Microsoft Xbox 360 Hardware Specs

It holds its own against other seventh generation consoles

by
Eric Qualls
Writer
Former Lifewire writer Eric Qualls has been covering the Xbox line of consoles and Xbox games since August 2004.
our editorial process
Eric Qualls
Updated on February 19, 2020
Microsoft Xbox 360 Game Hardware, Xbox console, controller

cveltri / Getty Images 

Some aspects of the Xbox 360 have changed since its launch in 2005, such as the addition of an HDMI port, built-in Wi-Fi, support for 1080p, and two total redesigns of the system—the Slim system and later the "E"—but the core of the hardware hasn't changed much. It's impressive that an initially underpowered system (compared to its main competitor the PS3) pumped out good-looking games and had an impact on the industry with its emphasis on digital media distribution and online gameplay.

Xbox 360 Hardware Specifications

Here are the full hardware specifications for the Xbox 360 video game console.

Custom IBM Power PC-Based CPU

  • Three symmetrical cores running at 3.2 GHz each
  • Two hardware threads per core, six hardware threads total
  • VMX-128 vector unit per core, three total
  • 128 VMX-128 registers per hardware thread
  • 1MB L2 cache

CPU Game Math Performance

  • 9.6 billion dot product operations per second

Custom ATI Graphics Processor

  • 500 MHz processor
  • 10MB of embedded DRAM
  • 48-way parallel floating-point dynamically scheduled shader pipelines
  • Unified shader architecture

Polygon Performance

  • 500 million triangles per second

Pixel Fill Rate

  • 16 giga-samples per second fill rate using 4x MSAA

Shader Performance

  • 48 billion shader operations per second

Memory

  • 512MB of GDDR3 RAM
  • 700 MHz of DDR
  • Unified memory architecture

Memory Bandwidth

  • 22.4 GB/s memory interface bus bandwidth
  • 256 GB/s memory bandwidth to EDRAM
  • 21.6 GB/s front-side bus

Overall System Floating-Point Performance

  • 1 teraflop

Storage

  • Detachable 20GB hard drive upgradeable to 2TB (Terabytes) 
  • 12x dual-layer DVD-ROM
  • Memory Unit support starting at 64MB

I/O

  • Support for up to four wireless game controllers
  • Three USB 2.0 ports
  • Two memory unit slots

Optimized for Online

Multiplayer capability and free games require an optional Gold membership.

  • Built-in Ethernet port
  • Wi-Fi ready: 802.11a, 802.11b, 802.11g, and 802.11n
  • Video camera ready

Digital Media Support

  • Support for DVD-Video, DVD-ROM, DVD-R/RW, DVD+R/RW, CD-DA, CD-ROM, CD-R, CD-RW, WMA CD, MP3 CD, and JPEG Photo CD
  • Ability to stream media from portable music devices, digital cameras, and Windows PCs
  • Ability to rip music to the Xbox 360 hard drive
  • Custom playlists in every game
  • Built-in Media Center Extender for Windows XP Media Center Edition 2005
  • Interactive, full-screen 3D visualizers

High-Definition Game Support

  • All games supported at 16:9, 720p, 1280 x 720 pixels, 1080i, anti-aliasing, and upscale on 1080p TVs
  • Standard-definition and high-definition video output supported

Audio

  • Multichannel surround sound output
  • Supports 48 kHz 16-bit audio
  • 320 independent decompression channels
  • 32-bit audio processing
  • Over 256 audio channels

System Orientation

  • Stands vertically or horizontally

Customizable Face Plates

  • Interchangeable to personalize the console