Blu-Ray 360
Marc:
Has anyone heard what Microsoft’s plans for Xbox are now that the HD DVD format is dead? I imagine that they’ll fire up a Blueray version of that add-on, but I haven’t seen any info.
Paul:
I wouldn’t think so, I believe they will focus more on their digital downloads business. think of the hd-dvd as a way of holding ground against sony’s ps3.
There’s a third option: they could make a premium Xbox 360 with an internal Blu-Ray drive in place of the DVD-ROM, then sell it at price parity with the PS3.
With their recent CPU and GPU die-shrinks, they’re saving a bunch of money on the components. There’s plenty of room to toss in a basic Blu-Ray mechanism.
But here’s where Blu-Ray’s victory is a problem: Sony owns it, and is the sole licensor for the format. If Sony decides not to license the playback ability to Microsoft, a Blu-Ray 360 can’t happen.
If that happened in a healthy antitrust environment, Microsoft could sue Sony for anticompetitive behavior (pot… kettle…). But nobody in the current DoJ would go after monopolies with any real effort.