Xbox 360 Elite now available

Redmond (WA) - The third tier version of Microsoft’s Xbox 360 gaming console went on sale in North American stores yesterday. The new system contains a hard drive with six times the capacity of the previous model, and a new port for HDMI output.

The biggest addition to the Xbox 360 Elite is its 120 GB hard drive. That’s twice the size of the PS3’s internal capacity. The "premium" version of the Xbox 360 when it launched in 2005 carried only 20 GB of storage.

The Elite console also supports high definition multimedia interface (HDMI) output, a feature missing from previous versions of the Xbox 360.

The list price for the unit is around $480, which is $80 more than the 20 GB version. Unlike the launch of the PS3 and Wii, the Xbox 360 Elite should not be too difficult to find stocked on store shelves in the days following its debut.