PS3 DivX support announced

by James Ransom-Wiley { Nov 13th 2007 at 10:27AM }

DivX, Inc. today revealed a partnership with Sony to integrate its video playback technology into PlayStation 3. While a consumer-targeted firmware update has not been dated, developers who update their SDKs to version 2.00 can already utilize the DivX decoder technology for use in their games. But who cares about games anymore? With DivX support enabled (hopefully in the near future) for PS3 owners, a lot of that juicy BitTorrent content you've compulsively horded on your basement PC can be effortlessly streamed upstairs to the console. Now if they'd just add Xvid support you could finally cut the cable bill altogether...

[Note: Xbox 360 is not natively compatible with DivX or Xvid formats, though DivX support has been rumored to be included in the pending Fall Update.]

[Via PS3 Fanboy]

Tags: breakingnews, divx, xvid

Reader Comments (Page 1 of 2)

Kokuryukai @ Nov 13th 2007 10:34AM

So freaking sweet!!!

jorojoserojas @ Nov 13th 2007 10:37AM

Agreed!

JJ Rooster @ Nov 13th 2007 10:59AM

Kickass! Picked up my 40GB PS3 last week. Now I just need to quit my job and enjoy everything!

gonk @ Nov 13th 2007 11:17AM

quitting your 2nd job?

FrankTheCrank @ Nov 13th 2007 11:20AM

*does the cabbage patch dance*

YES!!!!

finnith @ Nov 13th 2007 6:50PM

Everyone has to agree that they needed something like this.

ukickmydog (NDF - Earth) @ Nov 13th 2007 8:22PM

now 360 HAS to get divx, otherwise ps3 is gonna appeal to the media extender niche

touche ps3, touche

Mromson @ Nov 14th 2007 5:38AM

FINALLY! W00t!

BBxDirty @ Nov 25th 2007 2:42PM

For people having probs with the ps3 showing no data in thier video section is bcuz when u create your data disk you must put the clips(.MP4,MPG,AVI) in a folder CALLED "VIDEO"(X:\VIDEO\) "X:\" being your cd\dvd drive. You can't put them on the root directory of the disk. Hope this helps!
-Italia

FidliousWong @ Nov 13th 2007 10:43AM

Now how much longer until h264 support?

Napalm @ Nov 13th 2007 10:50AM

The PS3 already supports H.264. What it doesn't support yet is H.264 inside anything besides a mp4 container.

Supino @ Nov 13th 2007 10:43AM

Good news - hope Microsoft follows...

michaud.jon @ Nov 13th 2007 10:44AM

Wow... this has just screwed up my plans to buy a Xbox360...

Watership @ Nov 13th 2007 3:34PM

DIVX/XVID is coming to 360. What are you talking about?

FrankTheCrank @ Nov 13th 2007 11:51AM

I've got to laugh....hahahahaha.

Today, the PS3 just pwned the 360.

Synner @ Nov 13th 2007 4:10PM

Yeah, buy the ps3, I have yet to have my ps3 FIND any media on my media sharing pcs, let alone be able to play them. The 360 works fine though, oh and xvid and divx are in the fall update/

oh, and frank, you are a douche

Vidikron (FU) @ Nov 13th 2007 5:19PM

@Synner

I had absolutely no issues sharing media to my PS3. First off, make sure you actually have media sharing enabled in the PS3's settings. Second, how are you sharing media with your XBox? I don't have an MCE PC, so I have to use that Windows Media Connect... which is now integrated with Windows Media Center. In the media connect settings you need to make sure the PS3 is an allowed device. That's it.

adium @ Nov 13th 2007 10:46AM

You read that microsoft? do us all a favour and out do it with xvid support

JJ Rooster @ Nov 13th 2007 11:03AM

I think they are, or were considering it, but I bet MS will have a press release out by tomorrow now to announce it. Competition FTW!

michaud.jon @ Nov 13th 2007 10:46AM

Just to make sure, can anyone confirm that the xbox360 can NOT play these type of files?

Thanks.

Crono (NDF - Knight of the Old School) @ Nov 13th 2007 10:53AM

In its current state, the 360 can not play them natively. I stream them through Transcode360, though, and haven't had a problem except early on, which was fixed by re-installing Transcode360 on my server.

Divx support has been announced for Media Center Extenders. It is implied, but not confirmed, that this includes the 360.

manashima @ Nov 13th 2007 10:51AM

can anyone explain indepth what this means? I have a ps3, and what can Divx support bring?

XanthouS @ Nov 13th 2007 10:55AM

Virtually any video file you can obtain via torrent (TV shows, movies, etc).

There are also pleanty of legitimate companies who encode in Divx.

You'll be able to simply copy over and watch Divx files on your PS3 rather than having to encode the video in a different format.

Crono (NDF - Knight of the Old School) @ Nov 13th 2007 10:56AM

The ability to play divx encoded video files you download off the internet. Which encompasses probably 85% of content on the internet. This was previously impossible.

ill trooper @ Nov 13th 2007 12:42PM

"can anyone explain indepth what this means?"

TEH TORRENTZ! Battlestar Galactica Razor, American Gangster (camcorder rip), etc.

That's about what that means. I wonder if you can download directly from the browser to the hard-drive... Otherwise, this is neat but not that serious to me as I have a DVD player that will play nearly any file format I put on a disk... And my friend has the next model up that has a USB port on the front, so he just watches video off of a thumbdrive. Things are going nuts.

Ryan Smith @ Nov 13th 2007 1:07PM

The problem is most torrent video is Xvid so without that support its almost meaningless. I've been playing xvid on my 360 for a long time with transcode360.

ruibing @ Nov 13th 2007 4:51PM

Really? I have played a lot of xvid videos (anime and movies) on my Divx certified DVD player just fine.

RobR10 @ Nov 13th 2007 10:53AM

This was already confirmed by MS befor this post that they are adding support for this in the fall update...

Trev @ Nov 13th 2007 11:13AM

Do you have a link for that?

Its not like I imagine it won't happen, especially after this solid confirmation for Sony, but until we get a solid announcement and not a report of someone saying something in a way that kinda sounds like confirmation then immediately backpedaling, its still a rumor. I have a less interwub-news-addicted friend with a 360 and I'd like to tell them for sure, rather than a maybe.

Naes @ Nov 13th 2007 10:54AM

http://www.xbox360fanboy.com/2007/11/11/rumor-360-divx-support-to-be-a-fall-feature/

robert @ Nov 13th 2007 11:50AM

but do you have a link to a solid confirmation? that's what we're looking for.

i won't dispute that it sounds like it's going to happen but after he says yes he also says that it's not a certified or licensed product at this time

B1gC72 @ Nov 13th 2007 9:48PM

dude it says "RUMOR". since when does a rumor equal fact? a rumor isn't considered "confirmed" until Microsoft says it. 360 will get DivX support eventually but dammit let my Playstation have this one!

Neptune @ Nov 13th 2007 10:56AM

Just what I've been waiting for. Hope they will continue adding codecs.

michaud.jon @ Nov 13th 2007 10:56AM

Thanks RobR10, the Xbox360 does offer multimedia streaming right? (I'm not just imagining this)

--

Manashima: It means if you have your PC with a bunch of downloaded movies in your basement and you want to watch it on your big LCD TV upstairs. The PS3 or XBOX can stream the video directly to your TV without having to burn anything or convert any films or anything...

It's the future... =-)

Crono (NDF - Knight of the Old School) @ Nov 13th 2007 11:03AM

The Xbox 360 is a media center extender. Google them. I have mine boot up in MCE mode because I use it to watch TV, record TV, watch DVD's I've ripped (in 5.1 surround), watch anime I've torrented, listen to CD's I've ripped.

I use it for all that more than play games. That'll all change when rockband enters the house.

SoulBlade @ Nov 13th 2007 10:56AM

bout time someone did this.

SilentMike @ Nov 13th 2007 10:57AM

Divx = MPEG-4 ASP = Xvid
Unless they're doing something stupid an limiting it to only support Divx, I'm pretty sure Xvid will work too.

Now I just need MKV container with embeded subtitle support and I can finally retire the old Xbox.

F-Forward @ Nov 13th 2007 11:07AM

As far as we know, they could annonce Divx-support and then restrict the playback to specific FOURCC that only apply to "real" Divx-files. Then Xvid-files woudn't play without modification.

True, it would be really stupid to do something like that, but we are talking about Sony here...

Crono (NDF - Knight of the Old School) @ Nov 13th 2007 11:10AM

Sony AND Divx. Divx (the company) has been known to be pretty ambivalent to Xvid.

mccomber @ Nov 13th 2007 11:03AM

Awesome, this will be perfect for watching my completely legal collections of avi files...

FOXHOUND @ Nov 13th 2007 11:04AM

*high fives the cat* :]

Now I just need to pick up a larger SATA drive for mine...

Cyro @ Nov 13th 2007 11:15AM

Dude that freaking cat is way too fat!

deaftly @ Nov 13th 2007 11:07AM

pretty frigging sweet, time to fill up my new 40gb

Crono (NDF - Knight of the Old School) @ Nov 13th 2007 11:09AM

Ok, everybody's talking about picking up new drives and not having enough space. Just buy 1 big ass 1 TB or 2 big ass 500 gb drives for your PC, and put all your content there. Both the PS3 and the 360 can talk to your computer and pull the content through the magical tubes of ethernet and play them on your big TV in the living room.

VampireHunter Z @ Nov 13th 2007 11:25AM

I've heard that Western Digital doesn't play nice with the 360. Essentially it "sleeps" in the middle of a video because it stays awake when accessed directly from the PC. Don't quote me on this just read it somewhere.

Crono (NDF - Knight of the Old School) @ Nov 13th 2007 11:38AM

Could be. Never heard that though. Sounds more like a windows problem than a 360 problem though (power management settings).

I have a seagate for my media drive.

ill trooper @ Nov 13th 2007 12:51PM

"I've heard that Western Digital doesn't play nice with the 360. Essentially it "sleeps" in the middle of a video because it stays awake when accessed directly from the PC."

That's possible - I used to use a small utility for OS X/Mac while editing that would keep the external hard drives I had attached to my computer 'awake' by accessing them at set time intervals like once every two minutes... It helped prevent some random Final Cut Pro crashes I would get when it would go to access some clips that weren't on my main machine - sometimes the slight delay caused by spooling-up the drive would just cause it to conk-out. This was back on FCP 3, but a utility like that can still be useful it seems.

I'm sure there's got to be something like it for the other OS's out there.

Negativecool @ Nov 13th 2007 11:14AM

Wow...great news.

I'm gonna go poop now.

Phranctoast @ Nov 13th 2007 11:15AM

This is the reason I waited on converting all my files.

Awesome news!!!!

VampireHunter Z @ Nov 13th 2007 11:22AM

I haven't heard much dicussion about this but how does the PS3 compare to the 360 as a media center? I have a 360 and streaming HD content is really cool since my PC sucks at playing it. So far only WMV and MP4 is supported. What formats does the PS3 currently support?

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