05 January, 2006

Console

I have bought an x-box. After specifically stating I didn't want one for christmas I lasted all of 2 weeks before my willpower gave out. This could have a large part to do with some of the intense gaming that Mick and I had with his brothers xbox (before Joju) took it back and then some great fun with 4 player Halo 2.

Or it could just be marketing.

Anyway, I have yet to get it to work with surround sound. I have some ideas on how to go about that though, so if you hear some explosions very loud from the Annerley area, you'll know I've succeeded :)

1 comment:

Anonymous said...

Tsk, tsk. The 360 is not very far away. Just hang out for a couple of months for it to come out, a couple more months for the price to drop, and et voila, you have a far more advanced piece of machinery, capable of playing the old classics, as well as the new stuff (ie, the inevitable Halo 3).

As for surround sound, I think you have to do it with a digital optical cable. And you need the xbox advanced AV pack. I've confirmed that this does have digital optical sound out. Thing is, if you're just using surround off a DVD player, it's unlikely to have an input for a decoded signal. It'll likely only accept stereo, and the only 5.1 it does is from it's own DVD player. Mine's like that. I may hook my xbox up to my PC speakers for a bit to see how it goes with 5.1. They kick the arse of my DVD player speakers anyway. Much better top end.

On a related note, the damn xbox does not do HD for Australians. Apparently it runs in HD NTSC (well, it's just a progressive signal vs interlaced, but still!), but not in HD pal, as the HD pal stardard wasn't official till a couple of months after the xbox launch. I say they're just jealous that we have a superior signal. So really the component cables I've just ordered off ebay will not let me play HD on the new TV. Bah. At least the picture quality will be better for being component. So that's why they never had component cables in Australia... Oh well. At least it was only like $15 for an el cheapo brand.

But...! Soul Calibur may yet do 720p, and that'll be a thing of beauty.