Xbox

The Xbox is a home video game console developed and marketed by Microsoft. It was released on November 15, 2001, in North America, followed by Australia, Europe, and Japan in 2002. It was the first major American-produced console since the Atari Jaguar in 1993, and as a sixth-generation console, competed with Sony's PlayStation 2 and Nintendo's GameCube.

Microsoft began developing the Xbox in response to the impending launch of the PlayStation 2, which Microsoft CEO Bill Gates saw as threatening the Windows PC business due to its support for CD-ROM and DVD playback. Whereas most previous game consoles used specially designed hardware, the Xbox was built around standard PC components. Its hardware includes an Intel Pentium III CPU and an Nvidia GeForce 3-based GPU, while the software uses variations of Windows and DirectX. The Xbox was the first console to feature a built-in hard disk. The Xbox supports broadband connectivity to the internet via an integrated Ethernet port; Microsoft launched Xbox Live, a fee-based online gaming service, in 2002.