OK, believe what you want. Somehow, with our vast psychic powers, me and many other followers of the gaming industry were fairly certain that both Nintendo and Microsoft would use IBM's PowerPC technology.
I don't remember very many rumors that Microsoft would use AMD processors. I mean, doesn't anybody else remember that whole fiasco with the "leaked" photos of Power Mac G5 development kits for the Xenon?
Several Xenon spec sheets have been leaked over the last year or so, and pretty much all of them showed similair specs to what was announced at GDC. Pretty much the only hardware suprise was the included 1.2MP videochat camera.
This comes from someone who is a gamer first, and a Machead second...