graphics chip! Run!)

4. MGS is a great game! (Okay, just my own personal opinion here -- 20 minutes of excellent gameplay surrounded by 18 hours of crappy dialogue is a good game? Give me Ico any day.)

5. I'm throwing my loyalty behind (Sony / Nintendo / Microsoft) because they care about me as a gamer.

Re:Top five lamest arguments of the console war

[WildBeast]

me, I already have an XBox and I'm buying a nintendo. They're both great. I was a little disappointed with the GC graphics but the gameplay is fun so I'll buy it anyway.

Re:Top five lamest arguments of the console war

[Peyna]

1. -> Funny, I just saw a commercial on TV for a pretty violent game for GameCube, I believe it was rated M. Just found it, Resident Evil. Yeah, that's a kiddie game. Same goes for Smuggler's run.

I used to think the same way about the GameCube, but until I played a friends and realized that you don't need violence and extravagent plots to have fun games. I think it was some game with monkeys we played, forget what it was called.

Re:Top five lamest arguments of the console war

[Alpha_Geek]

Super Monkey Ball! :)
Great party game.

Re:Top five lamest arguments of the console war

[Ill_Omen]

Give me Ico any day.

In fact, please give me Ico 2 and Ico n+1. The last time I played such a simple, fun, interesting game of that type was 'Out of this World' in '93, though Ico has much better visuals (of course). I highly recommend both.

Re:Top five lamest arguments of the console war

[Anonymous Coward]

Congratulations, you apparently fell overboard on the clue boat.

Re:Top five lamest arguments of the console war

[yunfat]

If you like Ico, you should check out Rez. Like Ico, the control is amazing and so are the graphics. Its every bit the "Panzer Dragoon" of today.

Boy, its a good time to be a gamer.

When will the lawyers come?

[Rupert]

Probably when there's something on the site other than vapour.

Re:who dropped first the price first? not really s

[Heutchy]

No, they didn't. Just a week ago, Sony denied a price cut. They were probably planning it, but I don't think they were going to cut the price until they thought MS or Nintendo were. Sony was still outselling the other two combined at $300.

Xbox modchip to be released soon

[fabiolrs]

I sent this story to slashdot some days ago, it was rejected. It seens that this company is releasing a modchip, to prove that (many people told it was a fake) they released videos and photos on their site:

http://www.xtender.info/

Re:Xbox modchip to be released soon

[tc]

I think the video is a (very good) fake. If you look closely, you can see an extra thin wire headed from the port on the TV that trails across the floor and along the side of the fridge (in addition to the two power cords). The video is a bit grainy, so it's hard to tell for sure, but that's certainly what it looks like to me.

Another obvious way to fake a video would be to take a development or debug kit, and refit it into a retail box shell (or just paint it black - you wouldn't see the difference on a video).

It's also interesting that none of these mod chips have made their way to the various Linux Xbox projects yet. This also suggests to me that they are fake.

I'm sure it will happen eventually, but my guess is that this isn't it. I'll believe it when I actually see one in person.

Re:Xbox modchip to be released soon

[fabiolrs]

ill download the video again and then have a closer look at it...

after all it is much easier to fake a xbox video than a, for instance, gamecube one since the xbox is build on the common PC plataform...

Re:Xbox modchip to be released soon

[Troed]

Some people in the UK have had these chips fitted already (they live close to the fairs where the chips have been demoed)

Don't be a dumbass

[Anonymous Coward]

" don't know if you realize this, but MS loses at least $200 per unit that they sell"

I don't nkow if you realize this, but you don't know jack about what MS does.

"...but I read it on so-and-so..." you'll say. Proving that you're a sheep. You believe anything you read because you're used to suspending common sense and evidence. Sheep.

parts machine

[Anonymous Coward]

How much can be used in a normal PC and how much would this normally cost me in parts (less then $200- ?).
Processor
video-card
hard disk
DVD player?

Re:parts machine

[RatBastard]

Processor
Yes. But why bother? P3/733s are dirt cheap.

video-card
No. Built into the motherboard. Sorry.

hard disk
Yes. But 8GB hard disk drives are really dirt cheap.

DVD player
No. The XBox DVD-ROM drive does not work in a PC.

Very strange..

[Reverend Raven]

Isn't is lovely how the Xbox, that big port box, has been out since November last year and they've already issued a price drop? Now I bought my PS2 on launch day, (same with the Cube and all my other systems) and I happily paid $300 for it (and eBay'd the other two I bought for $500), and now a year+ later they're bringing down the price..that's fine. But if I just purchased an XBox in November for $300 plus the DVD add on yadda yadda...I'd be highly pissed right now. By dropping the price this much this soon you basically spit in the face of early adopters. I'd be interested to see how much pull this gets Microsoft with gamers, as we haven't been that impressed with the Xbox and it's lackluster ports as of late.

Very strange practice, lowering the system price six months after launch. I have a feeling it'll turn more people off than get them to buy one, but what the hell do I know? I do know this, until the Xbox has serious first-party game development behind it (Halo doesn't count), or some good third-party support it won't be taken seriously. The Big N has Miyamato, Rare, Retro, and all their internal stuff. Sony has Square, Capcom, Konami, Enix, and friends so they've got good third-party software that's exclusive (for a while, anyway). Microsoft? Halo and PC ports. Bright future indeed.

PS2 Linux Kit dut to ship on 5/22/02

[DeadBugs]

The PS2 Linux Kit is coming out next week. For $199.00 you get:

Linux for PlayStation 2 version 1.0 software

Monitor Cable Adaptor

Internal 40GB Hard Disc Drive Network Adaptor

Ethernet 10/100 Base-T

USB Keyboard & USB Mouse

Re:PS2 Linux Kit dut to ship on 5/22/02

[Artifex]

Yes. However, for $400 (cost of console and linux kit) you can buy an e-machine or other clone P4 from places like Fry's.

Sure, you can play games on the console, but remember, if you want to store game data, you'll have to buy another game drive (whenever it's released) - this included drive is only good for dev kit use. And with the PS/3 already in the pipeline, I'm not sure how cool this dev kit really is. Maybe if it was a port by SuSE or OpenBSD, I'd be a lot more interested.

Re:PS2 Linux Kit dut to ship on 5/22/02

[russmay]

Sony and MS are battling for the next big thing, set top boxes. Sure, sure, they were a dud before, but companies are still trying to make it work. Sony is seeing if Linux is a vaible OS for this stuff, while MS is trying to figure it all out. Hence the Linux kit for PS2 and the current prices wars. They are gunning for a box cheap enough that just about anyone will buy one, yet priced so they can at least break even. Then they will sell services and charge connection fees.

Re:PS2 Linux Kit dut to ship on 5/22/02

[Artifex]

I think Sony just saw a marketing niche for geek hobbyists and are making money off it - they already have assembly-level development tools for their real designers. The fact that the kit won't let you read from the internal cd rom makes it clear they don't want people doing production code with the kit. =(

-5 Uninsightful

[Anonymous Coward]

Yes, smart guy.

Re:Losing money never hurt Bill -- mac soft

[Anonymous Coward]

Did you read their last annual report? I did. Development of Office for Mac is subsidized by the Office for Win32 team. The Win32 team maintains all of the pre-existing PC and Mac code, and that is the only reason why the Mac team doesn't show a loss.

Ewwww....

[Anonymous Coward]

grandmother's computer and she'd be able to find her way around without fucking around

In the future, please refrain from using the words "grandmother" and "fucking around" in the same sentence.

Thank you.

Slashdot opinions wanted

[mrm677]

I'm considering purchasing a game console to supplement my PC gaming. On my PC, I play FPS multiplayer games, flight sims, and RPGs. I'd like a cheap console to play some quick, fun, and social games with friends.

Now that prices are nearly the same, should I get a PS2 or Gamecube or Xbox? What about the price of games? Any difference?

Re:Too bad i just bought a Playstation 2 yesterday

[ProfBooty]

Well I said its too bad, because the PS2 doesnt do progressive scan which looks quite nice on an HDTV.

The PS2 definatly has for now, better games.

Losing money?

[rabtech]

I doubt they are losing as much as some people tend to think. When you realize how old the P3 chips are, MS is probably picking them up at quite a steal. Manufacturing costs and all factor in, plus a hard drive, but still. I bet they were close to breaking even at $299 (given the dropping price of components). I imagine they will be breaking even with the XBox at $199 even in one year (assuming that RAM continues to tumble and AMD's new 64-bit chips push P3 prices down even further.)

Re:Losing money?

[bstadil]

"assuming that RAM continues to tumble"

Where have you been lately. Sdram has gone up from $1.3/chip at the low point to around $2.5 Now. Slightly above $2 is the break-even point for the manufacturers. Even Hynix made a bit of money last quarter.
Cost of RAM for Xbox has increased $5 or so from launch. That is a problem. If you have followed the debate on cost then you will know that the cost of the Eternet connection is around $5.
That might not seem to you like much but MS has publicly stated that they expected Broadband to be ubiquituous by now when they made the decision to include the connection. They have said that had they known the slow uptake of broadband the $5 extra cost would not have been designed in.
This just to put the DRAM issue in perspective.

Since when is MS more evil

[WildBeast]

Since when did MS become more evil than Sony? Many people here seem to be getting a PS2 because MS is evil yet we all know how much more evil Sony really is. Copy-protected CD's, RIAA, DMCA, etc. But suddenly nobody cares.

Slashdot is a weird crowd. I also remember the day when people were favorable to a RedHat acquisition by AOL/TW. Go figure.

Re:Since when is MS more evil

[WildBeast]

btw, you should be praising Nintendo instead, they're much less evil than Sony and MS combined.

Re:Since when is MS more evil

[ZaMoose]

Riiiiiiight

Unless you were being facetious. Then it's funny.

Remember the late 80's? Nintendo was practically vile.

Re:Since when is MS more evil

[WankersRevenge]

Very true - rooting for Sony is the equivilent of rooting for Michael Myers over Jason. In the end, your screwed either way. Nintendo might be less evil, but how less evil? Like Freddy Kruegar evil? Alas.

Re:Since when is MS more evil

[bnenning]

Since when did MS become more evil than Sony? Many people here seem to be getting a PS2 because MS is evil yet we all know how much more evil Sony really is.

Excellent point. At the risk of invoking Godwin, the current PS2-Xbox war reminds me of the battle of Stalingrad. I'd be quite happy if there were a way for both of them to lose.

Re:Since when is MS more evil

[WildBeast]

oh well, live and learn :)

Re:Since when is MS more evil

[Sentry21]

I also remember the day when people were favorable to a RedHat acquisition by AOL/TW. Go figure.

I just want nice red/black coasters to counterpoint my blue/white coasters.

--Dan

Re:Since when is MS more evil

[Ziviyr]

Nintendo might be less evil, but how less evil? Like Freddy Kruegar evil?

I think "Pikachu evil" covers it.

Since I can't stand "Windows evil" and "poorly filtered graphics, DMCA rox0rz evil" I went for the yellow rat evil, that and it was a hundred bucks cheaper at the time.

Re:Since when is MS more evil

[bcaulf]

Mmm... I think you're safe. Godwin's rule applies to "You want to be dictatorial like the Nazis!". But not to "Your armored fighting vehicles are the world's best, like the Nazis'!". Nor to this case, "You are fighting a losing battle like the Nazis!"

Why microsoft still makes money on the xbox

[razmaspaz]

True, MS is losing tons of money on the box, but every console manufacturer since the dawn of time has been losing money on their console. The money is not in consoles, it never will be. Its in games. For every game you buy(even the ones not made by microsoft, microsoft makes money for liscensing. The key is to offset game profits by selling enough games. So the more consoles out there the better. Thats why ms (and sony) cut prices. MS may have a tough time making back the price cut if they dont sell enough games though. Something that has been tough for them.

XBox security is tough

[Animats]

The XBox's firmware is in a 1MB mask-programmed ROM. It can't be changed without replacing it physically.

Physical replacement of the firmware chip is possible, but requires soldering 29 wires.

See a summary of XBox vulnerabilities here.

Join the Evil Empire here and make security even tighter.

It's worth understanding how the XBox locks out non-Microsoft approved software. We might see a lockdown like that in mainstream PCs someday. The MPAA and the RIAA would like that.

Sony Vs. Microsoft Gaming = Sony Victory

[Razzious]

I have watched this whole X-Box PS2 war rage for some time. Its amazed me that the X-box has done as well as it has actually. However I have watched Microsoft make a trend of "follow the leader" in the gaming industry and yet stay behind.

Everquest...Love it or Hate it, its been a higher success than Asherons Call. AC2 is excpected out at the end of this year just in time for the Starwars Galaxy release from Sony. We know the SWG release will pull gamers that have never considered a MMORPG before. Not to mention the "Planes of Power" release coming in November from Sony

Then wait a year and get the EQ2 and once again you have the makings of a Sony Victory.

Should Microsoft think they can kick Nintendo out of the Market, they are going to have to work harder than they did to get Netscape off of the desktop. Nintendo has continually shown it can hang in the market, and if they start pumping out new releases of the OLD SKOOL NES games, the nostagia alone will make us buy it. I have not paid attention to the GameCube really, but reading Metroid info has me ready to buy one tonight! Add to that "UP, UP, DOWN, DOWN, B, A, SELECT, START. and I have the makings of a CONTRA PARTY!

Sony needs to send Microsoft an e-mail that states clearly "You're in OUR world now"

Re:Sony Vs. Microsoft Gaming = Sony Victory

[Anonymous Coward]

Add to that "UP, UP, DOWN, DOWN, B, A, SELECT, START. and I have the makings of a CONTRA PARTY!


That's up up down down left right left right b a select start, and it works on most Konami games ;p

Re:Sony Vs. Microsoft Gaming = Sony Victory

[Razzious]

I knew that sounded wrong...Thanks!

A completely unscientific stability comparision

[bill_kress]

I've been looking at the displays at K-Mart, Target, etc, and I've noticed that there are definite differences between the three boxes.

About 3/4 of the time, the X-Box is "Down" and unable to be rebooted by the kids punching at the controller or reset button. The controller is occasionally broken.

About 1/4 of the time, the PS/2 is down.

I've never seen the Nintendo down. Not even a hint of a problem, ever...

Re:A completely unscientific stability comparision

[PatJensen]

I am in full agreement with you. My trips to Target, Wal-Mart and Toys R' Us were the same. Just around Christmas time last year, every X-Box I saw had a black screen with green lettering "This X-box has encountered a hardware failure, contact Microsoft for service" or something along those lines.

I did buy a GameCube for my wife, and we've been very happy with the quality and replayability of the games I got. Super Monkey Ball is fun with a bunch of drunk friends, and I really dig the graphics in All Star Baseball.

Pat

This is new to MS

[mslinux]

MS developes software. There is no expensive 'manufaturing' process in software development, at least not when compared to hardware. All they need is code, some CDs and card board boxes. This is one reason they have made sooooo much money. There isn't that much over head in what they do. Hardware development is different, much different. The profit margins are lower, much lower. Labor costs are higer, etc. There are too many variables that MS can't control which can influence the price of the parts in the Xbox i.e. earthquakes in Taiwan drive up microchip prices. So my question is, how long can their bank account support this kind of loss? And, when will Bill get tired of a reduced income? You have to admit, he has gotten use to making a lot of money ALL THE TIME, not just during the 'good' quarters like average companies. And my comment is: this is a good example of a monopoly in action. They take a huge loss (because thay can afford it) put their competitors out of business, and then raise prices. I think it's the begining of the end for MS. IMO, Their entry into game consoles is a desperate attempt to penetrate other markets before they loose all of their software business to open source, but it's to late, and they can't play on a level field. But one thing is for sure, Bill is gonna have to learn to live of less.

What is really ironic

[Treeluvinhippy]

is the cost of the actual games have stayed the same despite inflation. I have a few Atari 2600 catalogs from back in the day, and the games prices hovered around $40-60 then.

Looking at it from the inflation perspective my father bought the house where I grew up in 1980 for $40,000. Now over the years without making any major improvements and basic upkeep he had it appraised two years ago at $120,000.

Things like houses, cars , comic books (go to your local store and compare current prices with mags from the seventies), have drastic price differences from twenty even ten yaers ago. It dosen't matter how much money you have, buying power matters, what you can get for your dollar/euro/yen/.....*, and for what modern gaming boxes cost and what they do, they are extremly cheap.

Re:Why microsoft still makes money on the xbox

[WillSeattle]

True, MS is losing tons of money on the box, but every console manufacturer since the dawn of time has been losing money on their console. The money is not in consoles, it never will be. Its in games

Hold on. MSFT loses more than $200 now on each box. NTDOY makes money on each GameCube. Sony was breaking even on the PS2 - at best they're losing $100 per box.

With games at $50, MSFT needs to sell 10 to break even with the old price. Now it needs to break 15 games per box. NTDOY makes money on each game, so each game is gravy. Sony was in gravy for any games - now they have to sell 5-10 games at most.

With these economic realities, the best thing for Open Source is people buying xBox to turn them into Linux or BSD devices - and buying either no games or just buying Halo (one copy will do).

-

Not good enough

[MuMart]

Modding XBoxes is not good enough imho.

We really need Microsoft's private key so a pure software hack can be done.

Of course they'd sell an awful lot more of those if people could run what they want on it, but that would sorta break their business model ...

Re:Not good enough

[MisterBlister]

There won't be a pure software hack. The XBOX uses a media-check system like the PS1 and PS2 and the check can't be defeated by any consumer-available CDRs or DVDRs... The XBOX won't even LOOK at software that doesn't pass the media check, and you won't pass the media check unless you've got an XBOX original DVD, a fully bit-for-bit copy (that is currently way out of the range of any consumer (or even most pro) DVD writers), or the box is modded with one of these chips to bypass the media check.

Re:Not good enough

[Anonymous Coward]

um? i dont think anyone has said it would be possible to run linux on a xbox without a modchip.

Re:Not good enough

[CityZen]

But what about a "mod" that just plugs in to the game port, like the DVD player adapter? That would seem ideal. Just plug it in, then boot your distro.

Re:Not good enough

[MisterBlister]

um? i dont think anyone has said it would be possible to run linux on a xbox without a modchip.

Actually that's exactly what the parent I was replying to suggested....Thus my reply to it.

You forgot...

[America Uber Alles]

Mace Windu kills Jango Fett, Boba's dad.

Re:You forgot...

[Anonymous Coward]

> Mace Windu kills Jango Fett, Boba's dad.

(Darth vader points to Boba Fett)
"And that means _no_ disintegrations"

looks like Mace is gonna die, killed by Boba.

Re:You forgot...

[Xeleema]

GODDAMMIT!! Someone Mod this crap down! AotC won't be showing untill Friday (00:01, I wait for thee).
Someone slap a -2, @$$h013 on the parent!

Is there a question?

[eefnork]

Gamecube. Melee. 'Nuff said.

Support the evil empires!

[Treeluvinhippy]

Sony isn't quite as blatantly evil as Microsoft, IMHO, but they are one of the major forces behind both the RIAA and the MPAA.

I agree with you. Sony has alot invested in their movies and record labels and would love to see fair use crushed like a cockroach under the boot of legislation.

However I have to admit that I support them in their endeavors to restrict my rights. When I make backups of all my games, burn Mp3's I always use Sony CD-R's. They're great and I swear by them, as a matter of fact I need to go buy some more.

Re: Support the evil empires!

[2ms]

I hope you are joking because Sony CD-Rs test out to be some of the worst of the big names. Sony, like just about all the other big names, doesn't make their own media. This is generally ok except when the manufacturers are companies like Ritek, Princo, Fornet.

I try to always have a plentiful batch of Taiyo Yudens (found on pricewatch), but when I need some immediately for workplace or something, and dont have access to my Taiyos, I look for Philips Premium Silver (made by Taiyo) and default to TDK's best (made by TDK in USA).

Major pushers of crappy CDRs include: Maxell, Fuji, Sony, Imation, and Samsung.

Don't take my word for it, find test results at places like http://home.earthlink.net/~mzupanek/cdrlinks.htm .

It really makes a difference and there are huge variations in quality. Don't just buy the cheapest. You can find the best (Taiyo Yuden and TDK) on pricewatch for cheap anyway.

Re: Support the evil empires!

[byran lei]

>Major pushers of crappy CDRs include: Maxell, Fuji, Sony, Imation, and
>Samsung.
>
>
Sounds more like you've got a really crappy CDW/CDRW drive. I've *ALL* the brands you mentioned and have never run into a problem with any of them. Then again I didn't get my drive from some Fly-By-Night outfit selling them on the cheap via the WWW.

Re: Support the evil empires!

[Anonymous Coward]

It has nothing to do with your CD-RW drive. The problems are manifested when you want to stick the burned CD into your car/crappy discman/etc.

Re: Support the evil empires!

[byran lei]

>It has nothing to do with your CD-RW drive. The problems are
>manifested when you want to stick the burned CD into your car/crappy
>discman/etc.
>
>
Like I said, you've got a crappy drive that doesn't burn disks properly. Notice I didn't say your drive makes coasters. More than likely the designers of you drive took shortcuts they shouldn't have.

Keep on dreamin'

[jhylkema]

I'm not a Microsoft fan either, but, let's face it, M$ is not going to "loose [sic] all of their software business to open source." And it is not "to [sic] late" either. Even in the server market where Linux excels, they have achieved, what, a whole 15% market penetration? What measly percentage has it achieved in the desktop market? How many tenths of one percent? And what of VA and all of these other Linux companies that were supposed to make money hand over fist? VA? Hah!

Face it, guys, the techies don't make the purchasing decisions, PHBs do. Windoze is marketed to PHBs and that's what's going to get purchased, period. I know it sucks, but open your eyes, guys!

480p on a PS2

[Phil Wilkins]

Actually, with the recent release of v2.5.0 of the system libraries, PS2 does 480p quite happily.

Re:480p on a PS2

[Anonymous Coward]

The PS2 does not support 480p.

Excuse my lack of education, but if you are saying it can support HDTV by a change in the software....Well you'd need component video to output then which the PS2 does not have, and no games in that huge library of the PS2 support this, not to mention the system would still lack Dolby DTS 5.1.

btw-- I have a xbox and ps2 with a big "50+ HDTV and the xbox really does look so much better. Not to mention sound better with the positional sound.

Re:480p on a PS2

[Anonymous Coward]

Actually the PS2 does have component out, as well as RGB out for connecting to VGA monitors (Although some glue logic is required for VGA out).

Re:480p on a PS2

[lubricated]

I will try to excuse your lack of education since you seem to spout off about stuff you have no clue about.

There is no such thing as Dolby DTS 5.1

DX9

[Anonymous Coward]

The reason Microsoft dumps xbox prices should be that they are making them (by Microsoft themselves!) obsolete through the advent of DX9 and the DX9 compliant xbox2.

I can only guess that OpenGL may suffer in this Microsoft war on itself.

Your sig

[zbuffered]

I hate youI hate youI hate youI hate youI hate youI hate youI hate youI hate youI hate youI hate youI hate youI hate youI hate youI hate youI hate youI hate youI hate youI hate youI hate youI hate youI hate youI hate youI hate youI hate youI hate you.
There, I feel better now. I'm going to run home, get real drunk, and hopefully forget about that by friday.

Re:Your sig

[fahrvergnugen]

I'm with you, man. This guy's a total fuckhead for spoiling that. Why is it when the editors do it, it's called spoiling and everyone's pissed, but when this guy does it, it's a funny .sigline?

Re:Your sig

[Anonymous Coward]

FUCK I HATE THAT GUY, and I HATE YOU GUYS TOO cause I wouldn't have seen the sig unless there were countless posts about it!!

YOU BASTARDS.

Re:Your sig

[Anonymous Coward]

F(&#%&! I bought tickets in advance to see that tonight! DAMMIT, you stupid fuck.

Canadian Prices

[ChronoZ]

For those in Canada, Future Shop sells systems as follows:

GameCube: $299
Playstation2: $299
XBox: $299

Now's a good time for buying a system..

It's the game not the system

[edyu]

Gamers care more about games than the price or ability of the systems.

Re:It's the game not the system

[neuroking]

Actually, CNN had a poll, I think it was on their website. They asked which gamers look at first. Price was 46%, games was 43%.

Naturally, CNN read this as a "strong" indicatio that price is MORE important, even though the margin of error was +-3% :P

"no plans"

[Sid Meier's username]

Nintendo still has no plans to cut pricing on the Gamecube.

Sorry if this has been mentioned, I'm too lazy to check, but Sony officially had 'no plan' to lower prices up until the other day when they did...

Re:Losing money never hurt Bill - silly troll

[Christ-on-a-bike]

"I'll never understand how geeks want government out of privacy and copyright..."

No-one in the Free Software movement wants 'government out of copyright' or 'no copyright'. That would hand all GPL code to corporations, on a plate, by making protected source code distribution impossible. Protected binary distribution might still be possible through patents or secret copy-protection mechanisms.

Separate issue: geeks want governments not to unfairly and retroactively extend copyrights, because that's unfair.

Separate issue: geeks want privacy, because that is a right. rights are upheld by the government.

"through newer regulations..."

You're trolling here. The suits against MS will not result in any legislative action. Their task is to apply anti-trust penalties. As an abusive monopoly they get special treatment. What is difficult to understand about that? What is wrong with breaking up Big Oil or Big Software, or any other abusive monopoly?

There is encryption on IDE

[TechnoLust]

They are using an IDE encryption that is part of the new standard. This controls accessing the hard drive in another machine. If the drive is put in another machine, it will not let you access it without the proper code.

As for the DVD player, I tried to rip a song off a burnt CD and it won't read them. Also, there are rumors that the game DVDs read backwards (i.e. outside to inside.)

In the words of Samuel Jackson.....

[YAN3D]

"Just cause you pour syrup on shit does't make it pancakes"

microsoft's deep pockets

[zrodney]

ms does have a lot of money, but they use that
as a reason to do nothing most of the time until
the opportunity passes. Look at the history:

webtv -- they bought it and sat on it

go -- remember go, the pda in the early 90s?
remember windows with pen extensions??

somehow, pilot was able to make an entirely new
market from something that microsoft bought,
developed, then threw away because their research
showed that nobody wanted to leave windows 3.1

so, what I'm saying is that Microsoft's huge
cash reserve actually hurts their innovation
because they have no drive to make anything new
or better.

Re:microsoft's deep pockets

[binaryDigit]

Well, I wouldn't be so quick to say that Palm "made a new market from something M$ bought ...". Don't forget that there were a great many players that came and went in that market (esp. Apple with the Newton). Palm just made a "true" PDA, vs what M$ and others tried with scaled down portables.

But that's another market segment. Yes, I agree that their huge cash reserve doesn't necessarily help innovation. It simply helps them weather the storm if they feel that they need to push through whatever technology they happen to be hawking at the time. I was being sarcastic about the "beauty" of the cash reserve and massive income (unless of course your M$).

Let's Screw Microsoft

[Anonymous Coward]

Everyone should go out and buy an XBox, since they are the loss leader, and then NOT buy ANY games.

It would only take 200+ million of us, and their $40 Billion cash surplus would be gone.

Re:Let's Screw Microsoft

[Anonymous Coward]

Or, don't buy any of their consoles, and they lose $400 per system.

Rebates

[Sasquatch666]

My girlfriend just bought a PS2 about a week ago from Circuit City and was able to get a hefty rebate back. CC's policy is if you can find it cheaper 30 days after you buy it, they'll refund the difference + 10%. Since the price dropped by $100, she got $110 in cash back from the store. Not a bad deal :-)

china reuters article

[n3r0.m4dski11z]

i know noone will read this because ppl stop reading comments after it spills into multiple pages but i was jsut reading reuters and came upon this article about how microsoft is moving its production to china. thought it was interesting...

The move to China would help trim production costs because many of the machine's electronic parts were made by Asian companies, meaning those components would no longer need to be shipped to Europe for assembly.

I agree.

[Sorcerer13]

I don't see why people take sides. Each system can do amazing things, and each has some great games and more coming in the future. Evrybody needs to chill out.

I'm sorry, but...

[dnaumov]

I'm sorry, but I will only use the XBOX when it runs the Hurd.

Re:Would all the "experts"

[Anonymous Coward]

If the XBox, at the higher price, was losing money on each set purchased, think of it now. This is could be the end of the XBox if sales don't pick up.

I think M$ should realize that they are a desktop OS maker, that is all.

Reverse Engineering.

[Anonymous Coward]

1) M$ _has_ taken special steps to prevent 'misuse' of the XBox.
2) You didn't _license_ your XBox - you bought it.
3) You may do most anything you like with something you own, so long as it doesn't break _other_ laws. A hammer can be used to smash bananas, which is not it's intended purpose. Stanley won't be suing you. Don't smash people though - there are laws against that most everywhere.

Actual Price Difference

[donnacha]

The difference isn't that great, you're forgetting that Americans have to pay an additional sales tax, varying depending on which state they make the purchase.

The British VAT (Value Added Tax) of 17.5% is built into the British price.

American Price: $200 = £138

True British Price: £199 - £35 VAT = £164

The Price Difference: £164 (British) - £138 (US) = £26

That extra £26 is necessary for two reasons:

1. As a buffer for the downwards adjustment that the British Pound will have to make before joining the Euro.

2. To compensate for the lower number of expected games sales per unit sold in the UK as opposed to the US; Americans find happiness and personal worth by buying things they don't need and are less discerning about the quality of the games they buy.

So, not such a bad deal after all.

Re:Actual Price Difference

[Anonymous Coward]

Wow, a post from a European that ALMOST made it all the way through without an unecessary, puerile, and generally moronic attack on Americans in general.

Too bad you lost your grip on the wheel of reality and crashed and burned on that last sentence.

Oh well, time for the typical American response:

Don't worry, we hate and despise you too for your complete lack of worth!

Re:Actual Price Difference

[Anonymous Coward]

I thought it was:
"Yeah, well if it wasn't for us you'd be buying your Xboxs from the Germans!"

Re:Actual Price Difference

[darien]

That extra £26 is necessary ... as a buffer for the downwards adjustment that the British Pound will have to make before joining the Euro.

Er, what? So the retail price of an XBox has been deliberately inflated (making it less competitive) against the possibility of a fall in the relative value of the pound against the dollar several years in the future? Somehow I don't think so!

Actually, this type of pricing has been going on since long before the Euro was ever seriously thought of. The UK market simply sustains higher consumer prices (in absolute terms) than the US and much of Europe, and has done for many many years. Never heard of rip-off Britain?

Re:Actual Price Difference

[donnacha]

Interesting that you presume I'm not an American; does any questioning of the values underlying American culture HAVE to come from the outside? Has the brainwashing of an entire continent been THAT successful?

American culture IS the most consumerist the world has ever seen; regardless of whether that's a good or a bad thing, it has a direct bearing upon the relative subsidy that trans-global corporations will be willing to invest per individual to capture market share.

Only when we can separate nationalistic hubris from reality will we be able to properly assess the machinations of the world's true powers.

Re:Actual Price Difference

[donnacha]

Well, yes, rip-off Britain is a factor but less so now that it's assumed that the UK will be entering a larger economic pool; pricing tends to flatten towards an international level the larger the grouping, so, anticipation of the Euro has generally caused UK prices to float downwards, not as much as actual countries in the Euro such as Ireland or the Netherlands but, nonetheless, it has been a factor in pricing decisions by the big movers.

Equally, the presumed downwards adjustment has been worked into the equation. In the case of the Xbox, for example, Microsoft have to observe the fact that consumers simply won't accept an upward movement in the price of luxury goods. Necessities such as petrol, bread etc. yes, what can you do, but when it comes to consoles the prices can only go down, otherwise the punter will feel they've lost before they've even started playing.

Economics is always hard to pin down but surely you'll accept that the rip-off Britain effect has softened somewhat since Euro-comparisions made it harder to hide.

I also hope you'll note that currency speculators are now assuming necessary 12% drop in the £ relative to the Euro, and that MS, in their long-term planning, would be insane not to follow that lead.

Re:Actual Price Difference

[Anonymous Coward]

I still say most Americans are fat and stupid ;)

ESR

[Anonymous Coward]

What they have created is a money pit crafted from insecure, non-modular spaghetti code. Many observers (such as ESR) expected IE to implode under its own weight around the release of version 4.0, but it never happened.

Yeah, ESR has a pretty good reputation for predicting the death of Microsoft. Any day now... IE will implode. Linux will win on the desktop because Windows is a larger % of the desktop price... Not to mention "I'm rich and I just want to rub it in your face..."

Makes you kind of wonder about the accuracy of the Cathedral and the Bazaar, and whether maybe it was all just wishful thinking on his part.

the dreamcast has great game selection

[AtaruMoroboshi]

What crack are you smoking?

I bought a Dreamcast late last year and I've aquired all of these games for under $30 each, most at $14.99 or less:

Chu Chu Rocket
Space Channel 5
Sonic Adventure
Street Fighter Alpha 3
Marvel vs. Capcom
Crazy Taxi
Jet Grind Radio
Resident Evil: Code Name Veronica
Sega Bass Fishing
Sega Marine Fishing
Shenmue
Soul Caliber
Virtua Tennis
Sword of Beserk
Typing of the Dead (hilarious! type at zombies to kill them!)
Dead or Alive 2
Power Stone (AMAZING 3-D fighter, a genre I'm only kinda into, this game is serious fun. I got it for $8.99 last week and have been playing it non-stop!)

There are a lot of seriously awesome games for the dreamcast that while you might have to search a bit, are worth the effort. Here's my list of games I'm currently tracking down (some are still easily availible, I just can't drop $300 on a dozen games right now.):

powerstone 2
seaman
sega bass fishing 2
skies of arcadia
granda II
shenmue 2
Street Fighter 3: Third Strike
Marvel v. Capcom 2
Capcom v. SNK 1
Capcom v. SNK 2
bust a move 4
house of the dead 2 (and light gun)
samba de amigo (and special controller)
alone in the dark 4
sonic adventure 2
crazy taxi 2
tony hawk pro skater
tony hawk pro skater 2
fatal fury: mark of the wolves
Bangai-O
Bomberman Online
Giga Wing 2
Gunbird 2
Project Justice (rival schools sequel)
Dance Dance Revolution (and dance pad)

now, i realize hunting high and low for games isn't most people's idea of a good time, but if you're up for it, the dreamcast is WELL worth the effort. Not to mention all the neat hax0r things you can do with it, like boot linux, burn your own boot discs and play nes emulators...

the fishing controller and keyboards are easily availible, as are memory cards and additional regular controllers. Aracde stick controllers are a bit rarer.

the dreamcast is well worth the investment.

I do plan on getting a used ps1 to play metal gear solid, final fantasy 7, and dance dance revolution (easier than tracking down the import only DC version), so I see your point about if you're only going to buy one console, but I think for me, that one console would be the dreamcast. I'm starting to be fond of it in the way I am fond of my iBook, which says a lot.

.

Re:the dreamcast has great game selection

[Anonymous Coward]

Or you could just download the ISO's off the net.

The Dreamcast is a great console.

Re:the dreamcast has great game selection

[Sid Meier's username]

If you find a copy of the Bleem disc (good luck) you can play Metal Gear Solid on your Dreamcast with improved graphics.

Or you can just wait, because it looks like Konami is putting out some kind of compilation deal which may or may not include a remade version of MGS using the MGS2 engine for the PS2, XBox, and PC. They'll probably give all the details at E3.

Re:the dreamcast has great game selection

[Phil Wilkins]

...and in some cases that's the only way you're going to get a copy. I had a real problem sourcing a copy of Bangai-O! Glad I did though. Insane little 2d shooter.

Re:the dreamcast has great game selection

[Anonymous Coward]

If you find a copy of the Bleem disc (good luck) you can play Metal Gear Solid on your Dreamcast with improved graphics.


Or you could use ePSXe.

Re:the dreamcast has great game selection

[AtaruMoroboshi]

Bangai-O! is easily availible in the NJ/NYC area, though it is still at $30 in most places.

Please, Please, Please.

[Anonymous Coward]

Do not buy X boxes.
as games, as would be linux boxes, as would be
windows boxes.

Didn't you read the sign?

It says "Do not feed the Beast"

Xbox is many things to MS, a new revenue stream,
and a backdoor into dominating hardware.

Think that would be too obvious a violation of
anti-trust law.
Think again.
As Madge said, "Corruption ? You're soaking in it now."

Micorosft is exploiting the weakness in all of
us by lowering prices.

So if you can run Linux on an Xbox , you are still helping MS.

help stop MS from becoming the Unicorp.

Re:Please, Please, Please.

[jwkane]

Buying an Xbox, loading it up with Linux and _not_ buying any games __hurts__ M$.

You can't actually believe that anyone could make money selling off 733+ Mhz computers w/decent Nvidia graphics chipsets and hard drive for 200 bucks.

NetBSD on XboX -

[Neck_of_the_Woods]

Link to NetBSD Hack for XboX

How-to included with loads and mods.

"Too bad i just bought a Playstation 2 yesterday"

[Anonymous Coward]

Next time buy from a place with a price guarantee. I got one for my son on April 19 at Circuit City, and got the price difference plus 10% back today.

Re:Free OSes on the X Box - soon..

[DeionXxX]

As you can see here , there are already XBox games ripped from their Discs into a format readable by Xbox developer boxes and Xboxes with modchips. The modchips are almost out and information about them could be found here.

I am an Xbox owner and I don't think I will be trying to pirate using the XBox because I don't want what happened to the DC happen to the XBox. I'm tired of having good alternatives to the giants (Sony & Nintendo) and them being stomped by the fact that Americans (and others) are more interested in getting something free than supporting developers.

BTW one of the "side effects" of the modchips is that you can run unsigned code. That's how someone would Port *nix or bsd onto it.

-- D3X

Geez...

[Mupp252]

"I'd like to know if anyone has succeeded in porting a Free operating system to the Xbox. "

Why are you interested? Because of the irony?

If you want to see Linux so badly on this machine (I assumed you meant Linux when you said "free operating system"). Tape a Penguin to the console, take a picture, and let it be. Don't be the billionth M$ hater sitting around with friends chanting "Wouldn't it be soo funny to see Linux on a Microsoft machine?"

Your statement in the article makes you sound as low as the ones here

Who cares about porting os to the thing?

[Anonymous Coward]

Just wondering.. who the hell cares about ported OS's to game consoles? Actually, why would you care? Is there any benefit to reap? The whole point is to play games on the thing, you can muck around with OS' else where. Please clue me in.

Re:Who cares about porting os to the thing?

[TheShadow]

Because if you could get a working Linux workstation/server with a decent processor (733Mhz Pentium III), a decent amount of ram, and a decent sized hard drive... for $200. That's not bad at all.

Re:Free OSes on the X Box - one more link..

[DeionXxX]

I discovered this link on Xbox-Scene.com... They've got a roadmap and such. They're looking for Xbox programmers.. who are familiar with FATX right now.

Anyway... here's the link.

-- D3X

Oops. Try again.

[Jayde Stargunner]

I'm in the gaming biz and I can tell you that this is not the case.

Microsoft annouced a few weeks back that they were planning a price drop the first day of E3. Sony then decided to follow suit "in May." (Without a specific date set.)

-Jayde

Re:Oops. Try again.

[Anonymous Coward]

Ack, I don't have my uSername or password, so, i guess i'll have to maket his note as an AC.

anyway.

Sony had dropped thier price in the far east. Or atleast in Japan to ROUGHLY 230 USD, MY guess is that they DID recoup thier losses and just sold to compete with the GameCube. At 200 bucks, the PS2 looks FAR FAR more attractive than a 'Cube.

Re:Oops. Try again.

[CynicTheHedgehog]

I'm in the gaming biz and I can tell you that this is not the case.

Perhaps, but do you have a link to a purely speculative article written by an obscure web comic scriptwriter to back up your statement?

That's right. Who da man.

Re:Oops. Try again.

[Jayde Stargunner]

I'd have to track down our PR person to get ahold of the actual releases, and she's not online at the moment... HOWEVER...you can use this for some slight reference.

http://gamespot.com/gamespot/stories/news/0,1087 0, 2865558,00.html

"The price cut had been in the works for several weeks, according to David Hufford, Xbox product manager at Microsoft. Microsoft has been working with US retailers over the last several weeks to orchestrate the price reduction and put it into effect as smoothly as possible. Following Sony's announcement of a price cut for its PlayStation 2 console, Microsoft decided to follow suit rather than wait to announce the cut next week at E3."

Basically, Microsoft was gonna annouce a price cut at E3, Sony got wind of it and decided to beat them to the punch, so to speak.

However, it was something MS was already going to do at E3 anyway, so Sony's annoucement did not pressure MS into the position. It was actually the other way around.

-Jayde

Re:Oops. Try again.

[Phil Wilkins]

I think Sony just have a better poker face than Microsoft.

press bias?

[zeus_tfc]

Did anyone notice the differences on the CNN headlines? Both Xbox and PS2 get price cuts. Both are the same original price and both are decreased the same amount, but the CNN headlines are "Sony cuts price of PlayStation, PS2" and "Microsoft slashes Xbox price" Does this seem odd to anyone else?

Re:press bias?

[Anonymous Coward]

No, it just shows that some people aren't trapped in such a nerd-state that they think English sentences need to be exactly structurally similar in newspaper headlines.

What, is your ideal world where the headlines are
"Corporation("Sony")->Product("PS2")->price_ drop(100)"
and
"Corporation("Microsoft")->Produc t("Xbox")-> price_drop(100)"
?

What, did you're brain have a compiler error trying to grasp the context?

Yawn...old news again.

[EastCoastSurfer]

I submitted this story this morning around 9am est. It was promptly rejected.

Slashdot: The place to comment about old news.

xbox

[geekoid]

Now all they have to do to get me to buy a xbox is drop the price another $300.

Price fixing?

[Merlin42]

Ok IANAL by any stretch of the imagination.

What exactly is the definition of price fixing? It seems that with other products manufacturers can only state an MSRP(manufacturer suggested retail price, but with consoles (and to a very slightly lesser degree games) the manufacturer gets to choose the price that stores sell it for. Why is this?

Re:Price fixing?

[Tazzy531]

This happens a lot in a variety of industries. Mainly high end electronics and also for video tapes/cds/dvds. They sell it to the stores for a lot cheaper and tell them that to get it for that price, they have to sell at a certain price. They are not legally bound to do so, but if they sell below a certain price, they will not receive free promotional material and other ramifications. You'll see that video tapes, DVD, and CDs have a set price that they sell out.

Occasionally though, you'll find a resaler that won't care and sell it to you for cheaper..but it's a hush hush type of thing.

Strange Indeed

[Anonymous Coward]

I really hate to say anything but sometimes u have to... Calling the Xbox "that big port box" is well wrong. I can think of only one PC game for the Xbox and thats Morrowind which isn't even out yet. Besides, is that a bad game to have on the system? Porting from the PS2 is terrible though, but who are u going to blame, Microsoft? It would be stupid for them to turn down a company who is going to pay them all those fee's. It's the publishers wrong doing, looking for a way to make a quick buck or too. And the PS2 has its fair share of PC Ports and ports from other systems. Almost every Dreamcast game is coming out for it."Sony has Square, Capcom, Konami, Enix" Well how do they have them? They make games for more than just Sony's system and all but Square and Enix make Xbox games. Which system wins, who cares its all about the games (or is it anymore)oh! and whats this about no one seems to care about linux for Xbox or DC, but for ps2 its a "must have" bah..I wish my mind was as stubborn and closed as all yours

Nintendo consoles a different breed.

[cryptochrome]

By all accounts nintendo consoles may be less sophisticated than those of MS or sony, but they no longer target the same market or game selection. Hardcore adult gamers have chosen the PS2 (and flirted with XBox), while the GameCube is primarily targeted to the kids market.

The competition between the PS1 and N64 is what sealed the deal. Because the PS1 used CDs that were less responsive but offered WAY more storage space than cartriges they could make games with far larger and more involved plots. This allowed them to target the more patient but more easily bored adult market more effectively - particularly solitary adventure gamers. Nintendo chose to use cartridges as they had before for the N64, and ended up catering to the less picky, short attention span, multiplaying kids. Despite it's better hardware. I can only think of two titles for the N64 solidly aimed at adults. (Meanwhile Sega trapped itself midway between the sony/nintendo upgrade cycles, putting the dreamcast in the shadow of the Next Big Thing and ultimately killing it when the PS2 arrived).

Lately price was also a factor, as the monstrously expensive PS2 and Xbox pushed parents towards the much cheaper gamecube for the kids. But these price drops could change that. It's odd that Nintendo may be going for the older market again with some of the newer titles, but it's going to have stiff competition with Sony's library.

Re:Nintendo consoles a different breed.

[Troed]

Anyone who thinks the Gamecube target kids should open up their eyes. The average age of the Gamecube buyer in Europe sofar is 23.

Kids?

Re:Nintendo consoles a different breed.

[Troed]

Ah. Myself I'm 28 and own a Gamecube. My feeling is that the ones calling the GC "kiddie" and touting their Xbox being "more mature" are the ones below 20 .. :) That's what I see at the different forums anyway.

Re:Nintendo consoles a different breed.

[Anonymous Coward]

amen, from another 28 year old ...

we have almost every game system known to man, sans the xbox (we even have a pocketstation) -- my favorite? the gamecube, in a heartbeat ...

and i wouldn't call it a kiddie system, ever ... especially after getting creeped out by resident evil on it ...

Not XBox 2 - "second-gen" means reduced-cost build

[Namarrgon]

Nowhere does the DigiTimes article say Xbox 2 - that's just the Inquirer reading things into it.

What is far far far more likely is that this is just a new design for the current Xbox, using smaller motherboard, cheaper parts, trimmed-down design etc, as the rest of the DigiTimes article describes. No extra features. This is standard practice for console makers to reduce hardware costs, and more necessary than ever for MS after the price slash.

No, while it might be interesting to see a new and improved Xbox every year (could be done, so long as it was 100% backwards compatible), it'd take a major ongoing design effort, and would create confusion in the marketplace. Still, MS could likely pull it off more easily than any other console manufacturer, and many people do have a burning need to upgrade to the latest thing...

No Sir!

[Anonymous Coward]

http://www.psmodchips.co.uk/index.php?show=54&expa nd=54

Re:Cost Question and Dell

[Glasswire]

Obviously, none of the would-be hardware contractors that MS talked to would have built it and sold it themselves - Ms has the brand and would sell it. The negotiation would have revolved aruond how little Dell (or anybody else) would have charged Ms for the box, thus determining how much of a loss MS would eat on each box.

Geez^2

[timothy]

Mupp252 wrote: Why are you interested? Because of the irony?

If you want to see Linux so badly on this machine (I assumed you meant Linux when you said "free operating system"). Tape a Penguin to the console, take a picture, and let it be. Don't be the billionth M$ hater sitting around with friends chanting "Wouldn't it be soo funny to see Linux on a Microsoft machine?

No :) If you've read other comments I've posted, you might know that I'm not a Microsoft hater. (Not much of a Windows fan, but not a Microsoft hater.) I think it's on the whole a good thing to have a robust market in gaming consoles, even if just for the side benefits.

I'm interested in seeing any Free OS for the Xbox -- I don't care if it's Linux in particular, though that does seem the most obvious choice.

It would be neat to get a machine that's more powerful than my current desktop system for far less money, as well as lighter and otherwise more portable. I find the x-box rather chunky for a game console (but I'm not into gaming -- I find most of the game consoles pretty big for what they are; YMMV), but an interesting size for a general-purpose computer.

Also, people who are interested in having multiple computers, whether for general redundancy, or playing with a desktop cluster -- whyever -- it looks reasonable to stack a couple of Xboxes together.

With an automobile DC-->AC adapter, it might also be a good system for the car. Certainly smaller than some PCs that people have adapted for under-seat or in-trunk use. While it's nothing but a game- and DVD-playing machine, though, not as many possibilities. If it were functioning as a decent x86 box (no longer high-end perhaps but no slouch), it could be a lot of other things, too. I'm not sure if the XBox can serve as a standalone MP3 player now (like a lot of DVD players can) but I bet it won't play oggs ;) If it were de-crippled, it could do that as well as let passengers draw with the GIMP, play music in various formats besides those just mentioned, show on-screen updates from a GPS, etc, etc. Generally, be more flexible.

There are times it would be much easier to pop in a new box than replace more than one major component; if (should read "when" but who knows?) the projects to put Linux / NetBSD / whatever on the Xbox succeed, many more circumstances would warrant that. There's a pawnshop nearby where I could probably pick up an Xbox for $150 three months from now. (X-terminal? fine. Hey, might even buy a game to play on there and *not* replace the OS! :) )

Is this what the Xbox is meant for? No -- but so what? Life is more interesting when objects are re-used in ways that they weren't designed for. Is the price based on MS selling games to subsidize the console itself? Probably, though the comments in this thread point out that there's a huge range of estimates of what the box itself really costs MS. That's the concern of their marketing department, not me. There's something my brother calls the Las Vegas effect -- the shrimp and huge breakfasts are still free whether or not you choose to pay for the industry which makes them cheap. Same applies here.

I really don't chant against Microsoft, and I wish the government would a) stop harrassing them and b) simply refuse to buy non-open software (barring extenuating circumstances) on the simple grounds that it's bad stewardship of borrowed money (taxes). Lacks accountability, comes with too many thorns. That would be a much simpler answer to dissatisfaction with the effects of Microsoft than whining while buying their products. I don't think the MS-intervention currently being pursued sets a precedent that programmers should be proud of.

(I do think that MS has done some contemptable things; I just don't think that all contemptable things justify State intervention. And Yes, I believe for reasons I don't have time to get into here that most "Antitrust" laws are harmful bunk.) Cheers,

timothy

Re:Geez^2

[Kredal]

For using it as an under-seat media player, it will (sorta) work. You can insert a music CD, and it make it copy it (in wmp format) to the hard drive. No idea how many hours of music you can do, but it will store music, and allow you to play it back at any time.

So if you really really wanted to, you could use it as an (almost) mp3 player.

even if the price was 5.00$ i wouldnt buy one

[Anonymous Coward]

even if the price was 5.00$ i wouldnt buy one
even if they were given out for free i wouldnt take one
remember what mcnealy said, "the first hit is free"

Even thought MS looses money...

[geekoid]

...I still won't buy them, and either should you if your opposed to MS.
MS will use the numbers of units sold to say, "see, we are popular, make games for our platform" so more money will go into games, it will have a percieved popularity, so them people who ,IMO, don't know better will start buying them. Once established, you'll see cuts in there game cost, until Nintendo begenis to start feeling the pinch and decides it can make more money just making games. Of course by then, they'll only be XBox to make games for.
The MS will raise the price of the console, not so much someone new can compete, but certianly to a break even point. Then you can ecpect to see game hit 100.00, and it will by the only item in your house that is already DRM certified, so you can play the CD, but not be tempted to make a copy.

This is assumiong they stick with there normal M.O., they probabl;y won't becasue they got into so much troupble from the justice dept.... oh wait.

So exactly when did "Justiice Dept." become doublespeak?

Gamecube Cracked?

[Pyrosz]

From the news reported over at Xbox-Scene.com it looks like the Gamecubes protection my have been cracked.

Re:Gamecube Cracked?

[Dacobi]

That would be rather pointless since the Cube has it's own proprietary disk
and can't read normal CD's or DVD's

Re:Free OSes on the X Box - soon..

[Anonymous Coward]

Oh yeah, and Microsoft is a little-tiny *struggling* company who is being bullied by Sony and Nintendo.

As for your rather thoughtless comment on the DC, don't forget that the giants _were_ once Sega and Nintendo. Sony was the underdog, but they delivered where it mattered and took the reigns from both Sega and Nintendo. The PlayStation was *exactly* the good alternative to the "giants" that you speak of.

MS Announces another price drop

[VisualThoy]

Just a few years after Linux has been free, Microsoft has announced they are cutting Windows XP prices by 100% to $0 !!!

Apple still has no plans to cut pricing on MacOS X.

299 euros in France

[Reez]

was the price in a Micromania shop I went in today.
Still I'd rather buy a PS2 (same price), some games are interesting me. Or a beowulf cluster of Atari pads (so much for the funny line)

Re:Free OSes on the X Box-- DCMA??

[adamjaskie]

how do you trade silicon on a P2P network.

By saying, "Buy National Semiconductor part no. XXX-XXXX (or whatever), and burn this file to it."

Sources?

[drwav]

Can you please provide some sources for what you are saying? Not that I'm saying your wrong, but this place is a breeding ground for mis-information.

Re:Sources?

[IronTek]

MS Bob: This is only my opinion, of course. But I have no doubts it is correct.

IE: Various articles over the years...most notably, Netscape's old plans to extend their browser over the desktop. This scared the hell out of Microsoft. It would've taken away their control of their own desktop.

UTV: Articles on the next XBox. Read its feature list...then check out UTV's features. You'll find overlap.

Mac Support: As for my comment on the common cores. I *think* I read this in the book, Microsoft Secrets, but I will admit I'm not totally sure if that's where I read it. If not in there, there's a chance it was in The Road Ahead (Gates's first book)...as for the "largest seller of applications for the mac," I can't say where I saw that...probably in various articles...

*note that anywhere I say "various articles" or something...I do a great deal of reading...books, internet, magazines. Try searching for the stuff...you'll find it. I can never remember exactly where because I have too much misc. information in my head...

why?

[/dev/trash]

I'd like to know if anyone has succeeded in porting a Free operating system to the Xbox.

It's a gaming system. Why should I care if a mod is out there to get me a shell prompt, when all I care about is playing Halo or whatever.

Gamecube's target market

[Aexia]

>>I'd like a cheap console to play some quick, fun, and social games with friends.

Get Smash Bros Melee and Super Monkey Ball.

Don't forget about IBM.

[glrotate]

Big Blue was once thought invinceable. How could anyone compete with a company that large weilding so much market power?

Re:Don't forget about IBM.

[Darren Winsper]

They were forced to back off because of threats of antitrust action.

My Favorite Part of these types of Articles...

[Anonymous Coward]

I totally LOVE the fact that every article announcing a price cut or upgrade includes this mandatory concluding thought:

Too bad I bought an XBox yesterday.
Too bad I ordered my TiBook 17 minutes ago.
Too bad I just bought my brand new PS2 with 150 games last week.
Too bad I just unwrapped this Big Mac with no cheez and took a bite.

After seeing that ALL stories like this are seemingly the same, I wonder if the guy's actually got an XBox or not. I think not - it just adds spice to the story, a little drama. Good journalism, like CNN's storytelling.

And if he does own one, the horrifying lesson is clear:

Improvements hurt everyone. Please, Company X, don't do it. Don't lower your price. Don't bring out a new model. Have mercy. Think of the little people who bought a unit three minutes ago. And three weeks. And three years.

For God's sake, no. Just put the price cutters down and nobody gets hurt. Easy, easy... that's it, lower the price cutters slowly, slowly.... good.

Whew. That was a close one.

Zooberman
PriceCut Preventing Hero and Pastry Chef

price matching

[QueenNina]

I don't know about other retailers, but those of you who have bought the ps2 or the xbox from Circuit City in the past 30 days get to take advantage of the new Price Match Plus, which means they guarantee their prices for 30 days or 110% of the difference back. So you not only get back that $100, but an extra ten bucks back. Thought I'd inform all of you about that... I work there and got several calls yesterday from worried customers who were assured that yes, this applies to the console drops... :)

DMCA worries

[vossman77]

I was reading that Xbox Linux Project page and with all the "Circumvention of the Xbox security" references, they are practically quoting one of the DMCA no-nos.

I hope they don't have any problems down the road, because I'd really like to see this succeed.

Three strikes and you're out!

[Phil Wilkins]

PS2 component cable

PS2 progressive scan title

PS2 dts titles

HAND

interesting

[timothy]

I didn't know it had that capability -- even if it doesn't fit my whole laundry list, that's at least one good thing there ;)

I'm guessing WMP (I'm sure this is conservative) is 1MB / minute (how off am I? :)), so, if one were to use it that way and allocate say 5GB to this purpose, that would be 5000 minutes of audio ... that's quite a bit of time ;)

Thanks for the info on that -- still not enough to make me buy an Xbox, but a positive point for sheer listening. Whether WMP is a positive point, well, not to me ;) I have heard of that format, but that's all I can say.

timothy

Re:Too bad i just bought a Playstation 2 yesterday

[MKalus]

As an Xbox owner: No not really, it's summer (well, so they claim) right now and I am hardly at home anyways.

Michael

Re:Too bad i just bought a Playstation 2 yesterday

[Anonymous Coward]

Yeah, its a little grim for MS, but I wouldn't get too twisted and plotting their imminent demise...

After all, the PS2 had a pretty serious drought of good stuff till Gran Turismo 3 came out in July of last year (so Oct to July) and even then, it really didn't start moving with lots of good stuff till October... Its possible that Xbox will be able to do something of the same thing (if not to quite the same scale)

Re:Not XBox 2 - "second-gen" means reduced-cost bu

[Anonymous Coward]

The one thing noone wants is to turn the much more profitable, easy-to-understand console market into the hash that is the PC market...

Backwards compatibility only makes sense when you've marginalized the cost of the previous generation and want to leverage the advantages of it into the current generation... I.E. PSOne to PS2. Otherwise you end up competing with yourself. As it was, Sony cut it close with the PSOne, which almost was a still-viable platform when the PS2 came out. As it turned out, their timing was good, but just imagine if the PS2 had come out a year before...

Xbox2 in September is the reason

[2ms]

Nothing surprising here. MS is following the Nvidia model, and Sony is doing what it needs to to keep outselling.

The reason Sony and MS have cut prices on their current systems is that MS is coming out with the second-generation XBOX in September.

The system of coming out with twice as good generation every 9 months or whatever along with reducing price at midway point to prevent windows for competitors, has been NVidia's method for years now.

Considering that Xbox's whole thing is that it brings NVidia graphics to console gaming, what else do you expect?

Re:Xbox2 in September is the reason

[presearch]

is that MS is coming out with the second-generation XBOX in September..
The system of coming out with twice as good generation every 9 months or whatever...

If they do, that strategy will work for just one cycle.
If in 9 months, a 2nd gen comes out, along with new games to exploit it, and 1st gen buyers are out in the cold, they won't be fooled again.

and besides, M$, and xbox, sucks. heh.

PS/2 for $189.99 shipped

[Hansele]

Buy.com has the PS/2 for $199. Go to CurrentCodes and get a $10 off $100 coupon for buy.com, then search for item 50011601 in the search box. Voila, PS/2 shipped for $189

It was rarely funny before

[Anonymous Coward]

It seems most posts modded as funny, usually are not. Occasionally someone posts a clever witticism but most of the time its jr. high level humor as noted in the parent.

Slashdot needs separate mod choices for 'intellectually funny' and 'grade school funny'. Its pretty clear which category the parent post belongs in.

Spare us please....

[byran lei]

>Now is definitely a good time to be a gamer with all 3
>next-gen systems at $200. Too bad i just bought a Playstation 2 yesterday.
>
>
What a bunch of bullshit. Only a PC Gamer would be *STUIPD* enough to recommend owning *3* next-gen systems. Only a Microsoft Stooge would make a suggestion like this. Go buy a XBox that doesn't have anything that you want for it so all your friends can laugh at you behind your back is what is really being said here.

Warning! Warning! Moronic troll at 12:00!

[Anonymous Coward]

'nuff said.

What a steal!

[DarkHelmet]

$200 for an Xbox? If you include the cost of putting a Win2k kernel on there, that means that I'm getting the hardware for free!

So does that mean if I get an Xbox with linux on it instead that they'll pay me for it?

Re:Warning! Warning! Moronic troll at 12:00!

[Jace of Fuse!]

No, Moronic is taking an XBox, updating it's dedicated BIOS to contain a boot-loader for some alternative OS, losing the ability to play XBox games, and then running an OS that won't really see any advantages from the XBox hardware.

An XBox that doesn't play XBox games is a little PC that doesn't have standard input ports (so no keyboard or mouse), doesn't read burnt CDs (so you can't put custom software on it without usign the ethernet port), and will have almost no function what-so ever.

About the ONLY use one could find for an XBox hacked to run Linux/BSD/(Insert Cool OS name here) would be a cheap web-server. That could be a pretty good use, I suppose, but putting together a cheap PC for that use of equal power would be much easier and not too much more expensive.

Am I saying some inspired geek shouldn't attempt it? Definately NOT! Working on the project might be fun for the invididual(s) involved, and might provide some useful insight for others who might want to try to find other uses for their XBoxes.

For the rest of us, though, some mass distro of Linux for the XBox just isn't useful. Esspecially since free-games are right out seeing as how the XBox won't read burnt discs.

I'm not a troll. I'm a realist. If you want a cheap Linux Box, there are better, more practical alternative than hacking up a perfectly good game consol.

I personally happen to like my XBox in working order, thanks.

the bottom line

[bassinskeet]

the reason they are gonna be losing money is not because of the drop (sure that helps), but because anyone selling the hardware will always take a loss on the system. the only gain they get is off the sales of the games. to my knowledge thats the reason why sega stopped making systems and are straight on making games. if someone else wrote this then im sorry, i didnt read all of the posts.

if you own the past, you own the future

Quick way to kill MS

[wackybrit]

MS is relying on games sales to make money because they're losing up to $150 per XBox sold. Therefore, the more people that buy Xboxes and don't buy any games for them, the more damage it does to Microsoft.

So, one of you millionaire Linux zealots.. go buy 5000 Xboxes, and dump them into the ocean. You'll have just cost MS half a million bucks.

Oh, I forgot.. there aren't any Linux millionaires.

Longer term returns

[xixax]

Someone I know who runs a tyre store was telling me how one particular franchise was willing to set up a store in a new area and run it at a loss for ten years purely to shut down any competition in the area. Add up their cash reserves and work out how long they can afford to wait to get a sizable installed base that can be leveraged later for other consumer applications.

Just for a start, how about shipping games like:
Online billing/banking?
Cheap phone calls using VoIP & MSN?
email?
web browsing?

Xix.

Not entirely true

[wunderhorn1]

The PC clone market was born when Compaq and Phoenix clean room reverse-engineered the IBM BIOS, which specifies the low-level interaction between motherboard components. After that it was simple to piece together the parts that would act like a real IBM.

The cloners were (and still are) able to sell their PCs cheaper because IBM charged ridiculous margins.

Re:Not entirely true

[denshi]

The way I remember it, clones would buy the chips from the same people who built the IBM PC's boards, and use the Phoenix/Compaq bios. But since they couldn't get the contract breaks that IBM did, they were pinched for margins to compete with IBM. When the chipsets were condensed, the clones could build boards for less than IBM (who didn't have a tradition of rapidly minaturizing board designs -- see any mid-80's mainframe), and really ate the market alive. That also started a trend: PC board design moved tremendously fast, as everyone tried to out-minaturize everyone else. Thus the conquest of the market.

I did omit the clone BIOSes, but for good reason: those just gave compatability; the new chip designs gave lower cost and supercedence.

Older than you think...

[Anonymous Coward]

Henry Ford once said he'd give the cars away if he could garauntee people would pay him for maintnence.

Maybe they're losing money on each XBox, but every XBox sold puts them in a better position to angle for developers.

Can't get away from the software

[blighter]

They don't just make $ on software that they themselves make, they make it on all software licensed to run on their machine -- which is, of course, all software sold for the machine. So you'd have to stay away from any M$ licensed software.

Best idea I've seen is just don't buy it.

How long until X-box functionality is somehow integrated into Windows? For consumer convenience of course...

But....

[MtViewGuy]

I think Nintendo will HAVE to reduce the price of the GameCube.

Remember, Nintendo originally priced GameCube at US$199 because it undercuts the price of both PlayStation 2 and XBox. With that advantage now gone, Nintendo faces the real prospect of losing many new customers to PlayStation 2 or XBox. This is why I expect Nintendo by at latest the start of the Electronic Entertainment Expo (E3) lower the price for GameCube to somewhere between US$130 to US$150.

Don't!

[Anonymous Coward]

They decided losing $150 is a good trade-off to gain the market (they never go for second-place.

They'll lose more if they lose the market, so don't buy it.

MHO.

even better

[Anonymous Coward]

Everyone go out buy an xbox, get a mod chip, then download away.

Proof that...

[Kashif Shaikh]

Monopolies are not good for video games. I mean,all us consumers have a choice, and 2 out of 3(sometimes 4) systems always succeed.

I'm glad M$ is dying on the console front, I don't want M$ to own the video game market. I love video games(and won't drop them until I get married)...

Unlike other products, DirectX1 through 8, MS cannot afford to build an Xbox2. Just half-a-billion dollars spent on marketing, plus another hundred million spent on developing, plus they are losing ~$200 smackers on each system == ShareHolders_Not_Happy.

Um

[Anonymous Coward]

I know that I'm going to be labeled anonymous coward for this, but I have a quick question. Doesn't it cost money for the XBox (and PS2) to be able to play DVDs, on top of technology costs? Like, do they have to pay the DVD Consortium for that ability or something? Or am I completely mistaken? (which could very well be the case)

and I'd rather have an informed answer (ideally back up with a source of some sort), not random numbers and spoutings...

Thanks,
MasterCKO

Home DivX player anyone?

[sarabob]

The dreamcast was underpowered compared to the Xbox.

A decent DivX/SVCD/VCD player? A decent emulator platform (mame, snes/genesis/gba/gbc/n64)? Running on x86, which everyone and their dog is familiar with?

for $200? You betcha!

Re:Home DivX player anyone?

[Jace of Fuse!]

A decent DivX/SVCD/VCD player? A decent emulator platform (mame, snes/genesis/gba/gbc/n64)? Running on x86, which everyone and their dog is familiar with?

for $200? You betcha!

It won't read burnt CDs, and 10 gigs is hardly enough for a good sized collection of Roms/Movies/Music all at once. You'd have to stream everything off of the ethernet, which assumes you already have another PC somewhere else. If it weren't for that, it would be perfect.

Perhaps...

[Anonymous Coward]

Perhaps you are that 6 year old.

Re:Oops. Try again. and again

[Anonymous Coward]

Wrong. Sony has been working on combining three chips in the PS2 into one. They announced the upcoming change in JANUARY of 2002. When I say announced, I mean to the chip producing industry not the general public. (If you are in the IEEE join the computer society- lot's of good stuff)

The purpose of the change it so to lower production costs and increase yields. They expected the new singlechip PS2's to be available in the summer of 2002. That means a price drop this summer has been in the works for several months. the new machines won't be out in May, but probably june or july. They may start selling the original's at 199 just to match microsoft but that would be their only change in plans.

It was Microsoft who had to scramble to announce their price drop. Since they don't have much control of their production they have no way of reducing costs other than begging suppiers.

time for some new 'industry' contacts, perhaps someone outside the PR department? In the fab? Look ahead...

JON

Microsoft knew it was coming.

Re:Oops. Try again. and again

[Jayde Stargunner]

This is still nothing more than speculative. Sony's always bragging about how they're working on "x technology" to make their current or upcoming platform better.

The reason Sony did it was because it was leaked on the internet that Microsoft was doing a price drop. (I looked into it, and I guess it was a leaked Wal-Mart ad, actually.)

Of course everyone knew a PS2 price drop was coming *eventually*. Heck, the system is almost *2 years old* and hasn't had a price drop yet. Really, it was a matter of *when*, and Sony had no intention of reducing their price this soon.

Sony's had no trouble selling units at $299, and was in absolutely no rush to reduce their profit margin. They only did it this soon to be competitive with Microsoft, who cut prices much sooner than anyone anticipated they would.

-Jayde