News & Rumors: Xbox One (codename Durango)

[blakjedi]

Amazon lied. They just delivered my Xbox one. Happy dance.

As dlm so astutely noted there are no visible indications either on screen the controller or the box itself that tell you that the system is up and running when you first boot. I thought the system hung, but you have to just wait for literally a minute before it asks you to pick up your controller and press the xb button. At that point the xb logo glows in all white and the system begins its operations.


I just finished downloading the updates and am doing my install and time zone setting.

 

[Scott_Arm]

UPS screwed me so I won't be seeing mine until Tuesday, most likely.

 

[Dave Baumann]

Not sure how to embed pics from Skydrive, nor if you can actually see them, but here's mine in home home theatre setup. First one just to show the width relative to a standard AV receiver size

http://sdrv.ms/17VTcFn
http://sdrv.ms/1iColoL
http://sdrv.ms/17VTHzn

Comments so far:

Thumbsticks are smaller than Xbox 360 controller thumbsticks.
Voice controls better than I'd expected so far
"Everything" is an app that needs to be downloaded (XBOX Music, Blu-ray player, etc) - I expect this to change in the future
On sound makes it clear why there is a speaker on the unit.
QR code to get day one achievement was pretty cool.

Waiting app and game downloads to happen before setting up further or playing games.

 

[blakjedi]

I live in Washington dc and use Comcast xfinity cable internet and television.

Once the main system is setup, including Kinect, all you have to say is "Xbox, watch TV."
At that point the Xbox checks all of its connections for Television and cable input. After several acknowledgement screens (I have a 46" Samsung and a digital Motorola cable box), the Xbox walks you through volume, channel and info setting for the television. then it begins to attempt to control the cable box.

Interestingly enough, some of the digital dvr controls are also controllable using Kinect. I can scroll the live programming forward or backward and will attempt to test many more of the controls in the coming days. What I do notice is that whatever channels are your favorites should be added to your favorites list post-haste. The Kinect has a much better time with voice controls if the channels are favorited.

I'm waiting on my wife to bring my reserved copy of Ryse home. More on that later.

 

[Cyan]

That's sweet, I'm guessing Forza 5 doesn't have that feature.

I didn't try Forza yet. It asked me to download an additional file weighing 6GB, but I was downloading Fifa 14 at the same time, plus some apps, etc etc, on my 6MB connection.

My ISP is going to ban me from using the internet.

UPS screwed me so I won't be seeing mine until Tuesday, most likely.

It is a pity, really. I was *lucky* -just like blackjedi- :smile2: when in fact I am generally very unlucky with these things and it was delivered the day it should be delivered, unexpectedly so....

I hope you will have it at home as soon as possible. 2 days or so isn't much before you open the box, but I understand what you mean.

Not sure how to embed pics from Skydrive, nor if you can actually see them, but here's mine in home home theatre setup. First one just to show the width relative to a standard AV receiver size

http://sdrv.ms/17VTcFn
http://sdrv.ms/1iColoL
http://sdrv.ms/17VTHzn

Comments so far:

Thumbsticks are smaller than Xbox 360 controller thumbsticks.
Voice controls better than I'd expected so far
"Everything" is an app that needs to be downloaded (XBOX Music, Blu-ray player, etc) - I expect this to change in the future
On sound makes it clear why there is a speaker on the unit.
QR code to get day one achievement was pretty cool.

Waiting app and game downloads to happen before setting up further or playing games.

Thanks for sharing the photos Dave. I thought I was missing something because I didn't have to pass the voice test like in the Kinect 1 days by saying a sequence of numbers, from 1 to 6.

I wonder how they pulled that off, because it recognises the voice commands even if people have different tones of voice without asking you to perform a test to recognise your voice in particular.

 

[Tap In]

Wow wow wow.... this thing has exceeded all of my expectations so far.

Partly because I realize this is the day one and one thing MS does is improve their services and software over time so as good as the voice has been for me (nearly perfect) The little things that are rough around the edges will get updated Im certain


So many things to love about the pass through, fast game switching, ui voice taking you where you want in an instant... Bing search, voice control in games, the controller....well done

 

[BRiT]

My entertainment center needs to be reorganized so initially I planned on waiting until tomorrow or Sunday to set up the new system, but curiosity grew. It's now hobbled together so I can try a few things out before crashing for the night. I also need to figure out how and where I want to mount the Kinect 2 sensor.

After reading all the negative reviews (real and imaginary) the initial system boot and the first boot after update had me worrying. Even though it was only a minute on the 'green screen', every second of that time I was thinking "please dont let it be hung or bricked".

I don't plan on picking up physical media for games, but I'd want to know if the console is troubled or not. I need to find a physical bluray disc to try out the drive. In the meantime I'll pull up a dvd movie to try out. It's hard finding physical media when I've been using a multimedia fileserver for years now. Though playing a movie might not indicate if the drive is a troubled one or not.

Now I'm going through the various bits and seeing how the base system experience is.

 

[blakjedi]

My entertainment center needs to be reorganized so initially I planned on waiting until tomorrow or Sunday to set up the new system, but curiosity grew. It's now hobbled together so I can try a few things out before crashing for the night. I also need to figure out how and where I want to mount the Kinect 2 sensor.

After reading all the negative reviews (real and imaginary) the initial system boot and the first boot after update had me worrying. Even though it was only a minute on the 'green screen', every second of that time I was thinking "please dont let it be hung or bricked".

I don't plan on picking up physical media for games, but I'd want to know if the console is troubled or not. I need to find a physical bluray disc to try out the drive. In the meantime I'll pull up a dvd movie to try out. It's hard finding physical media when I've been using a multimedia fileserver for years now. Though playing a movie might not indicate if the drive is a troubled one or not.

Now I'm going through the various bits and seeing how the base system experience is.

as other people have said, download all of the functional apps when possible which includes Skype, cd player and blue-ray.it takes some time but you can't do a good functional test without those.

if you don't have media remember you can download a free trial of Kinect Sports rivals, and Xbox fitness for free. you will like the Xbox one app stores setup. PS4 has a clear edge in their categorization of their store.

 

[BeyondTed]

Where Is Chipworks?!?

Where Is Chipworks?!?

We want to compare the PS4 Jaguar images to the Xbox One "Custom (AMD) Processor" and see what is added/changed.

We want to compare the HP to HPM process cross sections of the transistors.

We want to see the Xbox One CU image next to the PS4 CU. The same CU? Added stuff? Native DP or just SP/CGN?

How about that eSRAM? 8T? 6T? Which 6T? Performance? Low Power? What??? 1T??? Then what the #$%^ else makes up the rest of the 5 BILLION transistors?

Any extra hardware directly connect to the eSRAM?



Where is Chipworks? Kanata? Nepean? Maybe downtown? Gone over to Ottawa-Hull...? At the local bar? WHERE ARE THE XBOX ONE SoC IMAGES? On vacation today?

If I still lived there I would drive over and ask what the #$%^ are you people doing? (Likely drinking at this time on Friday. I guess Chipworks forgot to PRE-ORDER!!!! Or maybe their Xbox One actually works and they don't want to sacrifice it while their PS4 was DOA (Just kidding, not serious, please calm down.))



Because matching VGLEAKS would be far too boring. And if they match VGLEAKS they must fire all of SIARCH immediately.

 

[blakjedi]

My entertainment center needs to be reorganized so initially I planned on waiting until tomorrow or Sunday to set up the new system, but curiosity grew. It's now hobbled together so I can try a few things out before crashing for the night. I also need to figure out how and where I want to mount the Kinect 2 sensor.

After reading all the negative reviews (real and imaginary) the initial system boot and the first boot after update had me worrying. Even though it was only a minute on the 'green screen', every second of that time I was thinking "please dont let it be hung or bricked".

I don't plan on picking up physical media for games, but I'd want to know if the console is troubled or not. I need to find a physical bluray disc to try out the drive. In the meantime I'll pull up a dvd movie to try out. It's hard finding physical media when I've been using a multimedia fileserver for years now. Though playing a movie might not indicate if the drive is a troubled one or not.

Now I'm going through the various bits and seeing how the base system experience is.

if you ever get stuck (like on the internet explorer screen) just say "Xbox go home" or try pressing the "B" button on the joypad. "B" will always back you out of your current app (except internet explorer).

Alas Xbox one DOES NOT sync your favorites up with your other windows 8/8.1 clients. if I'm mistaken let me know.

 

[Cyan]

as other people have said, download all of the functional apps when possible which includes Skype, cd player and blue-ray.it takes some time but you can't do a good functional test without those.

if you don't have media remember you can download a free trial of Kinect Sports rivals, and Xbox fitness for free. you will like the Xbox one app stores setup. PS4 has a clear edge in their categorization of their store.

My Xbox One is downloading games -Powerstar Golf, Killer Instinct and Crimson Dragon, plus a 6GB file for Forza 5- but it is dead quiet, which I am grateful for as I am running off to bed right now.

The Xbox 360 was very noisy, regardless the model to the point I couldn't sleep if it was downloading something in the background.

In fact the internal fan of the power brick is more louder than the console itself, at least to me. This could be easily fixed in future revisions of the hardware if they wanted to.

I prefer the new controller as a whole. However the LB - RB buttons of the Xbox 360 controller are perfect as they are, for instance!

Now *going to the Dashboard* doesn't exist anymore, everything gives an all-embracing feeling and games are running all th etime along with the rest of the system. You cant leave a game, so to speak as you used to.

 

[shredenvain]

Ok I have had my Xbox one for 24 hrs now and Im in love with the quality of materials and the interface.
I got 2 games Ryse and Dead Rising 3. In my opinion what makes these games next gen has nothing to do with resolution. Both games have much higher quality assets, lighting and draw distance.They both also look to have much less aliasing than last gen games and Im still using a 720p tv.

There are a few things about the xbox one that disapoint me. First off their are only 2 output resolutions to choose from 720 and 1080p. That rules out me using my hp monitor at 1600x900 or 1280x1024.
The second thing is that if your arent logged on to xbox live you dont get your achievements. I dont have broadband at home so i took my x1 to a friends house to download some apps.
The first thing that happened when i logged on was i received 6 achievements.
I really hope they change achievements requiring live to see them. You also cant edit your profile without live.

 

[RenegadeRocks]

Wow wow wow.... this thing has exceeded all of my expectations so far.

So many things to love about the pass through, fast game switching, ui voice taking you where you want in an instant... Bing search, voice control in games, the controller....well done

Nice to hear that. I have one question, since Kinect 2.0 won't work in our country for sure, how easy or cumbersome is navigating with the controller. I heard ppl complaining about it, but you can't know anything for sure these days regarding consoles.

 

[AzBat]

You're supposed to be able to run it with a cord without batteries, like a corded controller.

It's a non-issue for me. I don't have an Xbox One but if I did, I'd just get rechargeable batteries. And when using it with my PC, I've got plenty of short USB cables that I can use for that. I just thought it was odd that they didn't include a cable that probably would have only cost a few pennies. Then again, what cables they do provide are pretty high quality, heavy duty, and obviously built to last forever (slight exaggeration).

If they included a cheap USB cable you'd be less likely to buy the Play & Charge Kit which includeds the rechargeable battery pack & a special USB cable that's 9ft long & has an LED charging indicator...

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=veanVvMJT_o

Tommy McClain

 

[whome0]

Voice commands work great. You say "Change view" and you don't even have to touch a single button, only concentrate on driving and the road. A-mazing."Rear view" does what it says.That experience is impossible to replicate without Kinect or similar.

Just bring any microphone(headset or tablemic or integrated) and call it a day....I mean call Change view. No camera involved.

 

[RudeCurve]

Just bring any microphone(headset or tablemic or integrated) and call it a day....I mean call Change view. No camera involved.

That makes no sense at all when the console already comes with the camera/mic. Why would I want to bring a tablet to use it's microphone? Why would I want to wear an annoying headset just to change views while I'm driving?

 

[dlm]

Couple more random things:
- Someone asked about controller navigation: It's pretty good, honestly. The two features that aren't great without voice are snap and "record that". Also managing friends is tedious, but voice doesn't help there.
- The calibration is -great-. Run it. I had no idea how bad the calibration on my TV was. It's night and day having run through it. Only one of the post-processing options actually made things better instead of worse (really helped the blacks at high contrast). Never noticed that my TV's IQ has sucked for the last 5 years.
- Voice chat is really clear on the XB1, but the mix it comes with is worse than the 360 one. Alas.
- Killer Instinct is crazy. The Dojo mode is one of the best ideas I've ever seen in a fighter. I still suck, but massive kudos to the team for building such a great learning tool.
- The impulse trigger help Forza, but I'm still not sold on wheel-less racing
- Dead rising starts rough, but I like where it's going. The number of zombies onscreen is just incredible. Much like DR1 was a post child for last Gen in terms of character count, DR3 does it for this gen. A really solid technical accomplishment.

 

[bkilian]

Thanks for sharing the photos Dave. I thought I was missing something because I didn't have to pass the voice test like in the Kinect 1 days by saying a sequence of numbers, from 1 to 6.

I wonder how they pulled that off, because it recognises the voice commands even if people have different tones of voice without asking you to perform a test to recognise your voice in particular.

Hehe, I hate to tell you this, since it removes some of the mystery, but the only thing we measured when we had you say those numbers was the volume . You could say anything you want, play a guitar or blow a trumpet, it wouldn't care as long as you hit enough dB.

 

[Dave Baumann]

Further impressions after a night of playing around:

Its clear theres still a lot to be developed on the OS side; once after a while you realise there's not a whole lot there, including a lack of Social integration (Facebook, Twitter, etc.) inevitably they will turn up. Whats there is pretty solid though and skipping between IE and the game seamlessly is good.

I was debating whether to try the DVR pass through, but forgot "Canada" is no "America" and they don't actually have the guide and integration here yet.

Oh, and it strike me they really did want to make sound a clear stand out on this. To be fair, I didn't use the 360 on this particular setup (7.1 with near ideal speaker layouts), but they seem to really want to use the surround capabilities and noise from pretty much all channels is evident in Forza.

Ryse and the freebie downloads I just did tomorrow then...

 

[Cyan]

Spoiler

bkilian, some people don't mind that old woman, she doesn't even have a Xbox One for now.

Hehe, I hate to tell you this, since it removes some of the mystery, but the only thing we measured when we had you say those numbers was the volume . You could say anything you want, play a guitar or blow a trumpet, it wouldn't care as long as you hit enough dB.

:smile: Seriously though, this comment completely maimed and dismantled one of my favourite Kinect 1 myths.

I used to show off about the Kinect and brag about it with my family and friends telling them that the console recognised your voice with it, in an individual manner. And using voice commands to show people how amazing it was.

Additionally, I also remember when my brother during one of my demonstrations tried to say things to Kinect to see if it worked for him too, and I told him "No, no, you can't talk to it, it only recognises my voice. In order to talk to it and for it to recognise only YOU, you need to pass a test for perfect voice recognition". Sigh...

I even completed the test every time that I moved the Kinect around -sometimes when moving it even less than 10 centimetres-, thinking it was essential.

I haven't tried to test it with a guitar but now that you mention it, certainly blowing my own trumpet because of it worked.

Still... now that I know the truth I feel odd, but it's my consolation to think that for me it worked and people thought the same during the demonstrations.