Be Heard

It's been a while since we've seen a Xbox console update, but there is finally one on the way and its bringing us a whole new level of communication... ok, well it's fixing one that currently sucks. The Xbox currently uses a low bit rate codec to encode voice chat because Xbox LIVE was originally designed to be running on 64k connections, but these days the vast majority of people are running faster connections (at least in most countries that aren't named Australia) so with the Fall Update (which actually comes in Spring for Aussies) we'll be seeing an update to the voice chat system that aims to make the audio a much higher definition. Will this make it possible to communicate in a team game like Halo or CoD without sounding like your mic is wrapped in alfoil? yes... will it reduce the pitch of the billion 12 year old kids on Halo? probably not. The fall Update will likely be released in the first week of November to go with the launch of Kinect, and thus update the dashboard for Kinect control as well.