Would you let a slim white box with an acute case of split personality into your living room? Microsoft has spent more than $3bn (£1.7bn) and five years of effort betting that the answer is yes. Its Xbox 360 games console, which goes on sale later this month, is much more than a toy. You could use it to display pictures of Junior's latest school sports achievement on the television screen - or hand the controls to Junior and let him mash aliens in a blaze of high-definition, surround-sound mayhem.

The very idea will make purists shudder. Convergence is the dirty word of digital technology. Who wants a gadget that does several things only moderately well? The iPod, the BlackBerry and the TiVo box are all evidence that single-purpose devices inspire the greatest passion. Making the high-tech equivalent of a Swiss Army knife has always been in Microsoft's blood. The PC is proof that, for average consumers, any product versatile enough to handle all your home's work, media and communications will end up almost as frustrating to use as it is liberating. With that heritage, potential customers are likely to approach the Xbox 360 with trepidation.