This is really old news for everybody (except for Microsoft, or so it seems): the HD DVD format is dead, Blu Ray did win the format war, things like this once happen. Still, if you have an Xbox 360 HD DVD player, the next time you watch a HD DVD movie and you are signed into Xbox Live, you'll be prompted for an auto update!

Yes, this is not a joke, Microsoft really invested time and probably money to bring a (final) update instead of trying to find a way and please those who want a Blu Ray player or the ones that are outraged by the number of times they have to send their consoles to get repaired. The update includes, according to Major Nelson, compatibility improvements with certain titles and additional support for network features.

Unfortunately for those who were hoping for an update that makes your HD DVD player to play Blu Ray discs, that is not possible and will never happen. Still, this latest strange decision taken by Microsoft got some great comments from the users:

"Update does not include: A way to remove that sad, sinking feeling about knowing Blu-ray won the format war," a sad supremesonic wrote, followed by an anonymous comment saying, "O cool....good job I didn't buy one lol". And, the cherry on top of everything is a great comment by another anonymous user, "That's all fine and good, but when am I going to get my Betamax update?"

Well... at least that's one way to show your customers you care and news like this one here are rare as pearls. Or something like that. Anyway, for those who really want to get their dying HD DVD player updated but don't have access to Xbox Live, the update will be made available later this week on the official Xbox website.