Xbox One receives update to speed up downloads

Xbox One users rejoice! Download speeds have been increased to help deliver our digital downloads quite a bit quicker. Xbox announced on December 14^th that an update was pushing out to users to help increase download speeds for players. If you have a high-speed connection with 100Mbs or greater you will see up to 80% faster download speeds. If your connection falls below that you will see up to 40% faster download speeds. Background downloads should now work more resiliently towards intermittent connectivity issues.

Also rolled into this update are some fixes for controller performance, background music performance, and general performance/stability performance. It looks like this update is not limited to just the preview group and should be going out to all users. Looks to be an exciting update for just about everyone.

My Take: I have a roughly 20Mbs connection and my Xbox One is hardwired. So when I got home to download 2GB patch for Destiny I was pretty bummed to see that it was only downloading at a rate of 3Mbs. Needless to say I did not play that night. This update could not be more welcome in my household. Thanks Microsoft!

Xbox One S Controller Review

A few weeks back I finally got my hands on the Xbox One S white controller. I did an unboxing video (below) and gave some quick impressions. Now I'd like to delve a little deeper after using it for about a month's time.

There are several improvements here. The rubber on the joysticks has more grip than the original Xbox One controller. From what I read on the stats they should be more durable as well. Which is great when playing those sweaty Trials of Osiris matches in Destiny (spoiler I suck). The LB and RB buttons feel more responsive and less spongy. The textured finish they put on the handles of the controller also feels nice in the hand. Other small improvements such as the removing of the shiny plastic on the top and the new Xbox button really help make this controller look cleaner.

With that said I did notice that the range on the controller in my house is about the same as the previous model. Granted I am walking away to the sides of the Xbox when testing as I only have a small distance to go in front of the Xbox until I'm literally standing in the front yard (maybe I should try this for a video?). I should also note that the bluetooth option I used on my PC has worked really well and been easy to connect. However I haven't been able to get it to work with my Android device of choice which is a bummer.

Overall the controller just feels like a really good incremental upgrade to what, in my honest opinion, is already the best controller out there. Being that Christmas is coming up I highly suggest you pick up one. Some current sales as of this posting with Target, Best Buy, Newegg, and Amazon have these selling for $50 which is a $10 savings on the original price. But you'd better hurry some of these sales end this weekend.