Codenamed ‘Zephyr’, Engagdet reports that a Microsoft insider claims we’ll all be seeing it very ‘soon’. While that’s not very specific, it might mean that we’ll see it during Bill Gates’ CES Keynote speech and on the show floor at CES itself, or it might mean it’ll come sometime in the next couple of months.

Whether or not the new design will feature a quieter operation and a quieter DVD drive is as yet unknown, as is the question of whether or not Microsoft will bite the bullet and install an HD DVD drive directly into the unit itself.

A 120Gb hard drive would be instantly double the size of the PS3’s 60Gb hard drive, but what would be even better still is if users could plug in their own external hard drives through the USB connectors and also save data there, or play video content that’s been transferred across.

There’s also no word on whether or not Microsoft will introduce new controllers that might feature some kind of motion sensing like the PS3 and the Wii.

Microsoft has a tough balancing act here, as they need to improve the Xbox 360 to make it an even more attractive competitor to the PS3 and the Wii, without adding new features that will allow games to be created that can’t be played on the original Xbox 360.

It’s important to remember, after all, that this is not the ‘next’ Xbox to succeed the 360. It’s just slated to be a revised version, much like Sony released the slim-line PS2, which was dramatically smaller than the much larger original PS2 console.

More news as we get it!
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Alex Zaharov-Reutt  Consoles  Games  Microsoft  Xbox