How can a *console* crash?!
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| Author | Content |
|---|---|
| Tsela Nov 24, 2005 12:07 AM EDT |
I've been a console gamer for 15 years (always have been faithful to Nintendo, I've had a Super Nes, a Nintendo 64, I still have my GameCube, and am impatiently waiting for the Revolution), and I have *never* had a console crash. I did get once a defective N64 game cartridge, but that is a different thing (and I just brought it back to the store and took another one, which worked perfectly). But if you think it a little carefully, you should realise that a console should indeed *never* crash. A console is not a PC. It's a plug-and-play appliance, like a TV or a DVD-player. It's a highly integrated piece of hardware, with few extension possibilities (and those extensions are usually specific for that particular console). The software that is in it is supposed to be tightly integrated to the hardware and specific for it, and the games are developed using special developer packages the game companies receive from console manufacturers. This whole system, while reducing flexibility (but that's not what one is looking for in a game console) ensures maximum compatibility, so that you should *never* see a crash. Sure, games have bugs, and some can sometimes be quite bad, but then you get a game problem, not a console crash! It looks as though to "win" the next-gen console race (as if being first in the market is so important...), Microsoft decided to cut corners and to apply to the XBox development the same quality control as with Windows development. This is just one more piece of evidence that Microsoft never has the customer interest in their mind, but only their own petty power battle to become the One and Only. Well, between a crashing XBox and Sony pulling spyware on their customers, it looks like a great opportunity for Nintendo to get back to centre-stage in the console business. I for one wouldn't mind it. Nintendo has its share of faults (like their irrational fear of piracy), but at least they respect their customer much more than MS or Sony ever has. And at least they are true innovators, unlike MS Johnny-come-lately, or Sony "all that players want is another FPS and another racing game". |
| r_a_trip Nov 24, 2005 7:45 AM EDT |
Xbox 360 is what you get when MS is trying to apply X86 Desktop technology to a PPC based console. Forget tightly intgrated hardware. MS probably saw the 360 as just another DRM-ed PC, albeit a PC with a PPC processor instead of X86. Most likely they just modified the Win2000 based original Xbox OS to tun on PPC. So the software quite likely is a ported kludge that doesn't fit any hardware because it is a heavily mutated Desktop x86 OS. In other words, it is just like every other piece of MS software. A horrible patchwork of bad design decisions, layers and layers of added features and hackish "fixes" to make the hodgepodge work together. Xbox 360 is what you get when a sub-par Software company thinks they can design hardware and get it to run by cramming a stripped and deformed Desktop OS on to it. |
| TxtEdMacs Nov 24, 2005 11:06 AM EDT |
Assuming the comments are true with the difficulties encountered with the newest version(s) of the Xbox(es), there does not seem to be one simple (nor even one class of) explanation that would cover all the faults seen. One sticks in my mind is physical damage inflicted on a removable game disc, while locking up. If true, it makes it appear the lack of quality controls were persistent across the board in MS's attempt to be out first with the newest iteration of a game console. If this persists and the numbers I have seen quoted on the loss MS takes on each unit, their dreams of capturing the gaming industry will have to await at least another generation and a bit more of their excess cash has been expended in a useless venture. Give them a hand in another job well done. |
| dinotrac Nov 24, 2005 11:09 AM EDT |
txt - I saw comments on some game forums that some 360s come with a power bar that causes problems - especially problems with heat. Swap out the power bar for the type on other boxes, and the problems go away. I wouldn't know -- I don't own a game console of any kind. It's just what I read. |
| pat Nov 24, 2005 1:53 PM EDT |
I have a name for the xbox 360, "xbox reach around edition". I think it fits. |
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