Besides being a gaming device, the Xbox 360 plays DVD movies and can act as a Windows Media Center Extender. Click photo for larger image.

For a guy who usually becomes enamored of the productivity features in electronics, I have to make an admission: The Xbox 360 is definitely cool. It has a modern look; it has some features that made me mutter "Wow!" under my breath; and the designers did a good job of making it fit into the emerging home entertainment/computing environment.

The graphics are sensational -- especially when you see them on a large screen high-definition television. I took some time to challenge my teenage son to some games of "Madden '06," and couldn't get over the realism, from the way the players moved to the similarities between the screen stadiums and the real things. Even the fans looked real. Of course, much of this benefit comes from the developers of the game; but my kids and I agreed that it looked more realistic than the same game on Nintendo's GameCube.

My interests, though, went beyond the games, and the Xbox 360 shines in two areas: media compatibility and connectivity.

From a media standpoint, the Xbox 360 could easily take the place of other devices in your home. It plays DVD movies as if it were a standard home DVD player; and it acts like a Windows Media Center Extender so it can play your recorded music, movies and TV shows remotely from your Windows Media Center PC. You can have your PC in one room and your TV, attached to your Xbox 360, in another room, and have full access to your library of TV shows over your network. As a Media Center Extender, Xbox performs admirably. In several weeks of use, we didn't encounter any of the network congestion errors we encountered with other extenders, and the picture was more TV-like, with less herky-jerky movement.

The connectivity features play out through Xbox Live, an Internet service that allows you to download games, demos and video trailers and play multiplayer games with other people around the world.

Even with all this going for the Xbox 360, I was surprised that my children didn't gravitate to the game system every waking hour. My son, in fact, on several occasions chose to play on his GameCube instead -- even the same Madden football game. When I asked why, he said the differences in how the game has been implemented make it more difficult to play the Xbox version. Did that really mean that he lost his competitive advantage over his Dad, who is mediocre at both? (I actually beat him once on the Xbox game, which I have never done on the GameCube version.)

From my adult view, the biggest drawbacks were the time it takes to register for some services and the requirements to include full contact information to use Xbox Live.

With an internal hard drive, compact remote control and wireless game controllers, Xbox could be a cost-effective way to buy a game for your home and reduce the clutter of lots of devices (game console, DVD player, media center extender or DVR/personal video recorder). You can find various configurations online and at retailers with prices ranging from $290 to $600.