Thursday, December 6, 2007
The Fall 2007 Xbox Update: What Do You Think of It?
Posted by Jason Dunn in "THOUGHT" @ 08:00 AM
This morning I fired up my Xbox and installed the new update. I won't bother going over all the details of what was improved (here's a nitty-gritty list), but a few things jumped out at me as being better. I like the new way that content downloads are organized - it's quick to go through them by pivoting left and right, then up and down to get the content you want. The addition of Xbox Originals is cool, and I can see the framework for the forthcoming drop of Xbox Live Marketplace videos for us Canucks...but I didn't see much else to get excited about. I don't have a lot of content in Divx, though I'm very pleased to see them add it.
What I don't like is how they've left photo viewing in the same state: I have it pointed to my Windows Home Server, and when I select photos on the Xbox dashboard, I'm taken to a screen with a single folder called Photos. That's just silly: there should be some intelligence built into the system so that if there's only one folder in the root, it would display the contents of that folder. After going into Photos, I'm shown the three by three grid of folders. The problem is that only 14 characters are shown before it cuts off, so many of my top-level photo folders (organized by category) are truncated. The font is also too small for me to easily see from across the room. I'd much rather see a list view; more folders would fit on the screen at once, and if they used the same-sized font as "Play Slideshow" it would be easier to read. What would be great is if a random photo from the selected folder would appear over to the right of the list view - that would make it much more dynamic and interesting to use, and less like a DOS list.
Drilling down into a category folder, it gets a bit worse: I name my folders in a fairly descriptive fashion, so inside the "Christmas" folder I'll have a sub-folder called "Dunn Christmas 2004". Because the view is still the 3x3 grid, all I see is eight identical folders named "Dunn Christm...". How is that useful to anyone? I'm not about to change the way I name my folders just to suit the Xbox - I need the descriptive folders for Picasa and many other programs.
Here's something bizarre though: when I click into Videos on the Xbox dashboard, I get a list view with Photos and Videos in it (this is again off my Windows Home Server). I'm not sure why this is, but if I go into Photos from here, I get the list view that I wanted, no grid. It doesn't show me any photos though: only folders with videos. I tried playing an AVI file that showed up there, but the Xbox coughed up a "Status Code 80-C00DF242" error and wouldn't play the file. What's bizarre is that I can't find a single Google hit for that error code, nor any mention of it over at the Xbox support site - so I have no idea what it means. It sucks being the first guy to write about a certain problem online - no one has done the legwork for you. ;-)
I suspect the problem is that the Xbox can't play back MJPEG-based AVI files, which is what Canon SD series cameras, and indeed most cameras, record in. I think this is a significant failing of the Xbox, because I'm the same as most consumers in that I don't usually take my camera clips and edit them into a "movie" and output it to WMV format - I just leave the file in the folder in it's native format. The Xbox 360 should support MJPEG AVI video files, because that's what most digital still cameras record in.
Personally I think Canon has let video recording on their cameras languish and they should have moved away from MJPEG to Divx like Casio has, but until they do, consumers don't have any choice in terms of format - and the Xbox 360 needs to acknowledge that and support it.
So what are your thoughts on the new Xbox update?
Jason Dunn owns and operates Thoughts Media Inc., a company dedicated to creating the best in online communities. He enjoys mobile devices, digital media content creation/editing, and pretty much all technology. He lives in Calgary, Alberta, Canada with his lovely wife, and his sometimes obedient dog. His Xbox 360 rocks.
What I don't like is how they've left photo viewing in the same state: I have it pointed to my Windows Home Server, and when I select photos on the Xbox dashboard, I'm taken to a screen with a single folder called Photos. That's just silly: there should be some intelligence built into the system so that if there's only one folder in the root, it would display the contents of that folder. After going into Photos, I'm shown the three by three grid of folders. The problem is that only 14 characters are shown before it cuts off, so many of my top-level photo folders (organized by category) are truncated. The font is also too small for me to easily see from across the room. I'd much rather see a list view; more folders would fit on the screen at once, and if they used the same-sized font as "Play Slideshow" it would be easier to read. What would be great is if a random photo from the selected folder would appear over to the right of the list view - that would make it much more dynamic and interesting to use, and less like a DOS list.
Drilling down into a category folder, it gets a bit worse: I name my folders in a fairly descriptive fashion, so inside the "Christmas" folder I'll have a sub-folder called "Dunn Christmas 2004". Because the view is still the 3x3 grid, all I see is eight identical folders named "Dunn Christm...". How is that useful to anyone? I'm not about to change the way I name my folders just to suit the Xbox - I need the descriptive folders for Picasa and many other programs.
Here's something bizarre though: when I click into Videos on the Xbox dashboard, I get a list view with Photos and Videos in it (this is again off my Windows Home Server). I'm not sure why this is, but if I go into Photos from here, I get the list view that I wanted, no grid. It doesn't show me any photos though: only folders with videos. I tried playing an AVI file that showed up there, but the Xbox coughed up a "Status Code 80-C00DF242" error and wouldn't play the file. What's bizarre is that I can't find a single Google hit for that error code, nor any mention of it over at the Xbox support site - so I have no idea what it means. It sucks being the first guy to write about a certain problem online - no one has done the legwork for you. ;-)
I suspect the problem is that the Xbox can't play back MJPEG-based AVI files, which is what Canon SD series cameras, and indeed most cameras, record in. I think this is a significant failing of the Xbox, because I'm the same as most consumers in that I don't usually take my camera clips and edit them into a "movie" and output it to WMV format - I just leave the file in the folder in it's native format. The Xbox 360 should support MJPEG AVI video files, because that's what most digital still cameras record in.
Personally I think Canon has let video recording on their cameras languish and they should have moved away from MJPEG to Divx like Casio has, but until they do, consumers don't have any choice in terms of format - and the Xbox 360 needs to acknowledge that and support it.
So what are your thoughts on the new Xbox update?
Jason Dunn owns and operates Thoughts Media Inc., a company dedicated to creating the best in online communities. He enjoys mobile devices, digital media content creation/editing, and pretty much all technology. He lives in Calgary, Alberta, Canada with his lovely wife, and his sometimes obedient dog. His Xbox 360 rocks.
