Spring Update To Be Released May 9th 2.00am PDT

[Parm]

Downloaded the update about an hour ago! Looking good!

I personally like the Live Messenger integration, my PC is upstairs and my 360 is downstairs so it's handy for me. Now I just need a little USB keyboard to plugin.

Love the new achievement display, the pop up now tells you what the achievement was and how much gamerscore you gained as opposed to the old pop up which just said achievement unlocked.

Quite a few small changes I noticed too. You used to be able to disable notifications completely, you can now also disable notifications when watching a movie.
There's an option to allow the console to continue downloading in a low power state when you turn it off.
The video browser is much better, rather than listing all the videos on my PC I can now browse the folders that they're in.

Probably some other little bits and bobs that I haven't noticed yet! Any other little changes that you guys have noticed?

[Veles]

Mainly looking forward to the added codec support - however I can imagine the intregrated msn is going to wind me up eventually.

Don't worry, it's optional, you "sign up" your gamertag to MSN (my gamertag uses the same .net passport as MSN so all my contacts are carried over) and then you can sign in separately, or sign in automatically.

Since my 360 is right next to my PC, this feature, which was the main feature of this update, is a bit pointless for me, I was hoping for a little more, being able to track your friends using MSN would be very nice, see who's online doing what, similar to that XBList or whatever it's called that doesn't work for me anymore

Quite a few small changes I noticed too. You used to be able to disable notifications completely, you can now also disable notifications when watching a movie.

That was there before this update I think, I remember seeing it there a few days ago when fiddling with the settings.

Theres one more feature, instead of saying "Play Game" on the little disk tray icon on each blade, it actually says the name of the game you have in the tray.

I honestly can't believe it took them this long to implement this feature and the achievement feature.

[Carlh]

Veles,

I agree the name of the game and the redesigning of the achievement notification should have been like that from day 1.

I personally would like to see a browser added in the next update as this would be a great feature for the majority of users I would imagine

[Blackmage]

MSN messenger not if your under 18 thing is i was 18 along time ago. i got the complete access to my xbox master account and all

[Tom Scott]

I just did the update and it didn't brick my console like it did last time!

Not tried the MSN thing out, best bit for me was the marketplace blade, which is going to be a lot better than going into marketplace and then going into what you want to download.

[Veles]

Not tried the MSN thing out, best bit for me was the marketplace blade, which is going to be a lot better than going into marketplace and then going into what you want to download.

Yeah I can see that saving a lot of time and hassle

EDIT: Oh yeah found another change;

If you go into Games->Xbox Live Arcade, theres a new menu item there called Friends Playing Now, seems a bit pointless to me though.

[Parm]

A few more things:

Like said above, the game in the disc tray is now shown by name instead of just 'play game'. In addition to that, if you highlight the game name it'll show you additional details about the game in the box above. Namely what gamerscore and achievements you have from that title.

Another thing is being able to go straight back to the front page. For example, if you're browsing marketplace; you may end up going through loads of sections (games --> demos --> new releases etc), if you want to go back to marketplace without pressing back so many times just hit yellow once and you'll go back to the start.

[Veles]

Ooo that is sweet, didn't notice that before 'cos I had Halo 2 in there.

EDIT: I think they may have also (slightly) improved voice playback though the speakers

[Odc]

Wow. I've just got home from college and updated my 360 only to find that I can't messenger because I have a 'child' account. Normally I am in favour of restrictions such as stopping people from playing games when they are massively under the age limit.

However, on a computer, anyone can use msn at any age so why restrict users just because they use a games console? It seems utterly ridiculous that my 'child' account lets me play games rated 18+, buy Microsoft Points using a credit card and talk to complete strangers who if they wish can tell me that they will hunt down and murder me. So why oh why can't I use a simple chat program?

The worst part of this whole fiasco is that I can't even allow the use of messenger in the family settings and as I understand it, when I turn 18 in July the restrictions will still apply! I didn't think that being honest and entering my real date of birth would have such an effect and felt better for it. Now, the only way for me to get full use of the console is to get a new gamer tag losing all of my gamer score and shell out another £40 for a gold subscription!

You may think that I'm overreacting but does anyone else find these restrictions utterly absurd?

[Tom Scott]

Wow. I've just got home from college and updated my 360 only to find that I can't messenger because I have a 'child' account. Normally I am in favour of restrictions such as stopping people from playing games when they are massively under the age limit.

However, on a computer, anyone can use msn at any age so why restrict users just because they use a games console? It seems utterly ridiculous that my 'child' account lets me play games rated 18+, buy Microsoft Points using a credit card and talk to complete strangers who if they wish can tell me that they will hunt down and murder me. So why oh why can't I use a simple chat program?

The worst part of this whole fiasco is that I can't even allow the use of messenger in the family settings and as I understand it, when I turn 18 in July the restrictions will still apply! I didn't think that being honest and entering my real date of birth would have such an effect and felt better for it. Now, the only way for me to get full use of the console is to get a new gamer tag losing all of my gamer score and shell out another £40 for a gold subscription!

You may think that I'm overreacting but does anyone else find these restrictions utterly absurd?

Can't you get Microsoft to change the Live account type by calling them? Or doing a GamerTag change?

Just so you all know a "Forza 2 Demo announcement" is due any moment!

[digit]

It is a bit stupid considering that anyone can get an msn account or register another email for msn on the pc. So I agree with you its stupid, imo though I'd not get another gamertag purely for msn though...

[Odc]

Can't you get Microsoft to change the Live account type by calling them? Or doing a GamerTag change?

Just so you all know a "Forza 2 Demo announcement" is due any moment!

I've been reading around and people have tried to ring Microsoft but they wont/can't change it for you.

It is a bit stupid considering that anyone can get an msn account or register another email for msn on the pc. So I agree with you its stupid, imo though I'd not get another gamertag purely for msn though...

Exactly. It may seem sad that I don't want to lose my gamer score but I have put a fair amount of effort in getting it to the level it is now. Plus with only 3 achievements on Gears left, who'd want to?

[Clstrphbc_donut]

Forza 2 demo announcement when and where?

The updates nice, but Forza 2 is more appealing to me!

[darrensen]

Is there anyway to change the msn account you login with on the xbox?

I have 2 different passport accounts and would like to use the one on my Mac with all my contacts in.

Thanks

Darren

[Blademrk]

Don't think there is, at least not without creating a new account and losing all your gamerscore / save games associated with your old Gamertag

[OV3RCLOCK3R]

Why no 1680x1050 resolution seeing as how many people are using monitors with their 360's?