Industry Insiders Q&A MASTER THREAD [separate thread for Xbox/Add On & PS3] - Page 133  

We won't hold the release back forever. And believe me, given the fact that half the team works for me, when I tell them how urgent it is to get the audio fix out, they "get it." They are working very hard to get the release out and with high quality. I know this doesn't mean much to you all waiting for the fix, there is only so much I can push a team which is working around the clock.

So it's after the dash update now?

Amir,

The current dvd-drive in the XBOX 360 is much too loud for a home theater environment, and frankly I think it is too loud for even a second system in the house. I measured the output at 42 dB with just the fans alone and over 50 dB with a DVD in the drive itself. Are there no plans to fix this with the new Elite? If not, this is a huge missed opportunity in my opinion. Comments or thoughts?

Thanks,

Same thing here. Playing games at night, it's loud. Simple as that. However, the noise during movie playback via marketplace content is fine by me but I have not tried DVD playback for SD movies in the main drive. The make or break on the Elite, for me, would have been a quieter drive.

To be a little more clear (and add some closure to this topic), from what I understand, newer 360s are using the BENQ drive which are said to be quieter than the samsung and hitachi drives used previously. If the Elite is using the BENQ, then it is quieter right?

Could it be that AVIVO tech is only used for HD DVD playback and for general AVC content, it's limited to Xenon only?

Or is AVIVO used anytime AVC decoding is called upon by any part of the console?

Out of interest's sake, what bitrates? Shouldn't most "reasonable"-bitrate 720p24 VC-1 be relatively easy to play back on a 2.0 GHz Core 2 Duo MacBook? Or does the web browser make it much more complicated? Would 20 Mbps 1080p be too much? BTW, what OS?

P.S. Maybe you should tell Cyberlink of your results. They refuse to allow playback of any HD DVD with PowerDVD 7 on any machine without a next gen videocard. (As you know, the MacBook uses integrated GMA 950.)

Thanks, Amir. So higher bit rate, even with decreased compression, does require more CPU, hopefully it is compensated by increased (even a little bit) PQ. However, if one aims for similar PQ (truncating same frequency coefficients), would CPU requirement be similar ?

Dolby TrueHD certification requires bit exact decoding of the content. Here is the exact wording from Dolby FAQ on TrueHD:

"The Dolby TrueHD decoder circuit actually verifies the output is lossless as it is decoding."


- conformance tests exist to test pathological cases such that these extremes are already exercised prior to certification/logo'ing, etc...[/quote]
Yes, even in the case of lossy codecs, there are certification tests and PSNR levels to meet. In case of lossless, you have to be bit exact or you don't get to ship the technology.


Indeed. There are always dedicated audio DSPs/CPUs that are not impacted by other work loads. But if there is interference, it is job of the system designer to make sure everything works. Otherwise you will have issues with displaying the logo (and in some cases, licensing the technology at all).


Indeed.


That is what I would expect. And the exact same thing happens to PCM audio .

All I know is that Elite uses the same suppliers as the general console. So if this means BenQ and a quieter drive, then OK .

It is really beyond the scope of my responsibility to comment on these points. But yes, having quieter machine is always a good thing .

No, we haven't said it is before or after. I have said (and just repeated a few pages back ) that we are on track for meeting our earlier promise of "early to mid spring." I really don't know how to be more specific than this.

Well then, I must say I am happy to know that it;s planed to come out, and as you stated in the later post, that you plan it to be released this spring. For me, it means a lot because it means that it's been worked on, and it's still being worked on. Personally, I under more then enough of the technical stuff to know that it's a big pain to fix something like this properly and keep everything else working. Of course, I would like it sooner then later, but I would much rather have it done right, and with the quality it deserves then sooner. If it's worth doing, it's worth doing right.
Thanks for the post! I appreciate that you are willing to talk to the community about this in your spare time.

Amir,

Thanks for your continued support of the community here. I see you answering questions on Friday and Saturday nights and I want to tell you to go home (unless you're there) and be with your family!!!

Anyway, my question is: Since the upcoming HD-DVD add-on update is coming separately from the Dashboard update, does that mean that future updates won't be tied to the fall/spring schedule and can instead be released when issues are found and resolved, in a more timely manner? People shouldn't have to wait 6+ months to get fixes for compatibility issues with discs, etc.

Thanks again!

-Brian

Thanks! Yes, I am usually home. It is the curse of wireless laptop sitting next to you, with email notifaction from AVS on subscribed threads!


Yes, we will stay seperate from the dashboard release.

Can anyone properly explain DTS-HD codecs please??

I thought it was nailed, but I'm confused again My understanding was that you start with what is now called core which is good old DTS at up to 1.5mbps, 24 bit and 48kHz. If you use DTS-HD HR, you add HR extension packets to the core. If you use MA you add MA extension packets to the core up to insane bitrates. You cannot decode HD from MA...

However, on Fox discs marked as DTS-HD MA, PowerDVD, which only claims DTS-HD support not MA (like Panasonic are claiming with v2.0 firmware) appears to be decoding a VBR DTS-HD stream that hits some pretty big highs >5mbps, that must be taking it into lossless territory.

So, is PowerDVD actually decoding DTS-HD MA? Is DTS-HD HR a fixed bitrate codec like all other lossy codecs? Why did they have to make it so complicated?

Even the studios don't understand the differences it seems as BV in Europe have labelled their non-English DTS 1.5 mbps language tracks as DTS-HD MA... Or is it really DTS-HD MA and PowerDVD is only decoding the core? In which case have Fox got it wrong and have they actually only used DTS-HD HR which is why PowerDVD decodes it???

This raises a side question from me, any particular reason? I can think on only think of a few myself, and they make logical sense as well.
One being that they software is held separately, and combining the two could cause problems with the OS on systems without the HD-DVD add on.
The other one being that MS just wants to keep the separate and prevent unneeded downloading.

Amirm,

Has there been any word on the recent Universal combo disc problems? I can't imagine this is all a manufacturing defect - three high-profile releases within a month (Children of Men, The Good Shepard, and now Smokin Aces), all suffering such a big problem over such a large number of discs is a bit much to stomach.

If I had to make a wager on the cause, I'd say Universal is authoring / producing these with some new method that HD-DVD player firmwares aren't yet ready to deal with.

I imagine both Microsoft and Universal are taking this issue very seriously (I would certainly hope!), so can you make some kind of statement on the current status, and when/how customers can expect to have this resolved?

This is the only clip I see on the web site at this point. I think more may be posted later. I didn't pick the clips or have that big a role in the design or anything.

http://download.microsoft.com/downlo...-128%20vbr.wmv

Only 2 Mbps for 720p24!

Bear in mind this is a web browser plugin, so we're doing it all in software - no GPU acceleration, etcetera. Doing 1280x720 24p in a browser window on a laptop is a big advancement over what was in previous technologies.

VC-1 has been in Windows Media Center all along. VC-1 is the SMPTE designation for the Windows Media Video 9 technology we've been using for years.

Microsoft insiders,
Xbox Live Marketplace needs some graphical/audio powerhouse tech demos available for download.

Wouldn't it be great to just load up a fun little demo like the PS3 "rubber ducks" or that one with the millions of leaves? Or just a super-detailed house to walk through.

Oooh! Ooh! Or an ultra-realistic human head model that you can animate yourself. Set up a string of mouth animations and then record your own voice with the headset to sync up with the talking head? Oh yeah!
Or just some freaking beautiful village to just walk around and throw rocks into the lake.

Tech demos. Insiders, make it happen.

Just kidding, I'm just a 360 customer laying out his dreams...(seriously, make it happen)

Oh, forgot to mention the Silverlight implementation of the U-Control experience from a section Tokyo Drift, including PiP and the insurance meter at the same time, with clips encode for streaming over a 5 Mbps connection . In HD!

I just make the files, so it was pretty amazing to see what they did with them!

dear amir,

thank you for your answer. of course, I didn' want to imply that you or your people were not working. and I think we all appreciate all this hard work. however, if the audio-update as such is finished - why don't get it out now? that is the question that many folks in this forum don't understand. you could always have a secondary update regarding the playback issues lateron.

and this is also causing the confusion or irritation - if the audio update is finished and ready to go: then there is no reason to hold it back, especially if there is such public demand for the update. BUT - the update is not coming since months. therefore, many people start wondering: have they really finished the audio-update or are they just trying to keep aus quiet until they have figured out on how to solve this problem... see my point?

The main reason is that we want to have agile development. If we tie things together, then we constantly need to coordinate the work with each other, and be at the mercy of when they want to release/announce new features, etc. Same reason we update Windows components after the major release independently.

There are other reasons but the above is one of the main ones.

The reason is that we have to do what is called "regression testing." In other words, even if we just change the audio option, we would have to retest the entire release because changing the decoder behavior, might have unexpected effects elsewhere, breaking something else. I also mentioned this as release tax - i.e. extra work you do even if you fix nothing. For large scale products, the release tax and how you manage it is super important as it uses up a lot of resources, most of them time for nothing.

So instead of doing all of that testing twice, once for audio and once for all the other things we fixed, we combined them together to gain efficiency and time to release for both set of bug fixes/functionality improvements. Yes, this does mean that it delayed the audio release but we think it is a fair compromise for all of our customers because many people want the other fixes as much as audio (indeed, if you go beyond the AVC crowd, the other fixes are deemed more important).

We also have serious responsibility to content owners to keep Xbox as compatible as we possibly we can with their content (including working around any authoring bugs ). If we don't do this, the content might dry up at the source and that would not be a good thing. Hence the other reason we are keen to get out title compatibility fixes.

Amirn, very good explanation. Thank you for that small, but very appreciated incite. I didn't even think of that being an issue.

Wow, the streaming clip is impressive. Especially when you consider that its HD full screen, (my monitors is 1280x1024). The part that is most amazing is that it steams. I can't wait till Soapbox, Youtube, myspace start using this technology.

A follow up questions, so the U-Control is client based in the web broweser? I'm being streamed 2 video files and the plug-in combines the two?

Adam

Thank you Amir.

Keith, would you concur?

Yes, Amir is 100% correct on what's needed to pass conformance testing. It's really pretty straightforward. At the SoC level, it is our responsibility to ensure it still works 100% correctly no matter what else our chip is doing. For example, we made the audio DSP caches large enough to minimize DRAM memory bandwidth so that video processing isn't affected.