Smart marketing: in issue #80 of the official Xbox Magazine a disc contains three exclusive Rock Band songs.

Songs by Bang Camaro, Count Zero and Freezepop. We picked up issue #80 with disc at the local Safeway today ($9.99+tax), so if you hurry you might find it out there.

Wouldn’t be surprised if we see a bunch more exclusive Rock Band song deals. Bands should look to releasing their newest albums with a bonus exclusive Rock Band songs or codes for a redeemable new downloadable song inside Xbox Live.

We exchanged our broken Rock Band package at the local Best Buy today. Hoping this one makes it more than a month before breaking down. Rock Band still has major replay value, especially with the addition of new songs you can buy each week or find through deals like the magazine above.

Seen any other good Rock Band exclusive song deals? Share them below or trackback in from your blog with the info.

I captured some HD video of our sons completing the hardest and longest set of songs on Rock Band for the Xbox 360 on the expert difficulty setting.

The Endless Setlist which contains 58 songs took them 3+ hours to complete and out of a possible 290 stars (5 stars possible on each song) they had 275. A few songs they achieved gold star status on. Our youngest teen played bass and our middle teen played guitar.

Click To Play

Hmmcast #180 downloads
Windows .wmv (1480×1080 HD) PSP .mp4 (480×272) iPod .mp4 (640×480)

Dear Microsoft,

Our family of five loves the Xbox 360, but we’re starting to think it, and you, don’t even like us in return.

Sure, you like the fact that we keep reaching into our wallets to buy new systems and pay for the hottest, newest games like Bioshock, Assassin’s Creed and Mass Effect. Halo? We’ve bought at least two copies of each: Halo (2) for the Xbox, Halo 2 (3 copies, one was played out) and Halo 3 (2 copies, one the collector’s edition). My current favorite game of 2007 is Rock Band. Many Xbox 360 games we buy on launch day like Madden 2008.

And let’s not forget Xbox Live where we have four active ($49.95 x 4) one year live accounts and one Creators Club ($99) account, not to mention purchasing almost 100 arcade titles to date across the four accounts.

We rent movies from Xbox Live too. Haven’t kept track of the numbers there, but it’s probably over a dozen movies and TV shows rented. And yes, we bought the HD DVD player too (haven’t received the promised 6 ‘free’ HD DVD movies either).

Does this qualify our household as a good customer? In our possession right now, we own five Xbox 360s. The last one broke (#4) less than 60 days ago and you won’t fix because it’s a few months past the one year warranty and not the red rings of death; we don’t have an extended warranty on that one either. The disc tray won’t load any games or DVDs. Xbox Live still works though. If we want that fixed you’re going to charge us $140. We decided in light of the hardware reliability history we would buy the Xbox 360 arcade edition with extended warranty instead for Christmas. You can see it along the right.

Tonight my son was playing Halo 3 and #6 Xbox 360 console went into red rings of death mode (picture top of post). Amazing. This is the fifth Xbox 360 we’ve had go bad since April 15, 2006. Let me list the complete dates and history of Xbox 360 consoles in our household because it’s starting to be unbelievable.

Xbox 360 systems that have died since April 15, 2006
#5: today, January 1, 2008 (Happy New Year, Microsoft!). Status: three red rings of death, unrepaired. Under warranty, we’ll call for replacement tomorrow.
#4: Xbox 360 broken November 3, 2007. Status: broken disc tray, unrepaired. We replaced system with Xbox 360 Arcade System.
#3: April 2007. Status: red rings of death, replaced three weeks later on April 23, 2007
#2: September 22, 2006. Status: red rings of death, replaced on October 20, 2006
#1: June 14, 2006.

Status: red rings of death. Replaced July 1, 2006.

We try to place the Xbox 360 so they won’t overheat, see the current placement of the most recent system to die:

We can place the Xbox 360 horizontal or vertical, but death is inevitable. I pity other customers who buy an Xbox 360 and do not buy an extended warranty. These systems are the lousiest design of any home videogame system ever.

Should customers have to face these kind of issues? Just how bad is it? Susan Getgood contacted me after the last Xbox 360 breakdown to get my feelings on this negative customer experience. When writing about how many have gone bad the last time, I wrongly thought that was our fifth Xbox 360 to go bad. Actually, nope, this one is our fifth to go bad. How crazy is that when your own customer can’t even recall how many of the systems have gone bad? At least now I can point to this post. I’m thinking about adding a broken Xbox 360 counter to the homepage, as well.

Our next one to go bad, probably within the next 90-180 days based on history will be #6. The most durable Xbox 360 we’ve bought so far is the Xbox 360 Elite which is on life support at 8+ months. We’ve been having random audio out problems and screen blackouts at inopportune times. I would classify the Elite’s condition as “hopelessly diseased.” Odds are that one goes next. We have the Best Buy warranty there and will just return to them for exchange instead of messing around with Texas.

Microsoft, I know you’ve promised customers that you’ll fix these broken systems for three years and that came at great expense to your company. I implore you to extend the scope of that three year warranty to cover any non customer abuse situation. We didn’t do anything to have the disc tray not load any games and yet we have one that’s no good. The other four systems all died from red rings of death in less than two years including today’s.

Shameful.

If this were likely any other niche than videogames, I would never do business with your company again. I wonder how many customers you’ve already lost because of these problems. With each Xbox 360 that dies, my loyalty in your platform wanes and any fun from when it does work is reduced immeasurably. It’s like walking into the greatest arcade in the world and getting punched in the face at the door.

At some point, and I’m not sure when, I’m not going to enter any more.

Sincerely,

A little less loyal Xbox 360 customer

P.S. Dear readers, feel free to forward this to somebody, anybody at Microsoft that actually might give a damn.

Yesterday you could start downloading the new Xbox Live dashboard update.

We had to update three different Xboxes and the process was smooth across all accounts, taking only a couple minutes. I noticed a lot of lag and problems actually using the service yesterday, but the download part went smoothly.

The first thing I thought when seeing the menu in the new dashboard menu was that it was a bit like the PS3 blade menu. I’m not sure the whole hover over dropdown menu thing is all that great a UI to copy emulate, but now it’s available on both the PS3 and Xbox 360.

I’ve always disliked how when you move down on the controller to cycle through choices in the dashboard it’s too easy to move left or right and thus reset the menu. They should fix that.

Now onto the best news relating to this update: the Black Sabbath Rock Band song pack is now available under the Game Content menu.

440 Microsoft Points to jam on “Sweet Leaf” “War Pigs” and “N.I.B.” This adds to “Paranoid” which comes with the Rock Band game. This is the second song pack we’ve purchased for Rock Band. We also purchased the Police pack (three songs) and one standalone song: “Juke Box Hero” by Foreigner. Harmonix that makes Rock Band promised to release new songs every week and so far has stayed with that cycle.

Xbox games as downloads
Among the biggest news in the dashboard update is that some original Xbox games can now be purchased for 1,200 Microsoft Points as downloads under a new category called Xbox Originals. More are planned to be coming soon with seven games available as of yesterday: Crimson Skies, Fable, Fuzion Frenzy, Halo, Indigo Prophecy, Crash Bandicoot Wrath of Cortext and Psychonauts.

This reminds me of what the Wii is doing with the Virtual Console and the PS3 with the PS1 titles. It’s kind of a sad way to try and double dip for games you might already own. We already have two Xbox systems, I’m not sure how many Xbox games we’ll be buying as downloads, especially if these games aren’t enhanced in any significant way over the original titles. I’d buy NBA Jam either the original arcade game if it was made available or the Xbox.

Other new dashboard features
Xbox.com has a complete list of new features which include some increased parental features like a game timer. Although our teens are getting a bit old for these type features, parents will be in favor of having the ability to lock down the machine so it can only be played X number of hours per day or per week.

Also full screen movie previews and “enhanced video codec” are nice additions. We’ve rented several movies through Xbox Live and from what I’ve read the service is doing better than many movie rental services online. Would be nice to see them offer higher quality HD movies at no additional cost. We’ve never paid more for the HD movies they currently offer, they are already fairly spendy comparatively.

Xbox Live has two major free updates a year, one in the Spring and another in the Fall. Overall, this update adds a few nice things, but nothing that puts them any further ahead of the pack. Xbox Live is still the best online gaming service and could finally see some serious competition next year when Sony releases their 3D HOME interface. If Sony does a good job with HOME, we might see Microsoft move, but they are in the pole position.

And then there’s the Wii which is still selling a ton of new systems but has the worst online experience of the three players to date. I don’t get where they are coming from at all.

When it comes to the hundreds of reviews written I’ve yet to give any movie, TV show, video game, website, product and/or service the highest rating of A+. Absolutely there are A+ out there, and I’m sure the day of acknowledging some of them is coming, it’s inevitable. Could Rock Band be the very first A+? Maybe.

The picture above speaks volumes. For a moment I was reminded of our teenagers in younger years. Christmas in November happened last night. A magical, mystical moment.

Rock Band is available (maybe, supplies could be limited) in stores now and after one night of playing I think RB is the must have music-related game title for the holiday season. It is from a company called Harmonix who is made up of some former Red Octane (Guitar Hero) employees.

In the following deliciously SATIRIC post there is further explanation of the company division (remember: the Metallica lawsuit stuff is not true but funny considering the whole Metallica vs. Napster saga):

Red Octane provided the distinctive controller and Harmonix provided the game. The two companies parted ways in early 2007. Red Octane, now owned by Activision, is planning to squeeze the dying Guitar Hero franchise for every penny it’s worth while Harmonix has gone on to work on Rock Band, seen by many fans as the successor to Guitar Hero in spirit, if not in name.

Rock Band is available for the Xbox 360 and PS3 and costs $169 for the Special Edition on both systems. As written yesterday after midnight we were only able to find the PS3 version, but later in the day at Best Buy we found plenty of Xbox 360 versions (we’re going to take the unopened PS3 Rock Band Special Edition version back to Wal-mart so somebody else will get a chance to buy). After buying the warranty from Best Buy for $29.99 and tax this was one of the most expensive games we’ve ever purchased at just over $210 USD. Only games more expensive? A few NEO-GEO games. For another 60 or 70 bones one could buy a Nintendo Wii. I would definitely recommend the warranty on this one, particularly because of the drums. Those skins will get pounded figuratively and literally.

The Amazon reviewers for the Xbox 360 version (note: all Amazon links in this post are affiliate links) are giving it five stars as of this writing.

The Rock Band game itself sells for $60 and you can use your Guitar Hero II controller, but the real fun is with the whole band trying to jam together including: vocals (microphone), drums, guitar and bass (which is also played on a guitar). You can name your band and then go on a world tour playing gigs. You earn fans and virtual money while completing and more and usually harder to play songs. Also, Harmonix plans to sell new songs over Xbox Live every week.

Amazon also shows the drums ($79.99), microphone ($20) and wireless guitar ($79.99) will be available January 31, 2008. So if you want to bang the drums in the meantime, it looks like your only choice is to pony up for the whole Rock Band package. If you add up those prices for individual purchase buying the Rock Band package is a better deal anyway.

Note: according to the instructions you can plug in any USB microphone, but that’s the least expensive accessory of the bunch.

Those are two of our three children who I happened to walk around the corner yesterday and see fixated on the Rock Band box, reading intently. They could — and usually would — have been playing Halo 3 and Call of Duty 4 on their two Xbox 360 in the family room but where were they? Reading the side of the game box, anxiously waiting to unbox and start playing. I knew they were interested. I was interested. Even our oldest teenager who doesn’t play many video games (but loves music like me) was into seeing what Rock Band was like.

Meanwhile in the kitchen my wife was busy cooking dinner. I motioned to our oldest son to go get our video camera so we could record the unboxing. He returned and we started filming.

Inside the Rock Band box
Opening the box we discovered a number of smaller boxes and components:

- microphone with USB
- box with Fender Stratocaster. The guitar comes in two parts. You need to slide the top guitar tuning pegs on, otherwise it’s complete.

- biggest box with drum, drum pedal and master USB cord. You have to put this together, but it’s easy to do and can be done in less than five minutes. I’ll cover that step-by-step with pictures below.
- box with USB hub. This 4-way USB hub allows connecting all the instruments and microphone so your four piece band can jam.

How to assemble the Rock Band drum kit
The separate parts to the Rock Band drum kit include:

- drum pedal
- (2) black base pieces
- (2) small aluminum poles that connect the black base pieces
- (2) two adjustable riser poles
- drum pad as one connected piece

STEP 1. connect the two black base pieces with the two small aluminum poles together as shown below:

STEP 2. Connect the two adjustable riser poles to each side of the base. There is a latch in the middle which unclasps to allow raising and lowering the poles.

STEP 3. Connect the drum base to the top of the riser poles and fasten into place with the clasps at the back of the drum kit.

STEP 4. At the bottom place the drum kit petal in the groove along the base poles and connect the cord to the back of the drum kit. That’s it, your Rock Band drum kit is complete!

How to connect the instruments to the Xbox 360
The 4-port USB hub requires an additional power outlet. It’s one of those fat, square plugins that will hog two spaces on a power strip. Plug that into the power and the other end into the USB hub. Now plug in each of the instruments (drums, Fender Stratocaster, bass) and microphone into the USB ports. With all instruments and microphone plugged into the 4-port USB hub then connect the USB to the front of the Xbox 360.

Note: you only need one instrument or the microphone to play. You can go solo with any of the three instruments or vocals, but we wanted to play as a complete band. Then you are working together to beat the game.

Now insert the Rock Band game and prepare to start rocking. We warmed up our band with multiplayer free play which lets you choose from a half dozen or so songs to get used to playing. I played the drums (easy to medium), our middle teen played guitar (expert), our youngest teen played bass (hard to expert setting) and our oldest son brought the pipes (easy to medium).

Out of the gate, we struggled a bit, but kept at it. I really like how different difficulty settings can be used for each player, that made the game more accessible for everybody. A few of the songs tore our group up, particularly me on the drums and our oldest son doing the vocals on songs he didn’t know. Thankfully there is a “save them” feature which enables the better players in the group to bring back those who fail up to three times. We needed those saves.

After four or five times playing the free form songs we hit the World Tour mode. You need to name your band. We called our group Men Without A Cause. Before we knew it, dinner was getting cold, but nobody cared. We just kept playing and playing, going through different gigs, getting booed and cheered.

For a brief moment last night it was easy to forget we were playing a game. I was in a rock band in high school and it reminded me of the experience. We were really riffing off each other. What a great experience for a video game and worth repeating: the most fun I’ve ever had playing a music video game. Better than Guitar Hero? Yes!

If people can get past the price point and see this as the awesome multi-player party game it is, Harmonix will have a huge hit this holiday season. If you’re thinking this might make a great Christmas gift for the family then don’t walk, run to the store now and buy it. Amazon is showing temporarily out of stock for the Xbox 360 Special Edition but has Buy Rock Star Special Edition for the PS3.

Now everybody in your family can be in a rock band. I know what I’m going to be doing over Thanksgiving besides eating turkey. Sorry, no groupies pictures yet, we need to tune up our stage presence. Rock on!

No, it’s not the Shredder of TMNT fame, it’s the Shredder 11 Computer Chess machine.

Three levels of difficulty are offered: easy, medium and hard. I haven’t beaten Shredder 11 on ‘hard’ yet. Would like to see somebody put Star Wars chess in the Xbox Live Arcade. Speaking of Chess, there is Chessmaster on the Xbox but nothing on the Xbox 360 so far that I’m aware of.

XboxTopic.com hatches a “conspiracy theory“:

So if Microsoft won’t publish a chess arcade title, why is Ubisoft waiting on Chessmaster? …. Ubisoft wants to allow cross-platform chess play, running on their own servers. Xbox 360 users pipe in through Live. PC, Mobile, PS3 and Wii users pipe in their own respective ways. And anybody who wants to can play against anybody else, regardless of platform. It’s CHESS, for crying out loud, not Shadowrun. It shouldn’t be hard to implement, technically. Bureaucratically, however, it may be extremely difficult.

If this theory is close to reality, that’s sad. In the meantime if you want to play against human opponents online, Free Internet Chess is one good destination. I like their motto: “we do it for the game, not the money.”

While doing grocery shopping today we came across this bottle of Mountain Dew Game Fuel ($2.28 at Winco):

I looked around to see who else had already written about this and saw a fair amount of commentary and some pictures of the cans (Jake at 8bit Joystick has a nice review) and some on the plastic bottle which were part of a Halo 3 promotion and supposed to be produced for only 12 weeks from the middle of August. However, a cursory search didn’t reveal many folks talking about the aluminum bottled version (more rare?) — although a search on eBay revealed a few sellers ($4.99 a bottle + $6.99 shipping? Ouch.) — so I decided to create this post with pictures. Check your local Winco, they had a whole bin full of them at our local store in Puyallup. Still seem kind of pricey at $2.28 a bottle to me, but they feed into the whole collector’s thing.

There is an official website that goes along with this promotion at mountaindewgamefuel.com where you can learn more about the drink. 230 calories per bottle, and then there is this promo video which makes me a bit nervous tasting what’s inside.

As for the taste? Kind of like Cherry Pepsi, but sweeter. Did I get the sugar shakes like the gamers in the vid? No foaming at the mouth, no.

Keep in mind I’m a water guy, preferring an icy glass of water over other drinks. I tried the Game Fuel with an open mind but just too sugary for my tastes. If you can find it at your local Winco or have already tried it, what did you think of the taste?

And what about these promotions? Seems like a good branding opportunity.

According to research from NPD and hat tip to Tech.co.uk, the Xbox 360 console sells the most games per console. I’m sure this has been greatly helped along by Halo 3 which set the single day sales record of $170 million.

Now if only they would make consoles which actually stand the test of time, we just had our fifth Xbox 360 go bad (”unreadable discs”), not covered under the new extended warranty. Your hardware sucks, Microsoft, but it still doesn’t matter (gamer crack, I tell you). Fortunately the Elite pictured above is still running ok, BTW, and my gamertag is XboxTDavid in case anybody reading wants to add me. I’m no challenge at most games any more but enjoy when there’s time to play.

One of the best games for the Wii already comes with the system, Wii Sports, which must be hurting the game to console ratio for Nintendo. Don’t feel too badly for them as they are quickly catching up with Microsoft and have a number of promising titles coming including Super Mario Galaxy (yes!!) and for the overweight and underexercised gamer population: Wii Fit.

Meanwhile, the PS3 library is showing some promise with online titles like Warhawk and the creative card game Eye of Judgment (drats, still haven’t beaten the computer on ‘Normal’ difficulty). The Playstation 3 still has the most games in full 1080p, but that hasn’t tipped the scales. Maybe the release of a cheaper PS3 will help.

The Blu-ray Spider-man package (all three movies) could be worth buying, although I’m not sure how many have or will buy a PS3 as a Blu-ray player. The Wii doesn’t have this as a selling point and it hasn’t mattered. Anecdotal: CNET users are looking more forward to Zune 2 than the Wii (#2) or PS3 (#3). The Xbox 360 didn’t make the top 20 but guess what did? Yup, Halo 3 at #14. On the handheld side, the PSP ranked #11.

I’m still holding to the real console war will take place in holiday season 2008. It’s impressive and at the same time a bit sad that Nintendo still can’t keep up with demand for the Wii console. As long as demand is there, it won’t be long before there are more Wiis in homes than Xbox 360 or PS3. Nintendo will be able to meet demand by next holiday season.

It’s encouraging to see the Wii sell so well without the emphasis on superior graphics. Maybe we’ll get back to simpler but more fun games to play. Games that don’t cost more than making some Hollywood movies. As a longtime gamer I could care less about beautiful cinematic video unless it’s somehow interactive.

If your spacebar doesn’t get enough workout already, be ready for the following break time distraction.

Press the Spacebar 2000 is waiting for your frenzied spacebar mashing.

Free Xbox Live Arcade game: Yaris
While talking free games, the Xbox Live Arcade is offering an odd racing title from Toyota today called Yaris based on their car of the same name. Go get it for free while you still can, even if you can’t take down those 200 achievement points today.

Time for my mea culpa on one of the most popular posts ever at Hmm, Lists of 1080p games for the Xbox 360 and PS3: I was wrong to declare the Xbox 360 the victor in the 1080p arena at the time. They have never had more native 1080p titles than the PS3. Never, never, never.

Retraction good enough? I’ve also edited the original list post by striking through the mistakes and this post will be trackbacked to the comments so anybody who reads that list can read and see my very public correction. Duped by the advertising, I should know better. Not putting blame on anybody else but the guy in the mirror.

Now what if you just bought a 1080p TV and you want to experience some native 1080p gaming and watch movies at 1080p (HD-DVD or Blu-ray)? That continues to be the thing I’m most interested in. Let’s see where we’re at today, September 29, 2007.

PS3 has *22 more native 1080p titles than the Xbox 360
*number as of this post publishing, to see the most current numbers, see the two lists below:

Xbox 360 1080p games (revised 9/29/07)
PS3 1080p games

The PS3 game boxes are much more honest about which games — and yes, the Sony PS3 has more native 1080p games than the Xbox 360. I’ve edited the above lists to more clearly show native 1080p titles (highlighted in dark green) versus box advertised 1080p titles on the Xbox 360. I’m not sure a list is even needed for native 1080p titles on the Xbox 360 because there are only 2 titles to date: NBA Street Court and Virtual Tennis 3, not a very impressive list.

As for recent titles in native 1080p on the Xbox 360? Bioshock? Nope. Halo 3? Heck, it’s not even 720p, it’s 640p. And the numbers get even worse when you compare Xbox Live Arcade to the Playstation Store. There are currently no, zero, nadda, goose egg native 1080p titles in the Xbox Live Arcade while there are 9 titles in the Playstation Store. 9-0. PS3 wins.

Why create and maintain a list of what the game boxes show?
The PS3 has better truth in advertising than the Xbox 360 as of this writing.

I couldn’t find anybody else out there that was covering what the back of the game box says versus the truth. I’m sure the game company lawyers have it all figured out that by using the word “supported” they aren’t using any legally deceptive advertising, but if you are new to the world of 1080p you should immediately be suspicious of the terminology “supported” when talking about 1080p. Supported probably means upscaled and upscaled is not the same thing as native.

I know after writing the original post, seeing the significant amount of discussion at other sites, the feedback I’ve received directly and in comments here that this is an issue of great debate and concern among gamers. Instead of adding to the confusion, my goal has been and continues to be to cut through it and get to the truth. If you just bought a 1080p TV, Xbox 360 with HDMI or PS3, what games are native 1080p? The lists are both pretty small overall, with a mere 26 titles available in native 1080p for both game consoles.

That’s it, 26 total native 1080p titles for both systems.

Sorry to disappoint you on the gaming front but you can probably tear through playing all these games before Christmas. And if you’re hoping Microsoft will put more native 1080p games under your 2007 holiday tree or Xbox Live Arcade menu, history and current reality would suggest otherwise. The PS3 continues to regularly release new titles at native 1080p. My only updates for the Xbox 360 since the original list have been 1080p listed on the box.

And here is the truth in advertising
Microsoft, you need to do a much, much better job of clearly explaining on game boxes what is and isn’t native 1080p. There are literally dozens of upscaled 1080p titles on the Xbox 360 from the native resolution of 720p all marked deceptively — in my opinion, again, I’m sure the lawyers covered your butts — as 1080p. Yes, these games may support 1080p, but that’s not what many customers think when they see 1080p on the back of the game box and make a purchasing decision.

Compare this scenario to how Sony is treating 1080p titles on the PS3.

I haven’t been able to confirm even one title on the PS3 where the back of the game box shows 1080p and the title isn’t native 1080p. If anybody reading can confirm game box deception, please use the comments below to share your story. Nor can I find any titles being advertised in the Playstation Store as 1080p that aren’t native 1080p. I’m not saying Sony doesn’t have customer deception problems — remember the whole root kit mess? — but in this particular situation they look better than Microsoft.

For example, check out a recently released title’s game box Warhawk picture below:

In black and white:

Supported HD video output: 720p, 1080i.

Now why do games like Dead or Alive 4 (pictured top of the post) show 1080p and Warhawk doesn’t? You tell me. The only guess I can make is deception and that’s not a very friendly or warm guess.

Is native 1080p that big of a deal, really?
Inquiring gamers want to know.

Does it even matter if a game is native 1080p? I don’t have the best eyes, but the games I’ve played at native 1080p do appear a little sharper, the images have a crispness that isn’t seen at 720p. Yes, it’s a minor difference, very minor, but I see something. Maybe it’s all in my eyes though because I’ve read plenty of other gamers with 1080p capability who claim they can’t tell any difference at all. I’m not trying to be part of some holy war between consoles here, I like both consoles, I’m simply sharing what I see. Or think I see. Maybe it’s some Jedi mind trick.

Also worth repeating is that the Xbox Live Dashboard doesn’t look nearly as good as the Playstation interface. This is more easily seen. Sure, it could be how our TV is upscaling the dashboard and on a different TV the differences wouldn’t be as clear. We also have the HD-DVD player for the Xbox 360 and I think the Blu-ray movies look better. A lot better? No. A little better? Yes.

Hardware being used
Samsung LCD 1080p
Xbox 360 Elite with HDMI connection, optional HD-DVD player connected via USB
Sony PS3 (60GB) with HDMI connection, Blu-ray player built-in