Xbox 360 HD-DVD shows its colours

August 8th, 2006, 17:54 Posted By: wraggster

Microsoft has treated lucky punters the first public demo of its external HD-DVD drive for the Xbox 360. Kevin Collins, senior program manager at the Seattle giant, put the hardback book-sized device through its paces at the DVD Forum in LA, inexplicably choosing to play The Phantom of the Opera, while showing the drive's navigation and interaction features.

Collins refused to be drawn on pricing and a precise launch date, choosing only to assert that it will be one of the cheapest HD-DVD players available, and that it will arrive in the "holiday season". Collins added that: "All the audio and video processing is done inside the Xbox 360," so his claim that it won't break the bank has a ring of plausibility to it.

With prices of standalone HD-DVD and Blu-Ray players likely to be astronomical, and software libraries less than extensive, the battle for the next generation of DVD will only really get under way in earnest when the PlayStation 3 arrives in November with its built-in Blu-Ray drive, and the Xbox 360 HD-DVD drive also takes its bow. What price on Microsoft launching it the week before the PS3 arrives? Leipzig or X06 surely hold the answers.

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