XBox 360 Laptop

[Veriest1]

Crazy cool but it doesn't appear to have a battery (it'd probably need an Optima) which kind of defeats te purpose. Still cool though since you could be all chic and sit at Starbucks for hours playing video games and drinking $5 lattes... wait... I could do that on my laptop....

Verdict: Impressive workmanship but nearly useless.

[MinisterofDOOM]

Not really. 99% of the time I use my laptop or any other portable device, I'm within usable distance of a wall socket. In fact, for a long time my laptop didn't even have a good battery, and I never really missed it.

The advantage of it being in a package like that is portability and compactness, not necessarily the ability to use it out in the Gobi. Instead of needing to pack your 360 and TV up and lug them around, you need only fold that up and carry it with you.

The one downside is that the power supply for the 360 is bulky...size of a brick and heavy, too. So the laptop isn't quite the only thing you have to carry.

[Veriest1]

Not really. 99% of the time I use my laptop or any other portable device, I'm within usable distance of a wall socket. In fact, for a long time my laptop didn't even have a good battery, and I never really missed it.

Personally I use my laptop a lot and I'm not always gauranteed a postion near an outlet. I read the entire piece because I wondered what kind of solution he would come up with to get that monster to run on a battery for more than maybe 20 minutes or so.

The portable 360 is cool and serves its function well I'd assume. That being playing x-box live from a friends house or something without the need for an extra TV as you pointed out. But its uses are so limited for most people that it is nearly useless barring the situations where you need an extra TV... for the price I'd buy a new TV. And most people have multiple TV's anyway.

Due to this limited scope of use (minus installing a regular operating system on it) it's not as big of a deal to lack a battery. It's still disappointing since what defines a laptop to me is the ability to detach it from all cables and leave with it.

[LaughingBull]

Beta was better than VHS by far. Sony screwed that one up.

I thought beta only recorded in mono and VHS won out because it used stereo?

[C-Kwik]

blue-ray is the superior technology, the only thing it lacks is movies and an install base (much like HD-DVD)

can hold 50gb of data on a single layer Blueray Disk where you can only hold 30gb on an HD-DVD. HD-DVD as of yet can't do 1080p, where blue-ray can.

what sony needs to do though is get blue-ray out the door and cheap enough for computers, with blue ray burners. if they could do that, and get it at about the price as DVD and CD burners were when they first came out, they would probably win the standard war that is currently brewing right now.

I'm not sure I would call Blu-Ray superior at this point. Looks great on paper, but they have yet to deliver what they claim it is capable of. I'm sure it would actually be easier for Sony if they could keep it in the containers they originally designed for it.

Actually, BR has 25 GB per layer, not 50. 50GB is their dual layer...are they even able to mass produce these yet?

HD-DVD is capable of 1080p. It's up to the studios to determine if they will encode in 1080p and my understanding is HD-DVD movies are being encoded in 1080p. HD-DVD players are maxed at 1080i at the moment, but 1080p versions are on the way. Blu-ray movies released so far are on single layer 25 GB discs. Up until very recently, they encoded in MPEG2, and according to most reviews, the quality is lacking. They recently released VC-1 encoded movies, and if Sony can do 1080p on 25 GB, then HD-DVD can most certainly do 1080p on 30GB.

[nchopp]

I thought beta only recorded in mono and VHS won out because it used stereo?

No. Beta lost because Sony, as usual, had serious issues with the way they license technology. JVC let pretty much anyone that wanted to use VHS do so - Sony did not do the same with Beta. On the plus side for Sony, the 8mm format was derived from Beta, and the professional version, Betacam, is still widely used in news gathering and video production.

We still have two Betacam decks here that are used on a regular basis, and a Betacam camera that sits and does nothing.

We even have an old U-Matic (predecessor to Beta) deck that's semi-operational. 3/4" tape for the win!