I do hear your point, but I disagree with it. Of course the wifi on its own wouldn't cause a price reduction. I'm saying that a whole line of accessories and paid services together would have made the base price lower. Wifi is just an example of a lost revenue opportunity. To me, any console that has USB ports doesn't need a luxury item like wifi built inside the box; all such things can be add-ons; that is the point of USB. And no, I don't think Sony made these decisions just to be my best buddy. I think they blundered, and will not release this kind of console design again.
How much would it cost to add wireless to the Xbox 360?
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I do hear your point, but I disagree with it. Of course the wifi on its own wouldn't cause a price reduction. I'm saying that a whole line of accessories and paid services together would have made the base price lower. Wifi is just an example of a lost revenue opportunity. To me, any console that has USB ports doesn't need a luxury item like wifi built inside the box; all such things can be add-ons; that is the point of USB. And no, I don't think Sony made these decisions just to be my best buddy. I think they blundered, and will not release this kind of console design again.
So Nintendo blundered as well right? I mean, the DS and Wii have WiFi as well right? Or are you just going to keep that exclusive to Sony?
Or does this have more to do with the fact that you keep denying that WiFi is a standard technology, and there are reasons that hundreds of devices come WiFi enabled out of the box (iPod, Printers, Lapstops, Deskstop PCs, Zune, PSP, DS, Wii, PS3, Smart Phones, etc).
Maybe all those guys blundered it as well right? Or maybe, *just maybe* Microsoft screwed the pooch when they decided not to put the cheap as sin WiFi adapter into their next generation console.
The Wii is a poor example since its not sold for a loss. When the cost a console has to be partially recoup through accessories and game sales, then the more revenue streams you have, the better off you are.
The PS3 is great console with many standard features but while those features are great for the customers, they add to the large losses faced by Sony. While in the meantime, MS is able to profit off its HDD, Wifi and Live sales.
Whether, one agrees or disagrees with MS strategy has had little consequence as the high cost of some of 360 accessories is a way smaller impedient then the price of the PS3 when it comes to the general market purchasing either console.
Other than draining the battery faster you mean?
No, Depending on your wifi, and your broadband, WiFi, in general, is not faster than a broadband connection. 802.11b is significantly slower than Cable, and even G would not hold up to the standard 16 and 50Mb connections you can get now. I had a Wireless G bridge connecting my downstairs and upstairs, and I couldn't even stream MP3s consistently. Too much interference. So I pulled some cable through the walls and now I have no problems.
I don't see the problem in adding the chipset, I see a problem in placing the antenna. The 360 is a well designed faraday cage, they even had to redesign so that the wireless controllers (also 2.4GHz, and interfering in the 802.11b/g spectrum) could get signal. So it's case design that's the problem, not board design.
Also, The current adapter would not work for me since I upgraded to N and disabled B/G access (It slows down the N devices if it's enabled).
Frankly, your not in a position to make such a claim without a lot more sales data for the kind of accessories we're talking about. I mean, how many official wifi adapters do you think MS has sold? We know they've got 28 million consoles out there. I doubt the number of official adapters is a significant percentage of the overall user base (for one thing because it is so overpriced) So let's be generous and say they've sold maybe 5 million of them. If the profit per unit is something in the neighborhood of $80 that's $400,000,000 over all but only $14 per console. Fuck, that's more than enough to put integrate wifi in every box, but far too little to actually decrease the cost of entry as you've suggested. But lets be realistic as I think the actual sales are probably less than half of this flight of fancy. And when you consider that wifi and HDD drives are the only deviation in strategy between Sony and MS's accessory business (that is to say they both look for similar margins on things like official controllers, headsets, cables, etc), then there is basically no solid foundation for you claims.
Can get. The question is what fdo most people ahve. If most people's broadband is 8 megabuit say, of which they're getting 4 megabit, then 802.11g is ample. And 802.11g is The Standard in Europe. So really, there's probably another regional divide. In Europe, wifi is all 56Mb, broadband is <16 Mb averge I think (and in the UK, < 4Mb actual attained speeds). Ethernet is likely going to make zero difference to the online experience for 99.9% of European XB360 owners at least. Plus online gaming doesn't use much BW anyway to cater for minimal communications and lower connection speeds. Online is all about lag, which is more about the route your signal takes than anything.
I don't think the X360 case would affect WiFi signals if they routed the internal wire attenna outside of the "cage" but still inside of the plastic front or rear plastic panels.
As of 12:28 EST on 16 Jan 2009, this is what I see on Amazon's "Best Sellers" list for video game products:
http://www.amazon.com/gp/bestsellers/videogames/
It is #26, between #25 : 360 Wireless controller, and #27, a Wii-mote "gun" attachment.
Granted, this is just one online only retailer, but at least one can say the following:
Amazon customers purchase more 360 controllers than wifi adapters.
In a similar vein, it is now discounted on Amazon on their "Outlet/Game Deals" page for $87USD and is a "Top Seller" behind the "Wii Grand Slam Sports" kit for $18USD.
http://www.amazon.com/Outlet/b/ref=sv_vg_2?ie=UTF8&node=409566
Although I have no use for a 360 WiFi adapter, I definitely see a demand for it. It would really be interesting to know how many have been sold in comparison to the console.
That "5 million" figure is more than generous and is more than a strong enough justification for selling wifi for $100.00 versus intergrating it as a standard feature.
If the 360 ends up selling 40 million 360 with 5 million wifi accessory sales then that a difference of 400 million in profit versus 120-200 millions in costs, if intergrated wifi costs are between $3-5 dollars per console. A 500 to 600 million dollar swing is nothing to scoff at.
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As a consumer I'm not all the interested in MS making more money off me. How about a compromise, a $20 add-on? Remove the 802.11A if need be, no one uses that standard.
I believe that any HDTV Media Center Extender device such as the Xbox 360 was mandated to support 802.11A. The PS3 and Wii were not hobbled with this requirement.
I notice this winter there are finally reasonably-priced wireless adapters supporting all four protocols (A/B/G/N). Until now, A has carried a significant price premium.
I notice this winter there are finally reasonably-priced wireless adapters supporting all four protocols (A/B/G/N). Until now, A has carried a significant price premium.
And as a company, I sure MS is not interested in what you will pay as an individual. Obviously, there is enough support for the wifi accessory at the current price point to satisfy MS.
Sure, it's a good deal for them. You know who it's a bad deal for? The consumer! You're admitting an actual hardware cost of $3-5 dollars so I fail to see what I get out of this deal, other than the privilege of lining Microsoft's pockets on a feature everyone else includes. Since I'm not getting a break on the price of entry, as you've been arguing for so long, then all I'm getting is screwed!
I think this topic has run its course. Yes, it's a bad deal for consumers. Yes, it's a good deal for MS. Two valid perspectives on the same situation, and so there's no way to prove one side of the argument through reasoned debate.
In summary - all companies add markups on their hardware to be as profitable as possible balancing out cost of the product with demand at that price, factoring in alternative revenue streams. None are acting with the consumer's best interests at heart. MS's decision to leave out Wifi affected the value proposition of their box which will sway some buyers and not others, and affects MS's bottom-line through peripheral sales which the alternative choice would not have done. In answer to the OP, a few bucks per unit, many millions over the life of the system.
In summary - all companies add markups on their hardware to be as profitable as possible balancing out cost of the product with demand at that price, factoring in alternative revenue streams. None are acting with the consumer's best interests at heart. MS's decision to leave out Wifi affected the value proposition of their box which will sway some buyers and not others, and affects MS's bottom-line through peripheral sales which the alternative choice would not have done. In answer to the OP, a few bucks per unit, many millions over the life of the system.
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