Before the Xbox 360 Slim magically appeared during E3, the 360 had a version with a hard drive (which once bore the Pro suffix) and one without (formerly known as the Arcade), which sold for $249 and $199 respectively. Since the 250 GB Slim launched, folks have been waiting for the other shoe to drop with regard to a possible Arcade Slim. VG247 linked to reports of Amazon.de listing a Xbox 360 4 GB System Bundle with a price of 148.99 Euros. No picture accompanied the listing (which has since been taken down) but €148.99 equals about $189.64 here in the US and would be in keeping for the pricing for the Arcade 360’s last incarnation. The main knock against the Arcade version was not having a hard drive. But, since the 360 firmware’s been updated to be interoperable with more common external data storage formats like USB drives, the Arcade becomes a lot more attractive.
File this one under rumors and speculation but it’d just be smart business for Microsoft to have an Xbox priced around $200 for the holiday season.
