Microsoft adding HD movies and HD TV shows to Xbox Live on 11/22

[Sonikku]

Initially available content here:

http://www.xbox.com/en-US/community/news/2006/20061106-moviestv.htm

[la-li-lu-le-lo]

Hm... two thoughts immediately come to mind. Firstly, it's going to taking fucking forever to download an entire high definition film. Secondly, Sony will probably reveal tomorrow that they have the exact same feature planned for the PS3, and they'll say something like "we've been planning it since the PSX..."

[neomatrix]

unnnn x-box 360 have 20gb and hd movie is 30 gb

[madhatter256]

I betcha they will stream the video.... rather than users actually download the video files. Size also depends on the quality of the HD. It can be 480P, 720P, etc..

[Sienar]

Actually, MS has a special WMV HD fromat that can fit a 720p film on a regular dvd and acheive a remarkable level of compression. But I still bet a larger hdd will be announced and/or the option to store media on an external HD

[Sonikku]

T2 extreme HD (1080p) using WMVHD is 6 gigs or so, and MS will probably use 720p so im guessing a full on movie will be around 4 - 5 gigs...and as I understand it the movies are 'rentals' that you have 14 days to watch initially, then 24 hours to rewatch, so it's not like you'll be filling up your HD with tons of movies...they expire and go bye-bye. So it's essentially a HD-DVD rental for $6 ...TV shows are yours to keep.

As far as space, the latest dashboard update allows users to play WMV's off USB HDD's, so maybe you'll be able to download these video's to external storage?

[Shadowlayer]

Theres a rumor of a 70 gigs HDD coming for the X360

http://www.gizmodo.com/assets/resources/2006/11/291246264_38b8c2cc82.jpg

[Barc0de]

might this be a shot of the dev' hard drive?or do you trust that it is a commercial one?

[g_sepp]

Man just another way for us to spend money for points... Grrr MS stop nickel and dimeing us to death.

[sequent_blender]

Hm... two thoughts immediately come to mind. Firstly, it's going to taking fucking forever to download an entire high definition film. Secondly, Sony will probably reveal tomorrow that they have the exact same feature planned for the PS3, and they'll say something like "we've been planning it since the PSX..."

Actually, Sony have had the "Portable TV" or P-TV system running in Japan for around a year or so now, allowing people to download "rentals" of TV shows and movies to their PSP, which expire in around 30 days (some are free and can be kept forever).

[Shadowlayer]

might this be a shot of the dev' hard drive?or do you trust that it is a commercial one?

Its a snap from the Live event where they announced all this stuff.

[hl718]

Assuming it's not a photoshop, the "Microsoft" logo to the right hand side indicates a retail drive.

-hl718

[Sonikku]

it's not a PS, iv'e seen multiple pics, it was from the MS announcment of the HD video downloads. I think MS just got caught with thier pants down...

My personal guess:

The 360 Core will start coming with the 20GB HDD
The premium will start coming with either an 80 or 100GB HDD which is what we are seeing in that picture

Prices for both remain the same. I'm going to say this will be officially announced in the next few weeks, as a partial counter to the PS3 ...

[Shadowlayer]

The premium will start coming with either an 80 or 100GB HDD which is what we are seeing in that picture

Nice, but a HDDVD bundle would kick ass for sure.

Anyway, something is better than nothing...

[The_Panda]

Sonikku was absolutely right on all fronts. The HD movie files will be around 5 gigs and will be 2 week rentals. From what I read you can't watch the movie freely for those two weeks; instead, once you start watching the movie you have 24 hours to finish it or rewatch it and then it becomes locked. Standard definition movies and TV shows will also be available and it seems like they're getting a pretty decent line-up of content.