XBOX
This Microsoft sixth-generation
video game console was was released on November 15, 2001 in North
America, February 22, 2002 in Japan, and March 14, 2002 in Australia
and Europe and is the predecessor to the Xbox
360. It was Microsoft's first foray into the gaming console
market, and competed with Sony's PlayStation 2, Sega's Dreamcast, and
the Nintendo GameCube.
The integrated Xbox Live service allowed players to compete online.
The production of the Xbox's GPU was eased in August 2005, which
marked the end of Xbox production and the quick release of the Xbox 360
on November 22, 2005. The Xbox 360 had superior storage, audio and
video capabilities compared to the original Xbox. The Xbox was the
first to wield a hard disk drive, used primarily for storing game saves
and content downloaded from Xbox Live. This eliminated the need for
separate memory cards (although some older consoles, such as the
TurboGrafx-CD, Sega CD and Sega
Saturn had featured built-in battery backup memory prior to 2001).
An Xbox user could rip music from standard audio CDs to the hard drive,
and these songs were used for the custom soundtracks in some games.
On November 15, 2002, Microsoft launched its Xbox Live online gaming
service, allowing subscribers to play online Xbox games with other
subscribers around the world and download new content directly to the
system's hard drive. The online service works only with a broadband
Internet connection. Approximately 250,000 subscribers signed up within
two months of Xbox Live's launch. In July 2004, Microsoft announced
that Xbox Live had reached one million subscribers; in July 2005,
membership reached two million, and by July 2007 there were more than 3
million subscribers. By May 2009, the number had ballooned to 20
million current subscribers.
