Rumours of a souped up version of Microsoft’s Xbox 360 console have been doing the internet rounds for a wee while now. But hard evidence has apparently been found -- the fact the incredibly well informed Dean Takahashi of The Mecury News in San Jose has confirmed the existence of the Elite via his sources means it must be real. While Microsoft are themselves remaining tight-lipped we don’t imagine the announcement will be too far off given we’re smack bang in the middle of PS3 launch week. And don’t forget, the HD-DVD add-on for Xbox arrives on Thursday amongst a flurry of Xbox and Xbox LIVE related news.

You’ve gotta hand it to Microsoft, the way they’ve tackled the PS3 launch through a mix of cunningly timed product launches, guerilla marketing and internet rumoring has been quite sublime.

So just what is the Xbox 360 Elite? Well, the generally accepted feature set includes a 120GB hard drive, IPTV functionality and that all important HDMI port for high-def video and audio. It’s also black rather than white. The bigger hard drive is a no brainer, my 360’s 20GB drive is always at capacity thanks to all the stuff I download over Xbox LIVE, recently the free high-def South Park episode released on the Xbox LIVE Marketplace chewed through over a GB all by itself. The internal drive is still apparently a standard DVD drive -- a wise move on Microsofts part given the uncertainty over who'll be the winner in the burgeoning high-def format war.

Top of my wish list for the Elite Xbox 360? A quieter DVD drive, the current version is noisier than a front row seat at a space shuttle launch.

Oh, and in a correction to yesterdays story about beer, Microsoft and PS3’s, it turns out it was DB that sent the booze to Gameplanet not Microsoft. I’m guessing they saw the Microsoft stunt in the UK and thought they’d like a piece of that publicity action too.