Pachter: Digital distribution means a 1TB Xbox 360 HDD

by Stevie Smith - Jun 24 2009, 16:00

Recent moves and shakes in the videogame industry suggest the days are numbered for physical software formats and the future lies with digital distribution. Compounding that notion, the latest glob of speculation spat from the ever-churning rumour mill points to Microsoft introducing a massive 1TB hard drive for its Xbox 360.

More pointedly, outspoken industry analyst Michael Pachter of Wedbush Morgan has said a full terabyte of data storage is likely to arrive for the Xbox 360 alongside Microsoft’s potentially groundbreaking Project Natal control system, which is due to officially launch in 2010.

“I don’t see the timing between new release and digital download being a function of anything other than hard drive sizes,” said Pachter in a GamesIndustry.biz report. “I think as soon as we have large hard drives – think the rumoured Project Natal ‘new’ Xbox 360 with a terabyte of storage in 2010 – we’ll have day-and-date downloads.”

Pachter’s comments follow Sony Computer Entertainment’s recent unveiling of its new PlayStation Portable Go (PSP Go), which has dumped the system’s longstanding UMD format in favour of 16GBs of internal Flash memory and a completely download-only approach to product purchasing.

The likelihood of an Xbox 360 drive carrying a terabyte of storage has also been reinforced after Microsoft used its E3 Expo keynote address to announce a significantly expanded online Games On Demand service for the Xbox Live Marketplace, which is due to launch in August of this year.

At present, the largest Xbox 360 drive available at retail comes with the premium Xbox 360 Elite platform, which offers 120GBs of ceiling space.

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