Core or Premium - Hard Drive or Not?

Features

This is the big one, and indeed what has been causing the most confusion. Exactly what can you do with or without the hard drive? The fact is that what features of the Xbox 360 you are able to take advantage of will depend on which package you purchase.

Xbox Live

As mentioned earlier, you will need some sort of memory storage in order to access and play on Xbox Live. This is because your gamer profile, downloadable content, game patches, trailers and Xbox Live arcade games all need to be stored somewhere. So the simple fact of the matter is that if you purchase the Core System, you will need to spend at least another $39.99 to get a 64MB memory unit. But the thing is, once you have done that, for only another $60 you could have got a whole lot more accessories, including the 20GB hard drive. And in all honesty, how much is 64MB really going to be able to store? Once you have a few trailers, and maybe some arcade games it would be interesting to see how much space is left.

What's more, how many parents are going to go out and purchase the Core System, take it home to their kids and then find out that their children are unable to access Xbox Live, and that they have to spend more money to get some sort of storage device (either the memory unit, or the hard drive). Furthermore, once they find out they could have just bought the Xbox 360 System in the first place, for the same price as the Core System and the hard drive brought seperately, but with a lot more accessories, I am guessing they will not be too happy.

So while it may seem that people are saving $100 by purchasing the Core System, in reality they are not, because in order to get even the most basic functionality out of the 360 console (ie being able to save your games), a memory unit costing a minimum of $40 will need to be purchased.

Backwards Compatibility

Firstly it is necessary to explain the basics of how Xbox games will be able to be played on your Xbox 360 - it is done through emulation. Software will be needed to emulate the hardware of the Xbox console, which "confuses" the game into thinking it is in an Xbox machine, when in reality it is in a 360, and so the game will run. The emulation software has to be stored somewhere, and the most obvious place for it is the hard drive - if you have one.

So yes, this unfortunately means that if you do not have a hard drive you will not be able to play any of your Xbox games. If you do not have the Xbox 360 System, or have not paid an additional $99.99 to get the hard drive on top of the Core system, you will not be able to play your current generation Xbox games on your Xbox 360.