Xbox Series X | S

[cassidy]

Mines arrived and it's all setup, and that was super quick. Same as my OneX though it refuses to realise my TV does Dolby Vision, but I think that's because it only works on internal apps like Netflix not via the HDMI connection. Or it could be my Amp doesn't do DV, just HDR. 

 

Will verify that by connecting direct at some point. 

 

Anyway downloading the optimised version of games I own now and have Yakuza ready to play.  Really was simple to sort all told. 

[skondo]

Spoke to Argos customer service this afternoon and a very helpful chap confirmed my order is valid and I will be able to collect my Series X on Monday. Good news, but I’m not assuming anything and won’t be convinced until I get a confirmation that I can collect my order.

 

On the other hand....Yay!

[Hitcher]

2 hours ago, Strafe said:

For some reason (likely I didn’t read the article properly) I thought the patch for Jedi fallen order would give me 60fps 4K on series X but the 60fps mode is limited to 1080p. Shouldn’t it be able to do it?

No, it's 1440p@60fps even though the description still says 1080p.

[skondo]

Question for those with the Series X. Is the official memory expansion essential or a nice to have? I already have a 1tb external drive with old games on and I’ll install what I have deleted from my One X internal drive onto the Series X SSD. 

[Popo]

@skondo I'm not finding any need for expanded storage, not yet anyway.  The internal 1GB is almost always full, but only because I'm constantly downloading, trying (or finishing) stuff, then deleting it to make room for others.  Admittedly I don't have any monster games, like Call of Duty - the way I look at it, the Game Pass store front is the equivalent of a shelf full of boxed games; when I want to play one I take it from the shelf and install it (I just have to plan for the install time - but to be fair you need to do that with disks anyway).

 

I've got 32 games installed right now, which are a selection of Series X enhanced, Xbox One and Xbox 360 titles.

[Wahwah*]

I wouldn't rush into buying it. 1TB is not exactly roomy if you had a few TB of storage on your previous system, but it's still enough for a lot of games, more than enough to keep you busy. People talk about Call Of Duty and other games with huge installs as being indicative of the storage not being enough, but the majority of games are more like 50GB and below, often significantly.

 

I'm personally hanging on until they increase the capacity of the card or lower the price, or I feel like my life would be made better by having one. At the moment I don't feel like I'm short on space and I do have some of those big games installed like the aforementioned COD, but I do have older games on an external drive. The reality is that the majority of the time I only play one of half a dozen games.

[Shimmyhill]

I’m saving for the storage expansion card with reward points, hoping by the time I get there it will be 2tb - I’ve pretty much filled the internal 1tb and my external 1tb ssd.

[LaveDisco]

I really think of the new storage limitations in a different way as before. It's more like the cartridge slot, or a CD changer, your collection lives in the cloud, and you switch it out overnight. The loading being so much faster when installed, more than makes up for it.

 

In terms of expansions, I pondered a 1Tb expansion card and an extra controller for the X. But that comes to £5 more than a 0.5Gb Series S, which lets you play games in two rooms.

[deerokus]

It doesn't take long at all to copy stuff to and from an external if you use one as 'cold storage'. 

 

No need for the expensive add on unless you've got more money than patience. 

[MattyP]

30 minutes ago, skondo said:

Question for those with the Series X. Is the official memory expansion essential or a nice to have? I already have a 1tb external drive with old games on and I’ll install what I have deleted from my One X internal drive onto the Series X SSD. 

Well its kind of a question you need to ask yourself really. How do you play games? One or two at a time or do you like having a raft of games installed to flick between?

 

I can manage with 500GB for example because I generally only play on a couple of titles at any one time. Sure I have a ton of other stuff on there that I don't play and I have a clean up every month or so removing things I've downloaded to try and not really got into. You'll find that with using GamePass. 1TB is way enough for me.

[cassidy]

Yeah even though I am a new owner of the Series X. I've got my existing 2TB harddrive attached and that's only half full so plan on solely using that for One X and 360 games.  Swapping game out just like deerokus, internal will be used just Optimised games only. 

 

 

[skondo]

Thanks for the advice all. Will give it a miss for the moment.

[Darren]

2 minutes ago, cassidy said:

Yeah even though I am a new owner of the Series X. I've got my existing 2TB harddrive attached and that's only half full so plan on solely using that for One X and 360 games.  Swapping game out just like deerokus, internal will be used just Optimised games only. 

 

 

 

It's brilliant playing non-optimised games from the internal drive (I think you'd get the same effect from an external SSD too, just not an HD) and reading the first three words from a wall of text on each loading screen before it disappears. I can imagine some older games getting patched with an optional "press A to continue" button added to those screens to give you a chance to read them.

[Majora]

I'm also saving up my reward points for the 1tb expansion card. Agree it's not remotely essential but if I can get a very significant discount on it I'd welcome another 1TB of usable space over transferring stuff back and forth.

[Wahwah*]

28 minutes ago, Darren said:

 

It's brilliant playing non-optimised games from the internal drive (I think you'd get the same effect from an external SSD too, just not an HD) and reading the first three words from a wall of text on each loading screen before it disappears. I can imagine some older games getting patched with an optional "press A to continue" button added to those screens to give you a chance to read them.

Yes, that's one thing, the loading is so much better. On Doom Eternal, which I had many, many restarts on, loading was 3 seconds for another go. If I had been playing it on my One X or from the external drive I wouldn't have persevered.

[cassidy]

53 minutes ago, Darren said:

 

It's brilliant playing non-optimised games from the internal drive (I think you'd get the same effect from an external SSD too, just not an HD) and reading the first three words from a wall of text on each loading screen before it disappears. I can imagine some older games getting patched with an optional "press A to continue" button added to those screens to give you a chance to read them.

Hmm food for thought there.  Didn't realise that. 

[Darren]

7 minutes ago, cassidy said:

Hmm food for thought there.  Didn't realise that. 

 

It's like @deerokus said - just use the external HD as cold storage. My HD is set as the default location for downloads, and then they get transferred over to the SSD (which takes a fraction of the time) when I get round to playing them, and stay there until I've finished/had enough/given up.

[Strafe]

5 hours ago, skondo said:

Question for those with the Series X. Is the official memory expansion essential or a nice to have? I already have a 1tb external drive with old games on and I’ll install what I have deleted from my One X internal drive onto the Series X SSD. 

I sent mine back. If you already have an external drive that works I don’t really see the point in spending £220 to save a few seconds on loading time/some under telly real estate.

 

Unless you’re the type of person who plays loads of different games simultaneously I wouldn’t bother for now.

[AceGrace]

I got the expansion. I've plugged it in a forgotten about it. I also have an 1tb external ssd plugged in. For me it was about future proofing.

[AceGrace]

I also got a Series S just before Christmas from Argos. I had the same thing. Paid for it, it said the order had failed but got a text saying it was ready to pick up. Contacted Argos and they said all good.

 

So now I have a Series X, PS5 and Series S. I think I am going to use the Series S as a dev unit for emulation.

[Garwoofoo]

I replaced my incredibly slow external HDD with a USB 3.2 external SSD, and to be honest it loads as fast as the internal drive does. It's been a brilliant upgrade. More cost-effective than the official expansion though obviously I'm limited to running Xbox One games from it.

[Shimmyhill]

23 minutes ago, Garwoofoo said:

I replaced my incredibly slow external HDD with a USB 3.2 external SSD, and to be honest it loads as fast as the internal drive does. It's been a brilliant upgrade. More cost-effective than the official expansion though obviously I'm limited to running Xbox One games from it.

I don’t think anything properly uses the velocity engine yet hence there being not much difference, I love the external ssd for older games - gives them a new lease of life!

[CarloOos]

58 minutes ago, Garwoofoo said:

I replaced my incredibly slow external HDD with a USB 3.2 external SSD, and to be honest it loads as fast as the internal drive does. It's been a brilliant upgrade. More cost-effective than the official expansion though obviously I'm limited to running Xbox One games from it.

You’ll probably end up using it to shuffle SX games off and on the internal quickly, which is just as useful.

[AK Bell]

The SSD I was already using on the xbox one seems fast enough for most games. 

 

I was just saying in another topic that the only one I've had to bump up to internal for loading times was mass effect andromeda. 

 

Obviously the internal is needed for X|S only games, but we got a couple of years before we see a new one of them??? 

[cassidy]

So first day with the Series X and sadly work meant I didn't get much time with it and there was the redownloading of some Optimised games to the internal drive. 

 

Anyway. Bloody hell it's quick. It's a marked improvement from the One X. Switching on, and the biggest shock was the Rewards apps it's 5 seconds now and used to take ages to open on the One X. 

 

Oh and quickly moved a game from internal to external drive and Jesus it was done in seconds. 

 

Quick resume worked perfectly and is a great gesture but one I may not use that much.  And this morning I switched it on and Batman booted straight to where I left it yesterday in seconds and switched over to Forza Horizon 4. 

 

Which looks stunning in 4K/60.

 

Started Yakuza Like a Dragon last night as well but only played to the moment you get control after the battle, again impressed by load times on this. 

 

Can't wait for more exclusive and optimised games to come out but yeah Im happy I upgraded. 

 

[Hitcher]

8 minutes ago, cassidy said:

Rewards apps it's 5 seconds now

You do mean it takes 5 seconds from it popping up, opening, claiming, closing, and back to the game I hope.

[Mr. Gerbik]

In Like a Dragon they might as well have removed the loading screen images. It loads so quick that a short, near instantaneous fade to black would totally be sufficient. Now the splash screens appear for an instant, blink and you'll miss them.

[Wahwah*]

19 minutes ago, cassidy said:

Quick resume worked perfectly and is a great gesture but one I may not use that much

It's not something you actively use? It just does it,  right? Play one of the last 6 or so games that you've played and it just works (for most things).

[cassidy]

19 minutes ago, Wahwah* said:

It's not something you actively use? It just does it,  right? Play one of the last 6 or so games that you've played and it just works (for most things).

But I tend to quit my games from the home menu unless I'm going to be booting up the Xbox again in the near future 

 

Maybe it's a habit I can now get out of.

[gossi the dog]

For those in the Netherlands, Bol.com have stock of the Series X