 Xbox 360 Introduction: I guess being that this is an Xbox 360 site, I should give a pretty good overview of the Xbox 360.
So many of you might not have your Xbox 360 yet, and might be thinking “why the heck do I want this so bad?” Well this overview might remind you about a few things that makes the Xbox 360 worth having. The Xbox 360 is much more than an update to the original Xbox, it is a complete redevelopment where the core thought was ease of use and interaction.
Not only is their just the console to think about, but Microsoft has lined up some great games, and accessories that will be taking your pay checks for many months to come. The Xbox 360 launched November 22nd, 2005 to North America, and has been releasing around the world ever since. I think there are only a few places left that have not gone through an initial launch, but for the most part the world has had at least one Xbox 360.
Retail outlets are still finding it hard to stock these gaming consoles, as they are still flying off the shelves faster than they can be stocked. With this in mind, any X-box fan that anticipates buying the X-box 360 and X-box games should keep in mind that if they want to get it within the next few months, it is probably the best idea to search every store in the area at least once a week until you find one. Waiting around for shelves to fill up isn’t going to happen anytime soon.
The Xbox 360 Console: The first showing of the console was on MTV, which is a strange departure from the E3 launches that many consoles have. Microsoft ran the special on Thursday, May 12, 2005, and ever since then the world has been buzzed about the Xbox 360.
The console was made to be more than just another game machine as the 360 in its name is supposed to imply. The idea was to put the player in the middle of their digital entertainment world, and give them full control over their experience.
At first I was a little cautious about Microsoft’s offerings as most of my friends are Sony and Nintendo fans who were quick to point at the Xbox and say “it’s just a computer for the livingroom”. I agree with them that it is, but where Windows has never really been made for multimedia in my opinion, the Xbox 360 certainly is. The dashboard used in this release is just amazing, giving an almost endless amount of control to the user.
The Xbox will be launched with two different boxes available to be picked up. One is called the Core System, and the other is the Premium Edition. Different price points are attached to each box, and with it are very different setups.
The Core System:
- Console
- Wired Controller
- Composite Cable
- Xbox Live Silver
- Xbox Live Gold 30-day Trial
Price: $299.99 USD
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The Premium Edition:
- Console
- Wireless Controller
- Component HD AV Cable
- 20 GB Hard Drive
- Ethernet Cable
- Headset
- Composite Cable
- Xbox Live Silver
- Xbox Live Gold 30-day Trial
- Premium Chrome Details
Price: $399.99 USD |
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At any time the Core System can be upgraded with any of the features and accessories of the Premium Edition, but I would suggest avoiding the Core and grabbing the Premium, as there will be games that require the hard drive that the Premium comes with.
Xbox 360 Specifications:
CPU
- Three symmetrical cores running at 3.2 GHz each
- Two hardware threads per core; six hardware threads total
- VMX-128 vector unit per core; three total
- 128 VMX-128 registers per hardware thread
- 1 MB L2 cache
Graphics Processor
- Custom ATI Graphics Processor
- 10 MB of embedded DRAM
- 48-way parallel floating-point dynamically scheduled shader pipelines
- Unified shader architecture
Polygon Performance
- 500 million triangles per second
Pixel Fill Rate
- 16 gigasamples per second fill rate using 4x MSAA
Shader Performance
- 48 billion shader operations per second
Memory
- 512 MB of 700 MHz GDDR3 RAM
- Unified memory architecture
Storage
- Detachable and upgradeable 20GB hard drive
- 12x dual-layer DVD-ROM
- Memory Unit support starting at 64 MB
I/O
- Support for up to four wireless game controllers
- Three USB 2.0 ports
- Two memory unit slots
Online
- Built-in Ethernet port
- Wi-Fi ready: 802.11a, 802.11b, and 802.11g
- Video camera ready
Media Support
- Support for DVD-Video, DVD-ROM, DVD-R/RW, DVD+R/RW, CD-DA, CD-ROM, CD-R, CD-RW, WMA CD, MP3 CD, JPEG Photo CD
- Ability to stream media from portable music devices, digital cameras and Windows XP-based PCs
- Ability to rip music to the Xbox 360 hard drive
- Custom playlists in every game
- Built-in Media Center Extender for Windows XP Media Center Edition 2005
- Interactive, full-screen 3-D visualizers
High-Definition Support
- All games supported at 16:9, 720p, or 1080i, with anti-aliasing
- Standard-definition and high-definition video output supported
Audio
- Multi-channel surround sound output
- Supports 48KHz 16-bit audio
- 320 independent decompression channels
- 32-bit audio processing
- Over 256 audio channels
Physical Specs
- Height: 3.26" (83 mm)
- Width: 12.2" (309 mm)
- Depth: 10.2" (258 mm)
- Weight: 7.7 lbs.
Stats: April 2006 | May 2006 | June 2006 | July 2006 | August 2006 | September 2006
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