GamePro gets 360 Debug kit (power supply?)

[jvd]

The mental image was just funny when I read that.

its true though , i have a hurnitated l5 disc . I remember my friends and i were going to drive down to florida and the day before we left i bent down and picked up my underwear after a shower and boom there went my back. Now this thing looks much heavier than a pair of underwear . That was a fun time though going to all the theme parks full of pain killers and epcot esp driving the motorized wheel chair around as i got drunker and drunker through out the little countrys and all thier liquer .

God when i was little i hated epcot but now i can't wiat to go back (hopefully i can walk this time )

 

[mckmas8808]

Oh my bad jvd. Didn't know you were serious.

 

[jvd]

Oh my bad jvd. Didn't know you were serious.

na its okay i was half joking but half serious haha .

But yea the mental image of me behind my home entertainment unit yelling help me i've fallen and i can't get up is pretty damn funny .

That is why i got that little necklace thing where i press a button and people come and help me !

 

[Shifty Geezer]

Why is there so much discussion about the size of this PSU? Who cares!

I think it's a design things that affects people's perception. Small, slim and shiny are wht constitutes hi-tech looking at the moment. A large lump of a PSU stands out from the rest of the system. Of course it's nothing of concern but it does impact that first-impression zone. "Wow, look at this console. That's pretty sleek. And these controllers looks great. I met get some of those interchangeable faceplates and ... what the hell is this?! Man alive, that's enormous!"

If MS could avoid this oversized PSU it'd be better from buyer's perspective, but overall the experience of first seeingthe PSU will soon be forgotten.

BTW large doesn't necessarily mean heavy. The Amiga had a massive external PSU that weighed a ton, but a later revision kept the same casing but had super-lightweight innards. While some of the smaller A600 PSU's were heavier than the larger models. Though if that XB360 PSU is a solid lump of power coil it will weight a bit!

 

[Ty]

I'm just wondering if this is indicative of the power needed for next gen consoles? Does this mean that wattage has increased by a "decent" amount?

 

[expletive]

I think it's a design things that affects people's perception. Small, slim and shiny are wht constitutes hi-tech looking at the moment. A large lump of a PSU stands out from the rest of the system. Of course it's nothing of concern but it does impact that first-impression zone. "Wow, look at this console. That's pretty sleek. And these controllers looks great. I met get some of those interchangeable faceplates and ... what the hell is this?! Man alive, that's enormous!"

If MS could avoid this oversized PSU it'd be better from buyer's perspective, but overall the experience of first seeingthe PSU will soon be forgotten.

BTW large doesn't necessarily mean heavy. The Amiga had a massive external PSU that weighed a ton, but a later revision kept the same casing but had super-lightweight innards. While some of the smaller A600 PSU's were heavier than the larger models. Though if that XB360 PSU is a solid lump of power coil it will weight a bit!

Yes i guess i'm just surprised by how many people feel its worth arguing over whether or not these pics are real, and how this is now yet another spec with which we need to do a death match with the 360 and the ps3. Like you said it will soon be forgotten once its hanging behind your TV stand/entertainment center/wahtever.

J

 

[Shifty Geezer]

It seems a trivial argument, but at least it's something different to the recuring arguments of whether RSX or Xenos has the more pixel shader power, how much PS3 will cost and how it's software will be worse than XB360's software, and other perennial topics (like Cell doing AA) that cannot be conclusively argued but which some parties keep trying to do anyway despite having expressed their opinions on the matter a half-dozen times before and everyone already knowing where they stand on such matters!

 

[expletive]

It seems a trivial argument, but at least it's something different to the recuring arguments of whether RSX or Xenos has the more pixel shader power, how much PS3 will cost and how it's software will be worse than XB360's software, and other perennial topics (like Cell doing AA) that cannot be conclusively argued but which some parties keep trying to do anyway despite having expressed their opinions on the matter a half-dozen times before and everyone already knowing where they stand on such matters!

Ok let me try my hand in this one then:

Well at least MS is showing a real big actual power supply when all we've seen from Sony was beta power supplies!

How was that ?

J

 

[Shifty Geezer]

You learn pretty good

 

[Bad_Boy]

when all we've seen from Sony was beta power supplies!

J

I havent seen any type of psu from sony. I have just seen the power cord port on the back of the ps3, but that always had the "subject to change" print on the images.

 

[expletive]

I havent seen any type of psu from sony. I have just seen the power cord port on the back of the ps3, but that always had the "subject to change" print on the images.

It was a joke.

EDIT: On a more serious note, are there any exhaust ports on the PS3 pics? I havent seen any yet. Could it be possible to cool that electronics without an exhaust/fans? MY understanding is that even watercooled setups have some quiet fans somewhere in the pipeline...

J

 

[rendezvous]

It was a joke.

EDIT: On a more serious note, are there any exhaust ports on the PS3 pics? I havent seen any yet. Could it be possible to cool that electronics without an exhaust/fans? MY understanding is that even watercooled setups have some quiet fans somewhere in the pipeline...

J

Yes, there are several ventilation holes on the right sides of the unit displayed in the pictures. There could be some on the left side too but i haven't seen any pictures from that angle. The left side is however the side the unit is standing in upright position which would block any ventilation holes there.

 

[Sis]

I think it's a design things that affects people's perception. Small, slim and shiny are wht constitutes hi-tech looking at the moment. A large lump of a PSU stands out from the rest of the system. Of course it's nothing of concern but it does impact that first-impression zone. "Wow, look at this console. That's pretty sleek. And these controllers looks great. I met get some of those interchangeable faceplates and ... what the hell is this?! Man alive, that's enormous!"

If MS could avoid this oversized PSU it'd be better from buyer's perspective, but overall the experience of first seeingthe PSU will soon be forgotten.

I honestly can't imagine the PSU having any emotional value to the consumer at all. It gets talked about on the internets because that's what happens on the internets, but I think that the vast majority of consumers don't even think about the PSU when they plug it in. I'm not even saying they pull it out and say "whoa, that's big." Instead, they pull it out, plug it in, and never even notice it.

On a related note, anyone ever see the size of the 130w PSU for the Dell Inspiron line? Since it's a laptop, I am directly affected by this behemoth. No kidding, it adds about a couple pounds to my laptop bag.

.Sis

 

[Shifty Geezer]

I honestly can't imagine the PSU having any emotional value to the consumer at all.

Designers will tell you otherwise. Pretty much everything has an impact on the overall experience. The feel of the plastic, the shape of the connectors, and every other little experience has, by their reckoning, at least a subconscious effect. It's not something you'd necessarily pick up on when opening a package, but if you were to do a test-case study with 100 people opening an XB360 with a dinky, stylish PSU and another 100 people opening an XB360 with a huge grey lump of a PSU, and you asked them at the end to rate the XB360's design etc., those with the dinky PSU will likely rate the experience higher. But as I say it's a miniscule rating and not much worth bothering about.

Though I will say the external PSU can prove a problem if cables don't run long enough, and even then some people have their console squeezed in a little space where there's not much option to hide the PSU.

 

[expletive]

What if the 360s PSU is 2x as big as the ps3, will people think the 360 is more powerful since it needs twice as much electricity?

J

 

[randycat99]

No, it will just stand out as extreme tackiness like those cars with the 4" exhaust tips, but wouldn't break 150 hp even in dreams.

(Therein lies the relevance of my earlier inquiry, that we should attempt to tie a power rating to the brick. Once the power rating is known, it will put the size of the brick in perspective. Given the power rating, the brick may be the size one would expect, or it may be gratuitously big for some odd reason, or surprisingly small. There is no context, until we have a power rating, ultimately.)

 

[Acert93]

Designers will tell you otherwise. Pretty much everything has an impact on the overall experience. The feel of the plastic, the shape of the connectors, and every other little experience has, by their reckoning, at least a subconscious effect. It's not something you'd necessarily pick up on when opening a package, but if you were to do a test-case study with 100 people opening an XB360 with a dinky, stylish PSU and another 100 people opening an XB360 with a huge grey lump of a PSU, and you asked them at the end to rate the XB360's design etc., those with the dinky PSU will likely rate the experience higher. But as I say it's a miniscule rating and not much worth bothering about.

In MS's case they don't care because anyone opening the box has bought the product

So hide the darn thing from the eyes of all consumers UNTIL they get the thing home. Good old bait and switch! Anyhow, people buy consoles to play them. While the look of the unit itself is a small factor among some (matching an entertainment deck is important these days!), I cannot ever remember a console's power supply ever being an important factor. The N64 had a quasi external PSU, the GCN had one also. Ditto the PS2Slim. In thinking back to PS2 Slim discussions or GCN discussions I cannot think of once when someone brought up the PSU. Tens of thousands of people bought the PS2 Slim because it looked hot. I don't think they really cared (or even knew!) about the PSU.

So it may have a minor impact in the impression it gives some consumers--and may even be a make or break for hundreds of gamers--but it really is a non-issue for all practical purposes for almost all consumers. They will buy the console for the games, and maybe even how it looks. But the hideous power supply will be an unknown until they open the box. And even then it will end up tucked away behind an entertainment unit or a desk in most situations.

 

[expletive]

Ok my sense of humor just isnt translating to forum-speak well today ( i wonder if it ever did... ).

 

[expletive]

I dont think ive heard this much discussion about a power supply since the pre-release photos of the voodo 5 PC cards.

http://www.firingsquad.com/media/article_image.asp?fs_article_id=504&pic_id=3

Oddly, those never made it to market!

J

 

[randycat99]

I would like to clarify for the record that my curiosity of the whole PSU thing is not because I think it has some bearing on consumer desireability, but just a curiosity of where next gen consoles will end up in power ratings (since we've discussed vigorously in the past about heavy power consumptions in fancy chip architectures). So this is just the natural follow-up for that whole line of thought, imo.

Generally, I agree that most consumers will not care of the size, as long as it can still easily be stowed out of sight. There may be some peripheral discussions on just how large can an ext PSU go before it actually does become unacceptable in the eyes of the consumer (another topic, of course).