$100,000 Xbox prize up for grabs.

Now THIS is cool.

Quote:

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xBox Linux donor extends prize offer
By Drew Cullen
Posted: 02/01/2003 at 13:27 GMT

The anonymous donor who offered $200,000 to fund two prizes for the development of xBox Linux has taken off his mask. And yes, it is as most people who care about such things suspected all along, Michael Robertson, CEO of Lindows.com.

He is extending the deadline for part B of the prize for another year. This is to enable hackers to produced a Linux capable of running on xBox with no hardware modifications. The original deadline was the end of 2002.

The terms of Part A of the prize, to run Linux on the Microsoft games machine, has been accomplished. The distribution of $100,000 to several hackers as their reward is expected to be completed by the end of January, 2003, The Xbox Linux Project says. ®

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http://212.100.234.54/content/4/28710.html

Think about it...you paid $200 or $300 for your Xbox, how would you like to get 500 times the return on that?

This is pretty cool. I mean, the Xbox is a decent computer (although outdated by todays standards, I'd buy one if I needed one) with a TV out. How would you like that thing to be a PVR? Or a server of some sort. Heck, buy a few and make a kickass beowulf cluster.

Why? Why the hell not? Plus, it would jumpstart the outside development part of the Xbox, which would ensure that you would have games long after the XBox is out of the market. (Homemade ROMS anyone? DC homebrewn games that you can burn and play without modification) I mean, even the PS2 and Dreamcast run Linux, and they aren't even x86 computers.

There are several homebrewn progs and games out there... emulators etc. HOWEVER this sort of thing is generally outside of my comprehension as I'm not that technically minded enough to find them :shrug:

The initial reason I got a box though was for this sort of thing... I won't be adding a mod chip so I can use Xbox live, but this sounds interesting, and hopefully gamers will find more ways to make hacks for currently existing game IE Trainers skins etc :shrug: not sure though.

I already knew of this. It's a GREAT way to motovate Xbox development.

And ya, it basically is a cheap PC. Something like a 733mhz Celeron or was it Pentium 3? I last heard it was celeron. Someone find out.

But it's a perfect machine to just stick in your house for a network server or something. Maybe play some games that aren't too advanced. No matter was you say my CPU is over twice as fast as the Xbox. Throw in a GeForce 4 and my PC totally owns the Xbox.