Microsoft Defends 120GB Drive Price...Lamely
We were all a bit taken aback by the big throbbing $179.99 price of the new 120GB hard drive for the Xbox 360 - for a system that charges $200 to upgrade to a high-capacity HD-DVD drive that isn't included in its new "Elite" package (although the 120GB HDD is), this seems like a great way for Microsoft to kick itself in the face in regards to price competition with the PS3.
Microsoft's Aaron Greenberg addressed some of those concerns...problem is, he addressed the wrong ones, and poorly:
We know it is expensive and we have definitely heard that feedback but it is a little apples and oranges to compare it to internal PC hard drives because those are off the shelf drives that you have to install yourself. You have to format those and figure out how you are going to move your content over. There is a lot of work there for your average consumer it is not a plug in and play experience for them.
First off, it doesn't seem to me to be about PC hard drives, but about the PS3: for an insanely high price tag, the PS3 brings a high-capacity hard drive, an integrated high-capacity, high-definition optical format that it uses to store data on game discs, and HDMI output you don't have to upgrade to get.
Obviously, at the moment the 360 outstrips the PS3 by orders of magnitude...but Microsoft isn't doing itself any favors by asking its install base to either upgrade to the Elite system and consider doling out $200 for the HD-DVD drive that Microsoft doesn't seem to have enough faith in to use, or spend $379.99 to add both a viably large hard drive and a next-gen optical drive to an already not-inexpensive system. Boo.
Greenberg digs his grave deeper:
If you compare what we are offering with a real plug-and-play drive the closest thing would be to take a 120 gig self-powered external PC drive and in that case we are seeing those retail at anywhere from $160 to $200 for comparable laptop sized external hard drives.
That's just not true. A 120GB version of the high-performance 2.5" laptop drive that the 360 uses can be found for a mere $94.99. So unless there's $85 of plastic in that bad boy, it would seem that Microsoft may be listening, but they aren't hearing.
Microsoft: “120GB drive price is justified” [Xboxic]
tiny dancer
Posted to Hot Stuff, Miscellany on 5 April 2007
· Comments (4)
Other stuff like this: 120gb hard drive, elite, hdmi, microsoft, xbox 360
"You have to format those and figure out how you are going to move your content over."
You are going to have to spend time moving the contents from your small Xbox 360 hard drive to the new larger one. Do I get a rebate for doing that myself? Or does the $179 include a Microsoft minion that will come to my house and do that for me? I hope he's cute, but minions rarely are.
this is how M$ has treated pc users for years... and the reason many folk'd never buy a unit of anything from them. ever.
hmmm... meh... I think I'd just do the stuff xbox360fanboy and xbox-scene is suggesting. I doubt I'd need more then 20 gigs but should the day ever come... rather spend around 80-100 dollars then 180 >.>
Hell, I'd pay $179 for JUST a minion. They can keep the damn hard drive. Minions are so hard to come by these days.