This news has been around a while now but I only just noticed. The Xbox site buried the announcement in a document that mostly focussed on Instant Messaging, but anyway the next update to XBox360 in early May will include:
"# Added H.264 video support: Up to 10 Mbps peak, Baseline, Main, and High profiles with 2 channel AAC LC. # Added MPEG-4 Part 2 video support: Up to 5 Mbps peak, Simple Profile with 2 channel AAC LC." Hoorah, all my recent waffle with Rupert about this stuff & Windows Media Center is out of date, and it looks like I was wrong about how much microsoft would resist mp4 & h264. They are probably also showing off because the XBox360 has plenty of power so it can handle high-spec stuff. But it uses quite a lot of electrical power so Im not too keen to promote it a the best solution, and its a tad loud. Very good picture quality in HD modes when playing HD-DVD's so I expect the mpeg4 & h264 support to be equally good, I would guess its probably the same decoder thats already used if you have the HD-DVD addon for the 360, as both HD DVD and Blueray use h264. Anyway I dunno if the update will be available for UK Xboxers at the same time as the US, but when I get it I will report as to whether ipod & apple tv formatted vlogs play back on it ok, Id certainly hope/expect so. Cheers Steve Elbows
