Microsoft Confirms HDMI Xbox360 on XNA GSE forums Posted by XanTium | March 25 22:26 EST | News Category: Xbox360

For those who still don't believe an Xbox360 with HDMI port is coming a Microsoft XNA Framework Developer probably unintentionally confirmed it for you. To this question asked on the official XNA Game Studio Express forums: "Will the HDMI output on the revised 360 require any code changes. I am hoping some developers have a beta unit and can answer this question." He answered: "No changes required." The first HDMI-enabled Xbox360 will probably be a Black 'Elite' limited edition that will also come with a 120GB HD and will retail for $479 in April 2007. Some blogs/sites claim Microsoft will announce it this week. The 120GB HDD addon and Black accessories will probably also come out in April. And according to our sources close to Microsoft, the normal Pro and Core Xbox360 SKUs will also get a HDMI port in ~June 2007.

Hell Yeah HDMI now I can buy a 360!!!

so everyone else just gets the shaft... bummer

great news my current 360 is f@#king up and gettting rather annoying
didnt want to go and buy a new 360 untill the new boxes come out i dont want ne more heat problems
HDMI is also good
Rip

Well like I said before, What the hell is MS thinking! What is going to happen to the rest
of us who already have an xbox without HDMI?geez I can't believe I just paid $400 for this.

Well now I'm really not sweating it if they break out the ban hammer on the firmware.

Sorry for my last post (that got removed) mods. The "First Post" was just a joke, again HDMI = Great news

great news for us, the people that have been waiting with soooo much ( read a lot of )patience without having a 360 and just our xbox 1 and xbmc.

by the way: why the hell PAPutzback1 wanted to know that info? who is he?
and i only care for the first question.

older 360s will still run and play everything you bought it without hdmi knowing that. its only usefull for those with hd sets anyways and you can still use vga to get high def anyways.

thats some bs that the the ms loyal fans that ranout and bought it onlanch will get the shaft. they better at least send us some kinda rebate when we have to buy the hdd. f'ing bull

Yeh I'm waiting liek the rest of you for these xbox's to be released. If they do it smart they will sell alot more 360's. HDMI+120 gig HDD=me buying a 360 (providing you can still change the firmware). Hopefully it will have the smaller cpu as rumored and hopefully soon enough all games will use the HDD to cache data so that games load faster.

Lets hope the price is right.

Looks like Bill just gave us all the big black one... Literally.

Good thing I have a Gamestop 1 year replacement plan. I bought my 360 in Dec so ill just take it back in Oct and get a brand new 360 with HDMI! Hopefully they will have they will have the 65nm cpu by then and make a lot less noise.

Does any one know if and when this is coming to NZ?

It would be nice if they provided some sort of addon for the 360's without HDMI to upgrade to... I don't think USB2 can provide the bandwith required for this sort of addition however, maybe a box that is plugged into the AV output that can take the individual signals and convert it to HDMI, there are boxes capable of turining VGA into HDMI and the XBOX already puts out 5.1 digital sound through the AV port - I'm unaware of whether or not it would be capable of higher quality sound... oh well... maybe mobos will get cheaper...

I kinda doubt they will replace a current premium xbox360 with an "elite" 360 because everyone would be trying to do this. By the way. If im not mistaken all benQ drives currently don't have hacked firmware can anyone verify this? If this is true then all ms has to do is keep releasing all future systems with variantions of these benQ drives and the scene will be screwed. So far all hacks including the hypervisor explot only work with systems with drives with hacked firmware. So you are screwed not only by having the wrong kernel but also for having the newer quieter drive.

Well its unfortunate that we get the shaft, but Im not complaining. I mean I did get my 360 for free. And once this one craps out, I still have my extended warranty to fall back on so maybe theyll replace it with a HDMI one?

Oh well, time to get an older XBox360 on eBay at $150...

If 10% of current XBox360 owner are going to "switch" to an HDMI version we'll see a lot of "old" XBox360 on eBay (with prices between $150 an $250).

If Microsoft start shipping a 120Gb disk with this "Elite" I'd expect 120Gb disks to be sold on eBay at $200 (sounds fair to me since 20Gb is $99) and "core elite" floating at $349.
...eBay scalpers will love this...

and regular component cables...the HDMI is really just a convenience AFAIK, maybe small positives, but as a whole, it's not like you are missing all that much with regular component on the hdtvs.

Not pleased about this at all. I bought this console expecting it to be the top of the line for the next 5 or so years (As was the projection from Microsoft at the time - That is, the extended console lifetime expectancy).
Not only do they offer up a broken design for a console (I'm on my third now, and I'm now coming out of my year warranty), but now they offer a repair job - for another $600. (If it even comes with the upgraded CPU).

I will certainly not be buying this 'elite' console and will think twice about buying a Microsoft console in the future. Sony is not exactly the best company in the world to jump ship to - But this will certainly be playing a big role in my next choice. $650 is a lot of money for a Uni kid, and now I'm stuck with yesterdays news. I'm used to that with my PC - But not with my consoles.

So funny reading this, all the people complaining about getting shafted are the same people that would have been complaining about the console being 600$ (had it had these new features on release)

If you're using component and digital output 5.1 audio has no difference than HDMI.

The are only a few differences...

1) That you use one less cable if your TV happens to have 5.1 audio built in or that your amp has HDMI, which most don't right now.

2) HDMI sends out the signal in digital, and component is analog. (No damn difference over short runs. (Short runs = Anything less than 100 meters))

3) HDMI gives the powers that be control over DRM. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Digital_Rights_Management

HDMI isn't all what it's cracked up to be! It makes no difference over what you're seeing or hearing right now if you're already using HD with 5.1 audio!

The only difference is that the new xbox360s may run cooler! Which of course is a good thing, but that comes with tech getting better and cheaper over the years and has nothing to do with HDMI!

we know what path must be taken now!

Go Microsoft.. I can't wait to trade up!

HD-DVD over component has always seemed a little cheezy to me. I'm glad they're finally getting around to it.

Whoever has taken an LCD that does both VGA and DVI and says there is no difference is lying to you. Pixel perfection versus digital to analog to digital. Yuk.

-dp

Actually HDMI is very "fragile" to EMI so cables should be as short as possible.
HDMI has ICT, wich is a sort of macrovision, not something good but neither something that could ruin my day (well, I'm not expecting to "dump" component video to a recorder either).
And HDMI actually IS better than component on LCD and Plasma, it's sharper.

What would you gain going from VGA to HDMI? Nothing.

Digital(Xbox) --> Analog(component cable) --> Digital (HDTV)
Digital(Xbox) --> Analog(Vga cable) --> Digltal(HDMI) --> Digital (HDTV)

Much better is to:
Digital(xbox) --> Digital(HDMI cable) --> Digital (HDTV)

Ok is time to start dumping your old ass 360 for the new HDMI box. Ebay here we came

The sad thing is that current XBox360 probably could output digital out (since is the same board, the only difference lies in the HANA scaler) and is not doing it because it would lack the scaler (no big deal on a digital set who has his own scaler) and the HDCP stuff.

i don't mind having a HDCP free box at all.
we should all thank ms for launching a HDCP free HD-DVD player.
the original xbox360 is one of the reasons, that MPAA can't fuck us with the ICT flag until 2012.

just my 2 cent.

Quest

Uh, you have the Image Constraint Token (ICT) thing backwards. First of all, the image constraint token is a software setting, on the HD-DVD discs themselves (and not a single disc has this enabled). What the ICT does when enabled is that it lowers the resolution of the HD-DVD disc to a maximum of 540p instead of 1080p when using an analog connection. Therefore, the only way to prevent the possibility of your HD-DVD player becoming virtually useless in the future is to have an HDMI port (Well, DVI with HDCP is allowed as well, but that's not very relevant for the 360). Notice that I said possibility, because nobody knows for sure whether this will ever happen, but regardless, if you're buying an HD-DVD player, the smart move is to future-proof yourself with HDMI.

Also, the posts a few back about how it would be preferred to prevent a useless Digital to Analog to Digital conversion is very true as well.

Anyway, what needs to be confirmed is whether this will use the 65nm CPU, because while black is the preferred color for me, and HDMI is nice but not necessary, having a cooler running and hopefully quieter device would be the biggest factor in my getting this edition. (I currently don't have a 360 at all, so that makes it a much easier decision.)

Every analog output is "ICT free", not just only the XBox360 + HD-DVD reader.
Anyway it's a bit of a bother, I don't think there's people wanting to rip 1920x1080x3x29 bytes/sec (that's 172Mbytes/sec!) with their home grabber (I don't think that that kind of grabber exist either).
Actually I haven't enough space to store a 619 Gbytes/hour temporary uncompressed HD/BD-DVD video.

Read my last post, the one above yours, for why you are entirely wrong again.

just to remind people alot of people's lcd tv's native resolution is 1360x768

in that case useing the hdmi port will result in a 1280x720 picture

to get the best resolution you which is 1360x768 you would still have to use the vga port

for me there is no point in going to hdmi on my xbox as i will loose resolution

Why should they give you a free upgrade or rebate?? What world do you live in? No matter what you are buying or when you purchased it there is an inevitable risk that it will become obsolute. You might as well grow up and accept it.

Should Toyota upgrade all 2006 Camry owners to 2007 models just because they are loyal? Am I entitled to a 101" Panasonic Plasma screen just because I bought a 50" a couple months before? Whether it's Cars, Toasters, or Video game consoles nobody is entitled to free upgrades or rebates to the next model simply because they deem themselves "Loyal". If you think you're being screwed by Microsoft, well then you need a reality check because every company behind every product you've ever purchased has probable screwed you.

I was wrong about ICT over analog media.

Still, are you sure that XBox360 is ICT free ?

g8crapachino, still something feels a little dizzy in their back.
It's probably because there was no price drop, so this new version is coming out of the blue, in two to three months a today XBox360 owner will get, at the same price, a beefy unit with an HDMI port (and that's matter since XBox360 is "next gen-ish").
That's a wrong move (and the 120Gb disk when stores still have a $99 tag for 20Gb ones is a wrong move too) that could hurt Microsoft.
No matter if it's still cheaper than the other gaming console, they slapped their market for some dollar, now what ? lowering the 20Gb unit price to $79 while the 120Gb is going for $150 ?
I don't think I'll like that...

AGAIN, its not the hardware that has the ICT, the software does. The hardware has to abide by it in order to be sold. IF HD-DVD discs ever show up that with the ICT enabled, then the best you will be able to get on the 360 from your VGA and component cables on an HD-DVD disc is 540p. HDMI on the other hand, being a protected path, can display the full 1080p from HD-DVD no matter what.

ICT will not be implemented until well after 2010/2012, by which time the HDMI model will be plentiful and/or the next-gen 360 will be available.

For people complaining about this new SKU - don't. Noone forced you to buy the 360. You knew it didn't have HDMI output when you bought it. If you didn't know, then try to research what you purchase in the future.

Martin

HDMI will send out true 1080p (for films, games are unaffected) only if both the player and the display are considered "safe".
The fact now is... is the software inside the XBox360 (that's some code inside the HD-DVD, somewhere into a flash... so a bit of hardware itself) ICT free ?
I don't think so... and this doesn't matter anyway.
Gaming are much better with digital output and nobody will use ICT for games.

does microsoft also fix the motherboard design so it will have better reliability so it doesn't broken and give the 3 rlod error message ???

"You knew it didn't have HDMI output when you bought it. If you didn't know, then try to research what you purchase in the future."

Actually I was expecting the XBox360 before day one and nobody told me (or anyone else) that it hadn't a digital out interface.
We actually spent some time looking for an XBox360 DVI connector on MadCatz site (that had some sort of agreement with Microsoft about third party cables and optionals).
Still there was no clue that XBox360 had no DVI/HDMI output... if you knew should, please, point out the source of your knowledge ?

sure, but i didn't know there will be a hdmi version i thought that this is going to be final version (or that later versions won't get anything added. fixed - yes, added-no)

Especially after MS has DENIED to strongly for so long that HDMI is not on the cards... At all...

* Microsoft is planning to launch an IPTV service over Live = Fact.

* Microsoft is releasing an HDMI equipped 360 console = more or less confirmed.

* Protected content over said IPTV service on any current 360 = Screwed!


Why the hell are there people in this thread trying to convince the rest that this is a meaningless upgrade? The writings on the wall. There will be two tiers, the 'Haves' and the 'Have Nots'.

OOOO a new 360 just after the next upgrade on live : exspect alot of brick ups BE WARNED !! I'm on my 2nd and last 360 , if you cant install the games properly like you can on a pc whats the point in a 120gb hd , ide rather upgrade my pc now and get the best graphics i can and install the friggin game properly , and not get clunk clck wait 2 min for it to load up , what a piece of shit

I bet these little 360's have a cute BenQ drive like my newest 360 does!

I just seem to love my samsung xbox

best save me some pennies then

It would allow 1080p output, because the 360 is set up to output 1080p over VGA and not component. If the box plugged in and activated the VGA pins, then you would get better Hi-def signal than the 480p for DVD and 720p limit for HD-DVD that the component cables force. A person could then use the HDMI input on their TV to get this signal as not all HDTVs come with a VGA input but all new ones have HDMI. I agree it is better to keep the digital signal, but this would at least allow a higher resolution than the component cables provide.

Sorry, I had to post for the first time in years to type this to you.

ICT is Image Constraint Token that is a feature enabled in software on an HD-DVD movie disc(also on Blu-Ray Disc, no current releases of HD-DVD or Blu-Ray movies have these yet). It does not exist in software within the Xbox 360 nor the HD-DVD player itself. It's a feature that tells the player(360, or standalone HD-DVD player, or PC) to downscale the output from the user's desired resolution to a maximum of 960x540p if the hardware does not have HDMI, or DVI w/ HDCP(HDMI has HDCP standard), or whatever with HDCP. Basically you end up with the movie, but depending on your TV or monitor's native resolution, you could get a seriously pixelated image, it's meant to screw those without digital/HDCP'ed hardware.

And no, developers will not use it for games, because basically they can't, games are on DVD, not HD-DVD, and even if they were on HD-DVD, what would the potential user be pirating...video? ICT is meant to prevent people from recording the film through a capture method.

Great!

The sad thing about this generation is that this is the first improvements of many to come by M$ Sony is not far behind with the removal of the Emotion Engine in the PS3.
The truth is that they will change their machines a lot because both wants the first place in the market.

This is good for us because will get a lot of things we want on future releases.

360 w HDMI + 160GB HDD, thats great!

Maybe a future release will be a 360 with integrated HD-DVD or Blu-Ray (depends on the winner).