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Microsoft Readies Cheaper 360
Officially Microsoft is putting on a brave face, saying they won't drop the 360's price even in the console's weakest market: Japan. Just the same (probably in anticipation of Sony's PS3 price drop), the San Jose Mercury news says the company is secretly working on preparing a lower cost Xbox 360 SKU. Called 'Falcon', it's a cost-reduced system using 65nm chips instead of the at-launch 90nm electronics. This ties right into Michael Pachter's expectation of such a cut; it should be noted he doesn't see the DS or Wii prices moving any time soon. Related to all of this, Newsweek's LevelUp blog has two great interviews today: a Peter Moore discussion harkening back to last week's warranty announcement, and a chat with Jack Tretton about the price cut and the 360's hardware issues.
From what I've seen, HOME is a bloated way to hook people up online. I like the streamlined 360 online features. I don't want to have an Avatar walk around meeting other Avatars. It's pointless. I AM the Avatar. Just cut out the middle man and let communicate directly with people. And I don't want to walk my Avatar down to the shop to shop for something. Just show me a menu. That's why I shop from home for things. Web sites make it easy to find stuff in a 2D list. I hate going to a store to look for stuff. I'll hate it even more having to go to take my little Avatar to a virtual store and look for stuff there, too.