Well, from what's been said so far, that standby power consumption will allow the updating- at least allow it to begin. It's unclear but seems reasonable that that is just the XB1's "waiting for instructions" state. Probably uses more power as it wakes up a bit more fully to actually download and install updates. The HDMI passthrough question is very interesting though. No confirmation on that that I've seen. I'd bet that at .5 watts it will NOT allow the HDMI passthrough but again requires waking to a bit higher power level.
I think people need to understand that MS is NOT going to lower the price from $499 any time soon and certainly not befor launch. Not a chance. MAYBE if they were literally seeing almost no pre-orders. However, we all know that the hard core fans who want an Xbox are going to buy one, so MS has no reason to lower the price that early. They'll sell a good number just to the early adopters. We'll have to see how sales go after that crowd has purchased their hardware. I don't personally see MS reducing prices regardless for about a year though. They'll need to at least reduce the price a bit once Sony does their first price drop for the PS4.
