Set Up Your New Console Before Christmas, Advises Xbox Exec

We tend to hear this advice every year, and it's back again in force ahead of the Christmas period, as Xbox's Major Nelson has advised setting up a new Xbox console before Christmas Day — even if you're giving it as a gift.

The reason, of course, is to ensure the recipient can avoid spending the entirety of their day performing installations and waiting for downloads and updates to finish, and instead can spend more time actually playing some games.

Major Nelson went on to highlight that if you're an Xbox Game Pass Ultimate subscriber, you can also save time on the day by playing games directly via the cloud, which means you can stream them rather than waiting to download them.

Another benefit of not waiting until the 25th is that the servers will likely be very busy on the day itself, so there's a chance you may suffer reduced download speeds as a result. Get ready now, and that shouldn't be an issue!

The only downside to all of this is that the recipient may actually enjoy the fresh unboxing experience, as pointed out by various commenters on Twitter. Ultimately, the decision is up to you!

Do you recommend doing this as well, or would you wait it out? Let us know down in the comments below.