The ability to constantly reinvent how a console works and the functionality it offers has undoubtedly been one of the greatest innovations of the current generation of machines – and now Microsoft has for the first time started talking about its next significant Xbox 360 update.

VG247 reports that in his latest podcast, Xbox 360 evangelist Larry ‘Major Nelson’ Hryb promises that the next 360 update will be mainly focused on improved technical performance:

“We are making the guide faster. The team has done some really good stuff around making performance enhancements. However, ‘performance enhancements’ doesn’t sound right because it sounds like we’re going to give the guide a little blue pill, and we’re not doing that.

“Whatever we call it (and it’s not going to be called the new NXE), but whatever the next version of the dashboard is called, it’s better with a lot of very cool new features. That update will be out later this year.”

Microsoft’s 2008 release of what it called the New Xbox Experience was dubbed the most significant hardware OS reinvention in the history of consumer electronics, completely restructuring the way the console presented its content.

Whilst Sony has kept the PS3’s OS fundamentally the same, many significant new features have been rolled out to internet-enabled consoles since the machine first appeared. Even Nintendo nowadays regularly tweaks the OS of its Wii and the new DSi, though its changes have been less pronounced.