Final Thougths About The New Xbox Experience.

New Xbox Experience

The New Xbox Experience or NXE for short was suppose to be simpler, and easier to use than the original blade interface. It works on a grid system of square's; Games, Video, Friend, etc. Sounds simple enough right , but its not and to think Microsoft was so ecstatic about how it was going to revolutionize the 360 experience. I find it more annoying and tedious than helpful. I find My 360 slowing down substantially, because it's trying to load up the new avatar based friends list. It's on a grid like I mention before you now see your friends avatar, and if their in a party you see there avatar plus the people in their party. It gives you the option to join the party or game, but I find it constantly slowing down and sometimes it stops, because its rending all the avatars. Now to go into more details about the party system. You and your friend can start a party of eight, and it works when you're playing a game. However whenever I'm in the NXE dashboard everything slows down. I can't hear who in my party. What they are saying who join or left. I find myself having to leave the party or start up a arcade game; then for some reason it works. This is what I find so baffling about the party system it works fine in till I get to the dashboard. I used baffling because the 360 is using more power when your playing a game and in a party Right shoulding it do this then, and not when I'm on the dashboard ? Then there's the feature that allows you to save a portion of your game on the hard drive so it runs faster and quieter than before, but it takes up a lot of space. So if you don't have a large hard drive this can become problematic where you find yourself constantly deleting and adding new games. Also you can now download demo's and updates with the system off. Basically if you have an active download pending you just turn the system off and its a quiet hymn in till it shuts down. Other than that I have no bad quirk to say about this feature. Finally the Quick lauch feature which works exceptionally well when it come to arcade games. You just pick the particle game you want to play, and it starts without hesitation, but when its a disc base game unless you have the disc in your 360 there no point. Nothing elan about it you get asked to put the game disc in anyway. In closing the myriad feature's I enjoy are the party system which works the majority of the time. I also like how you can download game demo and update with the system off. Save your game to the hard drive. Other than that I personal prefer the blades over the grid especially the friends list and how it force you to make a avatar. I just wish Microsoft would have giving me a choice in the matter..