Bad at math? Use this MS Points converter

by Christopher Grant { Jul 6th 2006 at 2:25PM }

Been duped into forking over 200 "Microsoft Points" for some fancy horse armor, only to have your waning, embarrassingly poor math skills catch up with your error after the fact?

"2.50? 2.50?! I coulda bought a bunch of gamertag pictures for that!"

You're right dear reader, although we'd question that expenditure as well. In the real world, $2.50 can buy all sorts of great stuff like: four thousandths of a PlayStation 3, some Taco Bell, or a small water at a movie theater. Using bigsteveouk's Unofficial Microsoft Points Converter, you can convert Microsoft's funny money into real currency before making any more impulse buys, and then save that money for important stuff.

[Via Xbox 360 Fanboy]

Tags: Currency, Microsoft Points, MicrosoftPoints, MS Points, MsPoints, XBL, XBLM, Xbox Live, Xbox Live Marketplace, XboxLive, XboxLiveMarketplace

Reader Comments (Page 1 of 1)

SonicRift @ Jul 6th 2006 2:35PM

But do people really want to know what they're paying for a 16 kb picture file that they could add as their MSN Display pic for free?

that guy @ Jul 6th 2006 2:36PM

Thanks for the find, and the hilarious commentary. Joystiq rules.

jc @ Jul 6th 2006 2:37PM

"Bad at Math?" Maybe someone should buy Microsoft a real calculator.

Canadians are getting ripped off approx $2.69 for every 1200MS points we buy.

Anyone care to do the math to see who is getting charged the most?

minus_273 @ Jul 6th 2006 2:48PM

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Microsoft_Points

has a listing of the value of points in your local currency in dollars. As you can see Europeans pay almost exactly $1 more than in the US. That sounds like a good chance to make money to me. Buy US points and sell them in Europe for just $0.50 more instead of $1 more.

Draco @ Jul 6th 2006 2:52PM

@ JC

its more like were getting screwed by a toonie on every 15$ US. after exchange 15$US @ 15% exchange is ~17.25.

now if they incorporated GST then were only getting screwed a bit.. there must be tax on MS points one would assume.

James @ Jul 6th 2006 3:03PM

Microsoft should let us gift points to people on our friends list up to a certain amount. So some of us may have leftover points not needed while someone else may just need few points. What am I going to do with leftover 80 points? I can get a few gamer pics, but that 80 points may be just the extra number of points needed by my friend to buy a game or expansion pack. I should be able to transfer the points to them.

jc @ Jul 6th 2006 3:03PM

Nice find, minus_273. Thanks for the link. Sad to see the UK folks getting screwed again.

Draco, the CAD exchange rate is $1(CAD) = $.90(US). Right now the best deal I can find is $22.79 (with tax) for 1250 MSPoints.

WedgeTalon @ Jul 6th 2006 3:08PM

Woohoo! A PS3 is only about 48018 MS Points!

Night Elve @ Jul 6th 2006 3:25PM

@ 8.

Lol you are the man ¡¡¡

Thomas Crymes @ Jul 6th 2006 3:27PM

Of course, you could wait for the points to go on sale. Occaisionally, stores sell the 1600 point cards for less than $20.

I bought 2 cards from Outpost.com for $14.99 each with no tax. The sale only lasted a matter of minutes/hours, but I got in and stuck it to the man. Yeah.

Ff course the "Man" will eventually get my nonrefundable $30 so exactly who is getting stuck is very much in question.

Nushio @ Jul 6th 2006 3:53PM

What? No Mexican Pesos (MXN). Whatever will we do? Grab an abacus?

Meh, Microsoft gives us the shaft anyways. I cant get the horse armor even if I tried. Its not for sale here, but about 30 miles north, it is.

ill trooper @ Jul 6th 2006 4:01PM

Somebody get on an OSX widget for this! I need to contemplate buying that new GRAW content...

nojok3 @ Jul 6th 2006 4:05PM

Buys you lunch at Wendys

Keiichi @ Jul 6th 2006 4:20PM

Shouldn't MS Points be, like, known as M$...?

KilgoreTrout XL @ Jul 6th 2006 4:38PM

I love the PS3 jab.

Draco @ Jul 6th 2006 5:31PM

This was the only bright spot of a PS3.. it only costs

40000 MS points (converted to US) for the PS3
34500 MS Points (Converted to CDN) for the PS3

btw. 1250 points at bestbuy is 20.00CDN (so is there tax on that? never bought any) or about 18USD. so we lose $1.40 ish.

MSFT sucks at exchange rate, why is it the 299USD$ Xbox360 costs 399$ here 33% more? and the 399 premium is 499 here 25% more? which is it? 33% more or 25% more for our exchange? cause last I checked the exchange was 1.11159 (x-rates.com) which is 11%

epobirs @ Jul 6th 2006 6:03PM

This makes think of a few years back when someone suggested a way for Microsoft to stop being hassled by the DoJ. They would buy out a tiny European country like Luxembourg or the Grand Duchy of Fenwick and relocate the company to there. The currency would be defined on Microsoft stock certificates. One share of MS stock would be the basic unit of currency or MS Buck.

Microsoft now has its own currency with international exchange rates. I'd keep an eye out for any large real estate purhases by the company. I'd also be on the lookout for George Soros buying an Xbox 360.

JonFitt @ Jul 7th 2006 7:09AM

Woohoo. The UK and the rest of Europe get shafted again! Nice to know that MS is adopting the standard tech company line of "Let's hike the prices for those Europeans, they're all rich and live in castles anyway".

I am rich and live in a castle, but I resent the practice anyway.