Enhance Xbox One Console Cover Review

My teenage son’s bedroom is pretty much off limits. It’s full of half empty drink cans, plates growing their own food source and clothes left strewn across its entirety. But sat in one corner is his pride and joy. His Xbox One console. The console he has had from day one. The console that is used on a weekly, daily and hourly basis.

Apart from him, no-one can touch it, just in case it gets scratched or something much more dramatic happens to it.

But for all the joy that it gives him, it isn’t sitting there looking like new. Hell no. Because, like all manner of other items in his room, it is laden with dust. Thick disgusting dust.

Perhaps though I can persuade him that the Enhance console cover for Xbox One is worth a little look.

The Enhance console cover for Xbox One pretty much does as the name suggests – it covers your console. Created from a breathable fabric, with mesh netted sides and back, this cover will keep your Xbox One in pristine condition. You’ll not need to worry about it getting scratched and you’ll not need to worry about getting the duster out every few days in order to give it a spring clean.

Black in colour, with a two-tone design to replicate the console beneath it, a simple black Enhance tab and small blue logo to break up the darkness, the console cover has been designed to fit your Xbox One console perfectly. Well stitched and well created, there isn’t much that can be said about it in a negative fashion.

Except for maybe the overall point of the product. Because you see, this cover must only be used when the console is off.

And that is exactly where the problem with the whole concept lays.

Xbox One was designed by the team at Microsoft to be this super sexy, always switched on machine that is utilised for gaming, TV and music purposes. Seeing as many Xbox One owners use their console with those ideas in mind, the vast majority of machines will hardly ever be switched off. If you take the numerous consoles found in my house as an example, they can quite easily be left on for 18 hours a day, whether that be because they are being used for TV watching, Spotify listening or whilst I partake in the odd game or two. Which in turn renders the Enhance cover pretty pointless. At least in my eyes.

Yes, you can give me the fact that there will be a few owners who only switch their machine on for a few minutes every week or so, and in that case this cover is perfect for keeping it looking pristine. But the need to remove it every time the console is switched on renders it more trouble than it is worth – at least to hardcore gamers.

I’ll again grant you that the console cover is super easy to fit, has well placed cutouts for all rear mounted ports and can be installed and removed in a matter of seconds. But without a cutout allowing for the left-side mounted USB port – c’mon guys, how has that one been missed? – would mean at least one cable or stick needs removing before the cover can be placed. It also only fits the original first generation Xbox One console and with many gamers now having upgraded to Xbox One S, or are left holding out for the smaller, more powerful, beast of a machine known as Xbox One X, then the market is severely limited.

Most importantly though, at the end of the day, I quite like the look of my console and know for a fact that my son adores how his looks – even with all the dust. Placing a cover over the top of it, albeit a tight fitting cover that has been well created, massively ruins the look of the machine.

A good duster and quick spray of polish has never done any harm to any of my consoles over the years, and for all the good intentions of the Enhance cover, that is exactly how my systems will continue to stay dust free.

As for my son’s console? Well, perhaps when the dust reaches a couple of inches in depth he’ll take it upon himself to give it a little clean. Or perhaps not.