Alright, they made it smaller. The new xbox may run into some new problems though, such as forgeted up buttons now that there are no physical buttons on the case. Really, I compare it to the PS3 slim because they're direct competitors, so what if this one has whatever improvements, really it's just like the PS3 Slim and I don't give a stuff if it's not slimmer so stop crying about it.
I'm saying it's not a slim, in that a slim was essentially a complete downgrade for a smaller size, whereas this was an update of the hardware. I understand they're competitors, but calling it a "Xbox Slim" doesn't make sense, at all.
Also, a lot of new products don't use physical buttons in favor of those touch-sensitive ones, and I've never really heard of any issues, although I really don't like it. Like you said, that might become a big issue.