I see as a gaming machine first, and the rest of that stuff is extras.

It is the same as the others in terms of specs. Although I have heard stories about the 360 getting hot to touch and all of that, and I haven't noticed it on mine. Also the only time mine gets loud is when it is loading something from a game and that only for a second. Keep in mind though, they use different drives on the systems though.

As far as RROD issues, they're the same. I think consoles being manufactured NOW (after the three year warranty extension) will be less susceptible to the problem, but those are probably a month or two away from being in stores.

if I had a 1080p TV, i'd probably get the elite myself

Anybody have the Live Arcade Unplugged disc? With the exception of the inconvenience of having the disc in the drive to play the games, how is it? Is it exactly the same as downloading the original games?

It seems like a great value. Free month of live + 6 games for the price of 2 of them.

I've been looking to snag it cheap, but the only ones on it I don't already have are GW, Outpost Koloki and Bejeweled.

I have a (launch day) Premium 360 attached via component cables to a 1080p TV. The TV reports that the signal coming from the 360 is 1080p. And it does look dramatically better than it did on my older HDTV (that was not capable of 1080p, but did do 1080i).

If a person has a new TV capable of doing 1080p over component, then is there any additional PERCEIVED benefit of doing it over HDMI?

If one plans on a lot of download purchases, then the Elite's larger drive would definitely come in handy.

If MS ever produced an Elite w/HD-DVD that was quiet enough to use as a DVD player, I have to admit that I'd jump on it.

The versions of the games are exactly the same. I've got it, and love it. I'm NOT a fan of downloaded games so this is a great option, and a far greater value.

Well, we hope so. But really, we have no idea if this is true or not.

I've never noticed a difference on my HT-equipment between 1080p component versus HDMI.

But the HDMI-360 is also useful for SD-DVD upscaling (the 360 follows the DVD specs and doesn't upscale over component at all). And, of course, many televisions don't accept 1080p over component. I'd say the elite is worth the extra money easily, if buying a 360 today. I won't upgrade my Premium, but the choice would be a nobrainer for me if I were to make it today.

And I've easily filled the 20GB drive with demos more than a few times. So the extra HDD space would be useful to me, even without ever downloading videos.

I don't think i've read too many reports (if any) of Elite's going down.

Of course, the small supply and shorter time since release might be the reason.

Yeah, it's exactly the same -- the games show up with your other arcade games. The disc is getting harder to find, but I just saw them at my local Costco for $17.99. I got mine for like $12 shipped from ebay (new). Since it was packaged with the 360 at Costco, there are still probably lots of copies for sale on ebay; just remember if it's not new, you're not going to get that free month of Live.

I keep hoping for a volume 2 (Zuma, Cloning Clyde, Feeding Frenzy, Solitare, 3-D Golf and Pinball sounds good to me), but I seriously doubt that will ever happen.

I still see it all the time at CC & BB. And that's not necessarily true about not getting the free month of live with a used copy. Not everyone uses those or tosses them. I don't and leave in the case for when I do sell the game. Equally I've bought used games that still had them unused in there. So by all means that is no guarantee, but I'd say it is closer to 50-50 instead of 0.

Fair enough about that free month of Live; I was just giving him a warning on that front. And in case you're wondering, pinata, yes you can add that month to an existing Live subscription. I hadn't seen any Live Arcade Unplugged discs at any store for several months until Costco- well except for my local Game Crazy that had it tagged at $39.99.

I think Pac-Man: CE is the best update of an arcade game EVER.

Now, Namco needs to follow this model for a Galaga: CE.

Thanks for the info. It's $17.99 on Amazon right now. There are several considerably cheaper on eBay. I'll keep my eyes peeled if I end up getting (and using) a 360.

I don't know why people are saying the extra 100GB is useless. I bought a 360 at launch, and despite being very studious in deleting any unnecessary content, I still found myself with less than a GB left about a month ago and had to pick up the 120GB HDD to compensate. Considering that almost every game has DLC now, and some of them are massive (think Oblivion), it makes absolutely no sense to me to say that an extra 100 GB are useless.

how big is the oblivion download expansions?

That's true. I just d/l the two Rainbow 6 packs the other day when they went free and that took a good chunk out of the hard drive. I haven't played it yet, but that's one of those things where you never know how long the "free" will last.

I'll be snagging the two Lost Planet packs tomorrow as well even though I haven't played MP yet for the same reason.

You are down to 1 GB left just on XBLA downloads and game content?!

If you are downloading movies and TV shows then it is understandable and we have been saying that under that scenario, the extra space is needed.


It makes sense to those of use who aren't going to pay for the privilege of paying for more content. Considering how locked down the access to the harddrive is, Microsoft should be GIVING AWAY larger drives. (or at the very least charging a token fee, not charging a PREMIUM).

Microsoft benefits more from you having a larger harddrive than you do.

DLC is non-transferable. If I sell or give Oblivion away, I cannot sell or give away any DLC for it.

I know that my view is unique, but those are my reasons why the extra space is useless.

those lost planet maps with be free forever


they gave them out free with the CE edition when it launched, but it was a timed-release for them to be free.

I'm debating on getting the Oblivion expansion download now, or just waiting and getting the GOTY edition

Wait - they updated Pacman CE? This is the first I've heard of it. What did they add - it could use a few more modes.

Nah, he just means the Pac-Man CE is the best upgrade over its original arcade counterpart (Pac-Man).

eh, he's new to the 360 game

you guys will break him in soon enough

I have downloaded no movies or TV shows. As I said, I've had the system since launch and I download a lot of arcade games and DLC.