If you’re a lucky owner of an Xbox 360, then you’ll be able to download trailers in HD to your 360 and play them back over your home theater system.

Today Microsfoft announced that they will have high definition movie trailers available for download through Xbox Live Marketplace. Walt Disney Pictures are among the major studios to take advantage of this whole new advertising medium with a trailer for The Chronicles Of Narnia: The Lion The Witch And The Wardrobe trailer in 720p High Definition and 5.1 surround sound on Xbox 360.

How cool is that? I like to watch all the HD trailers that Apple releases on their site, and I would like even more to watch them on my home theater set up instead of on my computer. This is definitely a cool 360 feature.

Xbox Today - Movie Studios Will Offer HD Trailers On Xbox Live Marketplace

T3 has a review of the Xbox 360 console. I don’t know why, because we’ve been so inundated with information about the thing that we already know everything in the review except for one thing: whether or not T3 likes it.

And they do:

The only big corners that have been cut are the ones sliced away to create that slim hourglass figure - a far cry from its bloated predecessor, although the massive separate power supply dampens the effect a little. There are also some rather flimsy parts such as the nasty chrome open button for the DVD drawer.

Future-proofed in terms of gaming grunt, HD-readiness and compatibility with most portable gadgets, this is going to become the new lord of the lounge.

T3 - Xbox 360

I’ve mentioned it on PS3Blog several times. The Xbox 360 has no HDMI output. Or DVI output for that matter. And Firewire/iLink/IEEE1394 never even comes up. (It doesn’t have that either.)

Nope, the Xbox 360, which does all its internal processing digitally and creates a digital image to display, converts that image to analog for you. Then you can do whatever you want with it. Like convert it back to digital again.

What’s that? If you have a CRT, analog may not be so bad. A CRT is an inherently analog device. But what if you have a DLP, LCD, LCOS/SXRD/D-ILA, or plasma display? Those are all digital. Gosh, it would be nice if they could have a digital connection to the Xbox 360 for the highest possible quality of signal and gaming experience.

But no.

Cost, of course, is the culprit. Only 10% or so of homes have an HDTV, so why bother with a connection that less than 10% of homes can use? But still, it’s a shame. It Microsoft really believed that HD was the next thing, like they keep saying, they could at least give us the best means by which to display it.

audio|video Revolution - What is missing from the Xbox 360?

If you’re one of the gaming masses to buy an Xbox 360 today, you’ll need to hook it up to your HDTV. And what a coincidence! I’ve already written an article about that over on PS3Blog! Actually, the article is about the PS3 and the Xbox 360, but they’re in separate sections, so if you dislike Sony, just skip over to the Xbox 360 section!

PS3Blog.net - How to Connect your PS3 or Xbox 360

Is this the future? Current rumour has it that PGR3 isn’t really HD at all, but 1024 x 600.

What does that mean?

It means that Project Gotham Racing 3 for the Xbox 360 is rendering the racing scenes internally at 1024 x 600, and the Xbox 360’s scaling hardware (not the 3D hardware) is scaling it up to 1280 x 720 for output to your HDTV. So while your set is receiving a 720p signal, it doesn’t have 720p’s worth of information therein. Why? Probably to get a good frame rate. They jammed so much polygon and texture goodness in there, the Xbox 360 was having trouble rendering it fast enough. So they went for a slightly lower resolution to boost the framerate.

Which, in theory, is bad. But in practice, you’re still going to get a great looking game. Maybe not quite as great as it could possibly look if it was really HD, but still pretty good.

But I would have liked that extra little bit of pixel yummyness.

360 Insider - Project Gotham Racing 3 not really running at 720p?

BD-J. What’s that you say? Blu-ray Disc Java, I guess. Part of the Blu-ray standard is a Java runtime environment so that your BD player can do all sorts of nifty interactive things. Including hooking up to the internet to get the latest movie trailers and movie-related content. (Or other content, for that matter.)

Now, when I bought my first DVD player eons ago (a Toshiba), I thought all those interactive menus and such to be cool. I always checked out the special features to see what was available. But you know, as time goes on, I’m looking at these features less and less. I can’t remember the last time I watched a making-of featurette which is really just-a-big-commercial. So I don’t think I really care about BD-J.

So I don’t think I need to connect my BD player to the internet, avoiding much of the paranoia Dan Ramer seems to have about BD and HD-DVD players affecting your player’s firmware.

Of course, the idea of your legally-purchased software and/or hardware being revoked is a scary one. If that were to happen to me, I’d be royally ticked off. If you’re concerned about this too, take a look at Dan Ramer’s article, and write some letters (he provides addresses).

But it occured to me that there’s one player that would probably never get revoked, just because its manufacturer would face so much backlash if it was. It’s called the PS3. There’s no way Sony would ever allow its cash-cow to make it to the revoked list. Nuh-uh. Just one more reason to buy a PS3!

DVDFILE.com - This Week’s HD Disc Update

The WSJ reported yesterday that support for the HD-DVD rollout this fall is waning. Paramount had committed to releasing 20 HD-DVD titles in the fourth quarter, and now won’t release any. Universal is scaling back from 16 titles to 12. And Toshiba’s HD-DVD player will probably be the only HD-DVD player available this year.

These things put a dent in the HD-DVD launch which is scheduled for the end of this year. The HD-DVD camp is getting a head-start on the Blu-ray camp by coming out this fall, but it looks like it’ll be a timid step instead of a bold entrance. Breadth of support is vitally important for either Blu-ray or HD-DVD to succeed. And if it looks like studios are getting cold feet, that’s not a good sign to consumers.

Which is only good news for the Blu-ray camp, of course. And Blu-ray, it seems, is still facing media bias against Sony. In the WSJ article, it says that HD-DVD is backed by “Toshiba Corp. and others” while Sony is mentioned as the Blu-ray supporter. What about all the other Blu-ray supporters? Shouldn’t it have said “Sony and others”? There are more big name “and others” supporting Blu-ray than HD-DVD. It would be nice if WSJ didn’t give Sony short shrift. 1up.com continues this bias in their coverage of the WSJ article, saying “Clearly [Microsoft] won’t support Sony’s proprietary Blu-ray technology”.

First of all, why not? Microsoft has always been known for doing what’s best for itself and, its agreement with Toshiba notwithstanding, it could still choose Sony’s Blu-ray if it feels it would be better for the Xbox 360 to do so. I, for one, think it would be a smart move. And as a matter of fact, Microsoft has not yet confirmed that it will use HD-DVD. Bill Gates said “we are looking at whether future versions of Xbox 360 will incorporate an additional capability of an HD DVD player or something else.” That “something else” could be Blu-ray. This is the extent of Microsoft’s committment to HD-DVD in the 360, and it’s not firm. (For more on why Microsoft should use Blu-ray in the Xbox 360, see my article about it today on PS3Blog.net.)

And second, if you’re going to call Sony’s Blu-ray proprietary, even though there’s a gazillion companies supporting it, you should at least acknowledge that HD-DVD is a proprietary format as well, developed by Toshiba. OR!!! If you look up proprietary in the dictionary, you get “Owned by a private individual or corporation under a trademark or patent.” So either Blu-ray and HD-DVD are both proprietary (being developed by Sony and Toshiba) or neither are (there’s widespread industry support behind both). And the DVDForum’s support for HD-DVD means squat. There’s an association of manufacturers (that’s all the DVDForum is) behind Blu-ray as well. It’s called the Blu-ray Disc Association. So 1up.com is being just a bit specious with their statement.

Link: 1UP.COM - HD-DVD Support Waning
Link: AVS - HD-DVD Rollout, Set for Holidays, Gets Scaled Back

So you got your PS3 or Xbox 360 home. How do you connect it to your home theater? Do you have the right connectors? PS3Blog.net has the answers for you.

Link: PS3Blog.net - How to Connect your PS3 or Xbox 360

Projector Central has an article summarizing the state of HD on the current crop of consoles. If you have a PS2, GameCube, or Xbox, and you were thinking of connecting it to an HDTV, this article neatly sums up your options. To sum up their summation: PS2 and Xbox owners are okay, GameCube owners are screwed.

If you’re really interested in HD gaming, then you’ll need to check out the upcoming PS3 and Xbox 360. Both support native HD resolutions and both are covered in my other blog: PS3Blog.net.

Link: Projector Central - Video Gaming in HD

Hello! A note from the author here.

Because of the volume of next-generation gaming console news being posted here I’ve decided to break them out into a separate website, PS3Blog.net. Don’t let the name fool you! You’ll get all the same posts about the next-gen consoles as you’ve been enjoying so far. The blog is about the PS3 and its competitors, the Xbox 360 and the Revolution. If you’ve been a long time reader you know that I have a PS2 and that I’ll probably be getting a PS3. My friend Todd who has an Xbox will probably get an Xbox 360. Steve, who has a GameCube, is currently wondering if it’s worth the bother to get a Revolution. We’re hoping Nintendo pulls something good out of their hat. So while I have great respect for the Xbox 360 and Nintendo, I’ll probably be getting a PS3, hence the name. I’ve you’ve registered to post here, don’t worry, I’ve carried your usernames over to the new website. All the posts that were about high definition console gaming that used to be here are now at the new site. Hopefully it’ll all be seemless.

So check it out!

Link: PS3Blog.net