What Xbox 360 should do with HD-DVD

As we all know, HD-DVD lost the battle vs Blu-Ray as the next standard in DVD/Hi-Def DVD technology. Along the same lines, Xbox360 lost it's hi-def DVD player to Sony PS3's Blu-Ray. The Xbox360 did NOT have the HD-DVD built in like Sony's PS3 did. The HD-DVD was an add on attachment.
Immeadiately after the HD-DVD lost, Xbox360 ceased production and all of them were pulled off the shelf.

But here's what I think Microsoft / Xbox 360 should do:

• Give away all the HD-DVD players to any Xbox360 users. Why not? it's useless and the add-on will just sit in some dumpster somewhere. Why not give it away. Make the users pay for the Shipping.
• If it is USB (I don't know) then you could give it out to computer users and they can use it on their computers. Again, it's just landfill, give it away, let the users pay for shipping.
• Produce HD-DVD only content for the Xbox360. Start putting your games on them. Or putting multiple games on them, like a series. Imagine Halo, Halo 2, and Halo 3 on one disc.
  
• More HD-DVD Content. Xbox360 openings, conventions, forums, videos, behind the scenes, Making the Game, etc.
  

NOTE: It is not common knowledge, but the equipment to create an HD-DVD is simular to making a standard DVD (give or take a few pieces). Blu-Ray however, you need to replace the entire equipment to make the disk. So the equipment to make HD-DVD is more commonly available for Microsoft to reach and use.

When all is said and done, you've made use of a technology that we all thought was long and gone. You've taken control of a small nitch. You used the technology you based your equipment around. Remember the age of cartridges, they couldn't play on other systems. Same thing here. Microsoft can make it "their" format and they can expand their games onto it.

And if it doesn't work then you got rid of your stock and it's someone else's problem. But at least you maximized your system, rather than be stuck at a format that restricts your game size limit.

Convert to DTV

I've started to research the conversion to Digital TV (DTV) This is government's ruling to eliminate the Analog Signal and use only Digital Signals to broadcast their TV Signals.

If you have Cable or Satellite (DirecTv or dish) then you would not have to worry about this. But for people like my Grandmother, she will need to do something. It is already hard enough since she is not technically sound either.

So on to the Research:

Antenna - Whatever antenna you are using should be good enough to receive the Digital Signals. There are a few exceptions, but for the most part you should be fine.

Digital Converter Box - These things work like your Satellite Box. You set the TV to one channel, and then you turn the stations on the Digital box. This provides a sticky situation for my Grandmother. She will need to learn a new remote control. Plus it goes into another sticky situation...

VCRs (analog) - With the Digital converter box, your VCR is almost useless. It can only record whatever channel is on the Digital Converter box. So How is Grandma going to remember to control the Digital Box and the VCR at the same time? She can't. Ug. this is where it will get difficult.

VCRs (Digital) - These cose $150 (for cheap-os) to $300 (the one people like), nuff said.

That's where I'm at Right now. Though it seems like it might be easier just to get a Cable Package. Then it won't change that much... I hope.

Good Info
http://www.ezdigitaltv.com/index.html

Been a long week... its only Wednesday!

So What have I been up to? Lets see:

- Well the Y2K7 has come and gone. The IT Community has named the Daylight Savings Time change the "Y2k7 bug". Basically Pres. Bush changed the start and end time of the Daylight Savings time. However only XP and Vista were programmed to adjust to the new time change. Microsoft (in it's infinate wisdom) provide a manual patch for Win2k. and no patch to Win98. In addition to update Microsoft Exchange Server 2000, you had to semi-manually update every mailbox. It was a pain in the butt. The instructions weren't clear. They gave an automatic way and a manual way, and put the manual way first. Then you have to give 1 user account access to every e-mail box. And then finally update the mailboxes. I was told "just change the computer clock". Sure except Exchange/Outlook can't figure out what happened to the missing hour. Therefore everything would have been wrong... Hopefully it's over. only a few stragglers left behind.

- Also i've been fighting our Exchange server still. I even re-installed it. No prevail. We purchased a new server, but it hasn't come in yet.

- We're going Snowboarding next week. I'm excited. but there's so much going on.

- I moved my webhost. kinda. Infoquest offers a new service, new rates, better features. So I moved it. But it was a pain in the ass. The CS told me "you change the name servers" so I did. Didn't work. I went back to them and they said "we could have done it for you" "?? your CS told me to do it" Thanks alot. If the service is good I'll stick with it. If not, I'm gonna tell Infoquest to kiss it at the end of my term.

Thats all for now.

TDK DVD-r, DVD+r

I bought these... and they are crap. They are thinner than normal DVDs. Alot of these DVDs are becoming Coasters. The Original TDKs are alot better. They must have changed disc manufacturers.

Costco recently brought in a whole case load of these DVDs. So I suggest NOT purchasing these DVDs. Even though they are cheap. Even though they used to be good.

Other Options for DVDs FujiFilm and Sony. These are very reliable according to nomorecoasters.com

I guess I'm no longer promoting TDK as a "Qualified Vendor" of DVD makers.

Week of Jan 1 - Jan 7

Uh Recovery day. Happy New Years. Partied till the sun came out. Whew. I spent the rest of the week trying to set my body back into the correct timezone...

Sharks played Wednesday and WON. then I went on Saturday vs Columbus. Columbus is a rough physical team. They dont have alot of "talent" but they work hard. Their top player Nash was out with injury. A few notes from this game:
1) Official sucked. I never heard of these guys and I hope I never hear from them again. They missed calls all night and called imaginary calls. Nothing bigger will be from the gaff they made which allowed the sharks to score 2 power play goals on 1 penalty. One Shark (Clowe) and One Blue Jacket got penalties at the same time. so they skated 4-on-4. then a Blue Jacket got another penalty. so that SHarks were on PowerPlay 4-3. They scored! so they let out a Blue Jacket... the WRONG blue jacket. the players with matching penalties stay in the box. But NO the refs let the first guy out. Coincidentally they let Clowe out and the Sharks are on the Power play again! They score. Second period starts the Refs apoligize to the Bluejacks for screwing up. Luckily the game was decided more than 1 goal, otherwise there could have been a protest to this game.
2) Hat Tricks: Ryan Clowe has stepped up. 2 goals the game before and a hat trick this game. Also note: Erhoff got a Gordie Howe Hat Trick: A Goal, an Assist, and a FIGHT.
3) WE CAN'T SEE!!! during the 2nd intermission was a junior Sharks game, but these people would not sit down so we couldn't see the game. So I started chanting "We can't see! We can't see!" then was "Sit down! [Clap clap] sit down [clap clap] "Which turned into "you are deaf! You are Deaf!" but no one was cheering with me so we missed the entire "game". I got some compliments from other people for trying.

I've been on a Modding roll. For (what seems like) years, I kept telling Matt, Bring your Xbox over and I'll fix it. So he finally did. I opened it up and couldn't fix his chip, so I onboard fixed it. But I needed his original HD so I was screwed. But Nick had an Xbox that needed modding too. He had one that was modded but a blown power supply. And he had one that was not modded and needed to be. so I pulled the non-modded and modded that one. But something was still wrong with it. The mod worked but I didn't know what else was wrong. So I (on a hunch) put the modded'box's harddrive into my newly modded box. BAM it works. Nick was happy...
The next day I took Matt's Xbox back to him and put in his old HD. BAM it's modded. I updated his apps and now he's happy.

Matt told me of his plans. He wants to upgrade his entire Entertainment System. He's going all out. an HD TV, Multimedia Computer, 2TB (terrabytes) of hard drive space and a PS3. He wants to use the 2TB to store all his movies and mp3s. Essentially he wants an Xbox with Xbox-Media-Center with a huge Hard Drive. it sounds good but I can't even put a price tag on it.

And that's that for this week.

Creative X-fi Sound Card

I just purchased the Creative X-Fi: Extreme Music Sound Card. It sounds really good.

The Creative X-Fi is thier latest Sound Card system. Creative has a reputation of being very good in the audio industry and I consider them the leader in Soundcards.

I did have some problems with the installation of the card. I first took out my first replacement card (yuk) and put this card in. I booted the machine up and put in the Installation CD. it took off. I selected Complete installation. Why not? And it worked. THen I went online and updated the drivers. Why not?

After a reboot I noticed my Processing was at 100%. a process dllml.exe took up all the processing. It was installed from the creative package. So I tried to uninstall and start over. Well that's the begining of a turbulant time in my life. I wouldn't uninstall. After installing uninstalling installing uninstalling and not having it work, I went online to creative. Creative finally told me what to do. Using their \audio\drivers\setup.exe it uninstalled the backdoor way. Then I installed the CD, but using the "Minimal applications: optimized for gaming" settings (after all I was using this for BF2). Yay! It worked with out a problem.

Just for kicks I started reading the Tweakguide.com's BF2 guide. It shows how to maximize the Audio settings. And there is a specific setting for "Creative X-Fi" so I selected. Program CRASHES. WTF? Try again. and again. nothign. I look back in the guide and it references the soundblaster's website. You have to look closely and find the X-Fi Faq and it discusses specifically FOR BF2 how to fix it. It has to do if you have previous versions of Creative software installed (which I did). Ironically the fix uses the same setup program. Uninstall, reinstall. So I do it. BAM IT WORKS.

So I go into BF2. I fix the seting to Creative X-Fi. Set the quality to Ultra-High (a setting for Creative X-Fi). load game. Wow. what a difference. I have bad hearing as it is and let me say I can hear where those sniper shots are coming from and how close they are to hitting me. Absolutely awesome.

So is the card worth it. Yes it is. There are 4 versions: Xtreme Music (that's me), Platinum, Fata1ity, and Extreme Pro. Mine was the cheapest card at $110, with a $40 Rebate. So I got a good card with a good price. If you have the $ you can get the higher end, which has a remote and stuff. But for me I'm set!

ScreenSavers is Dead

Sad news today. G4 has finally killed TechTV. Months ago, TechTV (from SF) was bought by G4. Everyone was fired and few were hired back to move to LA. It became G4TechTV. But alas, G4 Fired everyone (again) and kept a few people around to do the shows. But lets face it. It is no longer TechTV. Its no longer G4TechTV. In January, it will be G4 (relaunched). This sucks. But lets face it, I wasn t into the show any mores. It wasn t about Tech any mores. It was about Hollywood and looking good and fame and whatever. I miss the real TechTV. Farewell TechTV. Maybe you can get resurrected elsewhere...