Being one of those people that play the “Microsofts rat race game at signing up for the new updates before everyone else”, my review on the fall 2009 update is as followed. There really are only 4 obvious new updates to the dashboard since we’ve already received the larger update prior.

Facebook
The mother of bulkiness and redundant features. I know the whole social networking phase is still pretty popular and everyone is all over it but I do think that Microsoft spent too much time programming this section whereas they should have focused more on the Last.FM section, where it is strongly needed.

There is a new blade for each persons status, mimicing the NXE style, as you will see in the images to follow. This makes the section seem quite big. It would have been a better idea to make each blade belong to one person with their wall posts included, considering most people have 50+ friends on facebook to begin with. I assume our friends list on facebook will eventually grow since we’ll be able to find our xbox mates on there as well. Since they’ve programmed it this bulky blade way (which is aethetically, very nice), they’ve excluded one main feature; viewing a friends wall and making a wall post.

After using facebook for many years, we all know that there are many of our friends that never update their status but we still post on our wall. It seems a little ridiculous that this feature has been left out complete. We are able to view our friends profiles, their status and even their photos but no option to leave messages on their wall. I know the facebook module is a work in process but surely they could have cut down on some other section, simplified facebook a little, like they have done with twitter, and given us one of the core features.

Twitter
This has to be the addition I’m most happy with since it basically includes most of the same features you recieve when you login to twitter on your computer. I’ve loved twitter for a while and now that I’ve got it on my xbox, I couldn’t be happier! One nice addition would be to allow us to update our twitter account through the guide, instead of makin us go through the dashboard. Even if you don’t allow us to view our twitter feed, at least let us update through the guide! It’s a simple application that we could get a lot of use out of.

Last.FM
I started using Last.FM about 3 years ago and thought it was a great audio scobbler. I loved how it would record how many times I listen to certain bands/songs, especially since I’ve always been guilty of reformatting my computer a handful of times every year and itunes resets the song count. So that is all I’ve ever used it for. Nothing more.

When it comes to the suggestion of new bands/music, I most definately prefer Pandora (U.S.A based only) and their gnome system. Even though Pandora has transformed into a paid service a few months back, I still prefer it much more over Last.FM. My main reason for saying that is that their programming to recognize the bands I really enjoy through the songs I’ve favoured is a huge plus. This is what Last.fm is lacking. When I start a new station based on a band and I get to hear the actual band play only a couple of times over a period of a few hours, it makes me doubt the system. Even when I’ve favoured a few songs within the station, I still barely get to hear them and continue getting more different selections.

The next problem with the Last.FM addition is, I can’t play my set stations while I’m gaming! I don’t know what they were thinking when they didn’t program it so we could listening to music while doing other stuff on my xbox. Music is something we all have on IN THE BACKGROUND, what was Microsoft thinking when they thought we’d only be interested in listening to music throught the Last.FM screen? Though it is useful when I’m cleaning the house!

The last problem I’ve noticed is, they should give us the option to display what band & song we’re playing while other’s view our profile. They’ve included this for Netflix and we have it while we’re on our computer using MSN Messenger. It should be known that we expect this feature! And no, I have no problem letting people see that i’m listening to some more emo music!

The positive side to Last.FM is the quality of music is crisp and I’ve seldom noticed songs being jumpy. There is a small tool bar for the song being played which scrolls the band name as well. It’s a decent size and would be superb if they implemented that to be visible ontop of whatever game we choose to play, or include it within the guide.

Overall, this can turn out to be a gamers dream component if they make some more adjustments.

Zune
I’ve got the least experiance with the Zune’s full functions since I’m an iPod gal (though that’s all I’ll limit myself to purchase from Apple). Zune section has replaced the movie section completely but the best part of this is they finally have given us the option to search for movies/tv shows by typing the name, instead of making me search manually.

Even though we can download full movies for a wooping 1200 MSP (SD), I doubt I’d EVER pay that much for a movie when I’d prefer a hard copy of it on DVD and save the room on my HD for game and not add to clutter. I’m pretty sure most people will agree with me there, unless they can offer us a really good deal on downloading them instead of going to a retail store. Some movies cost 1200 MSP (SD) to rent while others you can buy for the same amount. Not sure if this is a glitch yet. There is also no option to download music in mp3 format at this time.

(Images courtesy of gearlive.com)