My local Wal-Mart has the XBox 360 Elite out, but is refusing to sell them, saying that the "Do Not Sell" note in their system makes it impossible for them to do so. This isn't really true as Wal-Mart stores are still letting people check out other items so marked, including those Nazi T-Shirts they've been ordered to stop selling. The checkout person even refused to let me speak to a manager, which was a bit rude, and, I'm told, against the store's policy.
One interesting tidbit: in Wal-Mart's system, Sunday is the "OK-To-Sell" date. This is still a week earlier than the official date, as confirmed by a call to our local EBGames, which said it won't even get shipments in for a week.
Anyway, we will be acquiring an XBox 360 Elite pronto this weekend and will post first impressions here on the new stuff, which includes a sexy matte black finish, HDMI, and a 120 GB hard drive. Don't miss our forthcoming gripping verdict on whether the Elite is a $480 pile of "meh" or qualitative transformation of epic Hegelian proportions.
UPDATE: Despite an exhaustive search this weekend, an XBox 360 Elite has not come into my possession. The stores in town keep giving me the run-around. Interestingly, the store manager of Wal-Mart told me that it was a matter of his career not to let me buy the box before its street date, suggesting that it simply wasn't his job's worth.
The upshot of this is that the review is, at present, as follows: "Microsoft's Xbox 360 Elite is the same as the last one, but has a HDMI cable and a bigger hard drive and wears a ninja constume."
But since we got all dressed up for the party and invited you in, here's a neat comparison of the new and old Xbox 360 motherboards over at our sister blog, Game|Life.
