Xbox 360 elite finally announced

Author: Andy Vandervell
Published: 29th March 2007
Comments (13) Stumble
Xbox 360 elite finally announced

Black is leeter than white now, again, apparently.

After weeks of rumours it has been confirmed: Xbox 360 Elite is a genuine product. Contrary to earlier reports, the Elite will not be a limited edition but a genuine third SKU for the Xbox 360 brand. So, what’s new?

Well, it’s black, which is apparently the new white these days – or is it the new silver? Anyway, apart from its blackness, the Elite will feature an HDMI output and a 120GB hard disk drive. This, so says Peter Moore, will make it perfect for both gaming and entertainment enthusiasts:

"Today's games and entertainment enthusiast has an insatiable appetite for digital high-definition content. Xbox 360 Elite's larger hard drive and premium accessories will allow our community to enjoy all that the next generation of entertainment has to offer."

Naturally, all the various accessories will be black too and will be available separately at the same price as their fugly off-white cousins. The new, bigger hard drive will also be available separately for a trivial $179 (~£110 inc VAT). The Elite will also ship with an HDMI cable included, thus giving Microsoft executives suitable ammunition to throw at Sony during the next industry pie throwing contest.

As for pricing, the Elite will retail at $479 USD (~£290 inc VAT) and though no European pricing has yet to be announced a sub-£300 price point would be desirable – are you listening Microsoft? Arriving in North America on April 29th, no official word on a European date is available though late 2007 is a good guesstimation.

There’s no built-in HD-DVD drive – high odds on 2008 for that – but more disappointingly the Elite won’t use the potentially cooler and more efficient 65nm manufacturing process that many had speculated it would.

Other interesting tidbits include the inclusion of a transfer cable, for moving data from defunct Xbox 360 hard drives and judging by the pictures an audio splitter with RCA and S/PDIF outputs. As you will no doubt be aware HDMI carries both audio and video signals and this cable, which will feed out of the AV multi-out, should allow you to route the audio signal to a separate amplifier.

So, who’s up for buying a Core edition now? Let us know in the forums.
Quote DougEdey 29th March 2007, 09:53
Just so you have some more details Bindy (:p):
UK Release
Quote:
Originally Posted by Tim Ellis (HMV)
All we understand is that it's at some point perhaps around the late summer...I feel sure that there'll be demand for this product, and Microsoft now enjoys the level of brand penetration and player loyalty for it to be successful... There should be quite a few core gamers out there that may want to upgrade or who will at least want the extra capacity now on offer.

Australia
Quote:
Originally Posted by Microsoft Fact Sheet
Released in "Winter 2007"

HDD Transfer
Quote:
Originally Posted by Japanese Release sheet via Chris Kohler
You cannot put the data from two or more 20 GB hard disks onto one 120 GB hard disk. If you attempt to move multiple drives, only the last one you move will be stored.
Quote Flibblebot 29th March 2007, 11:26
I can't help but feel that they're missing a trick by not integrating the HD-DVD drive.
Quote mikeuk2004 29th March 2007, 12:12
I think what the PS3 and 360 are missing are DVD recorders and built in freeview. If its the mulitmedia hub of your home then it should have that function.

But to me the 120gb hard drive is no good if we cant put our own content on it and able to copy are own music from our pc's/mp3 players or portable hard drives. Or even copy our own pictures to it.

It being locked out and the only content to go on it is what you download then theres no point.

All I have on my hard drive is the HD south Park episode and 3 game demos. I have a portable hard drive plugged up with all my music and music videos and digital photos.
Quote <A88> 29th March 2007, 12:36
Ummm...MCE extender? Grabs all your videos, photos and music over a network from your pc through the 360. And the 360's designed so you can plug practically any mp3 player into it via USB and copy music over, even with an iPod. I don't see where you're coming from really. :| Likewise, if you're really bothered about using the 360 for TV (for whatever reason I'm not sure), you can stream from any TV-card equipped PC and do all the pausing/recording/library features you can already do at a computer.

<A88>
Quote DougEdey 29th March 2007, 13:03
MCE Extender doesn't work with all file formats.
Quote atanum141 29th March 2007, 13:05
With the help of TVersity it does.
Quote David_Fitzy 29th March 2007, 15:30
This xb 'elite' really should've included everything that PS3 boasts better stats on. Come on MS you've released a premium xbox with standard equipment. Had it included HDDVD then I'd've been tempted. As it stands a HDDVD player is more tempting.
Quote rowin4kicks 29th March 2007, 17:38
wow looks intresting! and i do like the black myself!
what im intrested in is the price drops of the core package? if there is any?
Quote zero0ne 29th March 2007, 18:43
the bottom link to the forums doesn't work right now.
Quote Vash-HT 29th March 2007, 20:36
Since it's retailing for more than the premium here I don't think they're dropping prices at all. Personally at 479$ I would rather get the 500$ ps3, but then again I already have a premium 360 so it doesn't look as appealing anymore. I would be mroe inclined to purchase this if it had the smaller process processors in it, but w/o it seems like I would be tempted to buy another 360 once they were finally released anyway.
Quote mikeuk2004 29th March 2007, 21:37
Quote:
Originally Posted by <A88>
Ummm...MCE extender? Grabs all your videos, photos and music over a network from your pc through the 360. And the 360's designed so you can plug practically any mp3 player into it via USB and copy music over, even with an iPod. I don't see where you're coming from really. :| Likewise, if you're really bothered about using the 360 for TV (for whatever reason I'm not sure), you can stream from any TV-card equipped PC and do all the pausing/recording/library features you can already do at a computer.

<A88>

Ok, for starters I dont have Windows Media Centre and second. I dont want to have to go to my bedroom and switch my pc on so I can watch a music video on my tv in the living room via my xbox 360. Third, yes the 360 is designed to let you connect mp3 players and ipods, psp and portable hard disks to play content from them. But you can not copy content from them to the xbox 360 hard disk which is what i mentioned.

I suggested it would be good if the 360 had a dvd recorder and freeview tunner to eliminate those 2 extra boxes under the TV. I know you can stream TV on a TV card in a PC. Thats what I use in the bedroom to eliminate a TV in there so I dont have 2 screens in the bedroom (1 TV and 1 Monitor)

Yes I know you can do all this stuff on a computer but I dont want my computer in the living room. You might still live with you mum and have everything in your bedroom, but i have a house and the tv is the living room and the computer is in the bedrrom.

It would be nice to be able to copy my content to the 360 drive, then I would be interested in a larger drive.
Quote <A88> 29th March 2007, 23:58
I really don't see the advantage of having a freeview tuner included. For a start, it would be UK only as all regions have different means of distributing digital terrestial. Secondly, it would push the cost of the 360 up for no reason but to save a bit of space under the TV. All-in-one devices are conveniant but they take on too big a task- everyone needs different components to match their needs and for most, an Xbox tv tuner would be redundant- after all, this is a games console first, media device second. Microsoft will be introducing some sort of IPTV service in the future but tuners are not their thing and just give another piece of hardware to go wrong.

At the end of the day, Microsoft are better off saving the development costs of the 360 and making the whole thing wireless to allow you to feed off a more suitable media 'server' such as the PC. I'd much rather be able to switch on the 360 and get all my media automatically from one place than having to keep copying it over to my games console and PC every time.

<A88>
Quote David_Fitzy 3rd April 2007, 19:01
Microsoft have said they haven't included the HDDVD and wifi because they don't want to force people into paying more for these extras...

Umm, Microsoft you wouldn't be anyone who doesn't want built in HDDVD or wifi would've gone for the white pro version. and anyway arn't you forcing people to pay extra for the 120Gb Hdd?
Also for those who do want HDDVD they have to pay for two optical drives instead of one (aswell as the supporting casing, electronics and packaging)
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