I'd like to introduce you to Elle, a very cool gamer chick and writer who replaced me on the Xbox documentation team when I came to Xbox.com. She wrote all the stuff you see in the Xbox 360 Dashboard and the Xbox Guide along with lots of other stuff. For those of you still waiting on your Xbox 360, and those who have already made it a member of the family, you'll find this story of the OOBE intriguing ... Take it away, Elle.
— TriXie
The Out-of-Box Experience
There's a feature of Xbox 360™ that doesn't get much coverage, but it's something every new owner does. It's the out-of-box experience: the very first thing you see and do when you get your new console.
The Xbox 360 out-of-box experience (affectionately known around here as OOBE) begins the moment you see the box on the shelf. It takes you right through unpacking and setup to the first game you play. What you may not know is that you're being guided every step of the way through subtle and well-thought-out cues in packaging, hardware, and software design. If we've done our job right, you won't even notice.
Physical Packaging
The first thing you encounter with Xbox 360, whether you're looking at it on the shelf or holding it in your hand as a gift, is the cardboard box. Hopefully, our inviting design draws you in, and the print and images inform you about the console. But there are other things, too.
For instance, if you look at the flap on the side of the box, there's a curve there that picks up the curved design of the console, and makes it easier to slip your hand in to open the box. We did that for you, baby.
When you get it home and tug on that flap, a whole new world awaits. The first thing you see is the console and a quick start guide in a welcoming bag (truly, the bag welcomes you!). Things are placed in the box just so, to reveal Xbox 360 to you, to let you revel in the experience before even playing a game.
The manuals and warranty are underneath the console, not on top. That was intentional, so the first thing you see is the console. After removing the console and manuals, take a look at the bags the peripherals come in. The words mean something, the colors mean something. The designers wanted to make opening the package fun and full of discovery. They even took boxes home to play with, to make sure we got it right. Yes, they're that meticulous.
Can you guess what this bag contains?
Now, I work for the documentation team, so I would be remiss if I didn't mention the manuals. My team put a lot of effort into those manuals, and the design was carefully thought out. The manuals are the size of a game case. No more frantically trying to find the manual after it's been tossed aside; this one will fit in nicely with your game collection.
Console Design
The marketing materials, packaging, and software for Xbox 360 are based on the industrial design for the console. The concentric rings that are so prominent on the box and in marketing materials are based on the ring of light around the power button. The curve of the blades in the Xbox Dashboard mimics the curve on the sides of the console. If you hold your Xbox 360 hard drive up to your TV when the Xbox Dashboard is up, you'll notice it's the same shape as the edges of the blades. This is not an accident, folks. Everything ties together on purpose.
Setting up the console is pretty straightforward. Put the box where you want it, and hook everything up. Power, video, and network go in back; controllers and memory cards up front. If you got the Xbox 360 Component HD AV Cable, you'll notice a switch to change between standard definition and HDTV modes. It's set at standard (TV) from the factory, but if you have HDTV, flick the switch, and you're set.
You may also notice the controller ports look suspiciously like USB ports. Well, that's because they are. Wired controllers plug in there, as do supported USB flash drives and MP3 players. You can, in fact, plug a compatible USB keyboard in, so you can use it instead of the controller when entering text. Brilliant, I say.
System Setup
After you have everything hooked up, it's time to power up and go through system setup. This too was designed to be as simple as possible, to speed you on your way to actually using the system. After the console boots for the first time (gotta love that boot sequence), the system pops up the initial setup screen. Early in development, there were lots of screens to go through. We eventually pared that down so that you can get through setup in a minimum of four steps: language, gamer profile, gamer picture, done.
Language is necessary because, well, we really have to know how we're going to talk to you. You need a gamer profile to do just about anything on the console: save games, get achievements, store preferences. Create an offline profile to get playing right away, or, if you want Xbox Live®, you can recover your existing account from Xbox Live or sign up for a new account.
If you're already a member of Xbox Live, check out Create a Gamer Profile: Xbox Live Member to make sure you have all the info you need to activate your account on Xbox 360.
One really cool thing about setting up your gamer profile is your gamer picture. The console comes with 12 gamer pictures, with more on the hard drive, and even more available on Xbox Live Marketplace. Of course, if you pick a basic gamer picture in initial setup, you can always change it later.
Choose a gamer picture
The final step of system setup has four options: Family Settings, high definition settings, Xbox Dashboard, and, of course, play. The design team figured the first three were the high-profile features that you should see at some point, which is why they're there in system setup. But, since you're probably itching to play your new game, just pop a disc in and get busy.
One thing to note— if you want to go through system setup again sometime, it's available on the System blade of the Xbox Dashboard. How convenient.
Play!
That's it. You've OOBEd, and now your system is ready. May all that hard work by the Xbox product team make your very first experience with the Xbox 360 as effortless and pleasurable as possible. Now, go play some games!
Article by Elle
