Tuesday, May 08, 2007

Xbox360 Blu-ray drive rumour fake



Microsoft executive Peter Moore has allegedly called Blu-ray "the most cutting edge technology out there" and announced that an external Blu-ray drive for the Xbox360 might hit shops before Christmas. This ridiculous rumour originates from a Hi-Fi forum and was propelled into the mainstream news by MaxConsole.

The thread - written by a user with a post count of one - includes an "article" to back up the outrageous claim. Its author is supposedly an Associated Press technology writer. However, the paragraphs are riddled with spelling mistakes and unclear, if not bad English.

The imposter also links to a number of articles which are all unrelated to the claim, other than a 1UP article dated October about Moore discussing the theoretical possibility of such a Blu-ray drive add-on in order "to adapt to whichever standard wins out in the end." Moore clearly reaffirms, though, that "HD-DVD is Microsoft's preferred DVD format."



It is so easy to spot a fake like this one. I am just extremely surprised that a site like MaxConsole would publish this crap, seemingly without the slightest cerebral activity wasted on checking the content.

They only just posted a story about Nintendo headhunting Kutaragi, linking to a German article that stated the very opposite. And last autumn, they were happy to publish Wii specs without a healthy dose of scepticism, along with a subsequent rebuttal from the anonymous source when a whole number of news sites pointed out that the specs could not be real. This would draw the validity of other rumours into question, too.

As far as this story and the one about Kutaragi are concerned, MaxConsole is currently engaging in nothing more than ´copy and paste journalism´.

Source: eCoustics forum
Thanks to: MaxConsole

3 comments:

Anonymous said...

Although this rumor is definitely false, I don’t see it as being too far out there. Especially since Peter Moore himself did not rule out the possibility.

However, despite the obvious preference for HD-DVD, it seems Microsoft isn't willing to completely tie its fate to the format just yet. During CES 2006, Microsoft's Xbox corporate VP of worldwide marketing and publishing Peter Moore told Japanese site ITmedia that a Blu-ray Xbox 360 peripheral could appear for the system if the need arises. Moore admitted that Microsoft isn't sure of the next-generation format war's outcome, with the worst-case scenario being a repeat of the Beta vs. VHS war of the '80s.

Link

Anonymous said...

Man Fal, I love to see you destroy rumors. This brings back fond memories.

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