Xbox Series S [XBSS] [Release November 10 2020]

The XSS is getting great reviews. It's not for hardcore gamers, but it's a great machine for $299.

 

Its here i wonder if it hit its target market. In my experience most people that are happy with good enough are people that actually know the specs/tech and understand what it means. In my circle of people, the less tech savy they are, the chance they got the latest flagship modell goes up. While the ones with better knowledge,
finds the right tool for them.

 

That's not the experience of X1S vs. X1X. MS had the best machine out for $499 for half the generation and people bought way more One S consoles. That seems to suggest that MS is correct about price being a thing.

 

Yeah, sandwiched between One S and Series X, Series S is weirdly positioned. Perhaps if you care about framerate but not resolution so much it's a perfect middle-ground for people who have decided 4K is not for them.

 

Whatever the GaaS flavour of the month is will likely run well on it. It has a niche nicely carved out for itself in the years ahead.

 

I agree with this, however, to play devil's advocate... Kinect is the best selling video game console accessory of all time. I think this excludes controllers, but's an often repeated statistic. If you look back at the Xbox One launch with that perspective you can see why MS went all in on Kinect, because sales data told a story of insane demand. But just because something sold well last generation doesn't mean that it's a surefire hit next generation.

 

I dont know, We have seen already with titles (and True next gen hasnt really been shown on series s/x yet) less Res / less FPS / less FX. Coupled with that it has 500GB less storage (and dont come with a disk, and game size contrary to what has been said dont seem to be a lot smaller) Unless you are very stretched for cash, it seems a very bad deal. Esp as you most likely will have to buy extra storage and then the price is nearly the same as series X. If it was $149-199 maybe sweet

 

Do we even have details for file size? The only one I saw showed smart delivery working but for a old game.

Are there new games using bcpack and built for SSD speed (no duplication) we use for a baseline for the actual generation?

 

Yes, Theres been a few games shown and they seem to indicate the same game size for both series S and X

eg
new call of duty game Xbox Series X/S: 136GB
assassin creed valhalla Xbox Series X|S: ~45 GB
Destiny 2 Xbox Series X/S: 65.7GB

Perhaps there are some games with smaller game size of Series S?

 

Impressive, and it's up to 1P to lead with things like this.
You can't rely on 3P especially at the start.

If reviewers was seeing this enough, they would think that its just 3P early release issues.
Been alot of commentary about game sizes and the meager XSS SSD size.
Xbox needs to highlight this and other examples.

 

Sorry it's a screenshot, mobile makes doing tables hard.

Gears nearly manages the 30% reduction for the S, Forza less so but I am not sure this was as much of an effort as it was farmed out.

 

That's not so bad, but that's 1st party. Will be interesting to see how 3rd party does when they start doing next-gen only titles.

Here's the Series S tore down...




Here's a video of a YouTuber in Brazil? that is tearing down a Series X & S. I'm linking only the Series S...



Tommy McClain

 

Not bad.

 

Well, there is enough room for a BR drive left in that small box. I assume they made the decision later to let this out of the box to reduce cost.
With a BR drive, the S would have been optimal for my son.

 

There isn't space.
I the gap your seeing is where the power supply goes.

 

Yep. I want to see them go smaller by removing the power supply & go with an external brick. Think they could get to a GameCube size or smaller?

Here's a full* English teardown...

EDIT: Not really full. He didn't take off the APU heatsink.



Looks like the SSD in on the bottom...



Tommy McClain

 

Southbridge? surprise!