If they can't sort it for consumer release, that's a much bigger issue of course. My guess (and it's just that) would be that they'll be trying to improve field of vision for the consumer release, as from the reviews I read it was the one major negative people cited.
i mean, we all saw the videos from the announcement, and the "live" demos. and that was just pure lies no matter how you want to paint them.
also even if they didn't lie, don't we need the dev kit to have the same full capabilities as the final product? would you acquire an early dev kit for some new console, only to find out that it has less ram, gpu and/or cpu than the final product? how can we actually test it fully?
But when you're developing a new category of device, that's not always possible.
For a very related example, look at the Oculus Rift approach to VR. they've been iterating on developer kits slowly improving the hardware while letting people feel out how to use that class of device.
Ultimately it'll be down to individual dev. houses whether it makes sense for them to invest at this stage, or wait till it's closer to consumer launch
I guess for MS is important to have a good portfolio of apps before the product is launched to the public. This class of unpolished dev kits are not unheard in MS world, Do you remember when the dev kits for the XBox were Apple Power Macs?
That doesn't sound like a problem. Now if it turns out it is less powerful than the final product, that would be a serious issue.