1) Installation is quick. Owners with hard drives that aren't 100% full will be able to update with no problem, but Xbox 360 Arcade fans that rely on memory cards can get in on the free 512MB card deal from Microsoft. We'd recommend you go for the 20GB hard drive for $20 if anything.

2) Avatars are neat, but need some work. They're not necessary in the sense that you've still got the option of using your old gamerpics to represent your gamertag to the rest of Xbox Live, but everyone can create a Nintendo Mii-like avatar.

3) Performance gains are found everywhere. One of the things Microsoft with the new Dashboard was lift restrictions about how much resources it could use, resulting in a much speedier and more fluid browsing experience.

4) Everything is much more usable because it's organized better. By putting in a game and going to its info screen, you can look at its achievements, all its possible downloads and access game details like whether or not it supports 1080p and co-op

5) Blades are still there if you want them. Although you're "stuck" with the new interface in the actual Dashboard, you can hit the Xbox guide button on your controller and hop around the console that way.

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The title does no justice to the video. Simply watch and enjoy.

Seems like the New Xbox Experience isn't rolling out quite as smoothly as one would have hoped. Reports are trickling in about sporadic issues accessing content via the Xbox Live Marketplace. Currently on my end, accessing anything on marketplace is running incredibly slow, erroring out at times with various numerical error codes. Just a moment ago the new Fable II theme appeared on the service with a date of 11/20 attached, only to error out when trying to access it, which is probably good seeing as breaking the laws of space and time totally voids your warranty.

We've put a shout out to Xbox Live's Larry Hyrb to see if there was any official word on the current stability of the newly relaunched service. In the meantime, how's NXE been treating you folks? Good? Bad? Ugly? Feel free to discuss among yourselves.

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Guitar Hero World Tour is getting the Xbox Live Weekend treatment come November 27th, snagging the coveted Thanksgiving spot on Microsoft's service. They're planning on making good use of the four-day weekend as well, kicking things off with an all-nighter kicking off Thanksgiving Day, lasting from sunset to sun up, targeted at those of you who can somehow stave off the sleepy effects of consuming massive amounts of dead bird. Then on Friday the obligatory play and win sweepstakes starts, running throughout the weekend with prizes ranging from 1GB memory sticks to a Samsung home theater system.

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