Xbox 360... we'll celebrate ANYTHING!

Last week Microsoft announced USB storage for the Xbox, mind you this was only 32Gb total, but USB storage nevertheless; the people rejoiced. But why? Since the release of Sony's PS3 (unless I am mistaken) they have supported FULL external USB HDDs connectivity to the system. When the two systems' storage capabilities are put head-to-head, the PS3 wins by a landslide. They offer comparably infinite storage expansion and for a MUCH cheaper price; Xbox STILL charges from $0.50 to $1.00 a Gigabyte for their proprietary system HDDs and max out at 250 Gb, whereas the PS3 allows you to use any 2.5 inch SATA HDD. With the release of the PS3 slim a few months back, Sony has been rapidly gaining speed on the market and if Microsoft intends on countering their competitor's gain, they need to make much bigger strides in their system's updates; they can't just throw their users a bone like this. As both an Xbox 360 and PS3 user, I find this update rather insulting actually. I know how the back end's of these platforms work; if you can make an update for SOME USB storage, you are more than fully capable to make it support ALL USB storage. With the seemingly endless content featured in the Xbox Live Marketplace, avid users are going to find themselves swapping out thumb drives and external HDDs like fuses in the Griswald family circuit breaker. All I'm trying to say here is that we should be happy that Microsoft is saving us SOME money in storage media, but we also shouldn't get too excited. This is a bittersweet instance where we should be a little upset too, considering what Microsoft could have just as easily offered out to its players.