HD-DVD On the Cheap with XBox 360 HD DVD Drive

For those of you who are frustrated by the sky high prices of new HD-DVD or Blue Ray players (running @$600 to $900, respectively,) there's a novel solution to getting your HD-DVD on your PC or TV on the cheap.

Apparently there's a way to "hack" the Xbox 360 HD DVD player -- officially designed to be exclusively connected to the Xbox 360 console -- that lets you watch high def movies on your PC or TV, without the need for the 360 console.




At about $200 , this currently qualifies as the cheapest  HD DVD drive around.

According to the folks at HDDVDFreak: "The hack seems to be as simple as finding a generic HD-DVD drive driver, then getting PowerDVD or WinDVD with the HD-DVD upgrade on, then plugging in the drive over USB and sticking a disc in. Presumably, you could even remove the drive from the casing and plug it directly into your PC over SATA, mounting it in a spare drive bay and earning some serious kudos."

For a full description of the procedure, the guys at uneasysilence also provide links to drivers and other related information, and provide snapshots of the surgery to free the drive for PC insertion.