Xbox Series X | S

[Stanley]

4 minutes ago, monkeydog said:

 

It's similar TF. It's a newer architecture, so it's not a valid comparison.  Based on RDNA1 cards, its likely to be at least as powerful as the OneX + added raytracing.  

Sure, my point was that Series S will likely be capable of outputting higher than 1080p up-to 4K, so they won’t undermine it in their marketing by suggesting its for people with old TV’s.

[Stanley]

17 minutes ago, Clipper said:

To my mind that would be muddled in terms of whether someone should buy the S or X.

 

- The S is less powerful

- In what way?

- Well it depends on the game - they all play the same games but sometimes the S will be 1080p and X 4k or the S might have checkerboarding and the X 4k or the S might do 4k just the same as the X but the framerate will be lower than the X.

 

 

That is just going to instigate instant narcolepsy

They’re not going to market their brand new next generation console by using words like “less powerful”. What they will do is market the Series X as “most powerful”. 
 

This is the problem when discussing these things, we’re completely removed from the advertising surrounding it. 
 

“iPhone 11, not as good as iPhone 11 Pro, get yours now if you’re a bit strapped for cash” 

[Popo]

1 minute ago, Wahwah* said:

 

No, we'd both be guessing. As I said though, the X represents a smaller slice of the market but still got patches and enhancements from third parties. There's a big list of titles on the xbox website if you want to take a look.  Third party titles are mostly best on One X and I'd expect the same next gen.

 

You can bet that Microsoft will be wanting the best versions of games on their top end system, and will support that with their engineering teams, tools and whatever else happens.  There's no way Developers won't be making their games the best they can be.

That all makes sense, I should say that it is for those reasons mentioned that I don’t think MS will release a Series S any time soon, for fear of sucking all the oxygen out of the Series X launch. 
 

I think I’m right in saying the One S is just the mid-generation slim model of the One, effectively replacing it in the market, while the One X is more powerful; equivalent to PS4 Slim/Pro? Putting out a cut-down model of a console alongside the flagship is uncharted territory, no?

[Alex W.]

23 minutes ago, Wahwah* said:

No, that was a dig at Playstation using peak performance figures when Xbox shared sustained load figures, not peak. It's mostly been ignored, they ought to get that out there a bit more.

They’re not “peak” figures, they’re the performance figures the console is designed for. It’s not actually demonstrated what impact Sony’s approach to cooling will have on performance but they have made it clear that they expect the machine to be running at the maximum GPU and CPU performance all the time. Which is absurd given how much time they spent explaining what it’ll do if in-development software is pushing its thermal behaviour the wrong way but clearly the expectation is that we won’t see that on shipped games.

 

Back to Series S: there’s no reason to expect it to miss out on ray tracing and everything else the Series X can do. The hardware configuration they’ve chosen is basically what you’d expect if you wanted to run Xbox Series X games at one quarter of the resolution. So I fully expect that to be the only distinction. I even expect it’ll run Xbox One X games in 4K, play 4K Blu-rays and stream 4K movies. The only difference would be the resolution at which Xbox Series software runs.

[Clipper]

4 minutes ago, Stanley said:

They’re not going to market their brand new next generation console by using words like “less powerful”. What they will do is market the Series X as “most powerful”. 
 

This is the problem when discussing these things, we’re completely removed from the advertising surrounding it. 
 

“iPhone 11, not as good as iPhone 11 Pro, get yours now if you’re a bit strapped for cash” 

Sorry my exchange was not clear - I was indicating any sort of conversation going on in any shop or amongst Joe Public.

 

But I don't see the marketing being any easier if it really is the case that Series S is a gimped X with no easy way to message it beyond some gumpf like "X is for enthusiasts"

[Transient Curse]

Just now, Popo said:

That all makes sense, I should say that it is for those reasons mentioned that I don’t think MS will release a Series S any time soon, for fear of sucking all the oxygen out of the Series X launch. 
 

I think I’m right in saying the One S is just the mid-generation slim model of the One, effectively replacing it in the market, while the One X is more powerful; equivalent to PS4 Slim/Pro? Putting out a cut-down model of a console alongside the flagship is uncharted territory, no?

 

Correct.  The only other time this has happened has been where systems come with differing amounts of storage, as far as I'm aware.

 

I wondered if we might not see simultaneous launch too. It doesn't really affect me, but I would like Microsoft to break their silence on this.

[Transient Curse]

4 minutes ago, Alex W. said:

They’re not “peak” figures, they’re the performance figures the console is designed for. It’s not actually demonstrated what impact Sony’s approach to cooling will have on performance but they have made it clear that they expect the machine to be running at the maximum GPU and CPU performance all the time. Which is absurd given how much time they spent explaining what it’ll do if in-development software is pushing its thermal behaviour the wrong way but clearly the expectation is that we won’t see that on shipped games.

 

Ah, sorry, that's not how it was explained to me. Time will tell!

[SeanR]

what if the series S is just a one X with a new SoC?

[Stanley]

2 minutes ago, Clipper said:

Sorry my exchange was not clear - I was indicating any sort of conversation going on in any shop or amongst Joe Public.

 

But I don't see the marketing being any easier if it really is the case that Series S is a gimped X with no easy way to message it beyond some gumpf like "X is for enthusiasts"

How do they normally cope, how do they market PS4 Slim and Xbox One S, iPhones etc. 

[SeanR]

Just now, Stanley said:

How do they normally cope, how do they market PS4 Slim and Xbox One S, iPhones etc. 

 

they don't.

 

the push the most powerful one. Every time.

 

ad infinitum

 

see also: arcade screenshots on spectrum game boxes

[layten]

1 hour ago, AI1 said:

If the Series S is more popular than the Series X (if the only difference is price and resolution then it might well do) and the Series S is created from leftovers on the factory floor from Series X production, then how does that work if the Series S becomes market leader? What yields are they expecting from Series X production and how do they manufacture more Series S's if no one is interested in the Series X?

 

"I'm confused!" /Partridge

 

 

The S SoC will be significantly smaller than that of the X. I would be very much surprised if they are not running 2 seperate designs in the fab.

[JoeK]

All I suspect is that we won't see anything genuinely jaw-dropping on the Series X until they decide to stop making their games run on everything. The only console this gen that has eked out every drop of performance has been the PS4.

 

I'm looking forward to the Series X enormously, but I'd prefer one machine only, and one machine that is pushed to within an inch of its life. 

[Clipper]

Just now, Stanley said:

How do they normally cope, how do they market PS4 Slim and Xbox One S, iPhones etc. 

apart from phones you don't normally get both options at same time in console world. One X came along and was a "midgen refresh" offering 4k and shinies.

 

Now we have two models out at same time one is more powerful than the other. Marketing can't easily say that or explain it without making one sound worse. I personally think it woul dbe more muddled than having S for 1080p and X for 4K.

 

But who knows - it is uncharted territory for a new gen of consoles to have one platform offer multiple models with different performance out of the box.

[layten]

2 minutes ago, JoeK said:

All I suspect is that we won't see anything genuinely jaw-dropping on the Series X until they decide to stop making their games run on everything.

Depends how quickly they release Flight Simulator.  

[Alex W.]

5 minutes ago, layten said:

The S SoC will be significantly smaller than that of the X. I would be very much surprised if they are not running 2 seperate designs in the fab.

Smaller chip, more chips per wafer, lower production costs.

 

Edit - It’s weirdly antithetical to the whole idea of high tech electronic wizardry that once these things are designed you just run them off like you’re printing stamps or making Kit-kats and there’s a huge economic gains if you can just get more out of the same raw material.

[Clipper]

3 minutes ago, JoeK said:

All I suspect is that we won't see anything genuinely jaw-dropping on the Series X until they decide to stop making their games run on everything. The only console this gen that has eked out every drop of performance has been the PS4.

 

I'm looking forward to the Series X enormously, but I'd prefer one machine only, and one machine that is pushed to within an inch of its life. 

I prefer to just have the gameplay loops that offer me the most satisfaction when I play. Shinies are nice but for me that all important gameplay loop (or style if you prefer) is what grabs me and impresses me.

[Transient Curse]

4 minutes ago, JoeK said:

The only console this gen that has eked out every drop of performance has been the PS4

 

It's ok if you don't like the game, I can understand if you didn't want to play it, but Gears 5 on One X is absolutely incredible, definitely worth a look! 

[SeanR]

2 minutes ago, Clipper said:

Now we have two models out at same time one is more powerful than the other. Marketing can't easily say that or explain it without making one sound worse. I personally think it would be more muddled than having S for 1080p and X for 4K.

 

Don Mattrick tried that, didn't he?

 

the whole "if you want to play xbox 360 games, there's a console for that" spiel

[Alex W.]

2 minutes ago, SeanR said:

 

Don Mattrick tried that, didn't he?

 

the whole "if you want to play xbox 360 games, there's a console for that" spiel

You say that like it was a strategy and not a petulant whine about people refusing to embrace their brilliant new vision for killing off second hand games.

[Clipper]

1 minute ago, SeanR said:

 

Don Mattrick tried that, didn't he?

 

the whole "if you want to play xbox 360 games, there's a console for that" spiel

don't understand the comparison at all.

 

Mattrick was saying you can't play your old games - a polite fuck off in other words - he was offering something negative.

 

the other is saying here are two flavours of nextgen one for your HDTV and one for your 4K TV. they all play the same games just one drives a 4KTV .

 

 

[SeanR]

1 minute ago, Alex W. said:

You say that like it was a strategy and not a petulant whine about people refusing to embrace their brilliant new vision for killing off second hand games.

 

you're right.

 

it's more like Sony's "get a second job if you want to afford a PS3" malarky

[Clipper]

Partially agreed and my main concern on that  is that if the rumours are true and Series S is being launched at same time as the X then it says to me that Series X might well be stupidly expensive so it softens the blow by saying ah yes but you can buy this one instead. Worst of every world that would be...

 

It would be utter shitstorm if they were £100 more than PS5. £50 more? maybe but still a bitter pill to swallow.

 

 

[SeanR]

2 minutes ago, Clipper said:

don't understand the comparison at all.

 

Mattrick was saying you can't play your old games - a polite fuck off in other words - he was offering something negative.

 

the other is saying here are two flavours of nextgen one for your HDTV and one for your 4K TV. they all play the same games just one drives a 4KTV .

 

 

 

at 4K native resolution, and only costs X amount more.

 

are 4K tvs any good at upscaling a 1080p image?

[Clipper]

Just now, SeanR said:

 

at 4K native resolution, and only costs X amount more.

 

are 4K tvs any good at upscaling a 1080p image?

as we have already said it ALL depends on the pricing of Series S, X and PS5

 

if X and PS5 are similar prices then it won't matter as the S will be a bonus way into nextgen for those with less money and HDTV

 

If X is more than PS5 it will become more problematic as PS5 might look like the sweet spot in the middle.

[Transient Curse]

3 minutes ago, Clipper said:

Partially agreed and my main concern on that  is that if the rumours are true and Series S is being launched at same time as the X then it says to me that Series X might well be stupidly expensive so it softens the blow by saying ah yes but you can buy this one instead. Worst of every world that would be...

 

It would be utter shitstorm if they were £100 more than PS5. £50 more? maybe but still a bitter pill to swallow.

 

 

I just can't see Microsoft coming in more expensive than Sony this time around. I'm going to have to get away from this thread. Apologies to all for posting every 25 seconds. 

[Clipper]

its interesting and makes a change from the warzzzzzz stuff. If Series S a launch is a thing it will be interesting to see how it plays out.

We need those prices and launch dates tho!

 

[Alex W.]

7 minutes ago, Clipper said:

Partially agreed and my main concern on that  is that if the rumours are true and Series S is being launched at same time as the X then it says to me that Series X might well be stupidly expensive so it softens the blow by saying ah yes but you can buy this one instead. Worst of every world that would be...

 

It would be utter shitstorm if they were £100 more than PS5. £50 more? maybe but still a bitter pill to swallow.

 

 

I could see them bracketing the PS5 price, £50 above and £50 below. Close enough to make the Series X a tempting upgrade from the PS5, far enough that the Series S is a respectable discount compared to the PS5 and a bargain version of the Series X.

 

Digital or “full” PS5, though?

 

Microsoft’s not here to mess around though. The Series X looks like a console that’s been optimised to not waste an ounce of plastic or a whisper of cooling. It’s got a lean efficiency to it. I could see the price gap between the rival consoles being very small indeed.

[TehStu]

On 05/08/2020 at 16:00, Jashin said:

 Is that an ‘anti consumer’ move? I can’t keep up.

Well, yeah. If you only want live, not having the 12 month option makes it more expensive, right? 4x3 month and 12x1 month are a bit more expensive. It shafts people who can't afford the $60 up front.

 

I guess we'll have to see what payment options pan out. Before I had 3 years of GPU for $1, I only paid for Live, in 12 month increments.

 

The "I can't keep up" bit - I'm just pointing out a fact.

[Talk Show Host]

2 hours ago, Stanley said:

You said earlier that most customers aren’t even aware of what 4K is, or disc drives, before suggesting Sony are offering a clearer choice, one with a disc drive one without. So why is it confusing for customers with no understanding of 4K or disc drives when choosing an Xbox as opposed to a PlayStation? Are Xbox customers just inherently more stupid? 

 

Because the PS5 is the same console, it is not weaker. It is this power difference which has the potential to confuse and also create a bad general perception. Having only Game Pass to counter this or communicate what weaker means will not prove an efficient strategy for Microsoft to attract more people through the Series S imo. 

[footle]

13 minutes ago, Talk Show Host said:

 

Because the PS5 is the same console, it is not weaker. It is this power difference which has the potential to confuse and also create a bad general perception. Having only Game Pass to counter this or communicate what weaker means will not prove an efficient strategy for Microsoft to attract more people through the Series S imo. 

 

All those people buying Switch Lites that don't Switch must be really confused.