The Xbox 360 is the successor to Microsoft's Xbox video game console, developed in cooperation with IBM, ATI, Samsung and SiS.
Its Xbox Live service allows players to compete online as well as download games and additional content.
Microsoft is predicting that with the Xbox 360, a greater market share, yearly revenue through their Xbox Live service, and falling hardware costs will eventually make system sales profitable.
Xbox Live Silver is free of charge and allows users to create a user profile, join on message boards, access Microsoft's Xbox Live Arcade and Marketplace and talk to other members.
Xbox Live Arcade is an online service operated by Microsoft that is used to distribute arcade video games to Xbox and Xbox 360 owners. In addition to classic arcade games, the service offers some new original games as well as games from other consoles.
The console's graphical user interface is the Xbox 360 Dashboard; a tabbed interface that features four "Blades".
Backward compatibility is achieved through software emulation of the original Xbox.
Xenos contains 48 unified shader units, which are capable of both vertex and pixel shading operations. This is in contrast to older graphics processor designs which utilize separate specialized units for these tasks.
Up to four controllers are supported by the Xbox 360, in the wireless form. However, there is a maximum of three wired controllers, as the Xbox 360 only has 3 USB slots.
The Xbox 360 controller is significantly different from the original Xbox controllers, the Duke and the S models. The black and white buttons have been replaced by bumper buttons, which are on the shoulder of the controller, right before the triggers. It is noticeably smoother, has a white-gray theme, and is very small and ergonomically built.
