Xbox Live Spring Update

[-tkf-]

Xbox is not meant to compete with MS's Windows business, although one might argue that there would be room to put Browser in there without stepping on anyones' toes, but it remains to be seen. I personally coulnd't care less about it as my PC handles that just well.

I´m just a bit surprised since the PSP,Wii and the PS3 has one it´s become one of those things i take for granted. And an absolute requirment if it´s the only thing connected to the TV.

 

[Tap In]

I´m just a bit surprised since the PSP,Wii and the PS3 has one it´s become one of those things i take for granted. And an absolute requirment if it´s the only thing connected to the TV.

oh and don't forget every MS/Windows PC has an MS browser too.

Somehow, I don't think it is an oversight, but more that they must have a reason for it.

Originally Posted by Paul_G
- Achievement Pop-ups will now display how many points and which Achievement you have gained.
- Low-power downloading (fans off) and auto-off after finishing queued downloads.

my favorites as well but I can't wait to see the list of "hundreds" even though many are probably very minor fixes.

 

[ErnstH]

Read this on some other Xbox site, not sure if it is legit.

Newsflash:
Instant Messaging Comes to Xbox 360

Redmond , Washington —Your Xbox Live® friends list is about to get a whole lot bigger. Microsoft Corp. today announced the launch of Windows Live™ Messenger on Xbox 360™, connecting friends across Xbox 360 consoles, Microsoft® Windows®-based PCs and Windows Mobile®-powered devices.

Chat with your friends via Live Messenger.

Chat with your friends via Live Messenger.

With this update to Xbox 360, friends and families can easily connect and chat directly from their television using Windows Live Messenger, a network of more than 20 billion relationships and more than 260 million active accounts.
"Xbox Live has really become the
largest social network on television."
—Jerry Johnson, Microsoft

Beginning the week of May 7, 2007, the Xbox 360 Spring Update will provide Xbox 360 owners worldwide with access to Windows Live Messenger features, broadening the communication options on the Xbox Live social network.

Connected Experiences
Members of the six-million-strong Xbox Live community currently send more than two million text and voice messages a day and can now use Windows Live Messenger to text chat with up to six people on their contact list at one time, while playing games, listening to music, or watching movies. Text chat adds to the variety of options friends and families already have to communicate with on Xbox Live, including voice and video chat.

Look for this new accessory this summer.

Look for this new accessory this summer.

Current relationships on Windows Live Messenger and Xbox Live will be unified on Xbox 360 and users will see at a glance if their existing friends on Windows Live Messenger have gamertags, instantly expanding the breadth of connected experiences they can share online.

"Bringing the largest IM community in the world, Windows Live Messenger, to Xbox 360 makes sense, as Xbox Live has really become the largest social network on television," said Jerry Johnson, product unit manager of Xbox Live at Microsoft. "For our growing community of six million on Xbox Live, using Xbox 360 is a very social, connected experience. They are using Xbox 360 to play games, music, and movies while simultaneously communicating with one another through video, voice, and text chat. With this announcement we are simultaneously expanding the access of Xbox Live users to existing friends and family while introducing Windows Live Messenger users to the benefits of Xbox 360."

Know instantly which achievement you accomplished.


Beginning the week of May 7, users of Windows Live Messenger on Xbox 360 can text chat using the virtual keyboard accessible on Xbox 360, or by connecting a USB keyboard to the console. This summer Microsoft will launch a QWERTY text-input device, a new accessory that will connect directly into the Xbox 360 controller to support text and instant messaging.

Other New Features
Beyond Windows Live Messenger, the Spring Update for Xbox 360 ihundreds of new features and enhancements including:


* A richer Achievement notification pop-up will showcase the name of the unlocked Achievement and the gamerscore value without needing to leave the game to check the Achievements list.
* Enhanced family settings features for Xbox Live communications enable different defaults for video chat and voice chat.
* A new Xbox Live Marketplace blade lets Xbox Live members access the content they seek—whether it is game content or TV shows and movies (available in the United States)—from one place on Xbox Live.
* Updates to Xbox Live Arcade allow owners to quickly see which Xbox Live Arcade games their friends are playing and join in the fun. Xbox Live members can also compare progress of leaderboard scores and Achievements directly with all friends on their friends list. Expanded "Tell a Friend" capabilities make it easier than ever to boast about Achievements and high scores.
* Expanded "Tell a Friend" capabilities make it easier than ever to boast about Achievements and high scores.
* A new option in Auto Downloads provides faster access to the entire collection of free, trial-version Xbox Live Arcade games.
* New progressive download controls provide easy access to optimal viewing options by letting people fast-forward, rewind, pause and resume as their video is downloaded from Xbox Live Marketplace.
* Extension of the background download functionality will allow owners to set their Xbox 360 console to turn off automatically after downloads are complete.

The Spring Update is free beginning the week of May 7 and will be easily accessible to every Xbox 360 owner through Xbox Live or on Xbox.com.

You may not even notice all the new features, but they are all designed to enhance your Xbox Live experience. Some of the other features in this upgrade include:

* The name of game in tray is now displayed in the dashboard.
* When the tray icon is highlighted, a list of achievements, game icon and gamerscore for that game is displayed.
* Video trick modes are enabled for content that is being progressively downloaded from Video Marketplace.
* Playback progress bar indicates download completion.
* Improved skip forward, skip back functionality during video playback.
* Switchable aspect ratio now available during video playback (Auto to Letterbox, Zoom, Stretch, Native).
* Player and friends lists now quickly show session presence information for quick identification of users that are joinable.
* Support for streaming WM-DRM protected content from a PC
* Folder view for video content on connected devices
* H.264 video support: Up to 15 Mbps, Baseline, Main, and High (up to level 4.1) Profiles with 2 channel AAC LC and Main Profiles.
* Added MPEG-4 Part 2 video support: Up to 8 Mbps, Simple Profile with 2 channel AAC LC and Main Profiles.
* Show folder hierarchy for video content played from all devices.
* Bookmarks are stored for each video that the user plays remembering the users last location in the file as well as the aspect ratio that the user choose for that file.
* Video trick modes (fast forward, rewind, chapter skip) can now be used while downloading Video Marketplace content.
* Skip forward and backward functionality has been improved to skip to the next or previous chapter. Each video is divided into 10 “chapters†allowing you to quickly skip around video content.
* The information bar that is turned on via the On Screen Display (OSD) now shows you exactly where you are in the playback of the video file. In addition it will also show for Video Marketplace content how much of the file has been downloaded and where the “chapters†exist in the file.
* Windows Media protected content (WM-DRM) can now be streamed from the PC to the console. If the WM-DRM license is missing or corrupted then a specific error message is displayed to the user. Bookmarking is also stored for protected content.
* When the user is in the dashboard and an Xbox 360 game is in the console then the name of the game is displayed in the tray icon of the dashboard. If the user highlights the tray icon then achievements and gamer score are displayed for that game based on the signed in user. Xbox1 games show the name and image of the game.
* Bookmarks are stored for each video that the user plays. The user can delete all bookmarks but this will reset all bookmark information for every video that the user has played. The bookmark database is exposed in the system/memory/system items
* When a user selects an item for download from Marketplace then the system will determine if there is sufficient disk space for the item and, if not, will ask the user to delete content on the HDD. The system provides a sorted by size list of videos, game trailers, demos and arcade content to aid the user in the deletion process. The same list of items are also available from within memory so that users can quickly see which items are consuming the most disk space.
* The console will block the user who attempts to download content onto a storage device that will never have the capacity to store the item without deducting any points associated with the content item.
* The screensaver is disabled when playing photos from any source

 

[AzBat]

Do all the blades show even if you're not going to use them?

The tabs for blades not being used are still displayed. Anybody got a quick comparison of the current and future system?

Tommy McClain

 

[Diamond.G]

Wow, they finally added the one thing i wanted. The ability to see what is in the tray before starting a game, without having to open it.

 

[Graham]

Added MPEG-4 Part 2 video support: Up to 8 Mbps, Simple Profile with 2 channel AAC LC and Main Profiles.

Argh.

I'm not an expert on codecs, but from what I can tell, xvid/divx encode to MPEG-4 Part 2 Advanced Simple Profile, where as this is support for MPEG-4 Part 2 Simple Profile... So close yet so far

Looks like a good update otherwise. And I don't care that there is no web browser

 

[Todd33]

- Add up to 600 Windows Live Messenger contacts to your Friends List.
- Text chat with up to 6 Live Messenger contacts at once during games or movies.

Don't care.

- The Marketplace will be getting its own Dashboard Blade.
- The Marketplace will be skinned independently of the Dashboard, for special events.
- The Marketplace will be getting a new, easier-to-navigate remake.

Cool, I think the marketplace is a mess, too hard to find stuff right now.

- Achievement Pop-ups will now display how many points and which Achievement you have gained.

Never paid attenjtion to achievements, I play games for the content not for a virtual pat on the back.

- Low-power downloading (fans off) and auto-off after finishing queued downloads.

Nice!

- View partially downloaded video files.

I thought it did this already.

The main thing that turn me off of the Dashboard and Marketplace is the whole MTV feel to it. t seems like their target demographic are a bunch of teens with pants around their ankles. Someone should clue in MS's marketing that people over 30 spend much more money than teen agers without jobs.

 

[Tap In]

these updates add just one more level of that fully functional feel to the dashboard.

Many of the little touches are taken for granted but would be /are really noticed if you were to remove them.

bravo for continuing to improve the user interface... ummm which is what they are the best in the world at (present company excepted, Mac users ) so this is expected.

 

[Diamond.G]

Read this on some other Xbox site, not sure if it is legit.
* Folder view for video content on connected devices

Oh, man I didn't see that before.. That will be great. I have a bunch of anime that I keep separated by name of series (even if the sub is done by different groups) with over 100 individual episodes of Bleach alone (not to mention 200 naruto episodes and all the other stuff i have [love me some Midori no Hibi]) I hated trying to stream it to my XTS.

@Todd33:
Does the PS3 allow you to organize your movies/music via folder upon importing?

 

[Tap In]

another video Gamevideos/1Up

 

[Diamond.G]

another video Gamevideos/1Up

Thanks for the link. Drooling now!!!

 

[one]

Read this on some other Xbox site, not sure if it is legit.

* H.264 video support: Up to 15 Mbps, Baseline, Main, and High (up to level 4.1) Profiles with 2 channel AAC LC and Main Profiles.
* Added MPEG-4 Part 2 video support: Up to 8 Mbps, Simple Profile with 2 channel AAC LC and Main Profiles.

Is it legit? Slightly different figures on a Xbox.com news page.

http://www.xbox.com/en-US/community/news/2007/0408-im.htm

# Added H.264 video support: Up to 10 Mbps peak, Baseline, Main, and High profiles with 2 channel AAC LC.
# Added MPEG-4 Part 2 video support: Up to 5 Mbps peak, Simple Profile with 2 channel AAC LC.

 

[ErnstH]

Is it legit? Slightly different figures on a Xbox.com news page.

http://www.xbox.com/en-US/community/news/2007/0408-im.htm

Xbox.com is the official site so I guess their figures would be the correct ones.

 

[lion2]

The best feature of the list is the ability to view partially downloaded video files. I know its available for movies and TV shows, but its a bit annoying to have to wait to watch new trailers for movies and games. Gametrailers.com have been doing HD video streaming for a long time so there should be nothing stopping microsoft from doing the same thing.

 

[scooby_dooby]

Great new features, triple the DL speed, w00t! I get around 300-400k, if they can really boost it, up in the 700-800k range I;ll be very happy.

Background DL, great news, partial video files, great news, stream MP4 files form my PC is nice.

Now I wish MS would just release a DivX/Xvid download pack through marketplace for $5.

 

[AzBat]

The main thing that turn me off of the Dashboard and Marketplace is the whole MTV feel to it. t seems like their target demographic are a bunch of teens with pants around their ankles. Someone should clue in MS's marketing that people over 30 spend much more money than teen agers without jobs.

Speak for yourself. I'm 34 and I like the Dashboard just fine. I'm sure the mostly over 30 crowd would agree as well.

As for finding content on Marketplace, I agree that it's currently somewhat of a chore. Since I'm pretty poor right now, I spend a lot of time looking for free content(pics,themes,etc). Microsoft should make it easier finding free content. I know that's counter to their plan to make money, but it would be nice nonetheless. Anyway, can't wait to see the customized look and feel to the game content pages.

Tommy McClain

 

[mrcorbo]

Media support: Almost there. Give us multichannel AAC playback and the ability to output multichannel AAC and WMA as a 1.5Mb DTS stream like they have for HD-DVD playback and it gets my personal seal of approval.

 

[Tap In]

couple more things I read...

- When a few menus deep in marketplace you can just press the Y button to go to the homepage instead of pressing B to go back a bunch of times.

- The auto download feature in XBLA has been improved, you now have the choice of automatically downloading new releases only or you can download the entire XBLA lineup.

- The detail/destination/game specific pages in marketplace support streaming videos - so you could watch the Forza 2 trailer right there instead of having to download it and then navigate to the video blade and play it back. Pretty nice.

it's funny how just when I am using dashboard and say something to myself about ... "Hmmm I wish it did this or that"... they come out with an update to add it.

2 examples are I was just thinking last month to have a "shut down upon DL complete"... it's in here... and also, "i want a Y button to go instantly back to front end no matter how deep into MP you are"... voila!

 

[infinity4]

xbox.com aren't that reliable to me. they got FM2's 2xMSAA bit wrong where T10 said it was wrong and will be 4x with no plans to downgrade

 

[pipo]

*bump*

Up and running.

It's neat to see what your mates are playing in your PC Messenger window.