XBox 360 questions. Three of 'em...
Esh
Tending bar. FFXIV. Motorcycles.Portland, ORRegistered User regular
Tending bar. FFXIV. Motorcycles.Portland, ORRegistered User regular
I'm going to pick one up tomorrow most likely and I have a couple questions...
1. Is it a good time to buy? Is any hardware inside getting updated anytime soon? Is there a serial number or something I should look for?
2. I want to connect it to my LCD monitor that has component in. It's this monitor. Will the 360 look just fine on it?
3. Lastly, how do I go about getting sound out of the 360 if I'm not plugging it's audio outputs into a normal TV? Is there a cable at Radio Shack that'll let me say plug in my computer speakers if needed?
1. Is it a good time to buy? Is any hardware inside getting updated anytime soon? Is there a serial number or something I should look for?
2. I want to connect it to my LCD monitor that has component in. It's this monitor. Will the 360 look just fine on it?
3. Lastly, how do I go about getting sound out of the 360 if I'm not plugging it's audio outputs into a normal TV? Is there a cable at Radio Shack that'll let me say plug in my computer speakers if needed?
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2) It will look similar to a PC game running at 720p (1280x720)
3) You can use an adapter. I ended up using the one that came with my sound card.
Wouldn't I need a RCA to female to plug my speakers into?
It should look good though? 720p is just fine, yes? Why won't it run at 1080i?
I agree with wait till after E3 because.. I don't know, it's E3, who knows what will happen.
That monitor cant run 1080i.
The HD numbers work like this:
The HD number = smaller resolution number.
So: 720p HD = a PC monitor resolution of 1280×720.
1080 = [1900ish]x1080
Your monitor only goes to 1680x1050 (close, but not quite).
How much of a graphical difference is it going to make? It's still gonna look pretty hot, right? It'll run faster at 720p at any rate, right?
I don't know if that monitor supports 1080i. It would have to deinterlace the image, at the very least. 720p is much more common in an LCD monitor.
I'm a little confused. My speakers don't have an "input" jack. They're a 2.1 Logitech set. The only place I can see where you could plug something in would be the headphones, and that certainly won't work.
This is where my pretty basic knowledge falls down... But I hear that for anything requiring a lot of movement (i.e. games or sports) 720p is actually better... Apparently ESPN HD in the states broadcasts on 720p for this reason.
The way I understood it was that the "i" in 1080i stands for "integrated" which means that its not true 1080 resolution (they merge some of the lines or something...) , so the increase in detail isnt as big as the numbers would lead you to believe. It also somehow makes 1080i excellent for still images, but not as clear for fast moving images.
I have pretty good eyesight, and definitely appreciate the difference from standard def to 720... But I haven't seen a 1080 rig yet, so I cant really comment. I suspect that running it on such a small monitor will also limit the difference for you between 720 and 1080.
Someone that knows more might be able to give a better explanation.
This seems more like what should work for me, right? I still can't quite figure out what you're meaning to do with the female to male.
Or, more commonly, "interlaced".
Basically, it means that each frame has half of its horizontal lines missing (so, each frame in 1080i really has a vertical resolution of 540 lines).
On one frame, all the "odd numbered" lines are produced, and on the next frame, all the "even numbered" lines are produced.
Interlacing is the way (non-progressive-scan) CRT TVs worked. The electron beam inside would scan the odd lines on one frame, then the even ones on the next. HDTVs don't work like this, so they have to do some fancy processing to try to recover the missing lines in each frame... but it's always a bit hit-and-miss.
In still pictures (or slow-moving video), the processing is easy. The TV can just mix the odd and even frames together to create a full picture with a vertical resolution of 1080 lines. However, in a fast-moving picture, the difference between the odd and even frames can be massive. So the TV ends up having to basically "invent" the missing lines in each frame, often creating a bit of a mangled image.
For fast moving games and video, I'd personally choose 720p over 1080i.
No, this will not work. That turns stereo RCA plugs into a mono RCA plug.
You need this (two male RCA plugs and a male stereo plug) and this (plug the speakers in one end, the previous cable in the other)
Don't be a fool. Wait.
If there's games you want to play, buy one and buy the extended warranty. Worst case scenario, you spend some time waiting for the box to be in transit to/from the repair depot. Best case scenario, you're actually, you know, playing that Xbox that you want.
Warranty dies. 360 dies. You need to buy another console.
Why in the hell are you guys so fancy fucking free on buying faulty hardware. I can't for the life of me understand the lot of you, regular people don't like buying things that break.
I am not saying NEVER BUY a 360, I said WAIT.
E3 is around the corner and Microsoft might announce a fix for the console or a revision. I am not arguing that the 360 doesn't have games people want to play, I am arguing the fact that he shouldn't get a fault console right now.
Those games will still be there after the 65nm revision. My friend asked me a couple days ago if he should buy a 360 and I also told him no wait till the new chipset is out. It's just smart thinking there isn't much coming out this summer anyways and if you have waited this long to get one a few more months wont kill anyone when a possibly better product could be yours.
I don't think Microsoft would wait until E3 to announce a fix or revision. They'd just get it done and do it straight away.
Fine then, wait for them to fix it. Don't be stupid and buy a console that will break down on you. (even with an extended warranty)
I've only had one break, and it was a launch unit from eBay. The failure rate isn't as high as you think it is.
Microsoft won't tell you but most of the evidence points to the fact that the problem that is crippling the 360 is an honest to god design flaw. It's not a matter of if your 360 fails to it, it's when.
I don't agree. Mine is almost a year old now and it hasn't had any problems to speak of. I do agree that there is a design flaw, but the failure rate, no matter how much you want it to be, is not 100% or close to it.
You said you had one break on you. Done. You suffered from it and you don't care.
The rate of returns to retail stores is in 30-33% right now, how many times do you think retailers didn't take back a console? That number of people sending there 360s into Microsoft is the number we do not know about because Microsoft refuses to tell us. Also, for your console you own right now I give it less then a year.
The 30-33% is a completely unsubstantiated number, there have been some (2 or 3 i believe) "supposed" managers for retail stores who say thats about the number they've taken back, but the fact of the matter is theres no percentages backed by actual hard data anywhere. It could be that high, it could also be 20%, 10% or even 5%
For the OP, you are going to have to buy an extended warranty for your XBox 360 no matter when you buy it. If the problem is fixed then you are just less likely to need it. If they ever figure out how to permanently fix XBoxes then you will only need it once.