Official Xbox2 Thread

[megadrive0088]

my dream fantasy for XBox2 is a mega-powerful console that is much more powerful than PS3 and NGC2 (but of the same generation)

like NeoGeo compared to Genesis and SNES.

what would that require?

how about quad Nvidia NV50/NV55 VPUs or quad ATI R500/R550 VPUs - each with a 256-Bit bus (thus 1024 bit data path) and each with 256MB graphics memory. GDDR3/4 or QDR.

writting software for 4 VPUs would be no nightmare. it would be just as easy as writting for a single VPU. just taking advantage of the scalability that is already present in todays R300 and probably NV30 also.

plus 1-2 GB of main memory.



on top of that (and this could be done on XBox1) is full internet explorer browsing (NOT WebtV/MSNTV as that sucks) -

also Blu-Ray re-writting

 

[London Geezer]

my dream fantasy for XBox2 is a mega-powerful console that is much more powerful than PS3 and NGC2 (but of the same generation)

like NeoGeo compared to Genesis and SNES.

what would that require?

how about quad Nvidia NV50/NV55 VPUs or quad ATI R500/R550 VPUs - each with a 256-Bit bus (thus 1024 bit data path) and each with 256MB graphics memory. GDDR3/4 or QDR.

writting software for 4 VPUs would be no nightmare. it would be just as easy as writting for a single VPU. just taking advantage of the scalability that is already present in todays R300 and probably NV30 also.

plus 1-2 GB of main memory.



on top of that (and this could be done on XBox1) is full internet explorer browsing (NOT WebtV/MSNTV as that sucks) -

also Blu-Ray re-writting

WELL u can always have a uber-console if u really wanted to, but it all depends on how much u wanna spend on it... i mean, the NeoGeo was unbelievably overpriced for the entire length of its life, and that's without taking into account the price of the games... impossible for little kids to buy really, even though they were some of the best 2D games at the time...
u can have a NEXTBOX (what a lame name) with 9290 NV50 each with 1024bits bus to the memory coupled with 8394 (put name of the most powerful CPU out at the time) running in parallel, all with an insane amount of RAM..... THAT would be powerful, but it would make no sense whatsoever to release such a machine...

 

[Brimstone]

XB2 needs a good base controller. They botched things up with the large controller the XB1 launched with.

Six controller ports for those 2d overhead style games that all your friends can play at the same time. Anyone for 6 player Gauntlet or Smash TV?

Have the console base be a keyboard. Anyone remember the Amiga 500? Instead of some fancy shape, let it have functionality instead. Laptops are the same way, just under the keys that you use are the guts of the the computer. Make the base under the consoles chasis have ergonomic
contours so it will sit comfortably on your lap. I guess they could have a mouse trackball built in as well.


Or instead of a fullsize keyboard, try to make the console chasis a cool controller in of it self. Imagine on one side you have a keyboard controller like the Belkin Nostromo speed pad Nostromo Speed Pad Web Site and on the other a trackball.


Also another idea for a keyboard layout could be drawn from Thrustmaster Tacticle Keyboard. Tacticle Keyboard Website

 

[jvd]

Xbox 2

athlon 64 (dual ram controller , dual hyper transport) 3ghz
512megs of ddr ram 400mhz
dual r 500 cores (each one with 128-256 megs)
Um some sound chip

Cost 500ish , sell for 300 ....


Does that sound good for a 2005 , 2006 console .

 

[AzBat]

I think talking about machine specs like CPU, graphics and memory is not really needed at this point in time. Consoles are not all about technology and speed. This thread was originally started to ask everybody's opinion on what Microsoft's needs to do marketing wise to have a successful Xbox2. Other comments were being sought on the non-technology features of the Xbox2. I think I provided some pretty good ideas, but I would love to hear people's thoughts on them, good or bad.

Tommy McClain

 

[jvd]

I think talking about machine specs like CPU, graphics and memory is not really needed at this point in time. Consoles are not all about technology and speed. This thread was originally started to ask everybody's opinion on what Microsoft's needs to do marketing wise to have a successful Xbox2. Other comments were being sought on the non-technology features of the Xbox2. I think I provided some pretty good ideas, but I would love to hear people's thoughts on them, good or bad.

Tommy McClain

Sorry my bad. Well i think ms needs to have a console more powerfull than the ps3 at around the same time of the ps3. With a very strong launch line up and a very jammed packed first year . For japan have tons of rpgs and adventure games. For america have the full line up of sports games at launch. A fps , a rpg , an adventure game and def a fighting game all on launch day. Mabye even have a tie in with the pcs . Like launch longhorn and have a rebate with it when u buy the xbox. . Other than that no clue .

 

[zidane1strife]

WELL u can always have a uber-console if u really wanted to, but it all depends on how much u wanna spend on it... i mean, the NeoGeo was unbelievably overpriced for the entire length of its life, and that's without taking into account the price of the games... impossible for little kids to buy really, even though they were some of the best 2D games at the time...
u can have a NEXTBOX (what a lame name) with 9290 NV50 each with 1024bits bus to the memory coupled with 8394 (put name of the most powerful CPU out at the time) running in parallel, all with an insane amount of RAM..... THAT would be powerful, but it would make no sense whatsoever to release such a machine...

Actually even if ms had infinite money they can`t just get something like that in a short period of time... Having that many cpus, gpus, ram... is going to take SOME SERIOUS SPACE, probably going to weight a TON too, not to mention the electrical supply... Who`s going to have the energy resources to power such a beast, not to mention the cost of having such a thing turned on?

In any case, what they really need is power, to launch near ps3, and have a comparable cpu to that of ps3 and gc2...

If they announce in 2004 just after the ps3 announcement, and launch the product 2yrs later(just like they did with xbox and ps2)... they`re already done for...

It seems ms is doing just the later, they don`t want their specs to look bad, but sony is going to launch their product likely 8-12Months after they announce it, if ms is going to wait for that time to start things, that gives them very little time to get the contract, design the box, and put it out in the market...

 

[Deepak]

I saw somewhere (I cant remember!)....that MS plans to name next XB as HOMESTATION ...such is the power of ****STATION!!!

 

[chaphack]

anyone posted these rumor specs?

Intel NetBurst micro-architecture (Pentium 4 or revised name) on 0.07-micron process
Clock Speed: 7 GHz to 8 GHz
SSE2 Floating-Point Performance: 28 to 32 GFLOPS (or 64 GFLOPS with architecture improvements)
External Bus Bandwidth: 5.33 GB/sec

System Memory: 1024MB (1GB)
System Memory Bandwidth: 32 GB/sec (or up to 64 GB/sec)

NVIDIA XGPU2
Clock Speed: 1 GHz
128 Gigatexels per Second
512 Billion Anti-Aliased Samples per Second Full-Scene Anti-Aliasing (4x, 8x, 16x, 32x, 64x) 64-bit color (16-bit floating point value per channel, RGBA)

2D and 3D Texture Compression
Z, Stencil, Shadow, and Multisampling buffers Vertex Compression
Triangle Tessellation (including NURBS support)
Programmable Pixel and Vertex Processors
Full Hidden Surface Removal (boosting effective fillrate 8x = 1 Teratexel per Second)
High-Speed Rendering Buffer (partial frame buffer): 4MB to 8MB
High-Speed Texture Cache: 8MB to 16MB
Textures and Full Frame Buffers are stored in System Memory (1024MB)
32 to 64 Hardware Light Sources
1.25 Billion Particles per Second
3 Billion Polygons per Second (peak)
1.25 Billion Polygons per Second (sustained)
800 Million Polygons per Second (with effects)
15 Trillion Operations per Second
1.14 TFLOPS (1140 GFLOPS)
Screen Resolutions: 640x480 (TV), 1280x720 (HDTV), 1920x1080 (HDTV), up to 2048x1536 (VGA)

NVIDIA MCPX2
800 MHz
1024 Total Voices (256 3D Voices)
3D Modeled Sound
Dolby Digital Encoder
Multiple DSP units
10/100/1000 Ethernet
USB 2.0, DVD, HDD Controller


40x DVD-ROM
160GB Hard Disk Drive or 30GB Solid State Drive

US Release Date: Q4 2006
Japanese Release Date: Q1 2007


Yes, it sounds like a fanboy list, but how will it gain up against the 1tflop cell?

 

[Sonic]

Looks good to me if they were real, but a GPU like that might be hard to come by. And I'm highly suspicious of the NURBS support, if anything it would be a more generalized processor to accel at it.

 

[jvd]

considering intel is going to be at about 3.1-3.2 ghz this year i doubt we will see anything close to 7ghz in the xbox 2. Even if they keep releasing speeds like they did this year they will only be at about 5ghz in 2005. That be thier top of the line chip and cost almost 700$ . So i really don't see that happening. They will prob put a 4ghz chip or a 3.5 ghz chip in it if it comes out 2005ish

 

[London Geezer]

considering intel is going to be at about 3.1-3.2 ghz this year i doubt we will see anything close to 7ghz in the xbox 2. Even if they keep releasing speeds like they did this year they will only be at about 5ghz in 2005. That be thier top of the line chip and cost almost 700$ . So i really don't see that happening. They will prob put a 4ghz chip or a 3.5 ghz chip in it if it comes out 2005ish

what was the top clock speed when the Xbox came out? 2GHz? and the Xbox only had a 700Mhz CPU....

so i don't really see the NEXTBOX having a top of the line CPU... remember that those top on the line CPUs are well expensive... but of course this is all speculation so for all we know, Microsoft might want to splash out LARGE amounts of money to put a high-end CPU and GPU in every XBOX... but i don't see that happening.... hell, we SO don't know anything about this it's not even funny...

still, those specs Chap gave are pretty cool.. it's nice thinking that ONE DAY there will be hardware capable of that and more.... even if it's not next generation, but the one after

 

[jvd]

considering intel is going to be at about 3.1-3.2 ghz this year i doubt we will see anything close to 7ghz in the xbox 2. Even if they keep releasing speeds like they did this year they will only be at about 5ghz in 2005. That be thier top of the line chip and cost almost 700$ . So i really don't see that happening. They will prob put a 4ghz chip or a 3.5 ghz chip in it if it comes out 2005ish

what was the top clock speed when the Xbox came out? 2GHz? and the Xbox only had a 700Mhz CPU....

so i don't really see the NEXTBOX having a top of the line CPU... remember that those top on the line CPUs are well expensive... but of course this is all speculation so for all we know, Microsoft might want to splash out LARGE amounts of money to put a high-end CPU and GPU in every XBOX... but i don't see that happening.... hell, we SO don't know anything about this it's not even funny...

still, those specs Chap gave are pretty cool.. it's nice thinking that ONE DAY there will be hardware capable of that and more.... even if it's not next generation, but the one after

Um if u read what i said ... u will see its the same as what u said. I really think they will go with a cheaper cpu and put two gpus in there . Its the smartest thing to do.

 

[Squidlor]

HOMESTATION was/is the rumored name for a MS television convergence box that basically was supposed to do the job of your TV cable receiver and TIVO. Basically it would be your cable box, TIVO box, and DVD player all wrapped into one, with the ability to control home audio, etc. Gates has mentioned television convergence devices since the mid-80's, and I think that (and the PS) was the catalyst for the XBox.

However, the HOMESTATION wasn't going to be the next XBox. When I last heard something about HS a year ago, it was going to be completely separate from XBox. There might be versions of the HS that could play XBox games, but the HS's main focus was to be more of the television convergence box. I've heard some talk that MS basically dropped the whole idea of the Homestation because most cable companies provide the cable decoder free of charge, most cable companies now require a proprietary cable box, and soon most cable companies will be providing cable boxes with Tivo-like features anyway.


I have to say that I wasn't very receptive of the XBox, but have warmed up to it over the last year. I'm an old Nintendo fan, but I think that MS are more responsive to the desires of today's North American game players. XB2 will be more successful than the first BoxX, and this is what I expect to see offered:

- MS will push into Nintendo's younger demographic by offering more youth-oriented fare, as well as an ESRB-rating lock for the parents. (i.e., console can be set to lock out mature games.)

- MS will be even more aggressive with North American developers and publishers. These games do well in Europe. The aggregate Euro and NA market is more than big enough for MS. I think that they will try to offer more niche JPN titles, but I don't think that MS will do anything too extreme to try and grab the JPN market-share.

- Much bigger launch than XBox. Titles will have plenty of time for polish this time around. The first XBox launch had decent variety of titles, but they all felt rushed.

- As per every MS release, XBox 2.0 should see improvements across the board. I expect to see a more efficient console design, improved controller ergonomics, expanded XBox Live (online) initiatives, perhaps some type of improvement in data storage.

 

[vers]

Pentium4 10GHZ vs Cell ?

50 Gflosp vs 1000 Gflops ?

:LOL

xbox 1,2 SUXXXXXXXXX !

 

[_phil_]

Xbox 2 will certainly be Gpu only:Game processing unit.Dx 13 hardware (gamecode hardware support, heavyly game oriented-event management- HLSL)


more "seriously",

Tim Sweeny (i miss it's unreal software engine ) about futur:
.

Regarding this "far off" application compatibility, we've been running the 64-bit SuSE Linux distribution on Hammer for over 3 months. We're going to ship the 64-bit version of UT2003 at or before the consumer Athlon64 launch. And engine our next-generation won't just support 64-bit, but will basically REQUIRE it on the content-authoring side.

so it WILL be 64 bits .this is a start.

 

[Tagrineth]

Can't resist.

Intel NetBurst micro-architecture (Pentium 4 or revised name) on 0.07-micron process
Clock Speed: 7 GHz to 8 GHz
SSE2 Floating-Point Performance: 28 to 32 GFLOPS (or 64 GFLOPS with architecture improvements)
External Bus Bandwidth: 5.33 GB/sec

We're already past that external bus.

System Memory: 1024MB (1GB)
System Memory Bandwidth: 32 GB/sec (or up to 64 GB/sec)

Total memory could be 1024MB for a UMA (consider that the graphics chip will use main RAM, and will need a LOT of space for a 1080i frame buffer), but... 32GB/sec seems too low and 64GB/sec seems too high to me.

NVIDIA XGPU2
Clock Speed: 1 GHz
128 Gigatexels per Second
512 Billion Anti-Aliased Samples per Second Full-Scene Anti-Aliasing (4x, 8x, 16x, 32x, 64x) 64-bit color (16-bit floating point value per channel, RGBA)

Biggest pile of bull in the whole thing.

Clock speed 1GHz - look at NV30 at 500MHz and what it needs. NOBODY wants a whiny console.

And FP16 only? Hah. And besides that, with a 1080i frame, AA needs a BLOODY LOT of memory; and 64x AA is mind-numbing overkill (unless it's ordered-grid like all but one of NV30's modes - in which case ATi's 8x or maybe 12x would look just as good).

Full Hidden Surface Removal (boosting effective fillrate 8x = 1 Teratexel per Second)

...no.

High-Speed Rendering Buffer (partial frame buffer): 4MB to 8MB
High-Speed Texture Cache: 8MB to 16MB
Textures and Full Frame Buffers are stored in System Memory (1024MB)

12MB to 24MB of embedded memory takes a really, really ridiculous amount of space. Can we say one viable die per wafer? Yields would be depressing to the point of suicidal tendency if we factor in "1GHz"...

32 to 64 Hardware Light Sources

At 4fps?

1.25 Billion Particles per Second
3 Billion Polygons per Second (peak)
1.25 Billion Polygons per Second (sustained)
800 Million Polygons per Second (with effects)

Not with 32-64 light sources

NVIDIA MCPX2
800 MHz
1024 Total Voices (256 3D Voices)
3D Modeled Sound
Dolby Digital Encoder
Multiple DSP units
10/100/1000 Ethernet
USB 2.0, DVD, HDD Controller

That's one hell of a high clock speed for a chipset. P4 and Athlon chipsets just reached 200MHz... I doubt they'll go much higher for a decent amount of time.

40x DVD-ROM
160GB Hard Disk Drive or 30GB Solid State Drive

160GB = asking for piracy.

40x DVD-ROM = asking for poor loading code.

US Release Date: Q4 2006
Japanese Release Date: Q1 2007

With those specs, even those dates are early.

Yes, it sounds like a <bleep> list, but how will it gain up against the 1tflop cell?

Heh. With properly optimised code or "Konami Port" code?


And finally... I challenge anyone to name any generation of consoles in which the most powerful hardware won. AFAICS, the WEAKEST hardware has won every generation to date, with the exception of 'in-betweens' like Jaguar and Dreamcast.

 

[Paul]

Yes, it sounds like a list, but how will it gain up against the 1tflop cell?

I think it *should* compete rather well, although the clock speed is too high.. 8Ghz? I would assume xbox2 to have maybe a 3-4Ghz chip.

Not to mention developers will get more out of Xbox2 with first gen games then PS3, but in the future? Ps3 games could very well be leaps and bounds over xbox2 games.

 

[DeanoC]

anyone posted these rumor specs?
1.25 Billion Particles per Second
3 Billion Polygons per Second (peak)
1.25 Billion Polygons per Second (sustained)
800 Million Polygons per Second (with effects)

I love the stupid errors in rumour list, Particles &lt; Polygons? You can have more particles than polygons if you have 'sprite' optimisations (you rasterisor is faster scan-line aligned) but if Particles were slower why use them?

 

[DeanoC]

If I was in charge of a major console release and had some spare pocket change (say 1/2 billion $) .

I'd go and fund around 200 developers to make the game they have always wanted to make. Assuming that half fail (due to the console maker not being that picky), that would leave you with 100 launch titles, your likely to get at least 1 or 2 of the TombRaider/Mario/GTA3/Doom/Res Evil/Sonic etc (mass hits) and your likely to get 5-10 of the quality of ICO/Res/Cannon Fodder/UFO/Ultima etc (critically acclaimed even if sales weren't that great).