so the xbox 360
is going to have a removable hard drive according to several sources. some have speculated that this will become the xpod, or msft's challenge to apple's ipod. personally, i don't see msft explicitly developing a directly competitive product to the ipod, but i can imagine msft putting windows media 5.0 on a device developed by a 3rd party e.g., samsung. the thing is, msft is not in the business of making hardware: it's not really in the company's DNA, per se (despite the xbox and xbox 360), and so i think that msft will leave peripheral development to outside parties. in fact, this is in msft's best interest: by allowing 3rd parties to develop peripherals that tie into the 360 via usb ports, msft can require these companies to put msft's proprietary software on these devices, and most likely generate revenue from licensing agreements. further, if these peripherals are successful, it will make the xbox 360 that much more compelling.
posted by janimal @ 11:15 PM
1 comments
1 Comments:
Well, one important thing to bear in mind is that microsoft has been bitten by using non-proprietary components in their systems. This is actually part of the reason that they're developing a removable hard drive for the 360 to begin with. One of the graphics chip developers, I think it's nVidia, owns the license to some of the hardware in the xbox 1. Now, if Microsoft wants to make the 360 backwards compatible it is going to have to use those components again, or at least be compatible with them, and that means paying nVidia another nickel for every 360 sold. But there's a catch. If MS can move those components into an optional, removable part of the console (i.e. the removable hard drive) they can pay a smaller licensing fee--a penny on the head instead of a nickel. That is part of why they did it. Notice how Sony is trumping Blu-ray or whatever it's called in their discs. MS is going proprietary with their discs, and I'm sure it's because of the nVidia business. Their relationship soured, and MS doesn't want to owe them anything.
That said, though, you make a good point. Jumping into the mp3 player game is not unlike jumping into the console game, only this time apple dominates the market. I mean, the way these kids are with iPod the word iPod itself means mp3 player, just like coke means soda. Apple is the goliath here, and I'm sure MS knows that. If they do roll out an xPod it will be no small deal.
Either way the removable drive is likely to have some kind of media function. All 360 games are required to support custom soundtracks, and you need either a hard drive for that or another PC (which you can hook up to through media center).
I will definitely be buying an xbox 360, but I will be a tad bitter to buy another mp3 player. I got a dell dj recently and I'm happy with it.
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