Forked Thread: Ps3 or Xbox 360 for Fallout 3 and other games

[Steel_Wind]

With a 360, the RROD is not so much the issue as the noise factor. Older == louder.

They do work though - and for some, it's a fine option.

 

[ssampier]

Blu-Ray DVD Combo Drive $130.00
Sapphire Radeon HD 4870 1 GB 256bit HDCP $240.00
(all prices from newegg 12/30/08)
===

Total $370.00

Not a bad price all things considered.

I appreciate the advice.

 

[Felon]

With a new unit, you can install to HDD and avoid the noise problem. (And as mentioned elsewhere, the noise is a significant issue).

I keep hearing about this. What's this "install to HDD" stuff about? I have an elite unit. Is that considered a sufficiently "new" unit?

 

[Banshee16]

I'll point out that the newer XBoxes aren't as loud. When they changed to the Falcon board (most of the ones you can buy that were in the stores in 2008), the CPU was cooler, and consequently, the fans are quieter. In addition, there is an even quieter/cooler one coming out.....it is even cooler, and quieter than the ones with the Falcon board.

The newer ones are supposedly not as prone to hardware failure either.

I have both systems, but I tend to play the XBox far more. I just find it easier to locate people to play with....but everyone has their own preferences.

Banshee

 

[Banshee16]

I keep hearing about this. What's this "install to HDD" stuff about? I have an elite unit. Is that considered a sufficiently "new" unit?

You can have a release date box from back in 2005, and you'd still be able to install to HDD. As long as you have installed the New XBox Experience, you'll be able to install a game.

They don't recommend doing it with Halo3, but other games should be fine.

When you're on your desktop, simply go to "My XBox", and select your game...don't click "play game"....go to one of the options to the right, where you can see an option to look at things related to a game....achievements, etc. You should have an option to install it to the hard drive.

Banshee

 

[D.Shaffer]

It depends on what games you like, honestly. If you have a game you want to play that's on one but not the other...there ya go.

For Fallout 3....There's DLC coming for it on the Xbox 360 version so I'd get that one. (If not the PC version)

 

[Arnwyn]

The costs is less

Unless you like online (and you've just advocated for Xbox Live) - then it costs more. (If one likes online, the 360 is the most expensive console available today.)

 

[Mallus]

Blu-Ray DVD Combo Drive $130.00
Sapphire Radeon HD 4870 1 GB 256bit HDCP $240.00
(all prices from newegg 12/30/08)
===

Total $370.00

Not a bad price all things considered.

Nice!

One last thing to consider re: PC vs. console is what genres of games you're interested in. For instance, a big chuck of the good PC games are FPS. In general, there's a wider variety of different kinds of games available for the consoles.

 

[Felon]

You can have a release date box from back in 2005, and you'd still be able to install to HDD. As long as you have installed the New XBox Experience, you'll be able to install a game.

They don't recommend doing it with Halo3, but other games should be fine.

When you're on your desktop, simply go to "My XBox", and select your game...don't click "play game"....go to one of the options to the right, where you can see an option to look at things related to a game....achievements, etc. You should have an option to install it to the hard drive.

Banshee

Thanks, I'll check it out.

 

[Steel_Wind]

Blu-Ray DVD Combo Drive $130.00
Sapphire Radeon HD 4870 1 GB 256bit HDCP $240.00
(all prices from newegg 12/30/08)
===

Total $370.00

Not a bad price all things considered.

I appreciate the advice.

Do note that with most Sapphire 48xx cards in stock - you will need to flash the BIOS on the card in order to allow it to work with most older (and some newer) games properly.

The flash.bat is easy to run on a Vista 32 machine....if you can somehow boot your machine into plain vanilla DOS.

If you have never tried to boot a modern computer into plain vanilla DOS, you may not appreciate how hard that task has now become. You will need:

- a PS/2 style keyboard or at least a dongle for your usb connection that allows you to connect it to the PS/2 port on your mobo. Because after your machine boots to plain vanilla DOS you won't be able to type in the word "flash" at the prompt without this as a pure USB keyboard won't work

- for most boot disk images, an IDE CD Rom. Trying it with a SATA DVD is not going to work. Hell, trying it with an IDE DVD usually won't work either...

- preferably have a 3.5 floppy (and a 3.5" disk!) around

OR

or a bootable Flash drive. (Those aren't easy to make work either!)

- And even if you have a floppy drive around - your mobo will need to support a connection to it. That's a rare mobo these days. Most newer ones do not.

Blah blah blah... end result: total pain in the ass.

There is a workaround for this under XP. A community util called WinFlash exists for use under XP that allows you to use it when running XP to flash the BIOS on a 48xx card. I recommend going that route. Even just grabbing an older hard drive with XP installed on it from another system just connected to a Vista machine long enough to boot it - and run the WinFlash util is all you need. It takes 3 seconds to do and you never have to do it again - but if you have an older BIOS on the 48xx card, it is a vital step you will have to do once.

If you don't have Vista installed - well - then running WinFlash won't be a problem for you