Reports from Japan suggest that SEGA are using Xbox hardware for the second time.

SEGA's 'Lindbergh' arcade board has been rumoured to be based on Xbox 360 hardware for a few months now, but SEGA has said nothing. The secretive hardware has been seen running House of the Dead 4 at a recent beta test, and the game's high-definition display increased speculation over what was powering it.

New information from arcade distributors in Japan reveals that Lindbergh is indeed based on Xbox 360 hardware, much like Chihiro (SEGA's last arcade board) was based on Xbox hardware. If this news is accurate, the Xbox 360 would be the ideal candidate for home console ports of upcoming SEGA arcade games. While House of the Dead 4 is the only publicly shown game, SEGA showed a demo reel for upcoming projects at this year's E3. The reel included a new Virtua Fighter and Afterburner - two games that would go down well with Xbox 360 owners.

With no official word from SEGA this is still only a rumour (that dates back to July), but it can't be too long before SEGA clear things up.