Microsoft Looking To Adopt Blu-Ray

The technology world moves so fast, that by the time you think you’re caught up, your gadget is “last week”. Well Microsoft is grinding its technology gears as fast as it can, to adopt support for the Blu-Ray.

In case you somehow didn’t findout, HD-DVD has gone the way of the dodo. A couple of weeks ago, Toshiba threw up the white flag, signaling an end to the nearly 2 year long fight. So now that Blu-Ray is the exclusive HD movie format, what happens to the companies that supported HD-DVD?

One of the biggest supporters of HD-DVD was easily Microsoft. They offered Xbox 360 owners, with an external attachment that would play HD-DVDs. Productions of these units have already stopped, and if for some reason you still want one; the price is dropping fast.

Steve Ballmer reported to Gameindustry.biz about what type of support that Microsoft could offer in the future, “We’ve already been working on, for example, in Windows, device driver support for Blu-ray drives and the like, and I think the world moves on”

Probably the biggest question, especially for gamers is if and when will the Xbox 360 start supporting Blu-Ray. And immediately following that question is, “Will the Blu-Ray playback be an internal player, or external?”

According to Financial Times Sony and Microsoft are already in talks about giving the 360 Blu-Ray functionality. No word as to whether the player would be internal or external though.

Blu-Ray playback for the 360 would be an amazing addition. I can’t help but imagine the cringes on Microsoft’s face for having to pay a royalty fee, everytime a Blu-Ray powered 360 would be sold. As soon as more info comes in, it will be posted; so stay tuned.