USB Mass Storage Device Support on Xbox 360

Discussion in 'News and Article Submission' started by InsaneNutter, Mar 18, 2010.

  1. InsaneNutter

    InsaneNutter Resident Nutter Staff Member

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    [​IMG]


    Documentation obtained by Joystiq – and subsequently confirmed with two separate sources – reveals that "USB Mass Storage Device Support on Xbox 360" will soon be a reality. The document, authored by a senior software development engineer at Microsoft, states that due to "increased market penetration of high-capacity, high throughput USB mass storage devices, a 2010 Xbox 360 system update" will allow consumers to save and load game data from USB devices. The update is purportedly coming in Spring 2010.

    Once the update occurs, Xbox 360 owners will be able to download Xbox Live Arcade games, Xbox Live Indie games, Games on Demand, DLC and Title Updates to the storage device. "USB storage devices may, however, have far greater memory capacity than MUs (at the date of writing, the largest MU is 512 MB), and may therefore support previously infeasible operations-such as installation of a full disc-based title." That's right, you can also store disc-based games to the USB device; however, it will require the disc to be in the tray for authentication, identical to the current functionality.

    [​IMG]

    According to the document, the USB mass storage device must be at least 1GB and the system will do a compatibility check. "The system partition occupies 512 MB of space, and by default the consumer partition occupies the remainder of the device capacity, or 16 GB, whichever is smaller." Upon inserting a blank USB storage device, "consumers are offered two choices: 'Configure now' or 'Customize'." The "Configure now" option will use "the entire device capacity, up to the maximum of 512 MB plus 16 GB" meaning, regardless of the overall size of the device you're using, the Xbox will only enable 16 GB of usable, non-system storage. The "Customize" option will allow you to "preserve some pre-existing, non-console data on the device" such as music.

    It should be clear by now that Microsoft is simply pulling out of the Memory Unit business and not the highly lucrative Xbox hard drive business. With an artificial cap of 16 GB – still shy of the 20 GB hard drive that shipped with the original 2005 Xbox Pro and a fraction the size of the currently shipping 120 GB hard drive – USB storage support simply removes the onerous requirement for a Memory Unit on Xbox 360 Arcade units, and brings the Xbox 360 platform a feature that's been present on the PlayStation 3 since that console's 2006 launch.

    If you're intent on circumventing Microsoft's cutthroat hard drive pricing the Xbox 360, you can use two USB storage devices for a maximum of 32 GB of usable storage; however, the console "has a fixed limit of two external USB mass storage devices" regardless of whether they're "formatted for the Xbox 360 or not." If you fill all three USB ports on the console, only the first two to be connected will be recognized.

    With talk of a new (slim?) form factor for the Xbox 360 picking up, and plans to abandon (or at least obviate) Memory Units underway, we're guessing those Memory Unit slots could be cut entirely from future iterations of the console.
     

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  2. InsaneNutter

    InsaneNutter Resident Nutter Staff Member

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    Great stuff if you ask me, even though I have a nice hacked 250gb drive it will still be great to keep all my saves on the usb drive so they can be used no matter who's Xbox 360 im playing on. Should make it a lot easier for people to download demos from Digiex too.
     
  3. KillerWhiteMan

    KillerWhiteMan Burnout Racer

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    I'm glad Microsoft finally allowed this. I had to send in my PS3 the other day and Sony asks you to back up your game saves before formatting the hard drive. Once I get it back, I can just copy the saves back over. Should make life much easier for those that play on multiple consoles and don't want to swap hard drives in and out.
     
  4. AntiNaz

    AntiNaz Addict

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    Finally Microsoft is smartening up a bit....
     
  5. Slaz

    Slaz Roast as you make toast!

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    This is 1 of the 2 things I always wanted Microsoft to fix.

    The other thing is, that I'm playing on multiple consoles and I'd prefer to switch console without transfering or recovering my profile.

    I mean, this is already possible with Games for Windows LIVE games, my profile is working on both my PC's, so why not on Xbox?
     
  6. InsaneNutter

    InsaneNutter Resident Nutter Staff Member

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    Ive never really thought about profiles in multiple locations before, now you mention it that would be nice. My profile just lives on a memory card so I just put it in whichever console im going to be playing on, handy for taking it around to a friends too.
     
  7. nate_piet

    nate_piet New Member

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    this is gna make my life a whole lot easier..atleast now i dnt hav to waste money on blank dvds wen i want to get demos from digiex....i am curious tho...wat bout certain ppl dat download complete pirated games??i dnt do it coz i tink u shld pay for games so dat game developers can actually make more,much more exciting games...jst wana knw if u guys tink it will make life much easier for these guys
     
  8. InsaneNutter

    InsaneNutter Resident Nutter Staff Member

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    For pirates not at all, you will still need a modified console to boot pirated games.

    This just make a lot easier to take all your saves and even lots of DLC with you to a friends how and of course in theory you will be able to dump downloaded demos from Digiex right on to the USB drive.

    Its likley someone will need to create a program to read the data in the files the 360 saves on USB, just looks like all Windows will see are a few 1gb data files.

    [​IMG]
     
  9. kookmasteraj

    kookmasteraj Active Member

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    epic win, I no longer have the urge to upgrade my hard drive
     
  10. paardje

    paardje Addict

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    Isn't it about time that they FINALLY do it?
     
  11. Slaz

    Slaz Roast as you make toast!

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    At least this update will reduce the urge to backup your savefiles to your PC, as you can easely format a cheaper 'backup stick' of some sort.
     

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