Xbox ‘Arcade’ owners looking to pimp their hard drive-deficient console in order to partake of the New Xbox Experience and the myriad wonders of Xbox LIVE will soon have the option of a chunky new starter kit.

Previously announced options to get round the problem that there isn’t enough memory onboard the Arcade to support NXE included a cheapster 20gb hard drive for £12.99 or a bundle comprising the latter and a three month Xbox LIVE Gold membership for £19.99. Not bad, and 20gb is certainly up to the task of handling the 128mb avatar-tastic dashboard update when it arrives on Nov 19th. That said, with save data, movie, demo and LIVE Arcade content all vying for hard drive space, it soon be eaten up - take it from us.

Perhaps it’s with that in mind that Microsoft has just unveiled a 60gb hard drive ‘LIVE pack’ in the US. The bundle also includes a headset (very handy for Gears 2), a three-month Xbox LIVE Gold subscription and an Ethernet cable - all for $99 and bound for US retail on November 4th.

Yeah, lucky old US gamers etc. However it seems that the same pack is due for European release too - retail is already whispering about a November 21st launch and a 79 Euro (£65-ish) ERP. Confirmation please, MS UK!