Microsoft launches virtual Xbox Museum
To celebrate the 20th anniversary of the birth of Xbox, Microsoft recently launched a virtual Xbox Museum for players to visit online. Microsoft announced the Xbox at GDC 2000 on March 10, 2000. Because its design was not yet complete at that time, Bill Gates showed a concept machine shaped like an X. As Microsoft’s first game console, Xbox was first released in the United States on November 15, 2001, priced at $199. In the middle of the night of November 14, 2001, Bill Gates personally came to Times Square and handed over the first Xbox to a 20-year-old from New Jersey at midnight. Subsequently, Xbox landed in other regions of North America, Europe, Japan, South Korea, Singapore, and other regions. Microsoft replaced Sega and became one of the three major powers of game consoles.
In order to enter the game industry, the wealthy Microsoft spared no expense to subsidize the development, game production, and advertising of Xbox game consoles. The project lost more than $4 billion. In fact, before launching Xbox, Microsoft tried to acquire Nintendo, which was in trouble but was ultimately rejected by Yamauchi.
The overall size of the Xbox is 324×265×90mm, and the weight is 3.86kg. Its CPU uses Intel Pentium III processor with a frequency of 733MHz, the GPU is NVIDIA customized “X-Chip” (based on GeForce 3) with a frequency of 233MHz, equipped with 64MB of DDR memory (bandwidth is 6.4GB/s), built-in 8GB HDD; 5x speed DVD drive; support 8MB memory card; equipped with four handle ports, 10/100Mbps Ethernet connection; support MIDI+DLS and Dolby Digital 5.1 surround sound effects; support color difference component output (maximum resolution is 1920×1080).
Although the first-generation Xbox game console was not very successful, it was enough for Microsoft to stand firm and laid the foundation for Xbox 360 to compete with PlayStation 3.
