This product is a great accessory but it does have some drawbacks.

The positives: It does make text messaging easier and much faster. It also allows you to update your profile faster as well.

The negatives: It causes your mike to echo if you mute it. You have to play with the connection and sometimes take off and put back on the chatpad in order to make it stop echoing. But it's not a permanent fix. So expect your mike to echo off and on. The louder your volume is on your headset, the more likely it will echo. Also, the chatpad sometimes doesn't register the buttons you press so make sure you read over what you type before you send it. The chatpad also has a tendency to break or at least have problems keeping a connection so sometimes your friends can't hear you or you can't hear them. Playing with the connections fixes this problem as well.

If you are willing to deal with the echoing mike problem, then this is worth the buy. It does get addicting and I don't think I could live without it. Even with the minor problems

This definitely makes entering in information easier, and it's especially useful if you sign onto MSN from xbox live. I bought this when I got my Xbox because it sounded pretty nice and I like it a lot. You can attach your headset to it also. It's very easy to type with this because it's just a tiny qwerty keyboard that you can use with just your thumbs.

the 360 text chat pad is probably the best addition i purchased so far that i never thought i needed til i got it and im glad i did. its not just for texting over msn messaging you can use it for anything that requires you to type in letters numbers words etc. no more moving your thumbstick around for minutes to just type in your email address and password 2 log in, you can message people over live with it and it can be used in all the video games to type in your save filing names etc...not only that its extremely light and you wont notice the difference. for the general public only white is available for now but it also comes wit a headset because the other headsets wont fit into the text pad. you actually cut down 95% of the time you used your thumbstick to type stuff in...

Alright, well i bought this about 6 months ago for $20 and it was well worth it. This messenger kit allows you to use text on pretty much anything, text messages to friends, msn, and even to add a name to those halo 3 videos. It has a backlight so if you're in the dark you can still see it. It also comes with a button that brings up your private chats and it acts as a bit of a grip for the system. It also comes included with a mic that plugs into the bottom of the messenger kit. The only problem i had with this was, 3-4 months after i had this my mic died so i can't use the messenger kit with my mic unless i either get a wireless or another mic that can plug into it. Other than that if you like to text whether it be for sending messanges, MSN, or like i said Halo 3 you can create the names/descriptions of your pics/film clips then i would get it.

Edit: I had gotten this chatpad so I could use it with FFXI on Xbox. ( Final Fantasy 11 Online requires typing ). It seems that I and anyone else who had gotten this product and uses it for FFXI have the same issue with it. It seems to have letters stick. So when typing things like what's up... I end up typing whhhhhhts up? ( it also tends to have letters not work all the time ). It gets frustrating at times but is better than not typing at all. It seems to work a lot better on the XBOX dashboard. I'm not sure why this is the case. I had thought my chatpad was defective since all the reviews were great.. so amazon so kindly sent me a free replacement and it seems to work just the same. :( But as I already said, I had encountered others on FFXI with the same issue. Maybe theres a slight compatability issue between FFXI and this chat pad? sigh... I mean I like it but it gets frustrating. Either way it's better than not typing at all.