Xbox One Slim

I completely removed the Xbox One from my TV entertainment setup.

They completely messed up TV viewing ever since NXOE. There's so many issues that I won't bother to list them all here. The two biggest issues for me now is Live TV is very choppy and laggy at random times regardless of having nothing running in the background at all. Also they do not properly support Surround Sound for Live TV, they're currently misinterpreting surround sound for TV such that it makes amps use a quasi-stereo mode where there is no sound coming from middle or rear speakers.

They also seem to be dropping support for Kinect voice control on new features. There are several new features they have added that have absolutely no voice commands to do what can be done via the remote. When users in the preview forums ask about it, they merely say they don't have voice support planned and to put it on the Xbox Suggestions site.

This to me is writing on the wall. They do not want to be an all in one media device. They are in the process of dropping support for anything that is not directly related to gaming.
 
Sorry to hear that Brit. That's weird that I don't have any of the same issues.
I mostly watch TV/play in my man cave and have very few of those issues.

That's too bad because I've been checking to see if you are online when iroboto, I and a few others are playing Halo 5 to see if you want to jump in.
 
BRiT said:
I completely removed the Xbox One from my TV entertainment setup.

They completely messed up TV viewing ever since NXOE. There's so many issues that I won't bother to list them all here. The two biggest issues for me now is Live TV is very choppy and laggy at random times regardless of having nothing running in the background at all. Also they do not properly support Surround Sound for Live TV, they're currently misinterpreting surround sound for TV such that it makes amps use a quasi-stereo mode where there is no sound coming from middle or rear speakers.

They also seem to be dropping support for Kinect voice control on new features. There are several new features they have added that have absolutely no voice commands to do what can be done via the remote. When users in the preview forums ask about it, they merely say they don't have voice support planned and to put it on the Xbox Suggestions site.

This to me is writing on the wall. They do not want to be an all in one media device. They are in the process of dropping support for anything that is not directly related to gaming.
Click to expand...
Sorry to hear that, too. I don't use TV on the X1 so I don't know, but I also think the future Xbox is going to be focused on gaming but will be some kind of PC, so you'll get the best of both worlds. I pray for a tablet console capable enough.

Changing subject, Official Xbox Magazine has created a poll to vote your 10 favourites X360 games of all time!! It's so easy and quick to vote! I chose RDR, Skyrim, etc etc. Missed Call of Juarez in the list thought.

http://ngmatthew.polldaddy.com/s/greatest-xbox-360-games-of-all-time
 
Cyan said:
Sorry to hear that, too. I don't use TV on the X1 so I don't know, but I also think the future Xbox is going to be focused on gaming but will be some kind of PC, so you'll get the best of both worlds. I pray for a tablet console capable enough.

Changing subject, Official Xbox Magazine has created a poll to vote your 10 favourites X360 games of all time!! It's so easy and quick to vote! I chose RDR, Skyrim, etc etc. Missed Call of Juarez in the list thought.

http://ngmatthew.polldaddy.com/s/greatest-xbox-360-games-of-all-time
Click to expand...

Don't worry, I think Nintendo is listening to your prayers. Minus the "capable enough" part though.
 
BRiT said:
This to me is writing on the wall. They do not want to be an all in one media device. They are in the process of dropping support for anything that is not directly related to gaming.
Click to expand...

Meaning a revised unit with no HDMI or Kinect input? From what you are saying it sound like it.
 
steveOrino said:
Meaning a revised unit with no HDMI or Kinect input? From what you are saying it sound like it.
Click to expand...

At least no HDMI input. If there is any kinect support, it would be via standard USB3 port and not proprietary connection. Their biggest value add for kinect is voice control, which can be done via standard mic input and sending it to Cortana for complex items.
 
BRiT said:
At least no HDMI input. If there is any kinect support, it would be via standard USB3 port and not proprietary connection. Their biggest value add for kinect is voice control, which can be done via standard mic input and sending it to Cortana for complex items.
Click to expand...

I'd add that the 3GB of reserved space is overkill for the new reality of XB1, especially if you factor out Kinect and HDMI pass through. Either free up that memory for games or find a way to cut it. 1GB reserve - enough to run a Win10 laptop with Skype, "Edge" and iPlayer - should be enough. Personally, I think the Xbox 360 dash (32MB) plus a decent implementation of skype and game recording would be fine. Anything else 99% of people could do on their phone.

And while we're at it, free up the rest of that seventh core...
 
Win10 uses virtual memory (quite liberally), I don't think Xbox One does. I assume Microsoft didn't go this route because VM introduces difficult to factor I/O usage.
 
Yeah, but I don't see why X1 can't use VM if they need to. There's going to be some kind of simultaneous (to game) access going on for snapping, background download, live tv pause (from the usb digi tuner) and game recording. They definitely have some way of managing disk IO while gaming.

Plus with a limited range of snappable apps (if you were to stick to skype, notifications, and a web browser) it's only the web browser that might conceivably need to use VM even with the 3GB reserve reduced to 1GB. Re-task some of the 8GB of flash for snap-VM and you might not even need to touch the HDD. You might even be able to free up some of the reserved disk IO that the X1 presumably needs to have ...

Windows phone 10 does a fair old job of managing notifications, skyping, and web browsing simultaneously on only 512 MB with 4 or 8 GB of crusty eMMc, and it can do it on less than one-and-a-half 1.73 gHz Jaguar cores.

Personally, I'm not particularly arsed about having a web browser on my TV at the same time as gaming. It'd be interesting to know how many people are ...?
 
Raises hand... I've found snapping Edge, YouTube or the True Achievements app when stuck in a game is really nice. I don't have to pull out a phone to do it & on my 55" TV it's bigger than my phone anyways. I also Skype while playing too. BTW, there are new features coming that I would assume would be impossible with a cutback: the USB TV tuner is getting DVR this year. What about background Cortana support coming this year too? Also, can Twitch streaming work on a reduce memory footprint? Function your suggestions to cut back OS RAM use & functionality isn't going to magically going to make the XB1 compete better with the PS4. There is already a large hardware disparity. So why hamper the XB1 even more against the PS4 just so you can get a few extra FPS? Personally I'm fine with the performance and quality of the XB1 games I've played. If I wanted something better I'd go PS4 or PC. If you're trying to gain the masses going to(or already gone to) the PS4 you're not going to impress them with a few FPS increase. You're only going to entice them with game & app experiences they can't get anywhere else.

Tommy McClain
 
Or lower price. Near PS4 experience at $200 for XBSlim instead of $300 for a PS4 would likely move some boxes. The question is whether a lower price would move more boxes than having a less potent games console with added DVR and Cortana, etc. Personally I think the added features really aren't of interest to the masses. We used to use PS3's browser in the early days, but now everyone has a phone or tablet on hand in my experience. Especially if they know they are going to want web access. If playing a game and wanting advice, I'd have the tablet to hand. For that reason I've used my Nexus 7 looking up Dragon's Dogma Wiki content while playing on PS3. The interface is likely easier than a console web interface too unless maybe using voice commands. What's XB1's browser like to navigate?
 
While a few FPS increases and graphical improvements might be nice (and clearly worthwhile, hence the mountains MS have moved to make this possible, and the efforts Sony went to with PS3 libraries and reservation reductions) the main benefit would be price. Beating Sony in the move to lower price points might gain them some users that clearly all the XBloat isn't helping with.

DVR, streaming, Skype would all still easily possible with reduced reserves, as would running selected, streamlined snapps. And clearly (especially with addition of DVR), the system does have some kind of IO management and reservation going on already (and probably over-provisioned at that). But a 3GB reserve intended to allow multitasking of bloated 3rd party Kinect enabled "snapps" (that, incidentally, almost no-one seems to be interested in writing) is nuts at this point. Remember how games were originally supposed to be able to handle being folded back onto four cores by the VM if the OS claimed them? Yeah, those days are gone.

Cutting $50 off the BOM, build and shipping costs and making a smaller, sexier (less horrible) machine will do far more for the system than sticking to the original vision. And at the very least it'll do far more for the bottom line when trying to justify XB4.

Edit: and cutting the BOM by dropping the optical drive (something customers actually care about) and replacing the HDD with a small eMMC (something that would make the system useless as a games console and as a DVR) is no substitute to making the core platform less uncompetitive.

If you're going to go DD only, do it in additional to cutting the fat, not instead of it.
 
function said:
Yeah, but I don't see why X1 can't use VM if they need to. There's going to be some kind of simultaneous (to game) access going on for snapping, background download, live tv pause (from the usb digi tuner) and game recording.
Click to expand...

Indeed. But when does the I/O unpredictability become untenable for a game that streams heavily. The more reasons to rely on disk I/O, and really it's about head adjustments and seeking, the more you can impact performance. The console HDDs are the bottom rung of disk performance to start with.
 
Edge is much better than 360's IE browser. It's as simple & as fast as a mobile browser. Never used a PS3 or PS4 so I can't compare. Compared to my Windows Phone or even my laptop it's only slower in the navigating when using the controller's thumbstick to move the cursor, but even then it's not that bad since they take advantage the other controls like the other thumbstick to quick scroll, triggers to zoom & bumpers to switch tabs. Personally I prefer navigating via voice since it's really quick. So yeah, without Kinect I suspect another device would be preferred. However, you can't beat having a browser on the same screen as your game. No looking down or fumbling with a different device.

As for the price differential, you have the potential to give the impression it's an even weaker device: a Hyundai car vs a BMW, you get what you pay for. I doubt Microsoft is willing to sacrifice the image that their product is not as competent as a PS4. Their reluctance to drop the price further this past holiday season seems proof of that.

Tommy McClain
 
AzBat said:
Edge is much better than 360's IE browser.
Click to expand...

Javascript performance seems weaker on the XB1. Something like this runs at two frames per second on my XB1 vs 20-30 fps on PC/Windows phone.

It's great for media playback though (Emby etc).

Cheers
 
DSoup said:
Indeed. But when does the I/O unpredictability become untenable for a game that streams heavily. The more reasons to rely on disk I/O, and really it's about head adjustments and seeking, the more you can impact performance. The console HDDs are the bottom rung of disk performance to start with.
Click to expand...

True, I'm making assumptions about the amount of headroom MS are likely to have on IO. And with game recording, background downloading, web browser, and now DVR too (all simultaneously) perhaps there'll be no headroom for significant additional VM access caused by reducing the none-game memory reserve. All I can suggest in my hypothetical scenario is that they limit BG downloading if they hit a hard limit, or that they drop performance of - or ditch entirely - unmanageable snapps that require too much VM activity (e.g. unfettered desktop-style web access).

Perhaps a new 6GB SKU with a minimum baseline of a 1TB HDD (denser platter meaning faster reads/writes) could dig out some of the hole if necessary too, if you wanted to keep all the IO heavy stuff from the original XBloat...?
 
This is a thread discussing XB1 Slim/TV box and the advantages/disadvantages of slimming choices for XB1. MS have no idea what Sony's plans are so their choices need to be made independently based on what the market is.
 
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