News & Rumors: Xbox One (codename Durango)

[Silent_Buddha]

MS is always yammering about forward compatibility so ...

Forward compatibility is the same as backwards compatibility. For example, almost every program designed to run on Windows XP is forwards compatible with Windows 8. There are obviously corner cases which don't work, but by and large that's the case.

Basically forward compatibility means you are designing the console with regards to keeping backwards compatibility in mind for future hardware. Using a relatively standard x86 CPU and PC GPU architechture means that's going to be extremely easy. It also means that for future generations of Xbox, Microsoft isn't expecting to deviate from x86 + PC GPU.

It does not mean putting in features (in games for example) that are useless for the current hardware and only become useful when future hardware comes out.

Regards,
SB

 

[Silent_Buddha]

I wonder how critical the idea of an HDMI input could be? For casual gamers it may be appealing if they never have to pick up the remote to change channel to access content, especially if they improve the Kinect interface substantially at the same time. They can reduce the barriers to using the console by having it always available at a moments notice, it'd be quite interesting for instance if you're watching say the 6PM news and then without picking up the remote give your friend a call with Skype. In my setup I have a 7.1 Amplifier so if I put the Xbox inline with that then the Xbox will always be available, even if I was gaming on the PS4 or HTPC at that point in time. Could this be the killer feature?

It's amusing to think that it could be possible to Stream PS4 games (video stream) through Durango.

Regards,
SB

 

[Gubbi]

Not all cable providers are that far along in the roadmap there, but they all have STBs with HDMI out, so thats where the HDMI in comes into play. Its basically 'legacy' support for where we will be in 5 years from now, but also making it easy now for consumers to slowly migrate to the xbox platform for all their entertainment needs.

It meshes well with the low power design of Durango. When not playing games, the box is unlikely to use more than 10-15W, - perfectly acceptable for a TV box.

As you say, the HDMI-in would serve as compatibility fallback. I'd like to see DVB-C/T2 decoding built in (chips are less than $8), or as a cheap addon. A couple of decoding card slots would be nice too.

Durango might not be cheap enough to replace cable companies' STBs from launch, but a year or two down the line, I could see MS gang up with cable companies to push XBox next into every home with cable TV.

Cheers

 

[ramr]

Forward compatibility is the same as backwards compatibility. For example, almost every program designed to run on Windows XP is forwards compatible with Windows 8. There are obviously corner cases which don't work, but by and large that's the case.

Basically forward compatibility means you are designing the console with regards to keeping backwards compatibility in mind for future hardware. Using a relatively standard x86 CPU and PC GPU architechture means that's going to be extremely easy. It also means that for future generations of Xbox, Microsoft isn't expecting to deviate from x86 + PC GPU.

It does not mean putting in features (in games for example) that are useless for the current hardware and only become useful when future hardware comes out.

Regards,
SB

I have also heard them speak of it in terms of scaling. Should be fairly simple to enhance IQ and up texture resolution given that assets are generated at high quality then scaled down.

 

[Xovek]

Hey,
Does anyone remember if durango´s system power spec was included in the VGLeaks?
Greeting!

 

[expletive]

It meshes well with the low power design of Durango. When not playing games, the box is unlikely to use more than 10-15W, - perfectly acceptable for a TV box.

As you say, the HDMI-in would serve as compatibility fallback. I'd like to see DVB-C/T2 decoding built in (chips are less than $8), or as a cheap addon. A couple of decoding card slots would be nice too.

Durango might not be cheap enough to replace cable companies' STBs from launch, but a year or two down the line, I could see MS gang up with cable companies to push XBox next into every home with cable TV.

Cheers

I wonder if they would consider releasing the xbox 361 with an HDMI IN and some added low-power functionality but without the local DVR or ability to send video to other devices around the house. That *would* be cheap enough for MS to use an STB replacement (storage considerations aside).

I suppose its one less reason to buy a Durango but there's a case to made that MS seems more concerned about having a solution at varying price points and getting people on the platform.

 

[3dcgi]

And this is why people should leave strategy to the professionals.

That's a dumb thing to say and if it were true we might as well shut down most internet forums. You might be a capable "strategy professional", but I've seen smart professionals make dumb decisions. No one should be comfortable in their ivory tower and discount the opinions of others based on status.

I'm a professional computer engineer, but that doesn't mean I can't learn from non-professionals or professionals in tangential fields. Learning and inspiration are why I've been visiting Beyond3D for over 10 years.

 

[Gubbi]

That is a full-blown ecosystem designed for domination of the home entertainment market with massive synergy across components.

What synergy ? Synergy usually implies cost and time-to-market advantages. For that to happen you need your platforms to be as similar as possible wrt. capability, - while varying capacity.

In MS' case, they'd want every platform to run WinRT. I'd revise your 5 SKUs down to two:
WinRT enabled STB, pushed through cable providers.
Durango.

I don't see a lot of investment going into new models of the 360, MS will just enjoy the tail end revenue.

Tablet ? MS already have the Surface RT.

Gaming server? A hot, expensive and underutilized box in your home ? Don't think so. Dad wants to play while Sonny is playing ? Get two Durangos.

Cheers

 

[expletive]

And this is why people should leave strategy to the professionals. Have you never heard of market segmentation? That is a full-blown ecosystem designed for domination of the home entertainment market with massive synergy across components.

Is that the reality? probably not, but it does unify the various rumors that have some legs behind them into a rational plan to take the home market.

Regardless if MS could technically create valid synergy across ALL these devices, the messaging on how these devices work together would be very confusing for consumers. I do believe they will have a 3-tier strategy with $99, $199, $399 price-points (with features of the higher SKUs building on the lower ones). However, I think they learned their lesson trying to push media center servers for years, people aren't interested.

WIth surface, i think the term will be their 'smart-glass' technology and it wont just be on surface tablets. Unfortunately they cant use their tablet market share as a lever for Durango sales because it is non-existent. They'll need to do it the other way which amounts to "works on all tablets but added feature(s) on surface tablets."

 

[ramr]

What synergy ? Synergy usually implies cost and time-to-market advantages. For that to happen you need your platforms to be as similar as possible wrt. capability, - while varying capacity.

In MS' case, they'd want every platform to run WinRT. I'd revise your 5 SKUs down to two:
WinRT enabled STB, pushed through cable providers.
Durango.

I don't see a lot of investment going into new models of the 360, MS will just enjoy the tail end revenue.

Tablet ? MS already have the Surface RT.

Gaming server? A hot, expensive and underutilized box in your home ? Don't think so. Dad wants to play while Sonny is playing ? Get two Durangos.

Cheers

The xbox surface piece is derived from the various rumors floating about, which some pretty serious journalist seem to believe are real. This is a gaming and media consumption device that allows streaming play of durango games and entertainment.
Think $199 or less, not $499. This is a hardware version of smart-glass whose primary function is gaming.

You are obviously thinking about manufacturing synergy, which is nice but not the point. Of course, they are all running some flavor of Win 8/9. The synergy is around all LIVE all the time. Every screen that you own is LIVE-enabled. It is all about controlling then entire home ecosystem. Illumina room and Fortaleza play into this as well. The hypothetical server is a 14 device that provides 2-3x the raw power of of orbis and 3-4x the performance. In that price envelope, you could have 2 TB/s of memory bandwidth through 16 GB stacked DDR4 @ 128 GB/s per 1 GB module and 4-5 teraflops GPU.

Is that likely no as it is probably too risky and big company have a hard time taking massively positive NPV projects that that level of risk. That doesn't change the fact that it is still a superior strategy. Obviously, I enjoy all of this speculation, and currently I have a hard time reconciling what we know and the existing rumors to MS' goal of home domination. Durango as currently configured in the leaks is an odd duck.

 

[Gubbi]

The xbox surface piece is derived from the various rumors floating about, which some pretty serious journalist seem to believe are real. This is a gaming and media consumption device that allows streaming play of durango games and entertainment.
Think $199 or less, not $499. This is a hardware version of smart-glass whose primary function is gaming.

Why would you need a specific hardware device for what appears to be a generic Smartglass enabled device?

You are obviously thinking about manufacturing synergy, which is nice but not the point.

No, I'm thinking about software development synergies. How can developers easily target and deploy a game franchise across differently performing SKUs ?

The hypothetical server is a 14 device that provides 2-3x the raw power of of orbis and 3-4x the performance. In that price envelope, you could have 2 TB/s of memory bandwidth through 16 GB stacked DDR4 @ 128 GB/s per 1 GB module and 4-5 teraflops GPU.

Won't happen. Too few will be sold to get developers to bother targeting games for it.

That doesn't change the fact that it is still a superior strategy.

How can it be a fact that it is a superior strategy, when it is likely to fail ?

Cheers

 

[Squilliam]

...Why? Don't see the point really TBH. Are we now at such a point in degeneration of western culture that it's truly seen as a burden to merely pick up the remote control to switch TV input? Please. Tell me it isn't so.

The burden is there for people who have husbands with complicated AV setups which the wife is confused about, people who are physically big, people who watch TV in the background who don't have the remote on them and people who want to access services without going through a bunch of menus. Skype isn't relevant as a calling option unless it is available as much as possible. I can see a cool use case where people gather around the TV and chat with Skype to distant family.

What is the idea?

TVBOX --> Reciever --> 720 --> Display

Adding the 720 there would introduce some challenges with audio sync afaik unless there is a way to do double Lip Sync.

TVBOX --> 720 --> Reciever --> Display

Would be a cool feature since it could show the TV signal in PiP but i am not sure it would be a killer feature. What is you suggestion?

I would imagine a HDMI input would be a really fast video input if you needed to analyze a high quality video speed. It's Microsoft they may have thought up something completely new..

My receiver has independent optical input channels so I was going to pipe the sound from the Xbox backwards through to the receiver using optical. It's a little more complicated but it is as good as the other options. I figure it won't add too much latency in any case.

This is the kind of thing I'm expecting and yes, I'd say that would be a very killer feature. In fact it's things like that which I'm looking forward to more than the hardcore gaming aspects of the console.

It's really a question of how it gets used. Microsoft obviously understands that if the Xbox is not on the same input as the display when the TV is on then it is 300% harder to sell movies/games/services to people than if the input was on the same plane. Do they intend to make the Xbox next into a cable box all to itself? In some countries with fibre optic roll outs that will be a very interesting development in I.P.T.V. as a lot of countries, mine included are going all out with 100Mb connections.

 

[AlphaWolf]

How can it be a fact that it is a superior strategy, when it is likely to fail ?

Cheers

Highly unlikely it will fail.

Mostly because it will never happen.

 

[ramr]

Why would you need a specific hardware device for what appears to be a generic Smartglass enabled device?


No, I'm thinking about software development synergies. How can developers easily target and deploy a game franchise across differently performing SKUs ?


Won't happen. Too few will be sold to get developers to bother targeting games for it.


How can it be a fact that it is a superior strategy, when it is likely to fail ?

Cheers

In order.

smartglass devices don't have full controllers

What synergy? there is only 1 version of the software.

It plays the same games as durango. plus should sell plenty as it cost reduces.

the strategy is superior if MS has the balls to go for it, which they probably don't. That is a winner take all strategy designed to crush sony and fend off google and apple.

 

[Strange]

In order.

smartglass devices don't have full controllers

What synergy? there is only 1 version of the software.

It plays the same games as durango. plus should sell plenty as it cost reduces.

the strategy is superior if MS has the balls to go for it, which they probably don't. That is a winner take all strategy designed to crush sony and fend off google and apple.

By your logic 360 disks should work perfectly with on PS3 and vice a verca.

No.

 

[ramr]

By your logic 360 disks should work perfectly with on PS3 and vice a verca.

No.

Hmm, what universe are you in? you statement makes zero sense.

 

[Strange]

Hmm, what universe are you in? you statement makes zero sense.

You don't develop one version of software for multiple consoles. Especially when you charge ~50USD each.

 

[ramr]

You don't develop one version of software for multiple consoles. Especially when you charge ~50USD each.

Sigh, please reread. Your statement has no relevance to my comments.

 

[Strange]

Sigh, please reread. Your statement has no relevance to my comments.

Your posts have been based on releasing multiple SKUs each with wildly varying hardware meanwhile you're also stating that you only need one software version.

You're also expecting a piece of hardware that is streamed games.
Dumb idea in my opinion. Much better to allow streaming to all devices through Apps.
The "only I can do this!" doesn't work very well unless you already have a significant market share and I don't think I see Microsoft dominating the tablet market with Microsoft branded tablets (which is different from having tablets that run Windows 8 OS).

And you're expecting that to crush every opposition that exists.

Not gonna happen. Microsoft is rich but not that rich.
I also do not see Microsoft becoming a HW company in the foreseeable future.
They might try to work in that direction but it's just not what they are.
Furthermore, making multiple devices to slice up the market doesn't necessarily expand the market itself. Shrinks it in some cases.


You also disregard the time and cost it takes to properly design ONE hardware and get it right.
Apple managed to get iphone and the ipad right and those two things came three full years apart and one was heavily dependent on the success of the other.

 

[dagamer]

As interesting as I find HDMI In, I actually think it'll be better suited for legacy uses because it lacks any elegant two-way control with your existing DVR. To me, that's a pretty terrible experience and the main reason why Google TV has flopped for 2 years.

If Microsoft really wants to go after the TV market, then the 720 needs to stand on its own as a DVR. My scenario would call for a separate CableCard gateway not much different from a SiliconDust HD HomeRun Prime that would take in coax then connect to your network and stream channels directly to the 720 for live TV and recording. They can leverage their Media Center technology and their existing TV guide UI that Verizon FiOS uses to build in a great DVR.

I also think that the idea of cut down Durango SKUs where parts are removed makes little sense since ideally, you'd want those people to upgrade to the full box in some fashion. Instead, this is why that $99 Xbox 360 subscription trial was so important, to gather data about how to subsidize a product. This is why Microsoft's BOM budget is so tightly controlled to hit a very likely $399 price point, so that subsidized, you get that magical $199 price (w/ 2 year contract or something) that is so alluring with cellphones that it makes the PS4 at a hypothetical starting price of $429 seem super expensive.

My *long* 2 cents.