Should *I* get an X-box?
 

Other than possibly Halo, there isn't much on X-box that interests me as far as games go. From the reviews I've read, most seem either mediocre or are genres that I'm not into (namely FPS) or they are quick ports of PS2 games. Please don't take that as a system bash, as I think it's a system with a lot of potential and know that people who are into those types of games (or Sega games) would love it. It's just not for me.

I'm also not all that interested in its DVD capabilities as I already have a standalone player and a PS2.

HOWEVER, the X-box as an audio component interests me quite a bit. I'm thinking specifically of using it as a jukebox. It's my understanding that the harddrive will hold quite a few CDs worth of music, it has a digital output, and wouldn't look too unsightly with my other components

But I have a few questions I hope you guys can help me with.

1. Is there a better/cheaper/more attractive recommendation for a music harddrive than a $199 X-box? Truth is, I'll probably wait till it's $149.

2. Is it fairly straightforward to make playlists or sort according to artist (i.e. sort by genre "rock" or by group "pearl jam")?

3. How much music will it hold assuming I don't save many games on it?

4. Does it record in .wav format or does it compress the music into some other format.

5. Does the DVD remote work particularly well for navigating the menus?

6. Did I miss anything?

Thanks in advance.

It sounds like you have already talked yourself out of getting the Xbox for what it was designed for. Maybe you should look into a mp3 player like this:

http://www.tigerdirect.com/images/SK...M975-1036r.jpg

Here is a link to a store that has one.

>1. Is there a better/cheaper/more attractive recommendation for a music harddrive than a $199 X-box? Truth is, I'll probably wait till it's $149.

If you plan to do that, Xbox's hdd is only 8 gig, it might sound big but you can probably fill that up easily..... If you are serious about it, you might want to modify it by adding larger/multiple harddrives. But that involves more money+labor....


To be honest, I would never buy a system like that for something it isn't really intended for (not saying it won't work or anything).... Buy it to play games, and if it doesn't have any games you like, then don't even bother. Look for dedicated solutions to what you really want to do.

Yeah, it's easy. You create a playlist, and then every time you copy music to the HD it asks you whether you want to add to a current playlist or create a new one. And afterwards, you can always copy songs from one playlist to another. Curiously, there's no option to move tracks over to playlists; only copy to the new one and delete that track from the old.

Quite a bit. It saves the music in Windows Media format, and from what I understand it's quite a bit more compressed than MP3. So figure how many MP3s you could store on an 8GB HD and then add about 10-20% more.

Please see above.

Yeah, the remove acts like a controller when not in DVD mode, so you can move up and down tracks, play, stop, do all the features you could normally do.

The XBox won't fast forward or rewind through a music track. That's a pain when you just want to skim through a track. And there's no real graphical representation to the music, only in the little window to the side of the menus.

If you want a good MP3 player, and already have a CD-R, just get yourself a NUON DVDN501 player. It's a DVD player with NUON technology (first attempt at integrating DVD and game consoles together, poorly supported but did have Tempest 3K) and will decode MP3s from a CD. It also has the Virtual Light Machine, which does all these cool full-screen effects to the music. You can find it on Amazon pretty cheap (less than $90).

Hope that helps...

Jeremy

Press Y then X quickly for a little surprise.. :D

One thing to keep in mind is that saving music to the Xbox HDD is a pretty slow and time consuming process... I thought I would use that feature a lot more but I just don't have the patience to sit and wait for it to copy a bunch of CDs.

I just can't see paying $149.99 for an mp3 player alone when the Xbox does virtually the same and much much more for $50 more. I find it a plus to having a jukebox, a DVD player and a gaming console all in one unit. That means less space, less cables and no extra remotes!

In another forum a guy said that he has 97hours of music on the Xbox harddrive and still has plenty of room for game saves.

Good luck which ever you decide.

XBox is 149.99 refurbished at gamecrazy until saturday, you also get 12 free rentals (1 per mo. at Hollywood), you can also get a warranty for 20 dollars more if you don't feel safe getting a refurb.

If you want a set-top mp3 player, why not try to build your own.

I saw this and it looked like a cool project to try out sometime. This is also the same guy who built the insane system that had the PS2, Gamecube, XBox, NES, and Atari in one box. yoshi's boxx

Thanks dude!

Ask yourself this though: would you never play any of the games? If not then get that Creative Labs thing above, otherwise the Xbox is good. You can actually put like 60 music albums on it.

don't get me wrong, if i get an xbox, i'll play games on it...i just don't think based on its track record that it would be my primary game machine. most people buy the xbox as a game machine with a jukebox feature as a bonus...i'd just be doing it the other way around.

thanks for the pics and link, but that's just ugly...plus it requires a lot of computer interface and a lot of converting files to .mp3

the cool thing about the xbox is that you can just put your disks in and rip away on to the harddrive...plus it plays games.

maybe burning MP3s onto CDRs and getting a 5 disk DVD/CD changer is a better bet...

how do windows media files on xbox sound compare to the original .wav recordings or .mp3s for that matter?

i'm also a bit concerned about taking the time to burn a bunch of cds to the drive and then having the xbox crap out with no backup.

don't take that as a bash either...i'm at least as worried about my PS2 crapping out. :)

oh, last question...

does it have a "random" feature?

i presume that it would, but you never know.

thanks for the replies fellas.

Yes http://www.dvdtalk.com/forum/showthr...hreadid=252833

Let's talk negotiations lol

Re: Should *I* get an X-box?
 

Officialy the X-Box has an 8GB HD. In reality it's a 20GB. I've seen pictures of open X-Boxes. MS just lets you see 8GB of it. If you know linux and willing to solder a mod chip then it'll make a really cheap jukebox.

Do a search on google or www.slashdot.org on what people have done. Just be aware that any modifications you make will void the warranty and may prevent you from playing some games. Another thing to consider is that the X-Boxes being sold now are different from the launch ones. Nvidia consolidated a few of the chips into one and changed some of the security so you may not even be able to do anything with it other than play games, watch DVD's and listen to CD's.