Xbox One (Durango) Technical hardware investigation

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He comments that it's a pc. You can get blu-ray drives for pc.

Know that. But it seems odd that its not simply an external drive versus one placed inside some type of housing.

http://www.pcper.com/images/news/tfe1.jpg

Thats an amd apu reference board too. Except what looks like a harddrive is simply plugged in while the latter pics looks like it has a harddrive port.

Edit: Its a demo unit.
 
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Going with 2 APUs make no sense. Separated gpu and cpu dies would make much more sense if you want to scale up. Now you are just doubling things to be inefficient if you use 2 APUs SoCs. Communication between the 2 chips are going to be a disaster and redundant parts makes the design really inefficient in terms of die area.

Separated GPU and CPU is superior in every way to dual APUs. For the same transistor and power budget, there is no reason to go with dual APUs.
 

I could actually see Durango shipping with a Blu-Ray drive but not the Blu-Ray playback activated by default. This would be so they don't have to pay the BR license fee on every console sold. They did this withe original Xbox (the DVD remote include the purchase of an MPEG decoder license as well as DVD playback activation). They could easily accomplish this the same way with a BR remote or by allowing users to purchase a "Blu-Ray" disc player app from the video section of the app store.

Anyone know how much it costs to license blu-ray playback in a device?

EDIT, the early product 'vision' documents clearly have the BluRay disc logo shown as a supported feature.
 
Anyone know how much it costs to license blu-ray playback in a device?
$9 for a complete hardware bluray player. They would still have to pay for the hardware bluray drive, I don't know what part of that $9 is hardware versus software or codecs.
But I don't think MS would have a BR player even if it was free. (like nintendo, just using it for the games, they're not calling it a bluray drive)
 
$9 for a complete hardware bluray player. They would still have to pay for the hardware bluray drive, I don't know what part of that $9 is hardware versus software or codecs.
But I don't think MS would have a BR player even if it was free. (like nintendo, just using it for the games, they're not calling it a bluray drive)

I don't think Microsoft can build a competent entertainment box that doesn't have Blu-ray playback, especially when it's pretty clear lots of people bought a PS3 for that feature alone.
 
$9 for a complete hardware bluray player. They would still have to pay for the hardware bluray drive, I don't know what part of that $9 is hardware versus software or codecs.
But I don't think MS would have a BR player even if it was free. (like nintendo, just using it for the games, they're not calling it a bluray drive)

I dont see why they wouldn't use a BluRay player unless they felt they could make something that performs better in some useful way, or is cheaper, than the existing commoditized PC Blu-Ray drives out there.

Nintendo, otoh, has historically used proprietary formats to thwart piracy but its clear MS has other plans on how to deal with that without relying on custom physical media.

FWIW, here is one of the images in the early Xbox 720 leaks:

xbox720.jpg


Clearly, Blu-Ray playback was on the table at one point.
 
Maybe the dev kits lack a BluRay drive and its not important to include one because the entire game will be downloaded onto the console.

I can't imagine that the retail 720 won't come with a BluRay drive.
 
This may be confusion...

There are likely versions of the next Xbox that don't come with a blu-ray drive period. In the Yukon leak they do cite different form factors/feature sets...
 
Xbox TV won't have a BRD and there might be a cheaper 720 SKU without one too - so maybe they're talking about that as it is clearly BS that no next gen Xbox device will be able to play Bluray.
 
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Not being able to play blu ray movies would be a significant, and I do mean significant, negative against the next generation xbox, so I don't believe Microsoft will be foolish enough to put themselves in such a position.

It makes absolutely zero sense. A lot of people who want a next generation xbox would actually not get one on this basis alone, not because they don't feel they can do without it, but because the PS4 is likely to have this capability, and many folks, when you really boil it down, simply just want their purchase to be as close to feeling like the total package as humanely possible, and raw tech specs don't quite send the message like a huge missing feature that your competitor has would, and that regular consumers can understand in very simple terms.

That's where the real next gen fight will be had. Who is offering up the superior services and features package? The gaming aspect of the consoles are more or less also apart of the services side of the equation.
 
Kotaku's report (based on the docs superdae stole) says games cant be played off the blu-ray, they have to be installed. Given that, it is certainly possible they're giving themselves the option to remove the drive in the future or from certain skus. The devkit does have a blu-ray drive though and all signs point to the retail units having one. It would be a bit silly for an "entertainment box" to leave out blu-ray movie playback.
 
Kotaku's report (based on the docs superdae stole) says games cant be played off the blu-ray, they have to be installed. Given that, it is certainly possible they're giving themselves the option to remove the drive in the future or from certain skus. The devkit does have a blu-ray drive though and all signs point to the retail units having one. It would be a bit silly for an "entertainment box" to leave out blu-ray movie playback.

If it is indeed Microsoft's intention to only exploit the storage capabilities of a high definition disc, then they could simply go with a proprietary "Blue Laser" player with no blu-ray firmware running on it.

The user would then be responsible for their own license which Microsoft wouldn't pay for but could still make available for purchase in the LIVE marketplace.
 
If it is indeed Microsoft's intention to only exploit the storage capabilities of a high definition disc, then they could simply go with a proprietary "Blue Laser" player with no blu-ray firmware running on it.

The user would then be responsible for their own license which Microsoft wouldn't pay for but could still make available for purchase in the LIVE marketplace.

This seems the most likely route. Seriously, who uses physical media anymore (i am fairly certain I haven't used non-gaming physical media this century).
 
Not being able to play blu ray movies would be a significant, and I do mean significant, negative against the next generation xbox, so I don't believe Microsoft will be foolish enough to put themselves in such a position.

It makes absolutely zero sense. A lot of people who want a next generation xbox would actually not get one on this basis alone, not because they don't feel they can do without it, but because the PS4 is likely to have this capability, and many folks, when you really boil it down, simply just want their purchase to be as close to feeling like the total package as humanely possible, and raw tech specs don't quite send the message like a huge missing feature that your competitor has would, and that regular consumers can understand in very simple terms.

That's where the real next gen fight will be had. Who is offering up the superior services and features package? The gaming aspect of the consoles are more or less also apart of the services side of the equation.


maybe some people but I can't be the only one who is 100% digital downloads over any disc media I do not see how it would be a mistake to offer a lower end sku without BR and maybe some other minor features removed. In fact it worked for them in the past to get the cost down and hit lower price point than others, I'll wager they'll happily do it again.
 
lack of a $30 feature is going to be that big of a deal ?


Personaly if they had to stick with discs I wish they would use some type of mini bluray . At least keep the things small
 
maybe some people but I can't be the only one who is 100% digital downloads over any disc media I do not see how it would be a mistake to offer a lower end sku without BR and maybe some other minor features removed. In fact it worked for them in the past to get the cost down and hit lower price point than others, I'll wager they'll happily do it again.

The low priced sku could live with dd, let's just prey that they don't put a limit on size.

And the 360 did have a dvd drive and a failed hidef add on, so they did try.

On a related note, I think br is a 1/3 of us disc sales now? At least based on titles that are released on both Formats.
 
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