I noticed that under the Xbox logo piece of plastic in front of the drive tray has the following words stamped on it. Prototype Microsoft REV P/N MIS 1-0051 T/N MSX-0004 Other Xboxs (including Green, Black and debug ones) don't have the words prototype on them, so can someone who has a smokey grey Japanese xbox check out the underside of their drive tray with the drive ejected?
I have a few early Xbox consoles with the words 'Prototype' stamped somewhere on their casing or parts. I will check my Smokey though as I have never noticed, but have often seen it on Debug Kits.
Had a fair few of them before now, all v1.0 mobos with thomson dvd drive, all on black units made in hungary
Fair enough, just looked on 20 other Xboxs from Europe, the US and Japan and none of them had the 'Prototype' marking on it.
The Panzer Dragoon Orta Xbox also has this Prototype stamp at the CD lid. Seems that MS never got beyond prototype status with the Xbox in Japan. ;-)
I don't think that OE was suggesting that the Smokey LE Xbox was 'standard', however let's be reasonable it's not rare considering the number of units produced. It was a 'Limited Edition', but not a particularly short run so can't really be considered as rare as all that. What OE probably meant, and as I understood it, was that having 'Prototype' stamped on it was the norm with the Smokey (and several other Xbox units), such as early Debug units and I'm afraid to say it doesn't make it any rarer or more valuable. ;-)
