Black Xbox 360 rumors abound

When the rumor mill gets a'turnin' you're bound to have a few false-starts, and it seems the new black Xbox 360 meme is no exception. The snazzy "black Xbox" seen above might look quite black and Xboxy, but we're sorry to report that it's just a developer box, plenty of which have been out since before launch for testing out pre-release games. Also, if when Microsoft does actually build a black version, we're kind of hoping they stick with that chrome drive tray from the regular 360, and maybe go with a truer black instead of this piddling smoke color. We're definitely not writing off the rumor entirely, according to some "leaked info" from Microsoft's planned X06 announcements this week, they'll be announcing Xbox 360 Black for the holidays, along with 1080p Halo3 and other fanboy pleasers. We also got a tip from somebody who claims to have a friend at GAME that says the black Xbox 360 will be a premium only color, and might even come with an integrated or bundled HD DVD drive and possibly a larger HDD. We suppose we'll know soon enough -- X06 is over tomorrow -- but that doesn't mean we can't stay busy drumming up the hype and unrealistic expectations until then.