The new Xbox 360 250gb console out of the box shiny case is striking – it’s more compact than the original of course and noticeably lighter but its the sheen of that plastic that really stands out. This is one sexy console.

The prominent grills on the side of the case give you a clear look at the fan system and cooling heatsink metal that sits under the shiny plastic, which is an odd design choice for a games console, which are usually very closed-in boxes that offer you little to no view of their inner machinery. It gives the machine a look comparable to high-end gaming PCs with those big clear side-panels that show off their powerful guts rather than then hide them away.

The new Xbox 360 250Gb redesign is slimmer, quieter, sleeker, has built in Wireless N, and has a 250GB hard drive. It is not a new console, and is not any spectacular leap for Xbox. This is simply a better Xbox 360. First off, the console looks great. It very sexy with glossy touch.

As with the old Xbox and all current-gen consoles, the slimmer Xbox 360 250Gb can be placed in either vertical or horizontal configurations. There are vents on both ends of the console, the underside of which will be restricted when placed vertically, but with grills covering a large proportion of the machine we can’t imagine there being any issues with heat in either configuration.

The power supply is much nicer than the bricks we’ve all had to hide behind our TVs for the past four years, its size sliced down to a fraction of the previous model’s, lighter and smoothly clipping into the back of the console with none of forced clunkiness of the original.

Flip the Xbox 360 250Gb around and on the back you see the usual selection of ports – USB, HDMI, power and the Xbox’s proprietary component video out. Optical support is now built in, and there’s the extra addition of a special port for the Kinect which will supply the device with its power, while old Xbox owners will need to plug Kinect into a wall outlet.

Slip a game disc in and close the tray and the device makes its first mechanical sound as the disc drive spins up. The sheer spin speed of that drive remains clearly audible as it was in the first console so it’s not an entirely silent experience, although we think that’s unavoidable.

With no disc in the tray, this Xbox 360 250Gb Elite console is absolutely silent – the single larger fan that replaces the multiple fans of the old noisy console clearly doing the trick in the decibel-trimming department. Where the old Xbox disc tray was slow to respond on opening and had that unnerving ‘ker-chunk’ sound as it came to a close, the new disc tray does its job quietly and smoothly, which adds to the more polished, finished feel of the new console.

Xbox 360 remains the game console to beat. All games are in high-definition and easy to use with excellent online gaming and communications via Xbox Live. The great graphics with xbox raise the bar for what consoles can do visually. Xbox has a great soundtrack and killer sound effects and makes for very addictive online play. 

On the front of the machine two memory card slots are present. 360Xbox has a pair of USB ports hidden behind a hinged flap through which you can connect to and communicate with MP3 players and PDAs and digital cameras and laptops.

When laid horizontally, the 4kg Xbox 360 is 309mm wide, 83mm high and 258mm deep and is actually slightly smaller than the original Xbox, which also weighed in at 4kg. Unlike the original, the Xbox 360 can also be propped up in a vertical position and, as you’re probably aware, can be customised with interchangeable faceplates.

As part of the bundle, you get a wireless controller. The Xbox 360 has built-in wireless capabilities, but only for controllers, not Wi-Fi. Unlike with third party wireless controllers for earlier consoles each 360 console can support up to four wireless controllers. The green LED on both the 360 itself and the controller indicates exactly which controllers 1 to 4 are connected.

Inside the 360xbox is where you find three IBM custom designed symmetrical PowerPC based processor cores running at 3.2GHz. Xbox 360 is designed by ATI he graphics processor unit is a custom designed unit running at 500MHz. Xbox 360 can process 4 times the number of polygons as the original Xbox console. There are 48 parallel shader pipelines inside the ATI GPU. Xbox console uses a shared memory architecture built around 512MB of GDDR3 RAM.

Xbox 360 gives you access to all the games you want to play and the people you want to play with and the experiences you will love — when, where and any time you want them. Why buy an Xbox 360? It’s obvious man To change the tides of the war. To make history. To rip the throne out from the fat cats over at Sony and bring choice, flexibility, customization and great online gaming to the masses … so be cool:)

Where do gamers go?

The choices you have as a gamer are:

1. Buy (Online, Ebay, used, Gamestop..)
2. Rent (Gamefly, blockbuster…)
3. Trade (Goozex, Switchplanet..)

Renting in the past at your brick and mortar rental place can easily set you back more then $5-$7 every week like Blockbuster. There have been other online rental game sites that charge a monthly fee like /month for one game out like Gamefly. Renting is a solution but you spend more time with games than movies. There is a considerable larger amount of time invested in videogames then in movies. Most movies range from 1.5 hours to epics of 6 hours. Where most videogames you could get a good feel for a game in 3 hours but most sports games and long role playing games could be played for more then 70 hours.

This is where Goozex Game Trading steps in. Goozex allows the gamer to keep the game as long as you want but have the option to sell it too. There is only a $1 transaction fee if you request a game on their network. So basically you can trade in your older games and build up Goozex credit until you get enough for a newer title and just pay the $1 transaction fee. All shipping costs are handled by the sender so if you are requesting a game you only pay the and not the shipping and handling. No membership fees so no need to feel you need to use the system. This is ideal in the sense that you could play the game until you are actually sick of it then send it in for credit. So you’re not rushed to get as many games played on the network because you can play at your own pace. Plus you OWN the game. At that point it is yours.

The network is peer to peer in that you can only request games and send games to other members. There is no single central warehouse and the pricing of the credits of the system are in points (100pts = $5). The pricing of the game is determined by market demand, release date, initial cost of the game, and a couple other factors. Most xbox 360 titles will go for 800-1000 pts which translates to $40-$50. This isn’t bad for a used game. Some money can be saved buying used but there is still tax and travel time/cost. Goozex gives you free shipping to you with no tax charge. You also have an option to buy credits if you want but I wouldn’t recommend that unless you have no games to send in or nothing of yours is being requested. The game prices will fluctuate and you will see the price change in your history. I’ve had a couple games I requested and I can see that price increase/decrease. It doesn’t happen that much but some games change +/- 200pts depending on market demand.

So why use Goozex instead of a used videogame store or an auction site with games like Ebay? You just need $1 to pay for the transaction fee. Most people don’t like to continually shell out more money for a game and then feel like the games they bought are depreciating at a very fast rate. Selling your game for cash anywhere will not give you that much. Selling it to a store they will mark your game up to make money. Selling online is tiresome. Goozex at least you get to trade in games you are done with and still get some value out of it as it will lead to other games you really want. There might be more difficulty in sending older sports titles as those don’t have much demand once their season is up like trying to sending in EA sports Madden 2005 will be a hard game to sell to someone on the network. Older games on ebay are a hassle to sell. You can build your own game list and no insertion fees.

Lots of integrated information like tips and reviews. I love being able to see the supply and demand of each game. This will let you know if you have a game people want or if you can possibly get a game on the network. Goozex determines who gets the game by matching up users. There is a waiting list that is generated and when you add a game you will see in what place you are waiting for that game. You get a good feel to when you will get a game. You need to make a list for want and haves for your games. They will show you your place in line per game. This is a good way to build up a wishlist and then have your core set of games your really want now. It is ideal to have a very large set of games you want now so you will have a very good chance of getting a game soon. I was requesting Crackdown for the Xbox 360 and I was 60th person in line. Turns out I got the game in less then 2 weeks. Just because you’re really deep in line doesn’t mean you won’t get the game soon. The system can deliver newer games in a short amount of time which is a huge bonus for gamers that want to play newer games but don’t want to buy them at the store. You have the option of trading just the game, the game with instructions, or the full package that includes case and instructions. Some people tend to not keep cases or instructions. The value of the game doesn’t go down as the credits don’t reflect what is included. This is because the user requesting the game can have the option to request only full packaged games, games with instructions, or just the game itself. I have not had a problem with getting full packages as I’ve gotten over 49 games and I’ve sent out 54 in under 2 years of being there.

Why NOT to use

For this site to be a perfect 5 star site I would like to see:

1. More users (will there ever be enough?)
2. More old school games (nes, snes, saturn….)
3. Sure isn’t free but man it’s 4 quarters. I’m a member of another site that has no transaction fees yet still protects the members.
4. Video game trailers for each game
5. More user interaction like user reviews and tournaments…)

All the above are small tweaks to the system that is already very functional. The main reason someone would NOT want to use this system is time and money. If you have the dough you would just buy it new down the street? Why wait? The main draw to the site is how much money you can save and the community there. If your not interested in connecting with other gamers and plan to play all your games alone then the only reason to use the system is money. If you wanted to save money but are impatient then this sits is NOT for you. I’ve experienced about 1-2 month turn around time for new games. Why? You are placed on a Que. The order of the Que determines when you get the new game, but more importantly is how many are available? Most people will play a new release for a certain amount of time before listing their games. The wait times do get long. Say you want a popular game that normally runs 40 hours to complete. You gotta factor in that a player like me would take over 1 month to beat a game like that. Seasonal games with many updates like Madden will hit the system quick but it’s also a bad thing. If you hold a game too long it will depreciate in value just like on the streets. Trading for early on might be for 1000 points but in a couple months with the market being saturated it could be 500 points in no time losing half of it’s value. Not Goozex’s fault but some games just don’t move well.

Current Goozex Simultaneous Transaction on the Network as of Mar 11, 2009 = 4793

Xbox 360 is the tremendous gaming system that has been published by Microsoft in 2001. Bill gates as the owner of Microsoft thinks that it is very valuable in the gaming business. With the Xbox 360, Microsoft has reaped tons of advantages in the gaming market.

Xbox 360 has a memory system built into the console that becomes its exclusive features. Other systems needed a memory card to save the advancement in the game. In its hard disc drive The Xbox was able to store this information. This is something that gamers found appropriate and much simpler to use.

Microsoft had to work on designing controllers that would work best with the gaming system and this did take some time and changes of plans. The novel controllers were vast and condemned for being too large. At last, the design of the controllers was streamlined to house players and the quick motion had by players during games. Moreover, the wireless controllers of Xbox 360 allowing for players to move around and stand up while playing games.

For most companies, gaming systems have always been the flourish of the future.  Microsoft is no exception, and the company worked for years to resolve the correctly variety of gaming system.

The Development of the Xbox 360

Microsoft went on to work on and develop the gaming console. Finally, the Xbox 360 was improved and has been a huge punch with gamers in all places. One of the most popular gaming consoles ever is the Xbox 360. Furthermore, this is in large part because of the graphics and capability of play that is allowed in games.

The Xbox 360 can also attribute its popularity to the games that are planned purposely for that console. One of the driving forces behind the popularity of the Xbox 360 is the series of games under the Halo name. 

In order to play Halo, gamers who love the Halo series should have Xbox 360. The Halo game has increased the sales of the Xbox 360. By this, the attractiveness of Xbox 360 undeniebly increases.

Microsoft has continued to expand competences of the Xbox 360 by putting a live feature to the system. This enables gamers to play with others by going through an internet service. Gamers can take pleasure in playing with other gamers from all over the world.

The market will be continually dominated by Xbox 360. It is possible to be true only if the graphics keep pace with a generation of people who are seeking upscale games and well-liked titles are published unique to the gaming system.

So, if you still need to understand a lot of things about Xbox 360, just explore this  special site Xbox 360