Actually the Xbox is a direct decendant of the DC

MS and Sega had a falling out of sorts.
I am fuzzy on the details but DC and PC games were supposed to be extremely easy to port from one to the other.
I am pretty sure many of the original Team Xbox members also worked on a team for the DC.
Good to hear your finally moving up though

Always fun to try no systems even if it is just to find out that you hate them.
As for the shitty graphics on the PS2 games it really depends on who made the game and how recent it is.
Earlier releases for PS2 were pretty lame.
Crash Bandicoot Wrath of cortex had like 2 minute loading screens before every level :-/
Longer than it took to play a bunch of the levels :-/