Video: Fall update game installation process

by Dustin Burg { Aug 9th 2008 at 6:00PM }

Looky here kids, it's the Fall dashboard update in the hands of some uber l33t dude who "magically" has the new dashboard installed on his Xbox 360. Even better, he (or she) demos the new hard drive game installation process using GTAIV. From the looks of things, the process isn't quick (copying gigs and gigs of data never is), but does actually copy over ever single megabyte from the disc. Though, you'll need the disc to load the game. Pop some popcorn, sit back and enjoy the Fall update game installation process.

[Thanks, DCB and SS1029]

Tags: dashboard-update, fall-update, gtaiv, hard-drive

Reader Comments (Page 1 of 2)

Momer @ Aug 9th 2008 6:05PM

That was... interesting. What I want to know are the RPM values for the various 360 hard drives.

E.J. @ Aug 10th 2008 4:39AM

Everyone's real concern is, how much installing can your DVD drive take consecutively before it craps out and fails?

OrionnoirO @ Aug 10th 2008 8:56AM

No, I dont think anyone wants to know this, as it is no harder to copy data from the DVD drive than it is to stream it, and in all actuality, it would be easier on it having all the data read once and then read from the hard drive from then on, so it would actually be easier on your DVD drive.

Arnon @ Aug 9th 2008 6:06PM

My god that is really organized.. I'm really diggin' this new dashboard.

LilTmac2003 @ Aug 9th 2008 6:49PM

You my friend, are absolutely 100% correct.

I'm a neat freak, so the new dashboard is a dream come true.

At first, I'm like, what is this [way back at E3], now with all the demos and videos I've seen, two thumbgs up Microsoft.

Alex @ Aug 10th 2008 6:44AM

Me too. But, can we choose to not install games and just keep the 'jet engine noise' that I don't really notice anymore?
I don't want to spend £70 on a 120 GB HDD.

Cameron @ Aug 9th 2008 6:06PM

20GB- 5400RPM
60GB- 5400RPM to 7200RPM
120GB- 5400RPM to 7200RPM

Dan Sotomayor @ Aug 9th 2008 6:13PM

why does it asks you to insert the disc when the game is in the hard-drive?

ryan @ Aug 9th 2008 6:22PM

the game is on the hard drive, they just require the disc for security reasons to see if you own the disc. if you could just play from the hard drive w/out disc, a lot of people could be out of business!

Sora @ Aug 9th 2008 6:24PM

So you can't borrow games from your friends/rent a game, install them, and hand them back and still have the game.

KirbyMeister @ Aug 9th 2008 9:37PM

that's just stupid, I mean the main reason why you want your games on your 360 hard drive is so you DON'T have to keep the disc in the drive, spinning around and risking scratches.

Erik Stroud @ Aug 9th 2008 10:09PM

The disk spins long enough to check if its real, then it stops. Though, I wish you could remove it once its loaded. That way I wouldnt have to buy another cod4 or halo 3. I could load it, pop the disk out, then my bro loads it.

Fire Fawkes @ Aug 9th 2008 10:11PM

Actually, I think they've said that the disk will only spin on start-up (to verify you actually have it) after that, there will be no disk spinning/jet engine noise. So scratching and such shouldn't be a big issue.

ryan @ Aug 9th 2008 10:15PM

^
it won't be scratched. one initial spin is all that is required. no spinning of any kind after startup. i'm sure you can even take the disc out once you start playing.

it's simply for security reasons. they didn't make this option so you can pirate games. it's simply for quicker load times and less work for you system.

Kristian Freeman @ Aug 9th 2008 11:49PM

I'll find it interesting if someone finds a method of cracking this. Depending on how the game is stored on the HD and how the disc is read at the beginning, it might be relatively easy to suddenly be able to pirate 360 games.

ryan @ Aug 9th 2008 6:15PM

regardless of how sexy it is, i still am not comfortable with the new dash setup. when you select new menus as you go from left to right, the other menus disappear.

i liked how the blades would hide behind the current blade selection, yet you could still read what the other blades were. in this one they just disappear.

hopefully you can still keep the current blade setup with the extra functions this fall.

ryan @ Aug 9th 2008 6:17PM

previous menus that you selected i mean, going left to right like the demonstration.

webster1990 @ Aug 9th 2008 7:56PM

They have said that you can, but only in the form of the new guide button menu (it looks a lot like the blade menus system we have right now).

You can completely avoid these menus if you change your settings to automatically load the game instead of the xbox menu, and simply use the new guide button menu instead.

Whocares @ Aug 10th 2008 3:06AM

God forbid options (that should be memorized by now) are not visible when your not using them at that moment... smh

ryan @ Aug 10th 2008 11:45AM

god forbid when going down netflick selections you can't have the option to see your previous selection while you scroll.

bottom line: seeing previous selections of options > a sexier interface.

CyberKnight @ Aug 10th 2008 4:40PM

That's one thing I noticed right away with the first reveal video at E3. When they showed the interface, I didn't see the Gamertag display. I had no idea where it was, even as they scrolled up and down and left and right through all the menus, until they happened to finally scroll all the way down and all the way left to reveal it.

Requiring users to either scroll in all directions to find something, or to memorize where everything is, because you can't see even all the top-level categories in any direction at a glance, is, to me, not "easier to navigate", no matter how easy it is on the eyes.

Maybe it'll work better in the final version, or it works better when you get your hands on it, but just looking at it makes me wonder.

Vander @ Aug 11th 2008 7:19PM

Have to be a Main Menu with 50% zoom off all then screens...just Guessing

Vander @ Aug 11th 2008 1:40PM

Hope for a Main Grid Menu

a ham sandwich @ Aug 9th 2008 6:17PM

man i really hope they polish that! as organized as it is, those icons look like they're from windows xp. ew!

ryan @ Aug 9th 2008 6:20PM

really? reminds me more of windows vista...

a ham sandwich @ Aug 9th 2008 6:25PM

no way! get a load of those music notes!

ryan @ Aug 9th 2008 6:28PM

so music notes are bothering you? ookaay...well just keep the old one. the dude below said you can change it back if you don't like it.

Tiptup300 @ Aug 10th 2008 12:53AM

Not to mention that this isn't a public beta. Meaning that all of the visuals are irrelevant to the final product.

d889 @ Aug 9th 2008 6:23PM

vista aero looks just fine, and so does this new dashboard.

you can turn it off and use the old one anyways when the update comes out so dont fret.

ryan @ Aug 9th 2008 6:26PM

sweet. thanks dude. :-)

webster1990 @ Aug 10th 2008 8:48AM

From what i have read you cant actualy turn it off, its just that the new guide button menu (the one that comes up wen you click the xbox button when playing games) now has several blades instead of one so it looks very similar to the dashboard we have right now.
The only way to not use these menus is to change your settings so that your xbox automatically boots from the disc and skips the dashboard.

CharmedPower @ Aug 9th 2008 6:28PM

Looks sweet

JimJimBinks @ Aug 9th 2008 6:40PM

I'd be really curious to know how fast GTA IV loaded up for him once it was installed on the drive.

The Phil @ Aug 9th 2008 6:52PM

Agreed, I want a comparison in loading times.

Christopher @ Aug 9th 2008 7:21PM

I hear ya on that one,IMO it seems kinda not that important to me to install the game on the hard drive if I have to wait so long.

koehler83 @ Aug 9th 2008 6:45PM

I wonder if the procedure changes for multi-disc games and if it copies entire images of every disc, regardless of duplicated assets among them.

NuckinFutsX360A @ Aug 9th 2008 6:50PM

Very odd that it shows he has GTA 4 in the drive, but shows halo 3 and achievement icons instead of GTA 4 ones. Also on the screen he is inserting the GTA 4 disc the picture is slanted down and to the right the rest of the video seems to be straight. Wonder if this is real or not.

LilTmac2003 @ Aug 9th 2008 6:50PM

Here's a question, it might be silly, I just wanted to know.

If you install a game, any game, for example, Gears, do I have to use that exact same disc of Gears that I used to install, or can it be any copy?

rTwelve [xbl:chilblane] @ Aug 9th 2008 8:59PM

Considering any copy of Gears can access your game saves I don't see why it would be different with installs. Same with other games.

ryan @ Aug 9th 2008 9:49PM

every game should have one universal code on every disc copy to read from.

that would suck if your disc gets ruined somehow and you can't get to your game, regardless of a new copy.

so no, i don't think it works that way. :-)

Teabag @ Aug 9th 2008 7:01PM

The style and slickness is so Vista like. I won't be surprised if it resembles Vista in eye candy. I like the new dashboard. I never liked the blades to be honest. A decent design but no style and hell lot confusing.

ryan @ Aug 9th 2008 9:53PM

i really don't care for the way menus disappear off screen to the left when selecting them in this one.

the blades were at least on screen at all times.

Whocares @ Aug 10th 2008 3:08PM

yup... cause Ryan would be lost without them. Hopefully the fall update will have a GPS feature so you wont be lost when they disappear.

ryan @ Aug 10th 2008 3:37PM

it's not that i'd be lost. it's just more efficient to see your options more clearly...like laying your cards out instead of stacking them.

Vcize @ Aug 9th 2008 7:42PM

Wait, this video is posted via Vimeo, right?

I thought they banned videogame videos?

Vcize @ Aug 9th 2008 7:45PM

Btw, it's funny to see the video's views broken down by day.

Aug 6th: 88
Aug 7th: 315
Aug 8th: 123
Aug 9th: 23,000

I guess we know what day the blogs got a hold of it.

Tann @ Aug 9th 2008 8:14PM

this looks really sweet.
nice and smooth..

Flakundenga @ Aug 9th 2008 9:26PM

this update sucks!!! wonder how long it took to download the game...

MrMuggs @ Aug 9th 2008 9:49PM

The value for me of copying a game to the hard drive is so I can go in and out and load any game I want from the comfort of my couch. It's certainly not that I'm too lazy to get up and pop in a disc but I like the convenience of having all of my games on my drive and not having to look through a stack of game discs. That's part of the beauty of XBL. The fact that we still have to pop in discs to prove we own the game is stupid. I don't understand why they can't figure out some other mechanism or check.

ryan @ Aug 9th 2008 9:53PM

because there is no other way of mechanism or check unless you buy whole games on your account like the XBLA games, THEN there becomes proof of ownership.

just be more organized with your games.

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