Xbox "720" "Durango" Rumored to Have No Disc Drive

[danwat1234]

[citation][nom]Anonymous[/nom]No disc drive... that't retarded! How are you going to play movies (besides Netflix). [/citation]
Bittorrent and put it on the Xbox's hard drive

 

[Guest]

If MS switched to a proprietary cartridge format, they could hinder piracy. I was recently in some Asian countries, and you can buy a 360 with a 500GB HDD filled with games for about the same price as a 360 costs in the states. You could also buy games extremely cheap. Piracy IS significantly affecting profits, and games and peripherals are the only source of profits when it comes to game consoles, which are generally sold at cost. I have no problem with companies trying to protect their profit margin, as long as it does not have a significant negative impact on the consumer, and I imagine MS will take a reasonable route. An example of companies causing a negative impact include members of the MPAA and RIAA.

 

[JOSHSKORN]

[citation][nom]shqtth[/nom]If the console does not work with my existing xbox360 games (DVD), then I will not buy it. no way will I have 2 clunky consoles in my tv room.[/citation]
I would be interested in seeing how they handle this sort of thing. Maybe by registering your game with your XBOX 360 gamertag you will have access to the game in the XBOX 720 via a download. Or, accessing the game through a cloud. Of course, that doesn't help those on slower connections.

 

[loomis86]

[citation][nom]omega21xx[/nom]Most games today install the important, constant accessed data, to the HDD. Moving to an SSD does not provide a advantage in game performance or graphics aside from load times. (and in some cases where ram is short and random seek for files and objects cause popping textures ect. that's mostly just Rage though ) so even today your games are rarely limited by the HDD or DVD (most ps3 and 360 games read from both at the same time while you play)[/citation]


In this day and age, I don't see any reason why they couldn't do away with BOTH the optical drive AND the hard drive and just load the entire game into ram from a USB stick. Put the operating system on a BIOS like chip(s). Heck, combine the BIOS, GPU, and CPU into one SOC. Saved content would go into the USB stick.

 

[loomis86]

[citation][nom]mikenygmail[/nom]Worst idea in the history of bad ideas. It's idiotic and a slap to the face to every 360 owner.[/citation]

Come one man! User your head. MS could EASILY offer a cheap external optical drive for folks with extensive 360 game libraries.

 

[gto127]

If they go with cartridge type games they are actually superior in load times. Nintendo's last home console with carts just didn't do so well because memory of the day was very small & very expensive vs optical. Still expensive but the size is no longer a bottleneck.I would like to see return of carts-No more scratched up games or failing optical pickups.

 

[Guest]

How about $30 per game? Would most people shut up then?

If they did away with manufacturing costs, shipping, import duties, margin for distributors and retailers, and offered games as a direct DL, both MS and the developers would make at least the same money as they do now (retailers where I live get 35% margin alone). At $30 a game they would probably also sell more consoles, which means more game sales, making it even more profitable than now. More profit would mean more focus from developers on the console.

Give me an SSD to play from. Offer an add-on upgradeable HDD to store my extra games on if I don't want to re-download games and my SSD fills up. Offer a cheap external DVD-ROM for 360 compatibility. For people with really terrible internet connections, let them take a USB stick to store and copy the game across for a small fee. Buy a serial key online and all game copies could work like unlockable trial software.

Amazon might have a problem with this system, but I, for one, would vote with my wallet.

 

[NewbieTechGodII]

No way...if the new XBOX does not have a DVD drive, I will not buy it period. I am using my XBOX's not only as a gaming platform, not only as a media extender, but also as a DVD player (why use two devices when one does it all?).

No DVD drive, no new XBOX.

 

[trtmerlin]

Will this mean that anyone who wishes to stay up to date w/ this "upcoming" xbox will need an internet connection? If so, how about the people that don't have internet or have limited internet access? It would be cool if they went back to a NES or a 64 cartridge type platform, however I doubt it. From the looks of it, it seems everything will be client/cloud based, similar to the netflix concept they have now.

Personally I like how things are now, except the prices of new games though ($59.99). I miss the days of quality over quantity.

 

[klavis]

[citation][nom]technogiant[/nom]Just how is your Own media better than cloud storage, have you never lost your activation code, broken a disc, reinstalled it too many times and fallen foul of securom, been burgled and lost your disc's......seriously the cloud is far superior....people need to move on.....this console will last till 2019 forget the sentiment for punch hole ticker tape.[/citation]

This is simple to answer if you use cloud storage you are not buying a game, you are paying for a software license. They can remove your use of that license when they want to. When you buy a game, the physical game, on disc, you legally own it, they can not take it from you. Simple as that.

 

[slabbo]

man, i think Microsoft sold their souls to the game developers and the internet service providers. No used games and no disk drive. So they probably want people to do away with physical media and just have everyone download games or access everything through some kinda of cloud like service. But with internet service providers wanting to charge for excessive data usage, we are talking huge amounts of profit for them at our expense.

 

[supere989]

Screw optical and go holographic!

 

[john_4]

[citation][nom]gto127[/nom]If they go with cartridge type games they are actually superior in load times. Nintendo's last home console with carts just didn't do so well because memory of the day was very small & very expensive vs optical. Still expensive but the size is no longer a bottleneck.I would like to see return of carts-No more scratched up games or failing optical pickups.[/citation]
Agree but this is more about DRM and killing used games sales and it seems rentals too.
Will never buy one, FU Microbloat if this true.

 

[john_4]

[citation][nom]slabbo[/nom]man, i think Microsoft sold their souls to the game developers and the internet service providers. No used games and no disk drive. So they probably want people to do away with physical media and just have everyone download games or access everything through some kinda of cloud like service. But with internet service providers wanting to charge for excessive data usage, we are talking huge amounts of profit for them at our expense.[/citation]
You hit the nail on the head and this will happen if they think they can get away with it. AKA tools who will buy it.

 

[mag36]

[citation][nom]omega21xx[/nom]I feel like we are going back to the atari/NES days of cartridges. lol Of course this isn't the same, but moving away from optical discs back to a solid storage seems pointless. Especially when SSD's are expensive ($1/GB) and SD cards are much the same ($0.75-1/GB)making that a more expensive solution than discs. $100 for games? nah, I'm sure they are just going to use some sort of SSD for the system storage and move to download only.[/citation]

The cost of SD is about ($.50-1GB) and think how much they will be a year from now when the system will be released. Microsoft would not want to pay blue-Ray royalty fees to Sony for every console they sell. So I Can see a media card vey easily used, and far as support for older games like they did in the past Im sure they could sell some type of optical drive add-on like they did with the HD-DVD player.

 

[daglesj]

I'd be more than happy with a removable SDD drive that you take along to the game store, plug it into the slot in the game vending machine, swipe my credit card etc. and the game is installed on my SSD in a few seconds.

Probably quicker than going to the counter and queueing.

MS could also devise a USB3/eSATA setup for installing games via optical through your exisitng Windows7/8 PC.

Or they could have installed a HD-DVD drive for the games. They paid for HD-DVD plus would help against piracy using a custom drive format.

Interested to see how it develops.

 

[TheKurrgan]

I can see why microsoft is doing this.. It has a myriad of reasons behind it.. But lets get to what I believe is the primary reason: They want all of their platforms to use the same market place.
Microsoft is pushing hard for unity across their platforms, phone, pc and game console. While this works out imo on the phone/pc front, I dont think the general availability of high speed internet (by that, using the 2012 definition of it, which is IMO 12+mbit down stream at a minimum) is there yet to support a purely cloud based purchase of video games. Especially considering the sheer size of some games today, with no chance of getting any smaller. It would seem impractical at this point to switch away from a storage medium for game purchase.
That said, I've seen Microsoft make some bonehead moves before, but never something that is flat out stupidity. They have a console lead at this point, and it would be purely bad business to try and drastically reinvent the console at this point in time. Let Sony try that and get people primed, then move to it during the life span of the 720, then at the next refresh, go this route in about 5 years.
I think the rumor of the storage-less (in terms of game acquisition) are not true. I also believe it will have either an internal optical drive that is compatible with the 360 games, or an add on drive that can be used if the elect to go with a SSD game delivery medium.

 

[ubicray]

I get a connection with 2MBps for nearly 30$ a month,and i'm not the only one who uses the internet at home,so it's not a good idea for me to buy this console

 

[Borisblade7]

[citation][nom]shqtth[/nom]If the console does not work with my existing xbox360 games (DVD), then I will not buy it. no way will I have 2 clunky consoles in my tv room.[/citation]

Yeah if my Nintendo 64 doesnt worth with my existing Super Nintendo games then i will not buy it. No way will i accept having to actually upgrade my console, i should be able to play my games on every console from now til infinity! /sarcasm

Dude, you bought the crappy console, thats how they work. If you want to be able to always play your old games you should be on a hardcore gamer system like a PC. Lower graphics, limited controls, very limited content, and games that can only be played on one specific console are the price you pay to get that cheaper simplistic console over a more expensive PC.

 

[Borisblade7]

[citation][nom]NewbieTechGodII[/nom]No way...if the new XBOX does not have a DVD drive, I will not buy it period. I am using my XBOX's not only as a gaming platform, not only as a media extender, but also as a DVD player (why use two devices when one does it all?).No DVD drive, no new XBOX.[/citation]

First of all, you need to upgrade to blu ray, then you can play dvd's on that. Second of all, dont buy it, dont play new games, keep your old system around, in fact i have an atari lyin around if ya wanna keep that hooked up and never get new things again for some dumb reason too. Blu ray and DVD drives are cheap now, they are are also goin the way of the dodo, things are moving to full digital format or the cloud. You will transfer them as files to non-internet enabled devices if needed but no more standard disc or other media formats will be released. I used my blu ray disc drive on my pc since its hooked to my big screen, but otherwise every single game i get is downloaded. They will need a model with a disc or other portable media interface for those who *laugh* dont use the internet. But there is no reason for anyone else to be using discs or anything like that anymore.