According to initial reviews of the Xbox Live Video Marketplace, Apple won’t have to worry about Microsoft’s iTunes Store-killer for the near future.

The Microsoft movie download service is apparently struggling under the weight of all that high-definition content. Some people are reporting extraordinarily long download times, and others report being charged for videos they did not receive.

• Gizmodo: I Was Mugged by the Xbox 360 Video Store
• Engadget: Stalled by glitches.
• Kotaku: 360 Movies Download Sloooooow.
• Situation Terminal: My Xbox Live HD Video Rental Nightmare.

“We have been experiencing technical difficulties associated with the extremely high number of downloads from the Video Marketplace service over the past 24 hours,” said XBox Live’s Major Nelson.

“We understand these technical issues have resulted in a very unpleasant experience for our members,” added Nelson, “including extremely slow downloads or not receiving the content they purchased.”

“We‚Äôve made progress over the past 24‚Äìhours, and the team is dedicated to fixing the issues and continues to work as fast as they can around the clock to get the service running as seamlessly as you have come to expect,” said Nelson. “We strongly encourage all folks who have experienced an error message or did not receive a download they purchased to call customer support at 1-800-4MYXBOX.”

Nelson also noted that the troubling messages some downloaders had received were not accurate.

“If you see the ‚ÄòPoints have been deducted from your account‚Ķ‚Äô message when you are trying to download free content, we are NOT deducting points.”

via SeattlePI