Xbox Live's First Big Update

GameDaily reports on the first major Xbox Live update since the launch of the Xbox 360. From the article: "The forthcoming update will bring with it a number of additions designed to enhance the user experience, with perhaps the most notable function being the download manager. Currently, when downloading demos, trailers or other items from Marketplace users are tied to the download screen. The update will enable users to queue up and prioritize up to six downloads and users will be allowed to play music, games or do other things on the dashboard while downloads are in progress. If an online game is started, the current download in progress will be paused so as to avoid lag." For the visual among us, Joystiq has a number of screenshots showing off some of the new features.

Hallelujah.

[blackraven14250]

We've been waiting for this download manager forever.

Cool.

[BaronSprite]

While I don't own an xbox 360 yet (too expensive, holding out for the wii-sonably priced nintendo), I did mess around with one at best buy recently and was impressed how far the UI has come since the first generation. It's good to see some user concerns being addressed, but really what's the problem with letting people play online while downloading? I'm sure XBL caps out your bandwith and that could cause some lag, but couldn't they just implement a cap to the download speed? With a broadband connection, gaming and downloading at the same time isn't far fetched.

Re:Cool.

[grammar fascist]

I'm sure XBL caps out your bandwith and that could cause some lag, but couldn't they just implement a cap to the download speed? With a broadband connection, gaming and downloading at the same time isn't far fetched.

I don't know much about the 360 architecture, but you've got more than just network lag to worry about. If a game is taking every last cycle on every processor, a few downloads (in addition to the game's normal network connection, if there is one) might make it stutter just enough to ruin the pl

Re:Cool.

[assassinator42]

Wouldn't it mess with some offline games as well then? I believe it's required that games reserve some power for the in-game dashboard thing. I'd imagine that's what does the downloading. Also, it can only do one download at once, they're just queued.

Re:Cool.

[Keeper]

I'm sure XBL caps out your bandwith and that could cause some lag, but couldn't they just implement a cap to the download speed?

Capping the speed won't prevent lag.

It makes sense if you think about it for a bit ... you have no way of knowing how the data transmitted will "come down" the line -- Best case, if you can have the server control the rate at which the data is sent, you aren't guaranteed to receive it at that rate consistantly. IE: the server could send the data at a constant rate, but you may r

Re:Cool.

[Serzen]

I don't know much about the 360, but I read a (print) article a couple years ago on Xbox Live that indicated the reason why broadband was required for Live was because of the way that the Xbox components were designed to work together. Basically, what was being intimated what that you had to have a minimum of 128Kbps down because that was the least amount of data that the Xbox was capable of processing.

Since many people who have broadband don't actually have that fast of a connection (768K max downstream

Re:Cool.

[bigman2003]

As a heavy Xbox Live user, I would not want a cap. I would ask for exactly what they are doing- pause the download while I am playing, the resume it when I am done.

If I even *thought* downloads *might* introduce lag during on-line play, I wouldn't do it.

But this new method lets me queue up a few downloads, and have them run while I watch a movie.

Perfect for me (a real live Xbox user).

Re:If this is the first

[Coopjust]

GameDaily reports on the first major Xbox Live update since the launch of the Xbox 360. From the article:

The question is, of course, when?

[PSXer]

I've known about this update for at least a couple of weeks (saw it on the Beyond3D forum), but still no release date. Shame.

Guess I'll just have to keep checking every five minutes.

Re:So, basically...

[tbmcmullen]

Huh... While I'm not a Microsoft fan-boy in any sense of the phrase, I have a hard time seeing how exactly they're failing.

They've sold millions of Xbox 360s. Their operating system dominates the home PCs and a large share of servers. Their office suite is the "standard" (in the real world). Their .NET languages are dominating the programming market (around here anyway... trying to find a programming job without .NET experience is hellish).

If by "failing" you mean that those with a technological background realize that many of their products are half-done turds, then I can agree. But thats hardly a realistic use of the word "failing".

And for your convenience...

[Myria]

...we've added a dozen new "security" updates to help prevent you from using the console as you wish!

Other features

[PSXer]

Looks like they've seperated game videos from demos. No more looking at the listing for a game and thinking "Hmm, 3 downloads, that's probably a 480p video, 720p video, and a demo, but there's only one way to find out"

Also, you can choose to have it boot to the dashboard instead of loading the game automatically. Great for those of us who paid $400 for "next gen grafx, d00d" but got addicted to Xbox Live Arcade games

Speaking of XBL Arcade, it's not mentioned in the article, but I hope they fix that interface. When you go to the menu, it takes like 15 seconds to count all the arcade games you have downloaded and to show you the one you last played, which makes the "last played" timesaver useless. Oddly, if you go to the list of arcade games you downloaded it shows you no problem, so I don't know what'w up with that.

Re:Other features

[ImaLamer]

you can choose to have it boot to the dashboard instead of loading the game automatically

I like this feature as my firewall blocks Xbox Live unless I initiate the login through the Dashboard.