XBOX 360 Live (1 Viewer)

I signed up for the Gold Account yesterday and have no clue what to do after signing in. How do I get to download stuff or play online? Should I not have a disc in the system? Can someone direct me to an online tutorial?

You can start with a disk in the system, if you want... you would just press you XBox Guide button (Big silver one.. I think they call it the Guide button). Anyways, that pops up your personal blade over top of the game you are playing. Press "Y" to go the XBox Dashboard.
Alternatively, starting the system without a disc in takes you there, as well.

From there, you should have the blades listed, one of which is the "XBox Live" blade. (Use the bumper buttons to swap between blades) There is an option for "XBox Live Marketplace" or something to that effect... that is where you will find all the downloads.

As regards playing online, each game that has multiplayer via live should have an option in the menu somewhere for Multiplayer and then somewhere under that for XBox Live. It depends on the title. But, if your XBox Live account is linked it should pop up a message and say your account is signed in every time you start the console. So, you are instantly ready to play online just by starting up a game while connected to the internet.

Hope that helps... ?

Thanks Evan. I'll try that when I get home. Have you bought and used any Microsoft Points. I am wondering how many I should buy/start with.

No, I haven't purchased any points yet. I've downloaded plenty of trailers and game demos (the X3 trailer is pretty sweet in 720p! ), but have not purchased anything. I plan to buy some of the arcade games eventually, but have to wait till after Christmas to have some extra money. The one complaint I have on the downloads is that you cannot do anything else while the download is running. It does pick up where it left off if you leave the screen, thankfully, but is still kind of annoying.

If you see something you want to buy and don't have enough points, it will give you the option to add them at that point, if you have a credit card associated with your account. Or you can buy the prepaid points cards in retail stores.

I wasn't going to purchase any points until I got hooked with the demos of Bejeweled 2 and Zuma. So I splurged for 5000 points (there isn't any apparent discount for volume - it's $6.25 for 500 points I believe) and downloaded the full versions of each game (for exactly $10 each since 800 points = 10 bucks.)

I'm hooked! Unfortunately, how do I find time for all the great disc-based games?