This is the first time that I've seen a date placed on the lifecycle of the 360:

http://www.eurogamer.net/articles/e3-natal-not-derived-from-3dv

Microsoft's Shane Kim has said that the systems making up Project Natal have been in development "for a long time", and distanced the full-body motion-sensing camera from the company's acquisition of 3DV Systems.

Following the announcement at the platform holder's E3 conference on Monday, many assumed that Natal's technology and 3DV's (seen in late 2007 prior to the company's acquisition) were one and the same, but Kim told VentureBeat, "At Microsoft Research, we have had a lot of working going on for a long time."

His colleague Aaron Greenberg was even more direct. Asked whether Natal was derived from 3DV technology, he told Eurogamer: "No, we built this in house."

"None of those rumours did justice to what we were actually doing with Project Natal. People expected a controller you put in your hands," Kim said to VentureBeat. "We have done a lot of work in natural user interfaces. Voice recognition is one of them. That's why we have been able to deliver development kits for it this week."

Microsoft hasn't gone it completely alone though, as Kim admitted "it's a combination of partners and our own software", and some have theorised that acquisitions like 3DV's were designed to insure the company against similar patents. "You have to be very aware," Kim said. "We want to ensure that we have great intellectual property protection. You have to have a strong legal approach, and this is not easy stuff. It has to be all buttoned up, legally. We have had a very concerted focus on this."

Elsewhere in the interview, Kim implied that Natal was as good as a new console anyway. "We firmly believe that the Xbox 360 has a life cycle through 2015," he said when asked about future plans for Xbox.

In Heruamon's humble opinions:

I think we are going to hear about a more powerful 360 console next year, at the latest.  I've been saying this for a while...M$ is an iterative company...they exccel at it, and it makes good business sense.  Call it the 360 +, if you will.  They will ensure they don't alienate current Xbox 360 owners with a update console, but looking at the Nintendo family of Handhelds, you get the perfect model.  I think this new console will highlight 2010, since it will mark the halfway point to the 360's lifecycle. 

- 45nm chipset for reduce power consumption, heat generation, cost

- Updated DVD drive for more noise reduction

- A new HDD system to copy the PS3( Which I find to be the best feature of the PS3)

- Maybe wireless adapter, sicne all the others have it

- SD card slot, and this might be offered, rather than the buffet-style HDD system

- More internal memory for better performance of games

The key will be that these will all be offered at the same price as today, because of efficiencies in manufacturing, and because M$ will be able to leverage the fact the 2015 is the close-out date for manufacturing of these consoles.  Chances are, we will see the new Xbox console in 2013-2014 timeframe.

In other news, Microsoft intends to skip the next generation and focus on the following generation.

When do you see the next consoles coming out?

that would be cool, i hope it has a hdd swap feature like the ps3.

I'm excited!

..........Yea, I doubt that.

The next gen will start 2012 the latest.

I don't think M$ has any intent of making NATAL the only option for games...that would be suicide.  The better bet to have the option of classic play or hybrid-NATAL play.

I think this was where both Sony and Microsoft were headed with their motion controllers, I mean, If Microsoft took the conventional lifecycle with the 360, Natal would be out for a matter of months before the NextBox would be announced or rumoured at least. This way they make the 360 last 1 and a half generations because clearly Nintendo is showing no signs of backing off while Sony is pretty much golden as its PS3 doesn't have any weaknesses going into the future like 360's lack of storage space on DVD's and Wi-Fi (which can be implemented anyway).

ZOMG, ten year plan!

I hope there is no next generation of "consoles", but something else.. more revolutionary