Known during development as Xenon, Xbox 2, Xbox Next or NextBox, the Xbox 360 was conceived in early 2003.
Due to its early launch, the Xbox 360 has a one-year lead on both of its competitors, Sony's PlayStation 3 and Nintendo's Wii.
Since Microsoft owns the intellectual property rights to the hardware used in the Xbox 360, they can easily switch to new fabrication processes or change suppliers in the future to reduce costs.
With the launch of the Xbox 360, Microsoft's online gaming service, Xbox Live went through a major upgrade, adding a basic non-subscription service, Silver, to its already established premium subscription-based service, Gold.
Xbox Live supports voice communication along with video communication, a feature possible with the Xbox Live Vision.
The Xbox CPU also contains ROM storing Microsoft private encrypted keys, used to decrypt game data.
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.
