Nextbox rumors..

Am I wrong in believing that the Blu-Ray in PS3's is slow and poorly suited for gaming, which is why they have such large required installs? Has the tech improved?

I watch no more than 5 or 6 DVDs a year at this point. If Blu-Ray does become important to me, I'd still rather pick up a standalone player on the cheap. I remember deciding that I would get a PS3 for the eventual release of the LotR trilogy on Blu-Ray. Turns out that by the time it happened stand alone players were cheaper and smaller, and I stream almost all of my movies, in HD.

I don't think Microsoft has to include Blu-Ray, but its not a bad option if they are interested in higher volume discs for games. Once they have Blu-Ray, I think the mindset that Blu-Ray is essential will fade away. It's been propped up by Sony PR up to now.

Jayhawker wrote:

Am I wrong in believing that the Blu-Ray in PS3's is slow and poorly suited for gaming, which is why they have such large required installs? Has the tech improved?

I watch no more than 5 or 6 DVDs a year at this point. If Blu-Ray does become important to me, I'd still rather pick up a standalone player on the cheap. I remember deciding that I would get a PS3 for the eventual release of the LotR trilogy on Blu-Ray. Turns out that by the time it happened stand alone players were cheaper and smaller, and I stream almost all of my movies, in HD.

I don't think Microsoft has to include Blu-Ray, but its not a bad option if they are interested in higher volume discs for games. Once they have Blu-Ray, I think the mindset that Blu-Ray is essential will fade away. It's been propped up by Sony PR up to now.

Do you represent the majority of consumers? They aren't going to actively market to somebody that's already going to buy an xbox. They're trying to sell xbox's to people that aren't automatically going to buy one. That's why they've been trying to position themselves as an overall media device.

As much as MS might want it to blu-ray isn't going away any time soon, and streaming isn't the one whole solution for media.

Plus without everyone having awesome, speedy,reliable internet and every console having large amounts of hard-drive like storage they need a method of delivering games that are quite large right now. We're filling blu-rays and shipping games on 3/4 DVDs now, what's it going to be like in 10-12 years? (12 years ago Deus Ex shipped on 1 CD and Baldur's Gate was on 6(?) CD or if you're lucky 1x DVD). That issue has probably been done to death in this thread though.

iaintgotnopants wrote:
Jayhawker wrote:

Am I wrong in believing that the Blu-Ray in PS3's is slow and poorly suited for gaming, which is why they have such large required installs? Has the tech improved?

I watch no more than 5 or 6 DVDs a year at this point. If Blu-Ray does become important to me, I'd still rather pick up a standalone player on the cheap. I remember deciding that I would get a PS3 for the eventual release of the LotR trilogy on Blu-Ray. Turns out that by the time it happened stand alone players were cheaper and smaller, and I stream almost all of my movies, in HD.

I don't think Microsoft has to include Blu-Ray, but its not a bad option if they are interested in higher volume discs for games. Once they have Blu-Ray, I think the mindset that Blu-Ray is essential will fade away. It's been propped up by Sony PR up to now.

Do you represent the majority of consumers? They aren't going to actively market to somebody that's already going to buy an xbox. They're trying to sell xbox's to people that aren't automatically going to buy one. That's why they've been trying to position themselves as an overall media device.

I have no idea how average or not that I am. What is the total number of Blu-Ray players sold versus the total number of PS3's sold? It's not an essential feature for a game console because players are cheap, and frankly, are easier to set up in a hometheater with specific settings than tying it altogether through what you game with.

Blu-Ray is going to be around for some time. But I suspect it is going to have a vastly shorter life than DVD's or VHS.

But no one answered my initial questions. I really don't know the answer. Was the Blu-Ray a net negative for gaming, since they are slow and required large installs? Is this something that has improved since the PS3 debuted? Will Microsoft be buying into a poor format for gaming in order to increase their chances of owning the living room?

Jayhawker wrote:

But no one answered my initial questions. I really don't know the answer. Was the Blu-Ray a net negative for gaming, since they are slow and required large installs? Is this something that has improved since the PS3 debuted? Will Microsoft be buying into a poor format for gaming in order to increase their chances of owning the living room?

A quick search on Newegg shows that blu-ray drives are up to 12x, and the PS3 slim review on Engadget mentions a 2x drive in the console revamp.

Not sure if that helps at all.

I think ps3 is using 5400 rpm hard drives as well. That would cause longer installs.

shoptroll wrote:

I think ps3 is using 5400 rpm hard drives as well. That would cause longer installs.

This is correct, or at least it is for my old fatty PS3.

To answer Jayhawker's question about blu-ray, yes it's sped up quite significantly since the release of the PS3. I havean 8x drive in my laptop and one of the newer 12x drives (like trueheart mentioned) in my desktop. Speed of the drive itself isn't really a seriously limiting factor anymore. Or at least it doesn't have to be in a newer console.

I wonder how much of the speed thing is the manufacturer trying to keep costs down (do optical/hard drives get significantly more expensive when they get faster) or if there's other issues such as supporting those speeds in the console firmware and games. The other thing that occurs to me is that even with minimal cost increases they might not want to go for the latest and greatest every time they can for the DRM/security aspect, I'm thinking of how people manipulate every component they can to break things open, and more models will mean more checking.

Scratched wrote:

I wonder how much of the speed thing is the manufacturer trying to keep costs down (do optical/hard drives get significantly more expensive when they get faster)

Definitely for hard drives. Looking on NewEgg, there's a $70 difference in price between a WD Caviar Green (5400 RPM) and WD Caviar Blue (7200 RPM) for 1 TB drives. I'm sure there's other factors involved like cache sizes, but slower drives tend to be cheaper for the consumer. Not sure if that's the case when you look at manufacturing costs or when you're not trying to make a profit off a single drive vs. a full system like a console.

With the Blu-Ray drive on the PS3 you've also got to remember that it was one of the first Blu-Ray drives available on anything. At the time I'm not sure you could get a faster one for any price.

Well, that makes sense, if they are getting faster. I don't see the advantage of a massive storage capability if net result is that ou have to install the info, and it takes forever to do it. Put it on multiple discs and burn it to the drive quicker.

All I really hope for the Nextbox is that MS releases it, "When it's done." It's pretty obvious that the 360 needed 6 months to a year more to actually be ready. I'm guessing MS is still happy overall, even with the ridiculous loss they took repairing and shipping them. But I don't think MS has to be first to market anymore.

Jayhawker wrote:

All I really hope for the Nextbox is that MS releases it, "When it's done." It's pretty obvious that the 360 needed 6 months to a year more to actually be ready. I'm guessing MS is still happy overall, even with the ridiculous loss they took repairing and shipping them. But I don't think MS has to be first to market anymore.

The 360 did what it was supposed to do with it's release date, which was get a big head start. While I don't think they want to right off another $1B hardware issue, I think there's a date on the calendar when this things going to come out.

I think they've learned enough hardware development lessons to not have something like the RRoD this time around. But time will tell.

The "Blu-Ray" part isn't very important, what matters is how big the discs can be. Single-layer BluRay can do 25 gigs, 50 if you go dual-layer, so that should last quite awhile. HD-DVD didn't get that large... I think it was 15 and 30.

Regardless, I suspect the DRM on the new generation is going to be so nasty that I won't be interested in buying. The whole idea of games as a service requiring an online component, instead of a product, is not a trend I like. It's not something I plan to throw dollars at.

Malor wrote:

The "Blu-Ray" part isn't very important, what matters is how big the discs can be. Single-layer BluRay can do 25 gigs, 50 if you go dual-layer, so that should last quite awhile. HD-DVD didn't get that large... I think it was 15 and 30.

There are versions that go up to 128GB. The trick would be getting a reader in the base model that can support it for the future when it's needed.

I thought part of the reason why the PS3 did installs was because even if Blu Ray is fast you're asking the drive to access much more data. So any speed up, however small, is a speed up.

Plus Sony just tends to think this way. They had installs on the PSP towards the end. I don't think it's an argument agains Blu Ray as much as it's a question of whether a given system can handle streaming thy much information off the disc.

More curious why installs are talked about like a bad thing? We do them on every system with a hard drive (PC, 360, PS3) because the hard drive is always faster than the optical drive. Then every time we play the game, it loads faster. One slow install for dozens of faster loads down the line seems like the right thing to do.

I think the happy medium is to do it the way the 360 does it: optional installs for faster load times, if you have the hard drive space. That way there's no "Yay, just got home with a brand new game! Now to wait half an hour before I can play it!" problem. And it also gives them the ability to release SKUs with smaller hard drives without forcing people into an "Okay, which three games can I have installed at one time?" scenario.

TL;DR version: Reasonably-sized optional installs good. Large required installs bad.

All this talk about which physical media and particular spec of blu-ray is a little depressing, can we not have digital-only yet?

Crhis wrote:

All this talk about which physical media and particular spec of blu-ray is a little depressing, can we not have digital-only yet?

I'm with you, but that discussion will be even more depressing.

Crhis wrote:

All this talk about which physical media and particular spec of blu-ray is a little depressing, can we not have digital-only yet?

Is good broadband universal yet?

Crhis wrote:

All this talk about which physical media and particular spec of blu-ray is a little depressing, can we not have digital-only yet?

Why shouldn't we have both? There's no reason to alienate either side of that argument at this point. There are some compelling arguments for keeping physical media in these boxes. I've never heard a good one for why they shouldn't feature a disc drive, whether it is used by a particular user or not.

MannishBoy wrote:
Crhis wrote:

All this talk about which physical media and particular spec of blu-ray is a little depressing, can we not have digital-only yet?

Is good broadband universal yet?

Not by a long shot, at least not in the US.

hbi2k wrote:

That way there's no "Yay, just got home with a brand new game! Now to wait half an hour before I can play it!" problem. And it also gives them the ability to release SKUs with smaller hard drives without forcing people into an "Okay, which three games can I have installed at one time?" scenario.

Guess I'm used to that from PC gaming for years. And the PS3 is a lot quicker than some PC games I've had on disc.

As to the multiple SKUs, that's actually a bad thing. Not having a standard HD on the 360 was a big problem with backwards compatibility. And having the 4GB version strains what you can enjoy from XBLA. Or yes, prevents us from heading towards that download-only future mentioned in the last couple posts. Granted they've tried to alleviate some of that with supporting USB drives, and at least that's a cheaper option than buying a bigger hard drive from Microsoft.

But I'd expect every future console to have a decent sized hard drive from now on.

The lack of hard drive was a lame move by Microsoft. I do like that you can expand them, though. But 20 gig should have been the minimum.

The real reason we will not see download only titles is that for now, the console makers need Gamestop, Target, Walmart and Best Buy. They can't afford to make end around on them. It is dicey just realeasing a game to be available as downloadable on day one.

But all of this discussion is pointless. There will only be three games realed for the Nextbox, as Microsoft announced at E3 that they are getting out of the games business.

AnimeJ wrote:
MannishBoy wrote:
Crhis wrote:

All this talk about which physical media and particular spec of blu-ray is a little depressing, can we not have digital-only yet?

Is good broadband universal yet?

Not by a long shot, at least not in the US.

Rhetorical

Jayhawker wrote:

The lack of hard drive was a lame move by Microsoft. I do like that you can expand them, though. But 20 gig should have been the minimum.

The real reason we will not see download only titles is that for now, the console makers need Gamestop, Target, Walmart and Best Buy. They can't afford to make end around on them. It is dicey just realeasing a game to be available as downloadable on day one.

But all of this discussion is pointless. There will only be three games realed for the Nextbox, as Microsoft announced at E3 that they are getting out of the games business.

I think the problem before was that hardware depended so strongly on the brick-and-mortar sales of software due to the royalties needed to break even on console sales. Historically, console companies took massive hits on distributing their hardware in order to gain enough market share that game sales would bring in royalty revenues that make up for that loss over time. Nintendo, this last round, proved that that isn't necessary, and I have a feeling that with the low costs of the latest tech, combined with the expensive ceiling in graphical advances in games, Sony and MS won't be far behind. If that "leaked" doc is to be taken seriously, a next gen console at a mere $300 with so much brand new tech would mean to me that MS would very likely break even on each console sale, and thus not be so reliant on B&M stores to make up that lost revenue. In other words, without the need to print hard copies and share revenues with the likes of Gamestop, the cost of games could feasibly drop with digital distribution and the hardware and software developers could still gain the same amounts of revenue as they had in previous generations. So with this newfound lack of a need to sell boxed copies through B&M retailers, I think the chances of a primarily digital distribution of games are far greater in this next generation. But truth be told, they're all corporations whose sole purpose is really just to make as much money as possible, so I don't think this generation will see the end of optical drives-- there's still too much money to be made from partnerships with B&M retailers-- I just think that the opportunity to nix ODDs entirely is increasing.

WipEout wrote:

I just think that the opportunity to nix ODDs entirely is increasing.

I don't think anyone will deny the trend, but to answer the question of whether they would be bold enough to do without one, I think not, or at least not yet or not entirely.

That leads to a number of possibilities:
-The way it is now.

-Ditch the optical drive entirely, i.e. there will be no model with one. Everything online or perhaps you could grab it on a memory stick from a retailer, and those would probably flip their lids from being cut out. It would likely require an online connection for authentication, at the very least once per-game on that console.
Does anyone want to guess how much they'd save in materials by eliminating the optical drive? Also how it will affect publishers, and the change in public visibility of the console and games?

-A mixture of consoles with and without the drive. Is it worth developing and selling two console variants to get people going through your (walled garden) online store?

WipEout wrote:

Nintendo, this last round with every system except the 3DS, proved that that isn't necessary,

FTFY. That's how they've kept plenty of cash reserves for decades. They never sell a system at a loss to start with. They only caved on the 3DS because of such sluggish sales.

But they have to run their games division at a profit, as all they are is a games division. Microsoft and Sony can afford to funnel money in the hole from other places.

The way the rest of Sony's business is going, no they can't.

I agree that having a next-gen SKU with NO hard drive would be motarded. But I don't see anything wrong with offering a smaller-hard-drive option as long as it's upgrade-able for the future.

I think the next gens should just have 4G built in, strike up some deals with the service providers sort of like Amazon does with the Kindle, and let all games be downloaded over the mobile networks. This would make it much easier for distributing games to people who don't have good broadband. Online game play would still be done via broadband to minimize latency.