(This is Part Two of my hands-on. .)
Silent Running
Installing games to a console's hard drive? I know! What's the difference between a game console and a PC these days? (Hint: Not lipstick.) Still, if it means I don't have to listen to my 360 buzz like an old window-propped air conditioner and my games load faster and run smoother, sign me up, with or without the optional mouse and keyboard.
How's it work? Easy. Pop the disc in the drive, scroll to the "My Xbox" view, click on disc options, and voila, there's one to "install game to hard drive." A button press and about 10 minutes of thumb-twiddling later, you're in business. Regrettably, you still have to leave the disc in the drive, but that disc never spins up again (it's really just insurance that people won't "buy once, install many" in violation of basic licensing principles).
Be aware that if you're sitting on an old 20GB hard drive, you'll quickly fill it to capacity with just a game or two. Any more and it'll cost you. The NXE may be free, but the price of Microsoft's official 120GB hard drive upgrade is $150. That's not a typo. I've , because it is, especially when you consider the fact that you can buy a laptop-sized 120GB hard drive for less than a third of that price (if you can even find one that small anymore).
"But there's no hard drive install option on the PS3!" True enough. That's because Sony's optical drive is comparably subdued (about 10 dB quieter, in fact -- a 10 dB increase in volume is perceived as a doubling in loudness).
So even though the new hard drive install option gets thumbs up from me, it's worth remembering that it's a band-aid to a hardware design flaw, and if you're a 20GB (or no) hard drive owner, also a pricey one.
Kicks With Net Flicks
Otherwise known as , these are the highly successful folks that let you rent flat-rate videos through the mail (aka "renting for either extremely busy or pathologically agoraphobic people"). With the NXE, they've also made themselves nice and cozy with Microsoft as part of a resource-pooling strategy that could well launch a digitally downloadable video empire.
How's Netflix work? On its own, it's a simple monthly fee based service that lets you select so many videos in a given time period, then hold onto them for as long as you like. No late fees, and as far as I know, no relentless collection agencies barking threats at your answering machine. The kicker: You have to return your current holdings before you can rent something new. Doesn't matter what you've paid, you only get new stuff once you've mailed back your old stuff. I've never used it, but most of my friends do, and they swear it's fast and friendly and (for at least a few of them) now completely indispensable.
You'll find the NXE's fledgling Netflix bookmark located under "Video Marketplace" with the trademark marquee-style Netflix logo. The service actually isn't installed by default, and you have to pull down a small 3MB file to get the ball rolling. Not a big deal, but step two's a bit less trivial -- any time you want to add or subtract content thereafter, you have to get up, walk over to a computer, and use a PC. Yep, you get to watch stuff on the 360, but your account and basic transactions aren't managed on the 360 at all.
Really? Really. I wouldn't call it a deal-breaker, but it does shatter the illusion that your Xbox 360 is an island. It's also bound to confuse the very secondary users Microsoft and Netflix seem interested in selling to, e.g. other household members who might not play games, but who'd use the 360 purely as a Netflix tool. Instead of popping their Netflix disc out of its envelope and popping it in the DVD drive and hitting "play," these folks now have to 1) leave the room, 2) hunt down a computer, 3) log into an different account, then 4) navigate around a completely unique interface to queue and organize stuff. Kind of annoying considering you don't have to "PC" anything when you're plucking down movies and TV shows on the PS3. Fingers crossed Microsoft and Netflix remedy this in a manner that puts control of adding/deleting content on the 360, where it belongs.
I wasn't able to test any actual video viewing because the service is region locked (I get a sad "sorry, content not available for your region" when I try to make it so). But I can at least pass along what I have seen and know.
Aside from gaining access to Netflix's considerable library of titles, the hook is that you can now watch movies instantly without downloading them first.
Oh, and they're high-definition.
Sort of.
What do I mean? The sample rates on these videos are going to be fairly low. Think compression rates, like with MP3 music files, meaning that some are going to lack the overall color depth and clarity you'll find in a 1080p HD DVD or Blu-ray title. That's neither Microsoft's nor Netflix's fault, that's just the business reality of current broadband speeds and local storage limitations. A dual-layer Blu-ray disc holds around 50GB of data. A typical TV season consisting of 22 episodes ships on four or five Blu-ray discs. Now imagine trying to stream 250GB (50 x 5) of data to your Xbox 360 and you see the problem (not to mention the trouble you'd get into if your ISP has a "fair access policy" restriction on your deceptively "unlimited" monthly usage quota).
As a hep new way to watch movies that cuts out the mailman and in-transit mail time, the Netflix partnership looks like a great idea. As either a non-gamer-friendly set top movie box or digital rental service that'll feed your wildest videophile desires, however, it has a few issues to sort through.
With a Little Help From My Friends
Winning the "most socially intrepid" award is the NXE's option to create "parties" of up to eight friends, then keep that party rocking even as you're switching in and out of games. Want to chat with a friend while quitting , then popping in a movie without dropping the call and reconnecting? Doing that with a whole group of friends, each one playing or watching something completely different? Now you can.
I can't say how this ultimately plays out (with "social networking" features, no one ever does) but the notion that you might grab eight pals from any place in the world to watch a movie or TV show together sounds fascinating. Now they just need to sort the logistics of wearing the Xbox 360's clumsy headset (connected to a kludgy gamepad, no less) while fumbling around for the popcorn and beer and Cheesy Poofs.
And the Verdict is...
It's a work in progress but it feels awfully progressive just three weeks from launch. Put it this way: If you're a PS3 owner, the only theoretically compelling feature is Netflix, and then just because Netflix has catalog muscle. If you're a Nintendo Wii owner, same deal. Netflix do or die -- the whole Avatar thing isn't designed to woo you away from your Wii-motes. The big winner? Xbox 360 owners, because they're getting a freebie update to the operating system that'll change the way they relate to everything from the games to social activities to digital media.
And if you own none of the above systems, Microsoft just added a very formidable and seductive arrow to its quiver of compelling buy-me arguments.