Gaming Difference between Arcade and Elite?

[ALX1982]

I'm thinking of buying an X-Box 360 but I'm confused about the difference between Arcade and Elite.

It seems that the only difference is that Elite is black and also has a 120 GB HDD. So the only essential difference seems to be that Elite has a HDD as opposed to Arcade which has 512 MB built-in memory.
What I'm wondering then is, what is the advantage of having a HDD? I mean, what can you do with it?

 

[Sefi]

You can download stuff onto the HD from games to music to movies, and install games to the HD to make many games load faster (still need disc in tray though). I would recommend buying either an Elite, or an Arcade and at least a 20GB HD. The HDs themselves are not cheap, so unless you find a cheaper used 20GB HD I would just grab the Elite and be fine on space if you want to do a fair amount of the stuff I mentioned. Space fills up faster than you think if you intend on downloading anything at all onto it, or installing a few games.

 

[ALX1982]

You can download stuff onto the HD from games to music to movies, and install games to the HD to make many games load faster (still need disc in tray though). I would recommend buying either an Elite, or an Arcade and at least a 20GB HD. The HDs themselves are not cheap, so unless you find a cheaper used 20GB HD I would just grab the Elite and be fine on space if you want to do a fair amount of the stuff I mentioned. Space fills up faster than you think if you intend on downloading anything at all onto it, or installing a few games.

Do games load a lot faster when installed?
Can you connect your PC and put stuff on the HDD from there? If so, can the 360 play divx movies?
Also, do you happen to know if the unit has a sleep mode? I mean, like if I'm watching a movie and I want the unit to turn itself off on a set timer.

 

[Sefi]

Games usually load noticibly faster. When you play a game that has lots of loading screens from changing areas such as Fallout 3 (my favorite 360 game by far), you will notice a big difference. I should also mention that installing games to your HD will effectively prolong your DVD drive's life since it will only be used when you first start the game for a few seconds. You can network your 360 to your PC to stream movie and music files. Divx does work, you can even play avi files from a usb stick put right into the front of the 360. All you have to do is install a small required video update on your 360, which it will prompt you about the first time you try to play a divx movie file. And as far as a sleep mode, the only one I know of is that you can set your 360 to turn off if it's inactive for 6 hours... so ya not that great of a sleep timer but it's something.

Oh, forgot to mention. If you like downloadable content for games you will NEED some kind of HD, the onboard memory on the Arcade is not enough at all. And if you even never go online, there are game packs out there that have downloadable content on a disc that will install onto your HD from that rather than buying it online and downloading it. Fallout 3 Game of the Year Edition is a good example, it has the game on one disc and all of the expansions on the other. You pop the second disc in and you can install whichever of the expansions you want, and then you don't need to use that disc again unless you want to install something again later.

And lastly, there's also free game updates that take up space on your HD. Left 4 Dead and Burnout Paradise had some nice free updates, but if you want them you of course need that HD.

 

[ALX1982]

Games usually load noticibly faster. When you play a game that has lots of loading screens from changing areas such as Fallout 3 (my favorite 360 game by far), you will notice a big difference. I should also mention that installing games to your HD will effectively prolong your DVD drive's life since it will only be used when you first start the game for a few seconds. You can network your 360 to your PC to stream movie and music files. Divx does work, you can even play avi files from a usb stick put right into the front of the 360. All you have to do is install a small required video update on your 360, which it will prompt you about the first time you try to play a divx movie file. And as far as a sleep mode, the only one I know of is that you can set your 360 to turn off if it's inactive for 6 hours... so ya not that great of a sleep timer but it's something.

Oh, forgot to mention. If you like downloadable content for games you will NEED some kind of HD, the onboard memory on the Arcade is not enough at all. And if you even never go online, there are game packs out there that have downloadable content on a disc that will install onto your HD from that rather than buying it online and downloading it. Fallout 3 Game of the Year Edition is a good example, it has the game on one disc and all of the expansions on the other. You pop the second disc in and you can install whichever of the expansions you want, and then you don't need to use that disc again unless you want to install something again later.

And lastly, there's also free game updates that take up space on your HD. Left 4 Dead and Burnout Paradise had some nice free updates, but if you want them you of course need that HD.

Thanks a lot for all the info! I guess it'll be an Elite if I get an XBOX 360. I have a Wii now but I wanna play some games that have come out on XBOX and not on Wii. Like Banjo-Kazooie Nuts and Bolts, Tekken 6, Halo 3 etc.
I plan to get the iXtreme so I don't know if I'll use XBOX Live.