Resetting VGA Resolution and Screen Format on Xbox 360 Blind (Without Video Output)

If you ever have to reset the display resolution/aspect ratio settings on an Xbox 360, and only have a VGA cable and monitor to do it with, you may find yourself in a bit of a quandary, as the monitor may not display the Xbox 360 menu, making it very difficult indeed to reset the display settings!

Never fear. Here's the sequence of controller presses to reset the VGA settings to standard aspect ratio, 640 x 480, which should work on almost any monitor. You will want sound for this, it will make things easier.

Once the Xbox 360 boots up:

• HOLD D-Pad RIGHT until blade selection sounds stop, or 3 seconds (You are now at System Blade)


• HOLD D-Pad UP until menu selection sounds stop, or 3 seconds


• PRESS A (You are now in Console Settings)


• HOLD D-Pad UP until menu selection sounds stop, or 3 seconds


• PRESS A (You are now in Display)


• HOLD D-Pad DOWN until menu selection sounds stop, or 3 seconds


• PRESS A (You are now in Screen Format - If you get a "bonk" sound, skip next 2 steps)


• HOLD D-Pad UP until menu selection sounds stop, or 3 seconds


• PRESS A (You have just selected NORMAL Screen Format and have returned to Display)


• HOLD D-Pad UP until menu selection sounds stop, or 3 seconds


• PRESS A (You are now in Screen Resolution)


• HOLD D-Pad UP until menu selection sounds stop, or 3 seconds


• PRESS A (You have just selected 640 x 480)

You should now see the screen. Proceed to set your display settings as normal.

Missing Sailing

I took a minute to myself at the boat the other day. It was one of those rare autumn days that the sky splits open and doesn't bleed wind. Everything just waited for something.

Passion was weathering the coming cold well. A few splinters from the flooded log booms still hung around the harbor, occasionally finding their way against her hull, but still she sat, silent in her chains, rocking, asleep.

I climbed aboard, fixed a cup of coffee below and had a seat. It was one of those days I didn't x-ray the boat with my mind, one of those days that what I saw was what there was. No cleverly-hidden water tanks, waste receptacles, electrical panels, just wood and fabric and the occasional metal trim.

A house, she is now, a home, just looking for a roam, but I couldn't give it to her. "Sorry, old girl," I said, as I tripped the engines and idled up to heat her fluids, "Not today." The prop never got to spin, no lines cast off. She sat, snorting in bondage, smoke and fury and not a knot made, not a yard of headway or sternway to call the day's score. I felt it - almost adventurous enough to cast off and - and what? Discretion gets the better of me all too often.

I slipped under the dodger to see her lines; the most neglected of all lay in constant tension - her spinnaker strings. So much rope, and for what? The spinnaker winches stood unused, a fine coat of dust already forming. A couple quick turns satisfied me that they were at least not broken, but I felt bad, and went to find a wash bucket.

She's been through tougher times than this, certainly. Her original owner found her in disrepair, bilge full of muck and paneling stripped to the glass. The boat's name, Passion, we kept, not just in deference to her own clean lines and racing sentiments, but to the owner's committment and tireless service to a boat that once was, then wasn't - then was once again.

Was I letting him down? I loosened the spinnaker lines and looked underneath where they lay - a long, black line, like Satan's sidewalk chalk, lay along the length of the line's bed on the fiberglass; one big dark highway of disuse along the deck where nobody could see. I filled the bucket, added soap, and washed the deck under the dodger. I erased the lines, I cleared the dust from the winches. I didn't make a promise then to give her spinnaker back - but I made a promise to think about it.

Because I felt the pull. I coiled the lines, replaced the covers and finished my coffee like a proper gentleman, but all throughout I felt her pulling, tugging at me. If you sail - cruise or race - you get that feeling from a boat you care about. She's not meant to stay in once place, you say to yourself. She wants to move. To move, to go fast, to go somewhere, to be up and gone and tensing at her lines and breaking through the squall into open day.

I shut off the tanks, the seacocks, the panel, and sealed her up. "Not today," I said.

Not today.

Playstation 3 Fails The Five-Minute Test

The New York Times just had a weekend with the Playstation 3. The results? Damning. Far from the exultation Sony was hoping for, the NYT reporter instead blasted the electronics giant for an unpolished experience that just didn't stand up to the Xbox 360.

http://www.nytimes.com/2006/11/20/arts/20game.html?_r=1&oref=slogin

In particular, I was interested to see this:

In the PS3's online store (which feels like a slow Web page) you can access movie trailers and trial versions of new games, but when you actually download the 600-megabyte files, you'll be stuck watching a progress bar crawl across the screen for 20 or 40 minutes. Astonishingly, you can't download in the background while you go do something that's more fun (like play a game).

What bothers the reporter in this instance is not a lack of content - certainly the trial versions of the games are there to be downloaded for free onto a video game console, something amazing that we've only been able to do in the last couple of years, but that the experience monopolizes his time - it takes 20 to 40 minutes he cannot get back.

What he wants to do in those 20 to 40 minutes, he cannot do. I would venture a guess that even if it were five minutes, he would be annoyed, and rightly so.

We are now moving rapidly into a market where the only currency left to bargain with in terms of innovation is time. Much like the predicted breaking down of Moore's Law, we no longer can get away with faster serialization of silicon. Until Gigabit DSL fulfills its own fiber-optic dreams of faster Internet delivery, we as a gaming populace - and beyond that, just as a data consumer populace - have hit our own Moore peak.

And in this world where you just can't make data transfer any faster, the only bargaining chip is time, and the key is parallelization. What can you do while you're:

• Waiting for your flight at the airport?
• Waiting at your doctor's office?
• Riding the in the car/plane/train/boat?
• Waiting for your 600 MB game demo to download?

If the answer is "nothing" in any case, there's a leak, waiting to be plugged by somebody. We've seen magazines plug the leaks in the old days, rapidly becoming outmoded by phones, game boys, Nintendo DS's, PDAs, laptops, palmtops, even integrated entertainment systems onboard airplanes, integrated DVD players in cars -

Waiting is the big game. And it's coming closer and closer to five-minute frustration. Companies need to continue to think about consumers waiting, and they need to realize that now, more now than ever, they just aren't going to wait very long. And now, just to end it right - someone overdubbed Michael Jackson dancing with Hey Nineteen from Steely Dan. Bizzare.

Related Tags: charles cox, ps3, playstation 3, xbox 360, xbox, sony, microsoft, xbox live

XNA Game Studio Express Beta 2 - The Educational Experience

Finally, the next phase is here - Microsoft XNA Game Studio Express Beta 2 has launched.

I've written about it, given talks about it at Seattle Code Camp, and now have a chance to see it reach its audience.

This product is a pre-release. It's not "done", but you can download it and play with it and make stuff with it for free. And you're going to want to. Why?

Because you can make video games with it.

XNA Game Studio Express Beta 2 lets you make games for your Windows computer easier than ever before. And, the full release, due out this holiday season, adds Xbox 360 capability, so you can make your own games for your Xbox 360.

This is the next phase of content creation, folks. Blogs and podcasts and video broadcasts, all good stuff. Consider it, though. Your chance to make video games.

So why here?

Because I'm a documentation writer for the product. I took it upon myself to help shape some of the educational experience around XNA Game Studio Express, and I want your help to make it the best it can be for release this holiday. You can help. This product is going to reach millions. Help me out here.

Here's what you need.

A computer running Windows XP SP2, a decent graphics card (Shader Model 2.0), and a broadband net connection (some big stuff to download).

Here's what to do.

1. Download Visual C# 2005 Express Edition and install it.
2. Download XNA Game Studio Express Beta 2 and install it.
3. Run XNA Game Studio Express Beta 2 from your Start Menu, and when it starts, press F1 for help.

Now you'll see the help documentation. Click on the "XNA Game Studio Express" node on the left and check out what we've got. Never made a game before? Open "Getting Started" and try the tutorials.

I'm especially interested in what you think of the "Going Beyond" tutorials. I want to know your thoughts on them. Leave comments. No holds barred. Did it work? Do you like? Can't tell? Whatever you have to say, get it said so I can help make this thing even better.

I'm excited about XNA Game Studio Express and want it to be wildly successful. A huge part of that is education. Try it out, get it working, try the tutorials. You are the front line. I'm counting on you!

Related Tags: xna, beta, game development, microsoft, charles cox, education, sdk, gamedev