This is great news. I hope we see both HD consoles hit $299 during this year. If Wii reaches 50% market share and devs continue to pull more and more awsome franchises to that machine, I will truly be disapointed. Not that I hate the Wii, but it just kills me everytime I think about games that were awsome on PS2, possibly going Wii exclusive and not really moving the franchise forward. I have nightmares of MGS4 being a Wii exclusive, and having to press pause and navigate a menu every time I want my octocamo to switch or real time cutscence that don't push the bondries of want we have seen in the current generation.

Thank you MS, now Sony please fallow with a world wide price cut in the next 3 months.

If these units ARE refurbs, will they be counted twice as sales?

i.e. a sale before the refurb and a sale after?

If thats the case, how will the "real" sales numbers be known?

or will they be old unsold factory stock refitted?

Refurbs? PR disaster, thy name is Microsoft.

hmmm...I wonder if their will be a slim 360 version announced soon, cause if there is one then I may pick it up.

It will make a difference, but $50 price cuts really don't get people that excited. Hell, the 100 Euro price cut in Europe did next to nothing. The 360 is reaching market saturation in the U.S., IMO.

The 360's sales in Europe have gone up roughly 1.5x on average since the price cut.  That's hardly nothing.

If they ARE refurbs then they will be on a new motherboard/case design specifically without HDMI. So they should be reliable as its a completely new motherboard most likely and the chips very rarely break.

how did u work this 1 out the xbox sold nearly 16 million in america and the 360 has sold 11 so its no where near saturation in america + the 360 is selling much better than the xbox so its gonna sell way more than 16 mill

Looks like the price cut for the pro is confirmed to happen before E3:

http://kotaku.com/397420/major-retailer-confirms-360-price+cut

http://www.hollywoodreporter.com/hr/content_display/technology/news/e3i3a6a726c3dd89a148e015a61f32f42f8

Microsoft will cut the price of its most popular Xbox 360 model, the 20GB Pro, by $50 to $299 in the coming weeks, game industry sources have confirmed.

Microsoft would not comment, but a major retailer, which requested anonymity, said the price move will come before the major video game trade show, E3, which runs July 15-17 in Los Angeles.

Microsoft last cut the price of the Xbox 360 Pro -- from $399 to $349 -- in August, in many ways setting the stage for the huge successful rollout of "Halo 3" the following month.

While Microsoft does not have a "Halo"-style blockbuster on the horizon this year, the company is trying to compete both with the Nintendo Wii for a family/casual gaming audience, while also fending off Sony's Blu-ray-equipped PlayStation 3 in the market-share battle for the more hardcore players.

David Cole, president of the market research firm DFC Intelligence, suggested a move by Microsoft had been expected, adding that he didn't think this cut would trigger an immediate spike in Xbox 360 hardware sales.

But the drop, which now positions the Xbox 360 Pro $100 less than Sony's 40GB PlayStation 3, will play a larger role during the holiday selling season, Cole said, noting, "Clearly, whenever you have a price decrease it puts pressure on the competing systems, because price is one of the major factors consumers consider when deciding which system to buy."

While Sony could be pondering its own price cut, the consumer electronics giant did note recently in an annual report that the PlayStation 3 has cost the company $3.3 billion since its late 2006 launch because of a strategic decision to sell the system for less than it costs to make.

Why only the Pro?