News & Rumors: Xbox One (codename Durango)

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It's a really small motherboard. GDDR5 doesn't need trace length matching, that's really helping.

This is not perfect scale, but good enough for drama. :oops:



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Stolen from the PS thread.

MS need to shrink X1 if they want to continue selling long term. Big is ugly, unpopular, expensive to ship and store. Having something cheaper and physically attractive to customers won't solve all their problems, but a fucking great coffin (plus PSU coffin) isn't going to be doing them any favours in Europe. Or Japan. And probably China. And probably lots of American kids aren't happy about trying to house an aircraft hanger in their bedroom.

They might be able to push Kinect back to USB 3 if they can power reduce (or scrap entirely for new systems, which would be a shame) and save a port, some routing and some backplate space there, but unless MS can do something about those 16 DDR3 chips they're going to be stuck with a lunker of a machine.

As a physical box (and not talking about software, which has consistently evolved for the better) the X1 needs to change.

But how do they get around the memory issue?
 
Do an all in digital ver, no kinect or blu ray drive,

Xbox 01 S

I dont use my disk drive really and for a second console people wont need a drive as they probably are loading games to usb drives for more space or are already digital only.

Package it with a digital game as usual and add discount membership code giving 10% off all digital games for a year.
 
But how do they get around the memory issue?

Only thing they can do really is follow suit with density improvements. Samsung is currently producing x32 width 8Gb chips, but they'll need to bin for higher clocks (they only list up to 1600MHz on the website).

Their product catalogue from 2012 mentions 16Gbit as well, but they would need to extend the width to x64. I've only heard of those for certain LPDDR SKUs.

Micron: http://www.micron.com/products/dram/lpdram/32Gb#/

That might be interesting as they are sampling @1866. Let's see in a few years time...
 
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Do an all in digital ver, no kinect or blu ray drive,

Why lose access to used games and ownership to save $25? Some would prefer it, but they'd be crucified online unless they continue offering two skus.

Looking at the XB1 motherboard (and add the riser card not shown, and the external PS) the bluray drive is the least of their problem. Removing the drive doesn't reduce the height because it's caused by the heatsink/fan design, it still doesn't allow stacking, and the width/length is unrelated to the bluray drive either.

The board area is only partially caused by the use of DDR3. The entire left half of the motherboard and the riser card are huge areas that could be reduced to a single chip with enough engineering... which is exactly what we see on the PS4 board.

I'm thinking maybe MS is waiting for 14/16nm to make a really big job of integration?
 
I wonder if the XB1 (or the PS4) will ever get shrink, I expect none of the IP to be implement by AMD for its own use at 14/16nm it would cost and take a lot time to do that, ultimately to save a couple of peanuts on the production cost and a bit more than peanuts in power usage. May be 20nm but I'm not convinced.
It would make more sense to redesign it altogether aiming for the more or less the same performances :8O:
They are in a situation where they need to compete on price, I wonder if they could significantly depart from the original design to cut costs. There would be some level of incompatibility (or a different SKU) but the nice thing with MSFT is that they have lot of good engineers and tools I suspect that dealing with a slightly different SKUs for Publishers would be a minimal issue, under the hood we speak about fine tuning a windows/direct x12 device.
XB 2 SOC and memory set-up
Overall use AMD newest IP: CPU, bus, GPU and proper power management .
28nm GF process.
1.5 CPU cluster.
Remove kinect related hardware (so mostly related to sound processing).
9 CUs // 16 ROPS GPU // 1 shader engine, 1 geometry processor, GCN 1.2.
latest VCE, UVD, True audio.
4 DDR4 memory controllers linked to 6GB of DR3200 ~100GB/s of Bandwidth

The idea is to significantly cut every possible corners to get the price significantly lower than the competition. I would stick to 28nm as AMD has the how too. The Soc would get significantly tinier and thus cost significantly less. DDR4 and DDR3 prices should cross soon, DDR4 consumes less power and provides the SOC with more bandwidth than the GDDR5 on both Bonaire GPUs. Up to date accelerators are a bonus. And then some magic.
The chip will overall operates at lower clock speed than Durango v1 BUT will benefit from a turbo implementation matching latest AMD designs. It will other benefit from refinement that made it in recent AMD SOC like Carrizo and Mullins.
For the GPU as much as possible calculations will be made at FP16 precision, it will also benefit from the refinements AMD introduce to its architecture since Durango design was settled over. It will be a real UMA system. Wrt memory MSFT will settle decide how much RAM the OS needs will in game, looking at lots of devices shipping with windows 2GB... I don't think it would prove much of an issue.

EDIT I wonder what I was thinking about yesterday when I wrote behind the wood instead of under the hood... :LOL:
 
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IGN Podcast unlocked number 200, and in commemoration IGN decided to invite some key pieces of the past, present and future of the Xbox.

These are true legends of the Xbox for me. :)

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http://www.ign.com/articles/2015/07...bosses-past-and-present-share-stories-secrets

Last time I checked the video wasn't online yet, but I can't wait to watch it.

This was really interesting. It is very much a celebration of the history of the Xbox, but not all PR fluff as I was afraid it might be. All three were surprisingly candid given that they weren't really being asked difficult questions, but actually volunteered details on the circumstances around some of the less-than-stellar moments of the Xbox's history during their respective eras.
 
Preview of the Summer Games sale. Nothing that really makes my toes tingle, what about the rest of you?

https://twitter.com/majornelson/status/616622571232964608
I have many of the games that I've seen in the video, but it's 70 games in total, for up to a 60% discount. There has to be something really interesting there. I am pretty excited about that.

This was really interesting. It is very much a celebration of the history of the Xbox, but not all PR fluff as I was afraid it might be. All three were surprisingly candid given that they weren't really being asked difficult questions, but actually volunteered details on the circumstances around some of the less-than-stellar moments of the Xbox's history during their respective eras.
I am going to watch it now, but thanks for the summary. This sentence of the interviewer in the article is quite revealing.

"I am incredibly proud of this episode. Honestly, it's the coolest thing I've ever gotten to do in my career. I hope you all enjoy it!"
 
It seems that nobody takes the possibility of a redesign seriously, most likely for a reason, though I wish it would have been a benefit of what appears to be a relatively thick abstraction layer between the hardware and the software.
MSFT could go to straight forward UMA machine for cost reduction and decide not to ripe the associated benefit and to "map Durango" to that new hardware. As we speak of Windows 10 + Direct x12 I don't think it would be the best way to it.

The way AMD GPU cards perform and compare, more specifically Cap Verde vs Oland comparison, actually quite interesting.
The HD 7750 (Cap Verde) is a 8CUS / 16 ROPs GPU operating at low speed 800 the (new...) r7 250 is a 6 CUS / 8 ROPs GPU operating at a higher 1GHz, memory set-up is the same. The interesting thing going by Tomshardware is that both hardware are really close both in performances within 5% or 10% depending on the resolution and also in power.
Making a parallel is really tempting. that comparison are not meant to be precise at all it just get me the the point that MSFT should allow itself a greater clock speed and it should come a lot closer to the PS4 performance. There is the bandwidth deficit though it could get mitigate by the new color compression techniques, newer bus connecting the CPU, the GPU to memory controller, if lot of calculations are moved to FP16 it will have a favorable impact on the amount of data that need to be moved, in turn it affect power usage and in turn it affect how effectively the turbo mode uses the allowed TDP. I wonder if a simpler, cheaper, UMA system could cheat its way closer to parity than the actual XB1 does by using FP16 calculation as much as possible, using newer IPs and a higher TDP.
That has strong implication on user base and early adopters though I think MSFT would pass, now mapping the actual XB1 to such hardware.
 
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Is there an actual list of the games in this sale yet? The preview video gives very little title info, and of course no pricing info.
No list for know afaik, so I think we should have to wait until July 7th. It's more than 70 games and I have like 57 or so, and I guess there are going to be great deals in there, which I need -little money, bought new small but fast functional car, my bank account is in shambles, these deals are great, plus infinitely fun indies with futuristic racing games, karts and toy cars games are coming out, among other incredible indies..., that's where I bloom-.

Xbox bosses IGN interview has been published in youtube too.


Could moderators please bring the Console Technology and Console Games direct links back? I am lazy, I dislike extra steps and that's one of the reasons the PC gaming forums fell into oblivion...
 
The latest quest on the preview dashboard is for game streaming to PC, so I tried it last night. It's a little bit odd for me, because I'm streaming to a PC that is physically right next to my XB1 and connected to the same 60 inch TV.

But, it worked flawlessly. No lag, no visual issues, no nothing. I had to actually go check my TV remote to make sure I was still displaying HDMI1 instead of HDMI3 to check that I was actually watching the PC output rather than the XB1 output.

All I had to do was plug the XB1 controller USB cable into the front port of my PC and away I went. Of course, the controller only works hardwired and not wirelessly, but besides that, it was just like gaming on the XB1. By the way, plugging the controller into the PC was just that and done. There was no loading or waiting for drivers to install after I plugged it in. It didn't pop up with a "new device detected" message or anything, just plugged in the controller via USB and it simply worked.

As far as the unfounded and baseless discussion about possible XB1 redesigns go, here's something for you to put in your pipe and smoke: In the Xbox app in W10, the way you actually select the XB1 is to click on the console icon. That icon looks exactly like the current console. If they did a major redesign of the console, they'll have to change that icon on the W10 app. And then how does that work if the new console looks differently?

Rather than a screenshot and uploading, I'll just link to this article that has enough pictures to show you. On the left of the screen, where it says "connected" it shows an icon that looks exactly like the current XB1. Any redesign would need to still have the same basic form in order to make sense.

http://www.windowscentral.com/how-stream-xbox-one-games-windows-10-preview-pcs
 
I think they should make one without the bluray drive. A digital only box, super small.
The issue with such a model is that it is set to be a lower volume SKU as digital download is not an option for lots of people in the US and elsewhere and for either technical reason or because they are still enjoy physically owning things.
It would save them a 30$ or a bit more on production cost but that is not enough right now MSFT is struggling in Europe and I relies a lot on subsidized console in the US.
 
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