The Xbox will be a games machine!
Why do Microsoft seem content to release a pure games console when it could be so much more?
"sleek" - Bill Gates (oh, dear)
The gaming community is frantically buzzing about the new consoles that are coming from Nintendo and Microsoft later this year. We’ve never had it so good; the Dreamcast is proving itself as the console of choice with great software and hardware. The PlayStation 2 is coming into it’s own with great titles on the horizon and its DVD functionality.
It might come as a bit of a surprise to learn that the Xbox will be a games console. This might sound strange but its true. The Dreamcast and PlayStation have shown that consoles can be more than the sum of all their parts. The Dreamcast was the first console ever to include Internet access out of the box and the PlayStation 2 was the first console to play DVD movies.
We recently brought you a story saying that the Xbox will not play DVDs as standard even though it features a DVD drive. If you want to watch high-quality DVDs you will have to purchase separate software and a remote control. It seems ludicrous that Microsoft would not offer this as standard. A lot of people thinking about upgrading to a DVD player might as well buy a PlayStation 2 for roughly the same price. Microsoft wants to push the console as a games machine.
The Xbox will come with a 10/100mbs Ethernet adapter that will allow you to connect it to a broadband connection. Broadband is the future of the Internet access, it is up to 40 times faster than normal modem connections. The surprising news is that you will not be able to access the Internet from the Xbox. The broadband connection will be used specifically for on-line games. Considering the Xbox sports a built in hard-drive, it doesn’t make sense to allow people to access the largest collection of information on the planet.
Let’s hope Microsoft change their collective mind or a third party developer comes along with a browser solution. Here’s what Microsoft had to say “The Xbox is 100 percent pure gaming machine goodness and the broadband connection is going to be used for games. Because it is a closed system (not a modify-able, frequently crashing, spec-changing PC) you will not be able to freely surf the web and corrupt your hard-drive.”
It might come as a bit of a surprise to learn that the Xbox will be a games console. This might sound strange but its true. The Dreamcast and PlayStation have shown that consoles can be more than the sum of all their parts. The Dreamcast was the first console ever to include Internet access out of the box and the PlayStation 2 was the first console to play DVD movies.
We recently brought you a story saying that the Xbox will not play DVDs as standard even though it features a DVD drive. If you want to watch high-quality DVDs you will have to purchase separate software and a remote control. It seems ludicrous that Microsoft would not offer this as standard. A lot of people thinking about upgrading to a DVD player might as well buy a PlayStation 2 for roughly the same price. Microsoft wants to push the console as a games machine.
The Xbox will come with a 10/100mbs Ethernet adapter that will allow you to connect it to a broadband connection. Broadband is the future of the Internet access, it is up to 40 times faster than normal modem connections. The surprising news is that you will not be able to access the Internet from the Xbox. The broadband connection will be used specifically for on-line games. Considering the Xbox sports a built in hard-drive, it doesn’t make sense to allow people to access the largest collection of information on the planet.
Let’s hope Microsoft change their collective mind or a third party developer comes along with a browser solution. Here’s what Microsoft had to say “The Xbox is 100 percent pure gaming machine goodness and the broadband connection is going to be used for games. Because it is a closed system (not a modify-able, frequently crashing, spec-changing PC) you will not be able to freely surf the web and corrupt your hard-drive.”
Companies:
Microsoft
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