That’s Baller

If the recent rumors are to be believed, Microsoft has plans to lower the price of the Xbox 360 Arcade (the cheap one) next month to the rock bottom price of $199. If this ends up happening, I can see them reversing the recent sales slump and making things very interesting come Christmas 2008. I bought mine for just under $199 on theworld’s best marketplace and have been very happy with it so far. The only problem that I have come across is that Microsoft still hasn’t released support for the x264, the preferred format for releasing HD content online. Within the last year or so, Dvix/Xvid decoding has become officially supported except while using Media Center Extender Mode (not baller). Although that is a start, we wait and wait for support for a widely accepted HD codec similar to Divx.

Unfortunately, until Microsoft releases official support for x264 we have to continue hoping that someone will be able to open the 360 up like has been done on the first generation Xbox. In a perfect world, Microsoft would Read the rest of this entry »