Wow... gamers are dumb.

[kool kitty89]

MS didn't go with x86-64 for the XBox 360 because they realized that if they did, they'd wind up with the same problem they had with the XBox - emulators on the PC running XBox games. Current PCs are nowhere near powerful enough to emulate the Xenon anywhere near full speed. With the XBox, since it used a P3 CPU, you could run XBox games in a virtual environment. The tri-core PPEs that make the CPU of the XBox 360 require full emulation, and even dynamic recompilation wouldn't get you full speed. So it gives them a few more years without fearing piracy due to emulators until long past when the game are no longer making money.

That makes a lot more sense than other arguments I've seen on the topic (most/all of which purely center on the x86-64 chips being "not powerful enough" and nothing else).

[OldSchool]

That makes a lot more sense than other arguments I've seen on the topic (most/all of which purely center on the x86-64 chips being "not powerful enough" and nothing else).

Are you guys saying that the decisions behind the hardware of the 360 are partially due to Microsoft inventing ways to circumvent Piracy!!?


Gaming's going to die if this is the case.... I NEVER even thought that Piracy could drive such decisions. I'm feeling quite naive atm.

[kool kitty89]

Are you guys saying that the decisions behind the hardware of the 360 are partially due to Microsoft inventing ways to circumvent Piracy!!?


Gaming's going to die if this is the case.... I NEVER even thought that Piracy could drive such decisions. I'm feeling quite naive atm.

Ever heard of the N64?


Not just piracy/security in that case, but overall control of the market. (granted Nintendo could have been proactive towards that goal and pushed for a secure optical format like they did with the GC -actually just normal DVD but with a hefty security system and encryption scheme, the Dreamcast's GDROM would have been nearly ideal for blocking piracy, but they overlooked some key things like the possibility of hacking the network interface to dump the data and the ability to boot normal CDs)

It's not like MS compromised performance though, the tri-core CPU it uses is still pretty powerful for the time (not bad even by current standards) and was definitely the safer route to go than what Sony did with pushing the single PPE with SPE comprocessors of the Cell. The 360 is still very freindly to cross-develop for with PC games for that reason and allows (more or less) simple recompiles for the different architecture. Actually in their case it's the media that was left alone while Sony pushed for higher capacity media, but for somewhat different reasons than Nintedno. (cost was obviously part of Nintendo's decision for carts, except that doesn't really hold up when you take the cost of carts into account vs CDs... with DVD vs BD that's not the case and DVD manufacturing was/is cheaper than BD manufacturing)

So the drawback is for xbox compatibility, not performance/cost/reliability. (the latter MS screwed up with in a number of engineering aspects and got made worse by the odd mandated use of lead-free solder and poor quality control -poorly applied thermal paste among other things -the overall flaws could have been largely addressed with a less cramped case, more powerful fans, and proper GPU heat sink -and only allowing horizontal operation if they weren't going to spring for proper vertical orientation DVD drives)