Today only Amazon.com are selling Xbox 360 120GB Hard Drive for $139.99, reduced from $179.99 with free shipping.

This is a great deal for those who are tired of constantly going back and deleting files on their 360 HDD just so they can get the latest demo. Although the image shows a black HDD the reviews on Amazon do point out that it’s grey like the existing 20gb

Today only Amazon.com are selling Xbox 360 Wireless Headset for the Xbox 360 at $59.99, reduced from $39.99 with free shipping.

This has been quite a week for 360 deals, this is not one of the better deals to appear, although I’ve not used one of these before myself, I’ve heard nothing but bad things.

Today only Amazon.com are selling Xbox 360 Play and Charge Kit with Controller Black for the Xbox 360 for $49.99, reduced from $69.99 with free shipping.

Last month Amazon had deals for both the Black wireless controller and then later for the Play ‘n’ charge kit. Today Amazon are showing off a deal on both for just $50, that’s about $10 cheaper than buying the two seprately

Once again, the rumor mill surrounding the Xbox 360 proves its might. According to a press release Microsoft issued on Monday, Microsoft will be dropping the price on all three of their console packages, confirming the speculation surrounding the past few weeks.

The Xbox 360 core system which does not include a hard drive, will be reduced by $20 to $280, the Xbox 360 Premium will get a $50 price drop down to $350 and the new Elite model, which features a 120GB hard drive, will drop $30 to $450. The Xbox 360’s group product manager, Aaron Greenberg, said Microsoft timed the price cut to coincide with the release of Electronic Arts Inc’s “Madden NFL 08.”

With the price drop taking place right before a landslide of eagerly anticipated titles coming to the Xbox 360 this fall, it appears that Microsoft will be in a great position to boost sales in the second half of this year.

Today only Amazon.com are selling Xbox 360 Play & Charge Kit - Black for the Xbox 360 for $11.99, reduced from $19.99 with free shipping if you add another $13.01 to your order.

Did you get that black 360 controller last week? Finding your batteries always run dry just before you can deliver the Coup de grâce? Amazon’s got you covered with the 360 play ‘n’ charger.

Today only Amazon.com are selling Xbox 360 Wireless Controller Black for the Xbox 360 for $32.99, reduced from $49.99 with free shipping.

A great deal on the new black controllers, and $5 cheaper than the white style. You know what they say, once you go wireless..

No matter how you look at it Sony has borrows many ideas from Microsoft and Nintendo.  From Trophy Cases in Home to PlayStation Network to SIXAXS motion controls no one at Sony can say that they do not borrow good ideas from their competitors.  Now with rumors that Microsoft wants to jump in and offer some additional help to the Folding at Home project, Sony officials look down their nose and pooh pooh them for copying them.

In a quote Jack Tretton said :

Would they be even having this conversation if we weren’t doing it? I don’t know. I would guess that the medical community would take help from anywhere they could get it, but the commentary that I heard is that Stanford isn’t sure that [the Xbox 360’s processing abilities] would help them very much, which is odd to me because if it helped at all, it seems like they would welcome it with open arms.

It’s really ugly territory to get into, but let’s take fighting a disease and see if we can get some credit for that. It’s not a cool game to play one way or the other, so I don’t want to even give the impression that that’s our motivation, and I’d be very disappointed if they’re looking for PR value or to try to suck off some of the goodwill that we’re doing.

So Jack when says “and I’d be very disappointed if they’re looking for PR value or to try to suck off some of the goodwill that we’re doing.”  Yeah, because Sony has done this all out of the goodness of their corporate heart.  They had no idea that the Playstation 3 would run circles around all the Personal Computers running the Folding At Home software, there by making their product look like a phenomenal number crunching work horse.

My comment to Jack Tretton would be this.  In the future contact Sony Public Relations before making demeaning comments about your competitors.  And here is the statement that I may have issued had Jack Tretton asked me to write his response for him:

“We are happy to see competitors of our opening up their platforms to assist in helping the researchers who diligently search for cures to diseases that plague mankind.  We are happy Sony was able to lead the way in utilizing the powerful interactive entertainment systems of today to assist with the massive number crunching process that is required to help cure these diseases.  We welcome our competitors to this endeavor and while we our primary interest is in what is best for humanity.  We can not help but be interested to see fans of the Playstation 3, XBox 360, and Personal Computers all compete to which platform can get the most Folding at Home work done.  Welcome to the competition!”

If any of you are interested in joining the folding at home effort you can follow this link to get more information.  If you want to download the client for your PC you can follow this link.  And if you would like to join the Around the Controller Network Folding At Home team you can click here on how to do that.  We look forward to you helping out and helping out science.

There has been a great deal of discussion about how Next-Gen the consoles released by Microsoft, Nintendo, and Sony have proved to be.  Microsoft seemed very determine to have the XBox 360 released to the public before the Nintendo Wii, and Sony PS3.  Many have speculated that having a year head start in sales has been a good move for the new comer to the console wars.  But is there another benefit to the quality alone time spent with the XBox 360?  Has it become that comfortable pair of shoes that you prefer over new and shiny consoles?

When I bought my XBox 360 I compare it to the original XBox version one.  When the Nintendo Wii came out, I did not own a Nintendo GameCube to compare it to so I ended up comparing it to the XBox 360.  When the Sony PS3 came out I did not compare it to my Sony PS2 as much as I compared it to the XBox 360.  For almost a year, I became very comfortable with the blade interface of the 360.  For a year the XBox 360 defined how I started games, interacted with my online friends, or downloaded content from the online store.  With these preconceived notions I was then thrust into two new and completely different experiences.  Immediately I felt like they had both done it all wrong.  I had gotten comfortable with the XBox LIVE interface, and now both the Sony Playstation Store and the Nintendo Wii shopping channel seemed like they were very cumbersome to navigate. 

So I decided to do a little experiment, I spent two weeks only using one of the three consoles.  First the Nintendo Wii, then two weeks later the Sony PS3, and then finally returned to the XBox 360.  After spending only a couple of weeks with each of the other two consoles exclusively, I found that when I went back to XBox LIVE I would get frustrated with its User Interface.  I would forget how to do certain tasks, like end voice and video chat sessions, or I had forgotten how to get to different types of downloads.

So before anyone is two critical of the Sony PS3, Nintendo Wii, or the Microsoft XBox 360 I would say spend some time with it you may find that it is not all that bad.

So “Zephyr” one of the worst kept secrets in recent history, Engadget has now said they have proof that it actually exists and they are spilling the details.  They are saying they have proof of the product Microsoft has code named “Zephyr”, which they believe to be called “XBox 360 Elite”.   There is supposed to be a short run of the hardware that is actually black with a black controller and headset to go along with it.  It will cost $479, and be sporting a 120 gig hard drive, and an HDMI output.  It is also rumored to run cooler.  It is not known if it will take advantage of the 65nm chip size.  Another unknown is if it will come with a built in Wireless Adapter (but then again if Microsoft includes that maybe they will not be able to afford to keep staff like Major Nelson, Trixie, and Tina Wood.  Seeing as these wireless adapters go for around $5 each).  We will be watching but the Elite XBox 360 is suppose to be coming to store shelves later this summer or early fall.