With the recent launch of the Xbox 360 HD-Drive in the UK, Microsoft aim to bring High Definition movies to the masses. With the Xbox 360 HD-DVD drive retaiing for a mere £130 it certainly appears to be the ideal "value for money solution". Even when factoring in the additional cost of a Xbox 360 Premium this works out less than many standalone HD players which are currently selling for around the £450 mark.

The drive itself is slightly larger than the Nintendo Wii and is finished to identically match the main X360 unit. There is a reassuring weight to the drive and it can be used either vertically or horizontally just like the main 360 unit. When the pair are mounted horizontally with the HD player on top, no air flow is restricted.

As well as bundling the HD version of "King Kong" with the unit, you also receive the Xbox 360 Universal Media Remote (pictured above), as you can see above this is a more substantial version of the tiny remote you used to receive with the X360 Premium pack. Another added benefit to this larger remote is that it can control your TV as well as a Media Center powered Windows PC. Checking the Xbox site for the remote "code" to control my Dell 37 inch HDTV LCD i was disheartened to find it absent, however if you hold down several buttons you can manually scan for the correct frequencies and after some trial and error I was pleased to find it supported the Dell panel. Information on this remote (you can also purchase seperately) is available over here.

Those of you already familar with the Xbox 360 will be pleased to hear that the power supply that comes with the HD DVD player is considerably smaller than the behemoth of a unit that comes with the X360 (picture above).

The drive slot mechanism is smooth with a reassuring "clunk" as it enters the fully closed position, for those interested the unit is a Toshiba drive, but ill delve into this more later in the article.

The drive is a USB2 solution which uses up the single USB2 port on the rear of the machine. Thankfully Microsoft have thought this out well and the HD-DVD drive also has a two port USB2 hub, so for those of you, like me, who have a wireless adapter, you simply plug the HD DVD drive into the rear of the X360 and then attach the wireless connector to the rear of the HD drive. They even generously have preattached clip on fittings for the wireless connector making it all look very neat and tidy.

For those wondering if USB2 is a fast enough solution to handle High definition material, the answer is simply "yes". HD DVD data transfer peaks at around 30mbps and the maximum bandwidth of USB2 is well in excess of this. The image above shows the other side of the USB lead that plugs into the unit, it is the standard "small fit" connector like you see on many other devices such as digital cameras, MP3 players and PDA's.

The HD DVD powers up when the X360 is switched on so you don't have to deal with individual power buttons when wanting to view High Definition movies. Even when the Xbox 360 unit is turned off, the unit is in a "sleep" state and if you hit the eject button it will open. It is pretty much the perfect operating solution and it is clear to me that Microsoft did extensive research and development as all those frequently annoying little operational "quirks" appear to be absent.

On first boot up, users are asked to boot from an included installation disk to update their 360 to add HD-DVD capabilities. For those wondering, the X360 HDD is not required as the update is firmware based. After this is finished the X360 dashboard will look slightly different. Boot up time is extremely fast at around 9-10 seconds which makes it dramatically faster than the Toshiba drive I tested last month.

The more astute amongst you will notice that the drive door icon is now split into two, the top half circle representing the built in drive and the bottom circle the HD-DVD drive. This is intuitive as the usual selection methods apply to launch games or HD-DVD movies at the press of a button. You can also totally bypass this and just manually press the eject button on the unit, close the tray and the HD-DVD player automatically loads. Ejecting the disc will return you immediately to the dashboard. It is also worth noting that if you eject the disc during a movie and return to it later, it will resume at the same place within the film. Another nice touch.

Microsoft are still bundling King Kong with the drive and they really should get some credit for this, because whether you like the film or not, it is a perfect starting point to test the quality of the drive as the mastering of the HD version is fantastic.

The DVD version compared to the HD version is simply night and day, it is a whole new experience and it really shows how technology has advanced - I used to think DVD was a great format! The picture via the HD DVD player to the Dell 3707 HDTV LCD screen (1080i) is really incredible. I would have liked to test the HD-DVD drive to a 1080p supported screen, however my order still hadn't arrived at the time of the review. I will follow up at a later date when the 60 inch screen arrives.

Some of you may not find the drive so appealing as it does not offer HDMI connectivity, while the console is capable of outputting a digital signal the current lack of HDMI limits the 360 to output 1080p signals via component video or VGA. Currently this is not a major issue as almost all screens available in the UK accept 1080p over component or VGA. Only movie purists will really be affected by this.

Will it work on a Windows PC?

Plugging in the drive to a Windows XP powered PC shows immediate detection of the drive. So far so good...

However when a HD-DVD was inserted the drive did not mount, however after some calls I received a special UDF reader file - and after an install and reboot windows showed the disc and all its contents.

Instantly the differences in standard DVD and HD-DVD are apparent with 27 gigabyte of video files in the TS folder!

So now we have everything installed how do we go about trying to get the movie to play? After many failed attempts with various programs we turned to our good friends at Cyberlink to help us out and they were happy to send us the very latest V7.2 HD edition of their wonderful PowerDVD program.

I was exceptionally pleased to see that King Kong played perfectly fine in PowerDvd 7.2 HD edition without any problems! The quality as expected was stellar.

Conclusion:

Try as I may, it really is hard to fault the Xbox 360 HD-DVD drive, Microsoft have done an incredible job of delivering High Definition movie content at an extremely affordable price (£130 RRP). Even when you factor in the additional cost of a Xbox 360 the combined price is no more than many standalone players available currently in the UK (many of which will not handle 1080p). If you already own a Xbox 360 and a HDTV, it really is a no brainer, especially as the price of HD-DVD's on Play.com or via reputable powersellers on ebay is no more than a standard DVD! (between £15-£20 each). Add to this that discs originating from the states play on UK machines and vice versa and you can see how good an overall solution this is.

The only real negative would be the lack of HDMI for movie purists, however considering the low price and the exceptionally high quality of the images as well as the fact that with a little effort you can already use the HD-DVD drive on your Windows XP based PC, I recommend this product without hestitation.

The only problem right now is availability as the first batch that arrived in the UK sold out, with the next order due to arrive near the end of January.

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