Install to HD... what's the freakin' point?

[MegaManFan]

I'm dead serious. I thought this upgrade to the New XBox Experience was going to be pretty freaking sweet, because then I could install Halo 3 and Bioshock and a bunch of other games to the hard drive and instaboot them without ever having to load a disc. It seemed to me that it would erase the difference between XBLA games and the games you purchased at the store, and I was really looking forward to that. I was even considering packing up all my XBox games and putting them into storage once I had them all installed. Unfortunately, no, that's not going to happen.

 

1. You can't install old gen XBox games to the HD, even if they are on the compatability list.

2. I tried installing Halo 3, waited patiently for what seemed like an eternity while it copied the whole disc to HD, took it out and selected "play from hard drive" only to be met with...

 

PLEASE INSERT HALO 3 DISC.

 

Bullsquat! Shenanigans and bullsquat! Can't they tell I'm using a freaking licensed copy from the fact I'm signed in to XBox Live? Don't my achievements already suggest that I've been playing this game? Why do I need to insert the freaking disc before it lets me play the game off the hard drive? Do they really believe people are going to hand out their games like candy and let people install them willy nilly? If you have to put the disc in to "prove" your copy is valid every single time then "install to hard drive" is totally useless. I should never have to touch a disc again, and if that's not the case why bother. The only difference between playing it off the HD and playing it off the disc is having to listen to the disc spin, which I don't really give a good Cthulhu be damned about (I long since got used to the noise). Someone correct me if I'm wrong, but "install to HD" seems to be totally freakin' useless.

[HammR25]

Do they really believe people are going to hand out their games like candy and let people install them willy nilly? If you have to put the disc in to "prove" your copy is valid every single time then "install to hard drive" is totally useless. I should never have to touch a disc again, and if that's not the case why bother. The only difference between playing it off the HD and playing it off the disc is having to listen to the disc spin, which I don't really give a good Cthulhu be damned about (I long since got used to the noise). Someone correct me if I'm wrong, but "install to HD" seems to be totally freakin' useless.

Blame the pirates. Yes, every Tom, Dick, and Harry would steal the games if they could. Do you really think developers would continue to develop for the 360 instead of just making games for the PS3 if Microsoft made it THAT easy to steal at least the offline portion of a game?

 

I understand your point but it's not completely useless. My 360 will suddenly stop reading the College Hoops 2k8 DVD and the game will crash. Hopefully putting it all on the hard drive will fix that issue. One would also assume that load times would be a little faster.

[NE146]

Yeah I dunno man.. for the 360 I'm fine popping in discs.

 

It was pretty much only the Xbox 1 where I got used to having games on the hard drive

[Albert]

2. I tried installing Halo 3, waited patiently for what seemed like an eternity while it copied the whole disc to HD, took it out and selected "play from hard drive" only to be met with...

 

PLEASE INSERT HALO 3 DISC.

LMAO, that's pretty funny.

 

Certainly I would expect some aspects of games installed to your hard drive to be faster (pretty much anytime access to the CD is needed, such as when loading a new level), but having to pop the disc in when you start playing is pretty lame-o-rific. How far we've progressed..

 

..Al

[keilbaca]

Load times are insanely fast, compared to off of the DVD. That's why they opted for this option.

 

Yes you do need the disc for the very reason as stated above, so you can't go to blockbuster, rent 10 games, throw them on the hard drive, and call it a day.

[NE146]

Load times are insanely fast,

 

I'm hearing conflicting reports about that. Faster? Yes. Insanely fast? I dunno about that.

 

I guess we'll all be able to test it by default as of today though..

[cimerians]

I dont think it would be super fast but an improvement no less.

I also think its pointless unless you have a game that constantly reads the disk (Eternal Sonata and lego Star Wars comes to mind).

[keilbaca]

Well, the advantage can help out on things like halo 3, where you can do glitches, if you become host. usually the person who loads the fastest becomes host.

 

My ex gf loved it that she became host ALL the time, because I replaced the IDE cable on the inside from the default ATA 33 to an ATA 133. Load times were 1/3 quicker, and she always got host, as no one else did it.

 

I'd imagine, you would beat out host for people who didn't upload the game to the HDD yet.

[Artlover]

PLEASE INSERT HALO 3 DISC.

 

If you have to put the disc in to "prove" your copy is valid every single time then "install to hard drive" is totally useless. I should never have to touch a disc again, and if that's not the case why bother.

Old news. MS said a long time ago this would be a requirement. It's also the reason I stopped caring about it.

 

It was the ONLY reason I had any interest in the NXE to begin with, but once they mucked it up, I gave up on wanting anything to do with NXE.

 

Blame the pirates.

Lets not.

 

Piracy is already huge on the 360. It's a known fact that there isn't a single anti-piracy measure out there that has ever actually worked. NEVER. The only thing anti-piracy measures have ever done universaly is screw over "legimiate" owners. In more recent times, all anti-piracy measures have done is give honest people a reason to pirate since the measures are more and more turning to requiring owners jumps through excessive, unncessary and unjustifiable hoops, opens people's systems up to hacking and virus attacks, and flat out being destructive to people's OS's and data. - To no end, because no matter how complicated and destructive they make DRM, someone still has it cracked and cleaned of the BS, and posted to the internet days before official release.

 

My 360 will suddenly stop reading the College Hoops 2k8 DVD and the game will crash.

Why do you think that has anything to do with reading the the DVD? Are you getting a disc error or is it locking-up? Locking-up is an issue a lot of 360 games have. I would suspect coding issues before anything else. If it's a disc error, it will give some vague error about it.

 

One would also assume that load times would be a little faster.

Certainly I would expect some aspects of games installed to your hard drive to be faster (pretty much anytime access to the CD is needed, such as when loading a new level)

 

Nope. This is also old news as MS said a while back that it would not really benifit newer games much where the data on the DVD's was already optimized. They specificly pointed to older games before optimization method as the ones that would really see an improvement.

 

Besides, I don't understand why people really would begin to think this at all anymore. The through-put on modern CD and DVD drives is more then fast enough for any need. The only thing that gets you is the seek/search times, and with optimization, that's less of an issue.

 

Yeah I dunno man.. for the 360 I'm fine popping in discs.

I think the question is, why are you? That's just insane.

 

It was pretty much only the Xbox 1 where I got used to having games on the hard drive

Both my Xbox1's and PS2 have everything copied to the HDD, and boy, it sure is nice. And here is the funny thing about it too, atleast on the Xbox1, having games copied to the HDD actually make them load SLOWER because of the damned pre-copy to the temporary data partitions all Xbox games do to make playing from DVD faster. What happens is the game still pre-copies to these partitions when running from the HDD, which means the drive is copying to itself, which is slower then a copying from a different device. Halo is a great example of this.

 

It was never about speed, it was about convienence. Not wanting to have to get up and change discs all the time.

 

To that end with all said, if I have to get up and change discs in the console anyways, I might as well just play it off the disc.

[+remowilliams]

Certainly I would expect some aspects of games installed to your hard drive to be faster (pretty much anytime access to the CD is needed, such as when loading a new level), but having to pop the disc in when you start playing is pretty lame-o-rific. How far we've progressed..

Definitely much faster and quieter. Albeit limited by the disk insertion, I'm very glad they added this. Sure no disc would be nice, but enable out of the box casual piracy and combine that with the general 'steal if it you can' attitude, and well they'd never sell another game. So not a fan of DRM by any means, but still happy with what I got.

[HammR25]

Why do you think that has anything to do with reading the the DVD? Are you getting a disc error or is it locking-up? Locking-up is an issue a lot of 360 games have. I would suspect coding issues before anything else. If it's a disc error, it will give some vague error about it.

For some strange reason I was lead to believe it was a disc read error when the console was telling me it was having problems reading the disc and that I should clean the disc.

[Artlover]

Definitely much faster and quieter.

I can see quieter since the DVD drive isn't running. But "much faster"? Maybe it depends on your definition of how much faster "much faster" is. But there are already a bunch of forums poping up, like http://www.neowin.net/forum/index.php?show...695892&st=0 , with HDD installed size of many games and comparisons between playing from DVD vs HDD, and save for a few exceptions, the results have been less then stelar. Only in the 5-15 second improvement range for initial loading.

 

The Good: Lost Odyssey is the only game that showed massive improved on a whole, Ninja Gadien 2 & The Orange Box have signignifigantly shorter load times, and Saints Row 2 doesn't have that horrible lag at the title screen anymore. Something about Mass Effect not having loading pauses when running to fast (as if that was ever really an issue, it's not like it actually paused the game, it was a hiccup lasting a fraction of a second when it did happen).

 

The Bad: Halo 3 runs slower from the HDD and PGR4 has pops & clicks in audio with playing from HDD.

 

The Rest: Wow, you save 5-15 seconds of loading time at the cost of many minutes to copy it to the HDD in the first place.

 

 

Why do you think that has anything to do with reading the the DVD? Are you getting a disc error or is it locking-up? Locking-up is an issue a lot of 360 games have. I would suspect coding issues before anything else. If it's a disc error, it will give some vague error about it.

For some strange reason I was lead to believe it was a disc read error when the console was telling me it was having problems reading the disc and that I should clean the disc.

Maybe you should have specified that instead of simply saying "crashing". We're not mind readers.

[Bilnick]

Well obviously the point of having the DVD in the 360 even while playing from the HDD is to prevent piracy.

 

Anyone with little effort could rent a dozen plus games and save them to their 120gb hdd.

[moycon]

Piracy is already huge on the 360 Artlover?

What exactly is your definition of huge?

As far as I know (and I guess I haven't really looked into it, but I haven't seen the blatant offers that usually come with something that is HUGE) piracy isn't anything like it was on the Dreamcast or the original Xbox.

And MS bans anyone that takes a modded system online. That doesn't hurt me.

So you think anyone should be able to rent a disk transfer it to their HD and play it?

Seriously you don't think anyone would take advantage of that situation?

Get real.

If that were the case, little software would actually sell. Folks aint that honest.

Maybe one day all games will be available for digital download then you won't need to change disk.

I suspect many people would have complaints about that though also. Something about paying $$ but not actually having a physical product or paying money and maybe possibly losing all your games someday because you don't have a disk etc...etc...

Ah I guess you just can't please everyone eh?

 

Reminds me of and old wise saying....

 

You take the good, you take the bad, you take em both and there you have the Facts of Life.

 

In the mean time Artlover, it's always a pleasure reading your latest daily complaint about the current videogame generation. Keep it up.

Edited November 20, 2008 by moycon

[Jess Ragan]

Halo 3 is a big no-no with the hard drive installation option anyway. The game already accessed the hard drive for maps, and when you install the whole thing on your Xbox 360, it becomes hopelessly confused and the game slows way, waaaay down. Bungie even recommends that you DON'T install Halo 3 on your hard drive because the performance drop is so significant.

[moycon]

it becomes hopelessly confused and the game slows way, waaaay down. Bungie even recommends that you DON'T install Halo 3 on your hard drive because the performance drop is so significant.

 

Makes sense.

 

I wonder if there is a list of games NOT to install.

Seems to me if there isn't one, there probably should be, or will be soon.

[Artlover]

As far as I know (and I guess I haven't really looked into it, but I haven't seen the blatant offers that usually come with something that is HUGE) piracy isn't anything like it was on the Dreamcast or the original Xbox.

Like you said, you haven't really looked into it.

 

Browse the web. You'll be tripping over all the sites & forums about modding 360's and people who have done it and resources for doing it. Follow that up with scanning the newsgroups and torrents. Every game made for the 360 has been released, even the newest releases (like FO3, COD5, GOW2, BKN&B, ME), most of the time days before official release. The 360 is one of the easier consoles to modify. There is no shortage of pre-configued/self-configuring tools that automate the process so even the biggest idiot in the world can do it. It's a hell of alot easier to mod then the Xbox1 was. In all seriousness, the single hardest and most time consuming thing about modding a 360 is opening the case. It's a cake walk after that. The fact that it's not at "epidemic proportions" is astounding.

 

And MS bans anyone that takes a modded system online. That doesn't hurt me.

They "try", but it's iffy at best. People have been playing on Live with modded 360's for ages now. Key word - "stealth".

 

A lot of the time when MS does their banning waves, they end up banning legimiate users too, and after all the complaints, end up reversing alot of them. Just don't seem to know what to look for exactly that can single modded units out. To that end, a lot of modded systems that get banned wern't banned because they were using a modded console, but because they did something stupid that broke stealth. Like playing a new game online before it's official release date. Or playing a game online with a bad/missing SS or something to that effect.

 

So you think anyone should be able to rent a disk transfer it to their HD and play it?

Seriously you don't think anyone would take advantage of that situation?

Get real.

Sure they will, but for how long. There is only so much space on the HDD's and not everyone has 120g HDD's. And even with a 120g HDD, it will fill up quick after just a few games.

 

After you copy a few games then what? Going to have to delete something to do it again. So it's nothing more then an extended rental.

 

And before you suggest it, no I don't think anyone is going to run out and buy a 120g or an extra one every time they fill one up just for this purpose. Why? Because they would be f--king stupid as hell if they did. Between the outrageous and unjustifible cost of the HDD units + rental fees, they would be better off just buying the games used.

 

To further add, it's only going to be usefull to them while they have it installed. Can't copy it off and share it someone else. Even using XFat explorer utilities, copying the game files off the HDD manually does no one any good since the shit is serialized to your console/HDD as non transferable content when installed. At best, it could allow someone to copy it off to PC for backup, and maybe be restored later to the same console/HDD if wanted. But now you're getting into more advanced stuff here that is beyond the casual gaming pirate you are refering to. Anyone that would get this far has a modded system and could just download it for free from the internet and burn a disc, saving a whole lot of time and trouble.

 

The long term practicality of this being used for wide scale piracy is limited and over rated.

 

The PS2 proves this - Commercial apps like HD Advanced and HD Loader did exactly this. Let you copy a game to HDD, then not have to have the disc at all anymore. Console didn't even need to be modded. Just use the very cheap & easily available software and copy over your rentals. Yeah, the bottom really dropped out of the PS2 market once those were released, huh?

 

If that were the case, little software would actually sell. Folks aint that honest.

BS. There are always people that will always buy it. Just look at music. It's the single most pirated material there is, and is available to everyone who has access to a computer or a friend of a computer. Music industry is still still selling assloads of product and making more money then they can spend.

 

Again, look above at the PS2 as proof.

 

Maybe one day all games will be available for digital download then you won't need to change disk.

I suspect many people would have complaints about that though also. Something about paying $$ but not actually having a physical product or paying money and maybe possibly losing all your games someday because you don't have a disk etc...etc...

Ah I guess you just can't please everyone eh?

You're really missing the fundamental point. There could be ways to protect against this. The HDD and the Console's both already have their own unique serial numbers imbeded. There is no reason why games can't too. Quick on line check and they could see if any game was regisitered with any other console, and ban everyone if it turns up more then once.

 

There is also no reason why video game companies can't work with the rental companies just like the movie industry does for other ways to find a solution. First, establish a rate of commisions from rentals. Second, provide them with rental-only versions of the games (honestly, this is something that the gaming industry should have been doing all along) that have a block in some way. Rental only block of serials internaly blocked by the dash as being authorized for copy.

 

There could have been other ways to approach this if they really felt this was a major concern (again, PS2 history proves otherwise), but they didn't. They went with the easy cheap fix way of doing it that eliminates half the reason for bothering at all.

 

It's just another case of screwing over the legimiate owners in an attempt to combat piracy

 

Sorry I expcet to have my cake and eat it too. There is no reason why I shouldn't beable to beyond their inability to design a secure way of handling this kind of situation using some other kind of basis.

 

In the mean time Artlover, it's always a pleasure reading your latest daily complaint about the current videogame generation. Keep it up.

Don't single me out please, as I'm hardly the only one bitching about this.

[Bilnick]

Sure they will, but for how long. There is only so much space on the HDD's and not everyone has 120g HDD's. And even with a 120g HDD, it will fill up quick after just a few games.

 

After you copy a few games then what? Going to have to delete something to do it again. So it's nothing more then an extended rental.

 

And before you suggest it, no I don't think anyone is going to run out and buy a 120g or an extra one every time they fill one up just for this purpose. Why? Because they would be f--king stupid as hell if they did. Between the outrageous and unjustifible cost of the HDD units + rental fees, they would be better off just buying the games used.

 

A 120gb hdd costs $135 from Amazon.com. If a DVD is 8gb, a 120gb hdd will hold 15 games, assuming all 15 games take up the entire DVD. In reality the hdd could probably hold 20+ games, as i am guessing most games are well under 8gb. So, in theory you could have brand new games for less than $10 a pop, plus the cost of a Gamefly-type subscription, which might add a dollar or so to each game (I would assume you could rent 10 games a month if you copied and sent them back the same day you received them)

 

Now if you can find Gears of War 2 or CoD5 used for 15$ a pop, hook me up!

[MegaManFan]

I can definitely vouch for Halo 3 being slower off HD than it is off the actual disc. In fact the same morning I posted this I deleted the HD install and never looked back. Bench tests on Eurogamer back it up as being worse than the disc itself and also confirm the general "marginal improvement" statements made in this thread - I'd say an average of 5-7 seconds loading time saved isn't worth filling up 8 GB of hard drive space a pop. My patience will last longer than my available storage.

[Hyper_Eye]

Locking-up is an issue a lot of 360 games have.

 

I would call that overstated. I have had a 360 since day one and I have a large collection of games. I could count on one hand the number of times the console has locked up (excluding the recent blowing up of my console upon installing the NXE dash.) I am sure there are games out there that have problems but, in general, the system does not often freeze. Oblivion is probably one of the best known examples of games that lock-up and after patching the problems were pretty much eliminated. At least the 360 has the ability to apply patches to fix problems. I still can't play more then a few minutes of JagDoom deathmatch without freezing... and that will never be fixed.

 

I know there are plenty examples of the PS3 locking up and I have had the Wii lock-up on me before (but only once... I will admit that thing is solid.) I don't think the 360 is more prone to locking up then most any other system. Burning up and destroying itself... that's another story.

Edited November 21, 2008 by Hyper_Eye

[Hyper_Eye]

As far as I know (and I guess I haven't really looked into it, but I haven't seen the blatant offers that usually come with something that is HUGE) piracy isn't anything like it was on the Dreamcast or the original Xbox.

Like you said, you haven't really looked into it.

 

Browse the web. You'll be tripping over all the sites & forums about modding 360's and people who have done it and resources for doing it. Follow that up with scanning the newsgroups and torrents. Every game made for the 360 has been released, even the newest releases (like FO3, COD5, GOW2, BKN&B, ME), most of the time days before official release. The 360 is one of the easier consoles to modify. There is no shortage of pre-configued/self-configuring tools that automate the process so even the biggest idiot in the world can do it. It's a hell of alot easier to mod then the Xbox1 was. In all seriousness, the single hardest and most time consuming thing about modding a 360 is opening the case. It's a cake walk after that. The fact that it's not at "epidemic proportions" is astounding.

 

You wouldn't seem to know what your talking about. The XBox can be modified without touching a single screw and it can be done in under 10 minutes. There is no need whatsoever to open the XBox to modify it. The 360 on the otherhand requires removing and modifying the DVD-drive firmware. Even then it is only good for one thing and that is playing pirated games. Modifying a 360 is nowhere near as functional as modifying the XBox which is pretty much completely opened up through modification. The 360, on the other hand, has much more complex anti-piracy system that has still not been broken. The modders have simply found a way to sneak by it but they are still limited on what they can achieve there. So I would call this another overstatement.

 

In the mean time Artlover, it's always a pleasure reading your latest daily complaint about the current videogame generation. Keep it up.

Don't single me out please, as I'm hardly the only one bitching about this.

 

Your bitching about the 360 goes beyond anyones general complaints. You troll this forum and bitch in all the threads. Every time you post I know exactly what to expect. I laugh though because your posts are so long and I know most people already know to skip them.

[NE146]

The modders have simply found a way to sneak by it but they are still limited on what they can achieve there.

 

To be honest I don't really see much talk in IRC anymore of how limited it is that they cant make custom apps or emulators. They've pretty much achieved all they wanted and that's 100% piracy of all 360 retail games and playing them on Live.

Edited November 20, 2008 by NE146

[moycon]

They've pretty much achieved all they wanted and that's 100% piracy of all 360 retail games and playing them on Live.

 

How come you don’t see pirated 360 games being sold around town? I remember going to local flea-markets and seeing rows of obviously pirated Dreamcast games for $15. To me that’s HUGE piracy. A bunch of geeks ripping apart a 360 and installing custom parts and software to get it to do what they want seems less huge by far. The few sites I did pull up regarding 360 mods warns that members are getting banned when going on line with their mods. Seems like a lot of hassle if you ask me. HUGE to describe the 360 piracy might be an over-statement regardless who's accomplished what in regards to getting retail games to play on it.

 

Sorry Artlover, I wasn't really wasn't trying to single you out. That statement had nothing to do with this thread or topic really. Just a general statement based on your constant complaining about the current generation of games.

[NE146]

Oh I definitely don't think it's huge at all.. far from it. The Dreamcast and Xbox 1 scene were much more accessible.

 

I was just saying in response to Hyper_Eye that those who do it, aren't really looking for anything more than pure piracy.. of course.

[Albert]

Locking-up is an issue a lot of 360 games have.

 

I would call that overstated. I have had a 360 since day one and I have a large collection of games.

I believe you misquoted me there. I did not say such a thing.

 

..Al