Yeah, so what, we'll admit the first thing we did this morning after we wrote up
those two Apple posts was
update our Xbox 360 -- it's a helluva job, but somebody's got to do it. Here are a few short hands on impressions of what it is you all can expect when you get home from work later today and turn that puppy on to check out the new junk. So here we are, Xbox dashboard 2.0.2857.0, enjoy.
Well, the first thing we did is hit the settings. Namely because we're sick and damn tired of booting into the games that are left in the drive.
So we turned that off.
We also noticed the
Xbox Live Vision camera settings menu -- wonder what forthcoming device that could possibly correspond to.
Yeah, not a lot we can do in there, but we like that you can set it up to work best with your room type and lighting source.
Another we hadn't seen before (or didn't think we'd seen before) is the remote menu, which allows you to use one of your pre-existing Media Center remotes to control your Xbox. Not bad if you already had one and didn't want to buy a new remote just for your Xbox, but ever since we've have our Media Center and Xbox set up next to one another, whenever we hit the Green Button it turns on both -- and that's just no good. After engaging this our Media Center remote stopped controlling our 360, which was something we'd long wanted.
As advertised, blades in the dash have more options for easier navigation.
Looks like XBLM was having some issues today -- we must've gotten this error a good three, four times.
The performance-optimized download queue was the
thing we were most stoked about -- as we're sure most everyone else was, as well. Yep, just your almost-usual download dialogue, but you can take it straight to the active download list.
Which can also be access from the XBLM front door.
As we saw before, it looks something like this. We kinda wish it would do simultaneous downloads, but we'll live.
You also get a nice popup letting you know when your download is done. Thanks!
Browsing around the system today and XBLM, everything seemed about normal. Pretty snappy, no major slowdowns (but a couple of minor crashes on Live, like above). Obviously we didn't get a chance to hunt around the other 120-some-odd Dashboard "features," but we likes what we see, and we only wish we had some of these updates much earlier than today.
posted Jun 6th 2006 10:54AM
This is great news!
http://www.chasetheglow.com
'Another we hadn't seen before (or didn't think we'd seen before) is the remote menu, which allows you to use one of your pre-existing Media Center remotes to control your Xbox. Not bad if you already had one and didn't want to buy a new remote just for your Xbox, but ever since we've have our Media Center and Xbox set up next to one another, whenever we hit the Green Button it turns on both -- and that's just no good. After engaging this our Media Center remote stopped controlling our 360, which was something we'd long wanted.'
Yeah, you guys just missed it with this one. Not only has it been there the whole time, but by default, it is turned off so that only the X360 remote can control the X360, so if your MCE remote was messing with the XBox, that means you guys had to have gone in there and turn it on to begin with.
I'm really liking the upgrade. It was quick, painless, and it addressed a lot of the issues I had with the interface.
Hey, I didn't know you could use an existing media center remote to control your 360. I'll have to check that out. My 360 didn't come with a remote, but I have one with my media center PC. Way cool if it does work! I was actually considering buying a remote to play DVDs.
Wish they gave the ability to Delete XBOX LIVE ARCADE demo achievements, it's annoying to play a demo, and have the game show up under your recently played history. Understandable if its a full-version game, but not for a demo. Give us the ability to delete achievements, we can delete internet history why not gamer history. Other than that the updates are awesome, best on here is the ability to boot up to the dashboard.
how do i get this new version of the 360 dashboard???
how come your xbox live front door has the nacho libre thing on it. mine just has a xbox 360 thing or live marketplace logo why is that
The biggest complaint i have with the x360 is the inability to play most original xbox games! How about an update for that little short-comming? I own easliy $1000+ in orig Xbox games...5 of them work!!!!!!!!!! No support for DOOM??? Granted it's not thebest game but come on!!! the game is less than two years old. Ultimately it comes down to one thing...GREED. Microsoft! Yeah you over there... take one for the team and give us, your loyal customers a little something for free! I spent all told close to $500 on my system and two games, wich by the way suck!
Media Extender
There's no hardware or software reason why we should not be able to connect to our PC or USB device and play audio and video including: DVD-Video and disc images, Divx, Xvid, WMV etc including High Defintion (not just upconverting. Streaming works if the PC is running but local codec support is needed for, say, a USB drive with your divx movies and MP3's on it.
However, it's not about giving the best value for the dollar. It's all about a VERY long-term plan about controlling the home media center. Sure, the XBOX 360 has limited media functionality but this is Microsoft for crying out loud and it could be WAY better but much of what they have done is a token effort. If the PS3 decides to offer the kind of support I need for my media then that is the way I'll go.
I just run a VGA cable to my Sony 32" HDTV and it works incredibly well but it's not convenient especially if the TV is in another room. Sure I can buy Media extenders and other devices but why should I when there's a fully capable device that I've already paid for hooked up to my TV? I think Microsoft will only completely support this if there's a competitive reason forcing them to. Sony, "That company is our last chance... no there is another?"
The problem is that they have to work on this for every game because the hardware is so different. personally i would like them to continue working on nice updates like these and working on new stuff. It's not a big deal to keep your old xbox lying around for all those old games you have lying around. Do you really play them that often?
Another thing I noticed is when you push the xbox-button on your controller, it brings up the blade from the left, a new item is thatit shows the wireless controller battery capacity with old xbox games. Before it wouldn't show that unless you were playing an XBox 360 game.
I thought it was the most annoying thing in the world since I play Halo 2 the most still. I would push the button to check my batter status, and it wouldn't show it. Now it does. Very very good! I don't care too much finding out it's low right before it dies.
I recall the battery meter always being there