Later this year Toshiba will release their very first Blu-ray drive.  Just in case you don’t remember, Toshiba was one of the few who backed the now failed HD DVD format.  As a result of Toshiba entrance into the Blu-ray player market, rumor and speculation have once again emerged pointing to Microsoft possibly adopting an external Blu-ray drive for their Xbox 360 gaming console.   After all, Toshiba did produce the 360′s HD DVD player so it seems only fitting for them to produce an external Blu-ray player for the console.

But with that all said I have a few questions:  Why would Microsoft wait this long to adopt the Blu-ray format to their gaming console? Surely, Microsoft didn’t have an exclusive contract with Toshiba stating that they could only produce external disc drives, right?  Since the Xbox 360 will soon offer 1080p movies on demand does it make sense for them to build a piece of hardware that possibly negates their business model?

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