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Gates May Announce Xbox 360 DVR At CES
Via Kotaku, an article at the Seattle Times offers an interesting theory on what might be an important part of Bill Gates' keynote at CES next week. According to Times writer Brier Dudley, upgrades and licensing for the Xbox 360 could be a big new feather in Microsoft's cap: "I've speculated on my blog that Microsoft may be preparing to license the Xbox gaming platform to consumer-electronics companies. In particular, Microsoft could work with Toshiba to develop a digital video recorder with a hard-drive, high-definition HD-DVD drive and Xbox gaming capabilities. They're already allied against Sony and other backers of the Blu-ray DVD format, and Toshiba could help Xbox finally penetrate the Japanese market." Toshiba has repeatedly denied the possibility of a 360 unit with a built-in HD-DVD drive, it should be noted.
Between a nice sale and gift card I bought the 360 HD-DVD addon for a song. An HD-DVD player for (practically) free that didn't take up an extra set of Component inputs, how could I loose? Plus I could now watch Heroes season 1 on HD-DVD (I missed all of the first season on TV).
Unfortunately it didn't take me too long to realize that my 360 is just too flippin' loud to enjoy movies. It's one thing if I'm gaming, but if I'm watching an old classic I'd rather not heard the buzzing of those fans. Since I was already jazzed to get Heroes I decided to return the unit and get the cheap Toshiba HD-A2 for a small price instead.
If they want to seriously consider doing this, they need to engineer the unit so it's a lot quieter or perhaps makes sure it doesn't get so loud with age.
Just imagine, a cheap device that is "360 compatible". Plays any Xbox 360 game. Has any set of features any number of licensed OEMs would like to put in. HP could make one. Dell could make one. Panasonic could embed them in TVs.
If the licensing outlay is cheap and competitive enough, it would kill Sony.
It seems a bit far-fetched, though.
I am government man, come from the government. The government has sent me. -- G.I.R.
This simply isn't happening.
The rumor within MS is that Microsoft would announce another VERSION of the XBOX 360 with PVR capabilities and Cablecard support. It is my understanding that this hinged on getting at least one of the major cable companies (TimeWarner and Comcast) on board. This apparently did not happen. Therefore, there will be no 360 PVR.