Microsoft's X360 HD-DVD drive is simple, compact, and well-designed. It attaches via a mini-USB to the X360 which is where all the processing for the drive will happen. This should keep the little drive from generating heat.
Although Microsoft wouldn't plug in the drive and show us it working for this demo, they told us it is going through QA and being sent home for real world testing with various MS employees now.
According to the rep, when it's running the drive makes just about as much noise as something spinning a disk 12 times per second should make. So, maybe it sounds something like your mother trying to vacuum inside a Super Collider? It remains to be heard.
On the back of the drive are two additional USB ports, so the drive will act as a hub rather than just occupy a valuable USB port on your X360. It also features a tab to add the X360 Wireless Network Adapter. The drive sits either horizontally or vertically which should make adding it to your entertainment center incredibly easy.
Right now there is a big question of HDMI connectivity -- an alternative to component connections it's an all-digital audio/video interface capable of transmitting uncompressed streams -- Microsoft said they have nothing to announce, but are considering the possibility.
We pressed this issue and asked if Microsoft is concerned about the fact that the Image Constraint Toke (ICT) component of HDCP/AACS copy-protection won't work over component video connections, which could make the X360 HD-DVD drive useless sometime in the future if the copy-protection scheme is fully implemented in HD-DVDs.
Microsoft replied via email:
"The image constraint token feature of AACS is an optional flag for the [motion picture] studios and several have publicly stated they have no plans to invoke [the copy-protection flags]. Therefore, the copy protection scheme is fully implemented in both HD DVD and Blu-ray today.
"We [Microsoft Corporation] do not see the absence of HDMI/HDCP as an issue over the lifetime of this generation of [the X360] console. HDMI/HDCP is still a very new interface and until it is supported broadly across the CE and PC industries and by consumers on a wide enough scale to be considered a standard, we don't expect anyone to impede content flow over non-HDMI devices (re: invoke the ICT)."
One Microsoft rep told us that "Let us [Microsoft] worry about that. The consumer shouldn't have to worry about that!"
Until we are actually able to plug it in and power it up that's all we know about this handy little peripheral. If you're an X360 owner and want to play HD-DVD movies this winter Microsoft seems to have designed the smartest and cheapest way to do just that.