Good news for Xbox 360 owners: those USB ports on the front of your console won't just be for show anymore. I mean, sure, you can do stuff such as charging your controllers with them or plugging in a wireless adapter, but you mysteriously can't do what a universal port is supposed to enable you to do. Namely: use a USB memory stick to save your files. Instead, you had to rely on Microsoft's small, overpriced memory unit. Not anymore!
From Joystiq:
Documentation obtained by Joystiq - and subsequently confirmed with two separate sources - reveals that "USB Mass Storage Device Support on Xbox 360" will soon be a reality. The document, authored by a senior software development engineer at Microsoft, states that due to "increased market penetration of high-capacity, high throughput USB mass storage devices, a 2010 Xbox 360 system update" will allow consumers to save and load game data from USB devices. The update is purportedly coming in Spring 2010.
Of course, there's a catch. The 360 won't let you just hook up another hard drive. You'll only be able to configure around 16 GB to work with your system. For more than that, you'll still be at the mercy of Microsoft's proprietary 360 hard drives, which are, frankly, a rip off.
Now if only Microsoft would stop charging an arm and a leg for its hard drives, we'd be set!