Xbox 360 Elite Officially Announced

It should come as no shock that Microsoft has finally announced an upgraded version of the Xbox 360: the 'Elite'. The worst-kept secret in the videogames industry is now official, offering a 120 GB HDD, an HDMI port, and a smooth black finish for $479. The new sku drops next month, and to fill up that new hard drive Microsoft has lined up seven new partners for their Xbox Live video distribution service. Outfits like Paramount and Warner Bros. are nice to hear about, but I'm equally excited about the likes of National Geographic and ADV Films. 1up has the market cornered on commentary at the moment, with reactions from the staff there, a comparison of the new 360's value vs. the PS3, and a few words from Sony's Dave Karraker. If you're looking for even more coverage, there are several links available below.

Worthless.

What a worthless bundle. First of all as we already covered in a previous XBOX 360 Elite article, there is no benefit to using HDMI instead of a component-cable. Second, by using HDMI, you are actually submitting to HDCP (DRM, content control stuff).

So what you're really getting out of this product is a larger hard drive. Whether a bigger hard drive is worth an extra $80 to you is for you to decide. I fail, however, to understand how nothing more than a larger hard drive and a black paint job makes it elite.

I'm going to guess there will be a flood of idiots rushing out to buy it - even to replace their existing boxes - because they think HDMI is some nifty high-definition thingamajig and then they'll rush home and plug it in and convince themselves that they really do see a difference.

If you really want to make it elite, make it quieter, cooler and less prone to dying.

Re:Worthless.

So what you're really getting out of this product is a larger hard drive. Whether a bigger hard drive is worth an extra $80 to you is for you to decide. I fail, however, to understand how nothing more than a larger hard drive and a black paint job makes it elite.

I also wondered how *only* a black finish makes a MacBook $150 more expensive and "elite" but.. common sense isn't popular these days.

If enough companies do this, one morning I could wake up and really believe that black color is extremely expensive and worth the extra cost, who knows.

HDMI is most beneficial for AUDIO

That's right, audio. While HDMI clearly presents a slight improvement for video (analog vs digital...), its real benefit is next generation audio support. While HDMI is a true digital picture and will give us a slightly better image, this improvement is negligible for the vast majority of people. With HD DVD content sporting DD+/TrueHD, and DTS HD audio that currently can't be handled over optical, HDMI provides us with a way of supporting that... Not that there's a whole lot of receivers that support those yet, but they'll be more available soon enough. You may think your A52/AC3 5.1 dolby digital compressed surround sound is good, but uncompressed TrueHD/DTS HD BLOWS IT AWAY. With even a half decent sound system, movies spring to life with the new audio formats.. Once you watch a film with a TrueHD or DTS HD audio track enabled, you wont be able to go back to "crappy" compressed Dolby Digital. Obviously, it depends on the mixing and the original soundtrack for the film your watching, but from what I've heard so far it's a real improvement across the board.

And, as much as I hate DRM, ultimately the decision to flag HD DVDs to downconvert over component is up to the movie studios... And... should they go that route in the future (I don't see it happening, especially now that HD DVD is compromised...), M$ will be ready with HDCP compliant HDMI.

Re:HDMI is most beneficial for AUDIO

You may think your A52/AC3 5.1 dolby digital compressed surround sound is good, but uncompressed TrueHD/DTS HD BLOWS IT AWAY. With even a half decent sound system, movies spring to life with the new audio formats.. Once you watch a film with a TrueHD or DTS HD audio track enabled, you wont be able to go back to "crappy" compressed Dolby Digital.

Somehow I have a feeling I've heard this before, about MP3 vs CD or maybe even SACD and DVD-A. Extremely few people can tell the difference between CD and MP3 >256kbps, and even regular AC-3 DVDs have that + 192kbps to encode the rear channels and bass track. DTS goes much higher than that again, typically 768kbps+. Of course the new formats bring 7.1 to the table, but how many movies have 7.1 sound, are played in a 7.1 player to a 7.1 reciever with correctly placed 7.1 speakers? I doubt 95% of the people would be able to tell the difference, 4.9% wouldn't be "BLOWN AWAY" and the last 0.1% is you.

The only thing I'm still missing is the option to go past 24p. If you've ever seen sports or anything else fast-moving high action in 720p60 progressive, you'll wonder how you ever survived with 24p/30i. They can quote whatever artistic reasons they want but 60p would improve a lot of movies IMO.

Re:HDMI is most beneficial for AUDIO

Perhaps your right. In fact, I'm sure I'm in the minority when it comes to being blown away by next generation audio (Though surely that minority is bigger than .1% ;)). Even so, the fact remains that having HDMI at least enables the xbox 360 to become a full blown HD DVD player, something it could only do with limited abilities in its non-hdmi version (if you play a truehd or dts hd track with the current generation xbox 360 it gets downconverted and encoded on the fly to dolby digital).

Now, 60p I'm not disagreeing with, framerate definitely makes a difference. But things shot on film look like there were.. well.. shot on film *because* of the 24fps frame rate.. and because of the film grain... And just like you (well, I can anyways...) distinguish when something was shot with a 1 ccd mini-dv cam, or a 3ccd mini-dv cam, or an HDV camera, or a DVC Pro camera... you can just TELL when something is shot on film. And to a lot of people, that's part of what makes a movie.. what it is.

Then again, there are some people that enjoyed the oh so cinematic experience of watching the blair witch project on the big screen... :P (That's not to say that movies shot digitally look like that piece of trash, merely making the point that you can tell the difference between film and digital).

Now, with all of the digital effects in movies today, and movies going directly to theater digitally to be played on DLP projectors the argument becomes a bit less cohesive... but there's definitely something about 24 frames per second that makes a movie a movie.. and not an NFL football game.

Re:Worthless.

I'm so sick of the anti-HDMI people.

HDMI does not require the use of HDCP. Being compatible with it does not mean turning on Copyright protection features.

HDMI can carry much higher bandwidth audio than optical or coax digital audio cables can right now, like TrueHD and uncompressed 7.1 PCM.

HDMI can share live display capability information (like that nice monitor detection you have on your VGA-based PC).

HDMI allows for better colour depth (higher bit per pixel values) and deeper blacks and brigther whites, combined with displays capable of these. This means displays can keep getting better and looking nicer and having richer colour because the capacity is already 'in the wire' so to speak.

Next troll?

Interesting...

FTFA:

We don't feel like the Wii customer and the Xbox customer are the same thing," he [Mr. Rodman] said. "We think that as soon as the Wii customer turns 14 they want something else.

At my college, last generation the ps2 and xbox were pretty much in a dead heat for the top spot. Now though, the Wii is clearly winning over the ps3 and 360. The will may not be, by and large, the system you play by yourself, but it's the best system if you have people over. Also, the retro gaming is a huge hit here (may have something to do with it being an engineering and science school, maybe).

That said, you haven't lived till you've played a real NES on 62" screen tv or a >100" projected screen :-D

Hardly elite

I'm a huge believer in the XBox 360 as a platform, and I'm delighted to have owned one since launch day. Wii's anemic release schedule and PS3's pathetic lineup of 360 ports / shitty first-party content (Resistance excepted) means that it's the best system out there.

I'm one of those dorks that buys everything videogame-related, but I'm not motivated to upgrade at all. An HDMI port, quieter operation, and shiny black skin isn't enough to attract me, and I'm an enthusiast for their products. If they'd integrated the HD-DVD drive and the wireless adapter that would be one thing, but this is much too little, far too late.

I mean, the PS3 comes with Blu-ray and wireless built-in on the high-end model. Meanwhile, the 360 costs $100 extra for 802.11 (an adapter that has shit range, by the way, on a shelf next to my wii and ps3 the 360 can't pick up a signal), and $200 extra for a hi-def video drive.

So: Elite 360 + Wireless + HD-DVD = $780.
PS3, with built-in wireless and built-in Blu-ray: $600. Way to destroy your price advantage, Microsoft!

Obviously I'm not the target audience for this product, but I can't for the life of me figure out who is.

Re:Hardly elite CONTROLLER

I would be happy to agree that the XBox rocks, but I have one glaring problem: I hate the controller. I have never liked the XBox controller and it's not for the lack of trying. But it just feels clumsy compared to the PlayStation's. I know that others will not understand this and probably think it silly if they don't have the same problem, but really the controller is the interface to everything. And if one doesn't feel comfortable with it, then everything else is moot. I think game machine designers should take note of that and consider offering a variety of controllers types.

re: PS3 content

As a long-time PC gamer, I can't bring myself to buy an XBox 360 at all. Every time I look at one, I'm reminded that under the fancy plastic casing, it's just a rather non-upgradeable PC inside. There's *never* going to be a single piece of software developed for XBox 360 that can't run identically on a modern PC, because they're using the same architecture. (Of course, the modern PC could very well have a *superior* video card and more RAM....)

I did, however, buy a PS3 - because the hardware is different. A Blue-Ray drive is something I didn't own yet on any of my hardware, for one thing. And the PowerPC cell architecture is sufficiently different from any PC or Mac I own to make me feel like I'm not just buying the same old thing again, repackaged in a different shell.

I agree that PS3 content is sorely lacking right now - but it sounds like Sony is taking a pretty long-term view for the PS3 consoles. The last line of their quote in the original article commented on the "value" of buying a PS3 that you'd keep "for the next 10 years". Sure, some of that is just marketing-speak, but it also indicates they envision the PS3 as hardware that will be around for a while.

I wouldn't say the ports of XBox games for PS3 are "pathetic" though. NHL Hockey '07 was highly rated in every online review I saw. I bought it and I'm impressed with it too. Same with Tiger Woods golf. You're certainly not seeing evidence that it's a "poor" port. Runs every bit as well as the 360 version.

Re: PS3 content

Why did you buy ports of the XBox 360 games for the PS3 when you, as you stipulate, could have bought them on a PC?

Is it because playing some games on a console is more fun? If so, then what is the difference between a PS3 and an XBox 360 again?

Of course the PS3 will be around in ten years, it'll just be two hardware cycles behind the PS5.

Re: PS3 content

A pendantic note:
The Xbox also uses PPC cores. Direct X API's make it easy to port but the hardware is not the same as a PC. Although 360 games tend to be PC style games, I can understand what you mean. The details however is that both the Ps3 and 360 and Wii use PPC cores. Likely due to their power efficiancy, thermal efficiancy, and size.

PS. I own a PS3 and I like it very much. Now if only FFXIII and MGS4 would come out tommorow.

Slot loading drive

Still no slot-loader?

Cost of adding a Cell processor to Xbox ?

Hey - Im very interested in getting a PS3, not for the games, but for writing code that works on a Cell processor, incl SPU's. That doesnt make me weird - its just that I have some signal processing applications that are currently running on clusters of 64bit unix boxes, and I reckon that Cell might be a good architecture to port these applications too.

Question then : How much to add a Cell processor (or equivalent 6-8 core architecture) to an Xbox360, and also to provide a GNU compatible toolchain to build code with ?

Not suggesting for one moment that the Xbox360 is MS-Rubbish, but for what I want a 'console' for, the XBox360 has nothing much to offer compared to a PS3.

I know I know I know that they are supposed to be 'games consoles', and I sincerely hope that a lot of people buy a lot of expensive games and blu-ray movies for them, because that keeps the base price of the unit subsidised below cost, which is all I want anyway - cheap, readily available, parallel architecture linux machine. Awesome.

Where's the Wi-fi? Where's the HD-DVD?

Not only is this new version missing two features the PS3 has and will end up costing more than the PS3 with them added...

IT CAN'T EVEN CURE CANCER

Seriously though, if I'd just bought an Xbox 360, I'd be *very* pissed off right now.

HDMI and scaling

My understanding is that the PS3's scaling limitations are at least partially a result of it's digital output, HDMI. The Xbox has an analog scaler, but is introducing HDMI only going to cause it to be prone to the same kind of issues?

But every 360 addon is white....

I have a 360 with HD-DVD drive and wireless adapter and a pair of wireless pads. If I was to switch to this just for the sake of HDMI and a bigger drive, bearing in mind that my HDTV doesn't support 1080p over HDMI, only over component and also I can't even see a difference between component and HDMI on the thing, I would also have to replace all the white extras. Oh, and I actually think the 360 looks better in white. Mind you, when I came to buy a new iPod Video I bought the white one because I didn't like the look of the black one.

L33T or 1337 edition.

That would have been a better name. For real elite gamers, L33T or 1337 is the right hyped choice.

BBC Model B - Elite

I almost dropped to the floor when I saw this announcement. Imagine my disappointment when I realised that this was not a new port of my favourite game from the 80's to the home console market.

Does this mean that the name "Elite" can be used to market games again, not sure Mr Braben would agree...

• http://www.frontier.co.uk/games/elite/index.html [frontier.co.uk]
• http://www.iancgbell.clara.net/elite/faq.htm#A3 [clara.net]

Perhaps finally all legal differences could be settled and the best space trading game could be in everyones home again :-)

Jez

goddammit!!!

I saw the title and thought "at last! David Braben's going to make the game!".

I am so disappointed..

(How he could do it well without Ian Bell is anyones guess however)

I think Sony found a price point

and M$, while watching the sales of the ps3, and realised that the older demographic that they are targeting is willing to pay more for a console.

$180 for 120 gig drive what a load of BS

How about discontuing the 20 gig and sell the 120 gig for $100 or less. Throw the owners of the better looking pro 360 a bone. Guess if MS won't sell a 120 gig drive for a reasonable price I'll save my money and not download shit from Live that I would need the 120 gig for. Thanks for saving me money MS!

This sucks.

I understand they weren't gonna canibalize sales of their $100 wireless adaptor, but c'mon, they could have included HD-DVD in the thing... $80 more for an extra 100GB and HDMI?

Who asked for $500 PS3?

Who asked for $500 PS3?

By all means it seems MS has heard you!

Hm. I just got Appled by MS.

I just got my 360 a few weeks ago. About 3 weeks if I recall. Now I'm out of date, something that Apple does to me on a regular basis.

Oh well. The HDMI I can probably live without even though I have a TV that supports it. The bigger hard drive would certainly be nice though. I think the reason for the HDMI has less to do with "hey, this is cool, high-res and digital" and more to do with "hey, you're using HDCP now!".

Does anyone believe them about it *not*..

... eventually replacing the standard 360? They say it's going to stay a separate new SKU, but MS also denied that the Elite existed in the first place.

I'll get one just for HDMI

I'm probably in the tiny minority here.. but I'm at least going to get one just for the HDMI port..

And not because HDMI looks better than component either.. just because I ran out of component ports in my TV but I still have an HDMI one!

My TV's got 2 HDMI, 2 Component, and 3 composite inputs.. it's also got one optical audio out which plugs in nicely to my cheapo receiver's one optical audio in.

Currently, I have my cable box hooked up via HDMI, my Xbox 360 and Wii via component, my old modded xbox and chessvision! [chessvision.info] via composite. It's all fine, except my old xbox looks like crap on composite! AND, my xbox 360 isn't using 5.1 audio (which would be nice for the HD DVD drive!)

Finally! I'll be able to move the xbox 360 to HDMI, meaning digital surround sound audio, and move my old xbox to component, meaning it's hd again! And, I've already got an HD DVD drive, so no big deal it doesn't come with it, and, I've got an ethernet cable so not too big a deal it doesn't come with wireless (though I REALLY don't understand why not.. actually wait, I do! It's because IPTV isn't going to work for crap over wireless.. so they want everybody to hook up their xboxes with real cable!)

Just sayin'...

$479... bargain!

$479... That's cheaper than the premium bundle at £299... oh, wait...

We Brits love taking it up the arse. Fortunately, I am leaving soon, but I pity those other unfortunates.

Xbox 360 Elite Live Family Special Business soon

- price $3600

will not work with the present xbox games you have, will not work with the present tv you have. you have to buy at least $1500 worth LCD or Plasma to be able to play games with it. also, the new Xbox 360 Elite Live Family Special Business will be much slower in any operation than its predecessors, but rest assured you will have an easy mind knowing that copyrights of major companies are protected with it.

Sounds familiar...

Feels like Microsoft is taking a page out of it's Windows business and putting it into the XBox 360. Vista Home Basic, Home Premium, Business, Ultimate... sound familiar? Not to mention tying in games development with Windows so developers feel the need to appeal to a greater audience and therefore develop for the Xbox/PC platform. All this sounds to reminiscent of what it's done to the PC market to the detriment of other platforms like Linux.

Think I'll wait a while myself

I'm going to wait for the "Super Mega Hugmoungous Elite XBox 10k Vista Pro Ultimate" edition that M$ will release next...you know, when they feel sales are starting to flag. It'll make ice cubes too!!

I'd be semi amazed if any regular /. folks didn't see this coming (and the constant string of "must have" upgrades that M$ will keep releasing in the months/years to come). Console gaming cheaper than PC? Pft, I'll give it 3-5 years before M$ "fix" that little problem...

Going to bite them in the ass eventually

One of the complaints I had about the PS3 was that, once you bought the cheaper SKU, you're locked into it, unable to "upgrade" it to the more expensive one, which contrasted with the difference between the two versions of the Xbox 360. With this addition of this HDMI port, one that can't be added to the console that's sitting on my shelf, however, the Xbox 360 loses this advantage.

However, this probably won't affect sales of the Xbox 360 one way or the other. Current owners aren't likely to run out and buy a second Xbox 360 because of it, but they won't be getting rid of their old one either. The real problem, however, will be in a few years when it's time to release the next generation of consoles, and customers start saying "I'm really looking forward to the next Xbox, but I think I'll wait a year or so after launch for the 'elite' version to come out."

Batman would be impressed! let down to others

While releasing a Xbox 360 Elite is a great idea, I feel that it's too early for it to come out. If you look at the extra add-ons you get an extra 100GB on your hard drive which will eventually be "must have" for serious Xbox players (Oblivion's expansion pack requires close to 1GB of space). The HDMI cables aren't a big deal to me (and probably a large percentage of 360 ownners) since I don't have a HDTV yet. While releasing an Xbox with HDMI cables is a great idea, the major addition that seems to be lacking from the Elite pack is the HD Drive. If you're going to release an "Elite" Xbox, shouldn't you have all the main accessories? It seems as if Microsoft decided not to include the drive due to cost reasons. I feel that they should have waited until they were able to produce the HD Elite version at a cheaper price and include the HD Drive in it. They tried to embrace the HD market, but excluding the HD drive from this edition might hurt them.

I'd like to know....

What happen to the Elite having an HD DVD player installed?

Xbox Live Video?

Sorry, a little new to the game on the Xbox Live Video, but why are they promoting it in conjunction with HD-DVD?

Why invest in an HD-DVD player when 720p looks darn good?

For that matter, why even invest in HD-DVD or Blu-ray if HD downloading is here? (granted you need high speed access and time to download)
With AppleTV, XBLV,...it seems like the HD-DVD/Blu-ray is the "mini-disc" step before mp3s became the format of choice.

i was going to buy this, but...

i don't care about the color of the console or HDMI. i was looking forward to a processor that didn't act as a space heater in my room and a DVD player that didn't sound like an airbus taking off. i guess i'll have to wait a little longer for normal room temperature and decibel level....

Insulted

Am I the only one who feels insulted by this comment?

"We don't feel like the Wii customer and the Xbox customer are the same thing," he said. "We think that as soon as the Wii customer turns 14 they want something else."

This seems like hes trying to say that the only people that buy a wii are kids under 14. I for one find this offensive. Since when does a game have to show extreme violence, language and nudity just to not be lumped into the "for kids" arena?

There are a bit of fun games for the wii that arent "for kids" such as COD and Trauma Center. Just because nintendo ends up being the console that most "child friendly" developers choose does NOT mean the system is for kids

Eagerly Awaiting HDMI on the 360

I'm probably a rare case but I've been waiting for HDMI before I buy a 360. Why? Because I have an older 23" LCD monitor with only DVI-d input that is currently sitting next to my desk waiting to be hooked to a console.

As the poster with no free component inputs mentioned, the economics of spending an extra $80 on the console compares very favorably with the other options. The extra $80 for the Elite with HDMI plus a few bucks for a HDMI to DVI cable gets me up and running on my existing hardware compared to the possibilities with a non-HDMI 360: sinking a couple hundred dollars for a VGA to DVI-d converter box or hundreds of dollars for a new monitor or HDTV.

Why not buy a PS3? Because the 360 has the games I want to play (and at reasonable prices used) and watching movies on my console is not a priority. I'll buy an HD-DVD or BR player in a few years when they can be had for $40 and the movies are $5-10 each.

Microsoft System Patch 1- real product release

Ok so it might work reliably now. The beta test is over and the actual product is shipping.

only half a ;-)

What are they thinking?

Maybe it's just me. I don't have a TV that supports HDMI. I don't care to replace all my DVDs with BluRay or HD-DVDs, or all my component video / digital audio cables with HDMI ones. So, "Elite"?.... meh.

What I keep asking myself is "Why now?" I mean these features had been announced for the PS3 for over a year now at least. Did it just take MS this long to copy Sony? Or was it a conscious decision to wait until Sony launched the PS3? I mean the PS3 has been sitting on store shelves for months with more integrated features than the "Elite" 360, and it has only recently received positive attention with the announcement of "Home" and their Second Life clone. So after the public has given a lukewarm reaction to HDMI and a larger hard drive on their competitor's console, they decide to jump in with a "Me Too"? At a higher (w/ HD-DVD and wireless) overall price?

I don't get it.

More versatile than Apple TV

Despite being a long-term Mac user and owning a 5G iPod, I still consider the XBox 360 as being the far more worthwhile set-top device when faced with the Apple TV. Apple TV may look pretty, but it lacks several key elements that could keep the Apple TV out of the hands of the non-Mac using population.

First, it seems almost too dependent on iTunes. If you look around at some of the early adopter reports, you can't access your iTMS paid content without at least one copy of the content stored on the machine your Apple TV box is synced with... even if you copy the files directly onto the Apple TV drive itself and give it internet access to verify the files with iTMS before playback. (For most Mac users, this means having the files crowding your primary HD.) This is a limitation that even most iPod users don't have to face.

Next, there's no support for us non-HDTV users who are perfectly comfortable using their current low-definition displays. If Microsoft would only open the 360's supported playback codecs to included several of the non-Windows Media content formats common to the typical Mac user, utilities like Connect360 would become significantly more useful in allowing Microsoft to take control of the market. Otherwise such users are just going to invest in a 5G iPod and a remote-control based interface to get around the lack of low-definition support.

Finally, the 360 has the added value of games. Not just the fancy 3D titles, but the entire XBox Live Arcade collection. The Apple TV docs specifically say it won't support the 5G iPod games (a huge mistake, IMHO), and the 5G iPods themselves won't play these games on any other screen than the built-in display. One should never completely overlook gaming options when trying to pitch a set-top box to non-techie users. It's hard to explain the value of a $300-400 device that isn't merely a DVD player or a game machine.

Side-by-side, the XBox 360 is just going to put on a much better show, simply baded on features alone. If it wasn't for the fact that I don't particularly need an all-in-one set-top media player setup, I'd probably be giving the new 360 model some consideration. However, given that the file size restrictions for XBox Live Arcade downloads is much more lax now, users may quickly find themselves needing more than 20GB of storage.

As for the media content, something like a slingbox-connected Mac Mini could handle most of what Apple TV already does, only without the imposed annoyances.

Sigh. Close, but no banana

I was waiting to buy an XBox until they came out with one that had a built in HD-DVD player. I want a new DVD player that can play HD DVDs, and if I can get a decent gaming console at the same time, more power to me. I was expecting the "refresh" to have this built in. I don't want a separate box hanging around. And I want the DVD player functionality to be well integrated.

Do I have to wait for an "Ultimate" version? Or am I S.O.L. when I want something so *obvious*?

Bleh

What I really wanted was the new CPU's that apparently run cooler then the existing ones, and I think from what I read on Engadget the Elite won't have em yet. HDMI and a real hard drive would have been nice, but I'm gonna keep on waiting me thinks. And right now my 8 year old TV only supports S-Video anyway until I upgrade later this year.

Upconvert Standard DVDs?

Anyone know if it will upconvert standard DVDs via the HDMI port? My upconverting player just died so may I'll put the money toward this and a trade-in of my launch console that's tooooo loud.