Audio and Video for the Xbox 360

The Xbox 360 works with over 256 audio channels and 320 independent decompression channels using 32-bit processing for audio, with support for 48 kHz 16-bit sound, and all games made for the console are required to support at least 5.1-channel Dolby Digital surround sound.

The console Sound files for games are encoded using Microsoft's XMA audio format, whilst an MPEG-2 decoder is included for DVD video playback. WMV or VC-1 is used for streaming video and other video is compressed using VC-1 at non-PAL or NTSC resolutions or WMV for HD.

Voice communication is handled by the console, unlike the original Xbox in which it was handled by the game code. This allows for cross-game communication and as voice goes only to remote consoles, there is no voice echo to game players on the same console.

As there are no digital video outputs such as HDMI or DVI, HD-quality output can only be produced over component video or VGA. However, a wide array of HDTV and SDTV resolutions (up to 1080p) became supported by the console hardware after the software upgrade carried out in November 2006. It has also been rumoured that future releases of the console may feature an HDMI port.

Adapters and cables are available for RCA (audio and video), SCART, TOSLINK, Component video, S-video, VGA and D-Terminal connections, depending on the regional standard.