Xbox Live - New Xbox Experience

New Xbox Experience

At E3 2008, Microsoft announced that all Xbox 360 owners would receive a new dashboard update, titled New Xbox Experience (NXE), on November 19, 2008 that has added many new features. Though the new interface is generally downloaded when a new Xbox is connected to Xbox Live, some games, including Fight Night Round 4 and Dragon Ball: Raging Blast, will also update it.

One feature is the ability to watch standard quality and 720p streaming movies and TV shows from Netflix through the Xbox 360. This feature is only available in the U.S. and Canada, and requires an Xbox Live Gold subscription and Netflix Unlimited. Users are also able to watch Netflix titles with their friends in a party of up to 8 players. Xbox Live members have the ability to view over 12,000 movies and episodes. Users can browse for titles based on their interests and Netflix ratings with the Xbox interface. Users no longer need to visit the website to choose the content to watch. When a player parties up with a group, they also have the ability to join games together, chat together or view a slideshow of photos.

Another feature gives players the ability to create Avatars. Players are able to customize avatars by changing body shape, facial features, hair and clothes, as well as new clothing being released from time to time. Xbox Live requires that users select an avatar. Another feature is the ability to install an entire game disc onto the Xbox 360's hard drive, which decreases loading times, and significantly reduces noise due to the game being read from the hard drive and not the louder disc drive (similar to the PS2 HD LOADER Feature). For most games this feature also reduces the amount of time spent reading the disc, thereby helping to extend the life-span of the optical drive mechanism.

During the Press Conference at E3, Microsoft announced Xbox Live Primetime, a series of scheduled programs where Xbox Live members can play against each other. The first announced game is an adaptation of the Endemol game show 1 vs. 100 in which one Xbox Live member will play against 100 other members with a live host and prizes awarded. This service is currently in an open beta in Canada and the United States.

The Xbox Guide has also been redesigned. Players are not only able to view their friends and messages, but are able to access their game library. If a user has installed any game onto their Xbox 360 Hard drive, they are able to immediately start the game from the guide, whether they are in a game or in the dashboard. Microsoft also confirmed that every new 360 comes with 3 free Xbox Live Gold trial accounts, upon creating a new account the player is allowed to claim a trial period upon refusing to pay for Gold subscription; therefore allowing the user to try online gameplay for that one month trial period, after which the player is required to pay subscription fees to continue matchmaking online. Major Nelson also announced that the update supports 16:10 on VGA or HDMI, expanding the choice of resolutions.

While previous system updates have been stored on internal memory, this is the first update to require a storage device. The update requires at least 128MB free space on either a memory card or a hard drive. Microsoft has stated that many Core or Arcade users will not have sufficient space on their limited memory cards for the new update and thus provided them with a free 512MB memory card or a discounted 20GB hard drive for a limited time. This promotion has since ended and all new arcade units now come with 512MB of internal memory.

The NXE was leaked onto Torrent sites and could be installed via a USB drive. Microsoft's Major Nelson stated that unauthorized installation of NXE would result in the user's console being banned from Xbox Live until its official release which was on November 19, 2008.