Johnny Awesome
Veteran
Maybe that doesn't matter to MS in the end, now that the Wii is grabbing most of the low-end gamers anyway. Strategies change. It won't surprise me at all if they go back to HD only.
360 Arcade, Elite, Premium, and Pro discontinued on Amazon (New SKU at GDC?!)
- Thread starter nintenho
- Start date
This one is not discontinued:
http://www.amazon.com/Xbox-360-Cons..._2?ie=UTF8&s=videogames&qid=1203349867&sr=8-2
Seems like only the bundles are discontinued.
http://www.amazon.com/Xbox-360-Cons..._2?ie=UTF8&s=videogames&qid=1203349867&sr=8-2
Seems like only the bundles are discontinued.
I don't think they will get rid of the Arcade because offering an Arcade sku pratically costs MS little to nothing.
The only thing different between a Pro and an Arcade is its packaging as the Pro gets different and/or additional peripherals and a different themed box.
Johnny Awesome
Veteran
I'm not arguing that they will, just that they could.
I understand that. I just offered an argument to why that might not happen.
They can discontinue the SKU, but allowing the manufacture of games to essentially make all those users unsupported would be a huge mistake, perhaps even a class action lawsuit level mistake. So unless they plan to give every arcade/core owner a hdd I don't think you'll ever see the end of the 'games have to run without a HDD' policy.
You can't just disenfranchise 10-20% of your user base and think that offering them a $60 upgrade option will make the problem go away.
Those are some very good points. I believe 12x DVD on Blu-ray would be easy now.
It was insightful to note this requirement.
Ever since Burnout Paradise came out (and Little Big Planet was announced) I have expected models without an HDD to cease production.
Without an HDD being standard Microsoft has no chance of competing with Wii or PS3 for another year.
According to the charts at the bottom its rein over either console has already ended.
Here is my post from the Console Hardware Folder.
Dude this is a ridiculous post. Completely ridiculous.
PS2 never had a HDD.
Wii doesn't have a HDD.
Both are pretty successful.
I could go on and on but I dont want to offend anybody by offering my opinion that Blu Ray isn't needed for this generation of games, and that a standard HDD has proven near zero game play advantages. More third party developers have publicly struggled with PS3 and it's built in HDD than 360. Not BECAUSE of the HDD of course, but you get the point. It's my opinion that Sony didn't really want to build in the HDD anyway, but rather had to to compensate for slow Blu Ray loading. The fact we are now seeing lengthy mandatory 5GB installs on some PS3 games bears this out.
In short, you are completely wrong. It seems to me the people the core pack bothers most are always fans of other systems. Maybe that should tell you they perceive it as a threat...
And btw, how do you explain that after 2.5 years 360 is on pace to surpass lifetime Xbox shipments this year? Xbox shipped 24-25 million. 360 is at 17.7 million and will likely ship at least around 9 million in 2008. Whether it beats the PS3 or Wii, 360 has undebatable performed better and more profitably than Xbox.
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Let's simplify this.
Do you own an Xbox360?
Did you buy the one without an HDD or one with an HDD?
If you bought the one with an HDD, did you buy it because it was a better value?
If you bought one without an HDD, are you still playing without an HDD?
As a comsumer your own behavior would be sample evidence of its inferior value.
The PS2 has no bearing on the HDD discussion. I agree with Shifty Geezer software sales kept the PS2 going.
Minor point. But you are wrong about the PS2. It did have an HDD. But only one game required it.
And though I am not using it, my PS2 does in fact have an HDD in it even now.
It just was decided by Sony that introducing an HDD game base after millions of units were sold would disenfranchise the current user base and tipping towards the Xbox HDD momentum.
How do I explain XB360 sales? Big challenge…Timing without competition and good dev support.
Mostly that Cell Broadband Engine Architecture SDK 2.0 and earlier was by comparison…challenging.
Runtime 2.1 is a giant leap in the right direction when compared to runtime 1.2 in SDK 2.0 and earlier.
Nintendo Wii includes (512MB) TWICE the internal storage Core & Arcade Xbox360 include (256MB).
And graphically has less than 15% (480p) the demands Xbox360 stretches for (1080p).
Wii is almost literally GameCube over clocked by 50%. So dev tools were already mature & costs are low.
So is retail price, being half the competition’s price to get its advertised benefits.
One other minor point, you were also wrong about.
The Xbox360 has been less even profitable than the first Xbox despite charging twice what it costs to make.
This Xbox 2007: http://www.gamespot.com/news/6175367.html
Last Xbox 2003: http://www.infopackets.com/channels.../20060729_microsoft_q4_losses_and_profits.htm
So yeah this time is more profitable than last time…by Negative Four times.
This despite the mentioned current Xbox selling for twice what the hardware on its own costs.
Plus sales growth that trails the competition when paralleled from launch date forward.
Recap.
The 5GB install is Capcom only so far. And they asked Microsoft but were denied it because technically it lacks an HDD.
So you distinction of needed is wrong. Sony chose to allow it because Capcom asserted beneficial value of it.
If properly optimized HDD streaming on PS3 offers 4 times (60MB/sec)the bandwidth of Xbox360’s DVD (15MB/sec).
However the textures and other details were larger on PS3 than on XB360 reducing the advantage, that remained.
So you were wrong to discriminate about this.
You are also wrong about how hard drives affect load times in gaming. Do a search for PS3 7,200rpm.
The Seagate 5400.4 Momentus & some 7,200rpm 2.5inch drives improve load times by 10%-20% on the PS3.
Taking the very first Company to install on the PS3’s HDD as a reference for all future developers is foolishness.
Additionally the HDD has resulted in less pop-in on cross platform PS3 games, also seen on Xbox360.
The Xenon cores are also limited in other ways but I need to go to sleep, rather than elaborate.
You also underrate the importance of Wii’s internal memory.
I am unable to enlighten you as to its value. But it is clear you need to learn more in order to appreciate it.
Try checking yourself before calling someone else’s work completely ridiculous.
Just because the direction taken with factual information doesn’t agree with you, doesn’t make the facts ridiculous.
It is however ridiculous to continue defending my position with you, when you cite no facts, and incorrectly invent your own.
The only completely wrong thing here was your closing unbalanced, and 50% completely wrong statement.
Xbox360 has better pixel/texel shading performance; but lower poly, physics, & geometry performance than PS3.
And as linked and shown this System has thus far been less profitable for Microsoft than the last Xbox system.
Thankfully they are making it back by charging customers for 2x Xbox360's everytime they buy one.
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I won't bother with the rest of your post, but this horrible negligence stands out.
er so selecting a quarter where they had a big one time charge and neglecting the 900million in profits the game division has made since then... nice try.
Please do some research before you spam out huge posts that are just wrong.
er so selecting a quarter where they had a big one time charge and neglecting the 900million in profits the game division has made since then... nice try.
Please do some research before you spam out huge posts that are just wrong.
Out of interest... what is your definition of "competing". Are you measure both hardware and software sales? By what margin do you define "not competing"? 90% of sales of both other systems? 50%?
I'm just broswing before sleeping. But I look forward to see you cite those numbers.
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look them up yourself, MS quarterly reports are online. The last 2 quarters have posted profits of like $160 million, and $360 million, no reason to expect this quarter isn't profitable as well.
Wha...? Please print out the last two years worth of RSX vertex shading threads and crawl back under your rock.
Double wha? Add to the printout pile the last quarterly reports.
Best regards,
CurrentCTO
Ok back on topic please.
And FutureCTO, a special warning to you. It seems an awful lot of what you post is either inappropriate, uninformed, factually wrong, totally off topic or simply flame bait. Now that's fine, but only when it is either given context, stated as such - or by backing up your claim and most importantly having a solid reason for doing so.
I am also less than impressed by the subtle but aggressive tone you quite often take with other members. Being persuasive does not mean being forceful.
In your large post at the top of this page, you clearly tried to turn this into a 360 bash. Brining up everything from 'free 4xaa' to the wifi adapter cost argument. This is ridiculous, and the sort of thing you expect out of teenage fanboys. This is a technology forum. Hell you even used vgchartz. Seriously, read it over.. How on earth is that appropriate here given the context?
The sad thing is it sits in line with your post history. Need I mention the last post you created and the nonsense about the dual shock (not to mention you created the same thread twice under different user names).
Not everything has to be conspiracy and it's OK for people to have differing opinions, remember that just because 1 + 1 can equal 10 doesn't mean it always does.
Now your clearly a smart guy, just a *bit* too wrapped up in it all. All I ask is you treat others here with the same level of respect you hope to receive in return.
And FutureCTO, a special warning to you. It seems an awful lot of what you post is either inappropriate, uninformed, factually wrong, totally off topic or simply flame bait. Now that's fine, but only when it is either given context, stated as such - or by backing up your claim and most importantly having a solid reason for doing so.
I am also less than impressed by the subtle but aggressive tone you quite often take with other members. Being persuasive does not mean being forceful.
In your large post at the top of this page, you clearly tried to turn this into a 360 bash. Brining up everything from 'free 4xaa' to the wifi adapter cost argument. This is ridiculous, and the sort of thing you expect out of teenage fanboys. This is a technology forum. Hell you even used vgchartz. Seriously, read it over.. How on earth is that appropriate here given the context?
The sad thing is it sits in line with your post history. Need I mention the last post you created and the nonsense about the dual shock (not to mention you created the same thread twice under different user names).
Not everything has to be conspiracy and it's OK for people to have differing opinions, remember that just because 1 + 1 can equal 10 doesn't mean it always does.
Now your clearly a smart guy, just a *bit* too wrapped up in it all. All I ask is you treat others here with the same level of respect you hope to receive in return.
RancidLunchmeat
Veteran
Have we ever been able to actually confirm the cause for the shortages?
I believe that MS did acknowledge the shortages at some point recently, but did they give a reason?
I had some extra money this past weekend and thought about dumping it on a 360, but the local Walmart and Target were out of stock. Not even a Core/Arcade unit to be found.
I know the speculation was they were trying to use up existing stock and purposely delaying putting the new units into the supply chain. But if that theory was correct, shouldn't there be massive amounts of 360s hitting store shelves all at once?
And we've already reached the point of scarcity. So I don't see a reason to further delay release of the newer units. Unless those newer units don't actually exist. (Ie: manufacturing problems going to the new process?)
Does anybody know? Clearly, there was no new sku announced at GDC.
I believe that MS did acknowledge the shortages at some point recently, but did they give a reason?
I had some extra money this past weekend and thought about dumping it on a 360, but the local Walmart and Target were out of stock. Not even a Core/Arcade unit to be found.
I know the speculation was they were trying to use up existing stock and purposely delaying putting the new units into the supply chain. But if that theory was correct, shouldn't there be massive amounts of 360s hitting store shelves all at once?
And we've already reached the point of scarcity. So I don't see a reason to further delay release of the newer units. Unless those newer units don't actually exist. (Ie: manufacturing problems going to the new process?)
Does anybody know? Clearly, there was no new sku announced at GDC.
It could also be a case of underestimating demand in the U.S. Maybe the X360 carried more moment from the Xmas holidays than expected and they couldn't romp up production fast enough. Or it could simply be the case that they're fully moving to 65nm process.
