Gaming Microsoft Xbox 360 Elite

http://www.bit-tech.net/gaming/2007/08/24/microsoft_xbox_360_elite/1

Today signifies the European launch of Microsoft's Xbox 360 Elite - the first significant update to the console since its launch in December 2005. Surprisingly, Microsoft doesn't want consumers to pay through the nose for the update...

 

I think if an HD DVD drive was added to the 360, that would bump up the price a bit dramatically, and i think that might be the reason MS didnt include it. The one thing MS have over Sony, is the price.

Anyway, im sure gonna get this, maybe closer to xmas, it looks promising.
Do you know when the new market place is going to be released in Europe at all?

Cheers for the review

Sam

 

I think their stance on HD-DVD inclusion is spot-on. If I want it, I'll get it seperately. It's not essential and could be a dead format in a couple of years. However, I do think MS seems to be off the mark with its stance on WiFi. The PSP, the DS, the Wii and the PS3 all include built-in wifi. I can't imagine how little it would cost to include it but when you're forced to use their propriertory USB solution it really takes the piss, considering how much it costs compared to similar products.

Another pair of gripes are 65nm architecture and a quieter drive. The former is apparently going to be introduced as soon as all the current stuff is sold, but I think if you're getting an Elite they should just whack it in there and let the hotter stuff go in the cheaper models (probably a bit controversial though!). And the quiter drive, well, I thought they sorted that out ages but I guess not, considering your review.

Despite all that, I will be buying an Elite sometime in October simply because black + bigger hard-drive = take my extra £50 sure!

 

Anyone else wishing for a white Elite? I know I COULD find one of the Premiums with HDMI (and then get raped for the 120GB HDD) but shame they don't offer both colours

 

I think price is the *only* thing they have over sony at the moment...
I never thought I'd say it, but the PS3's just a more competent piece of technology. MS really should have held back a year and spent more time developing the console - two versions of a console doesn't give a good impression, and I expected more improvements than this from one to the other.

 

I have to strongly disagree.

My Elite is definately quieter than my Premium, idle and whilst playing a game.

It's also fair to say that a disc running at x16 (Xbox 360) speed is always going to be louder than one spinning at x2 (PS3).

 

More competent or not, when it comes to a gaming console, the games are where it's at. I don't buy a console with the intention of spending a year waiting for games I'd like to play to come out. So the "But *insert supposed killer app* is coming out next quarter!" argument doesn't fly with me.

I will admit, by hardware specs alone the PS3 is quite impressive. But not $600 worth of impressive, especially without a warranty. And I'm a big fan of trying something like this before I buy, and I've only come across ONE working PS3 display in the last year... every time i walk by one, either it's off or frozen up. I'm not keen on dropping that kind of cash on something that doesn't even seem to work properly at the point of sale.

As far as the Elite 360 goes, HDMI would be great if I had an HDTV, but I still refuse to buy a TV that costs more than my car did (yeah, so I'm cheap... and I see no sense in replacing my current TV just because there's better to be had), and when I get to a point when I need more than the 13GB availible to me (which will take some time, as I only keep demos long enough to decide if I want the game) then I have a 300GB USB HD that works perfect with my 360.

Bottom line is, it's all subjective. For me, MS won this round of console wars, even if I'm not partial to MS, but after spending some time with the 360's my roommates had, I had to have one. Maybe if I had some time with the PS3 the case would be the same, but as I said above, I can't seem to find one in working order to try out.

 

:-O I need to read up on these things more! No warranty is shocking, at least when the first line of 360's broke, people could get free replacements...

Same. I know a guy who bought a 360 to run on a normal TV, but we were all a bit dumb-struck when we saw it, it just looked like an original xbox >.<

 

Don't get me wrong, I want a 42" LCD TV in the worst way, and I know that my 360 would look so much better on one. But me and the wifey have a bun in the oven, so I can't justify the expense while we have so many things to handle between now and March. That's not to say that if I find a good deal around the holidays I wouldn't grab one... if I have the money and we've gotten the baby stuff we'll need by then.

 

3 guesses what my student load loan is going on this year... ;o)

 

I have a prem, and would like to get an Elite, but I (and I think a lot of people) want to wait for the cooler 65nm 360. Until that comes out i'll keep going with my prem (which I have added extra fans to the back for cooling).

 

I'd wait for the 65nm chips if I wasn't eagerly awaiting about twenty 360 games between now and Christmas. I mean, if it Red Rings when the Falcon board's widely available the odds are you'll probably just get sent the new board anyways.

 

AFAIK, the smaller the chip fabrication, the cheaper it is, since they get more chips from the same amount of silicon. All 360s definitely are a lot quieter though that they used to be, but they won't really get any quieter without slowing down the disk read speed. I'd rather have quick loading times than a quiet but slow system like we have with the PS3.

 

Well yeah, that's a given, but it's not why it'd be controversial. More like passing the buck and isolating the possibility of the final lot of heat issues to the cheaper machines.

 

it looks uber cheap in black

 

I can't believe that I'm saying this but I'm gunning for the PS3. I just got a Wii so I can definitely hold off until a price drop. But when looking at the build quality of both the Xbox and PS3. the PS3 wins out. A game console is an investment, even more so today when prices are so high. At these prices, they have to work and they have to last AT LEAST the lifetime of the generation. My gamecube survived from the release date to today and beyond; that was a good investment. My Xbox, no way. My neighbor's ps2, no sir-ee. I bought a Wii because its cheaper and the build quality is good and made with proven technology. Because if you think about it, your console is like a PC except it only does one or two things. It damn well better last longer than PC if it isn't doing much.

Microsoft made the mistake of handling the manufacturing most of the components themselves because obviously they can't handle it.

 

These machines (or at least the controllers) must be abused to hell and back though, whenever I go by a console set up in a shop it is indeed not working...or in the process of being broken by 8 year olds

 

I still find myself thinking that the elite 360 would be a nice toy to have if you simply want to chuck in a game for a quick blast, I'd still find myself going back to the PC for any serious gaming though. I like the notion of the Wii, its a barrel of laughs at a party when you've had a few beers and have a go at some of the games with a crowd of folk - especially if some of them are non-gamers. But I hope that the rumoured light sabre game for it does become a reality, I reckon that would be soooo much fun.

But back to the subject, I can probably see myself buying an E360, just not right now.

 

Any thermal design enhancements?

First off I want to say the 360 is great piece of kit. Don't get me wrong, but it does have its fall-backs: price not being one of them. But I wanted to retort back to the PS3 comments that I found a little "wrong/misleading" in my opinion because I like to show both sides:

For the finger-prints on the PS3....it's supposed to be stuck with all of your A/V equipment, and even with that hardware you gotta take a Swiffer to it once in a while so I don't understand the reason for anyone to say it's a finger-print/dust magnet especially when it depends on where you put it.

As for the PS3 being slow: What the hell are you talking about? First-gen titles on the 360 were just as slow and I have not found load times to be any different on current titles, but again it depends on the type of games/media. Also, if later titles can be downloaded to the HDD what would the read times be on that? The drive is an all-in-one drive, so what do you expect from a progressing new technology? Also, it's a sacrifice that you make: Faster reads time with smaller disc space or slower read times with larger disc space. Honestly, for futureproofing reasons I'd like the disc space to be bigger to allow for native 1080p rather than having a smaller disc space and upscaling 720p to 1080p like the 360 is doing on most current/future titles.

As for the Non-Elite vs. Elite loudness issue, have you tested the dB levels on both? I guess with the read speeds being faster on the Elite I would expect it to be louder, but that's just on a #'s basis.

 

http://benheck.com/07-12-2007/inside-the-xbox-360-elite

In a word, yes. Whether it's a proven solution yet is another story, as I've heard of one Elite red ringing at least. Of course, that could be for whatever reason, not just the known GPU problem.