Xbox One Dev Kits Receive More GPU Bandwidth

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Microsoft has confirmed that Kinect-less Xbox One consoles will have up to 10% more GPU bandwidth. So, if future games are developed utilizing this freed up GPU bandwidth, what happens when that game is played on a Xbox One with a Kinect? Would you have to unplug the Kinect to avoid an instant performance hit?

"Yes, the additional resources allow access to up to 10 per cent additional GPU performance. We're committed to giving developers new tools and flexibility to make their Xbox One games even better by giving them the option to use the GPU reserve in whatever way is best for them and their games."
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Just start again with a Xbox One.5 using a GPU with more compute units and shaders and offer a free trade in for existing customers. All the rest of the design stays the same.

If not I think they'll have to issue Xbox Two a lot quicker then they planned.
 
daglesj said:
Just start again with a Xbox One.5 using a GPU with more compute units and shaders and offer a free trade in for existing customers. All the rest of the design stays the same.

If not I think they'll have to issue Xbox Two a lot quicker then they planned.
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seconded
 
daglesj said:
Just start again with a Xbox One.5 using a GPU with more compute units and shaders and offer a free trade in for existing customers. All the rest of the design stays the same.

If not I think they'll have to issue Xbox Two a lot quicker then they planned.
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^ this
 
cdr_74_premium said:
This is a mess. The Xbox One early adopter I know is going to freak out over this!
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This is for consumers to. All you have to do is disable or unplug the Kinect. I personally like the Kinect and the voice command features.
 
They've updated the article. It seems it's an SDK option, so there will be no need to disconnect the Kinect; the developer just has to take advantage of the option to use the extra bandwidth.
 
xX326Xx said:
This is for consumers to. All you have to do is disable or unplug the Kinect. I personally like the Kinect and the voice command features.
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I thought only the kinect-less version would get the 10% bonus.

That's what you get for not reading the article... hehe.
 
You can also look at it this way from MS perspective.

If they had sold the XBOX 1 without Kinect and told consumers that if they wanted to buy a Kinect separately, they would have a 10% performance hit. How many Kinects would they have sold?

MS made a huge gamble, realized they didn't make the most popular decision. Now they are stuck with a huge mess. Now devs and consumers will be stuck with an ugly choice, and many of those early adopters are likely to be pissed. This could actually be a worse backfire in the long run.
 
I bet Mattricks name is cursed on a hourly basis back at XBox HQ.
 
KillerFry said:
They've updated the article. It seems it's an SDK option, so there will be no need to disconnect the Kinect; the developer just has to take advantage of the option to use the extra bandwidth.
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This seems mind numbingly simple to implement. How hard is it to have the OS and/or game suspend the kinect software when certain games are playing? It couldn't be that hard to have the O/S auto suspend the kinect when a game fires up, then if said game uses the kinect it makes a call to the OS to resume kinect services. Its not like you need kinect to play Call of Duty just yet.
 
CaptNumbNutz said:
This seems mind numbingly simple to implement. How hard is it to have the OS and/or game suspend the kinect software when certain games are playing? It couldn't be that hard to have the O/S auto suspend the kinect when a game fires up, then if said game uses the kinect it makes a call to the OS to resume kinect services. Its not like you need kinect to play Call of Duty just yet.
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Hey, hey, hey! Don't shoot me! Hahaha.

It is actually kind of amazing it wasn't there to begin with. My guess would be that in order to have the voice commands enabled whether you're gaming or not - or even if the game makes no other use of the Kinect - they decided to always have it on, taking that bandwidth.

What I'm actually wondering is, if the developer turns off the Kinect functionality to get the extra bandwidth, does that mean all voice commands are off? Or will Kinect functionality be modular, so that they can turn off all visual processing and leave audio on... or... something like that... or...

... whatever... my XBone use right now consists of a glorified Bluray player, heh.
 
That is good as I like options. I have not used the Kinect for months anyway after the novelty of it wore off.
 
Why do I get the feeling the word of mouth between xbox kids will be "I heard if you unplug the Kinect you get 10% more power" and a network effect is going to occur with everyone plugging their Kinect.

Good job, Microsoft
 
Well, as I've always found very silly to talk to an electronic device... voice commands aren't really desirable for me. Heh.
 
cdr_74_premium said:
Well, as I've always found very silly to talk to an electronic device... voice commands aren't really desirable for me. Heh.
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Voice commands are fine for people who want it, the problem is Microsoft didn't need to hand victory to Sony by bundling an expensive webcam with motion tracking (at a time the motion control fad was already over) to support voice commands.

Like the PS4, Xb One's voice commands could've simply been handled by headset microphone.
 
cdr_74_premium said:
Microsoft going full retard, as usual.
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I think this is more of them getting one some prescription meds for their prior full retard mode. This was a logical patch, although it doesn't fix the underlying problem of the consoles being woefully underpowered.

Good news is, there's no way that Sony/MS can drag out these consoles like the prior generation. We may be resetting to a 5yr cycle.
 
Spidey329 said:
I think this is more of them getting one some prescription meds for their prior full retard mode. This was a logical patch, although it doesn't fix the underlying problem of the consoles being woefully underpowered.

Good news is, there's no way that Sony/MS can drag out these consoles like the prior generation. We may be resetting to a 5yr cycle.
Click to expand...

I think the 8-10 year plan was only brought in due to the world economy going tits up a couple of years after release.
 
Considering Sony is in financial hardship and Microsoft is flush with cash, they should have put the nail in the coffin and made Xbone 2x as powerful as it is today, charged $299 for it, eaten the losses, and put their only major competitor out of business.

This would have been the most rational course of action if they had anyone on the executive team capable of thinking long term. Once you have a monopoly on the living room, you're free to push all sorts of other value add options to recoup your losses, ie: video streaming subscriptions, VOD, OTT video, streaming music, selling music, xbox and xbox 360 emulation software and games, etc....
 
Seventyfive said:
Considering Sony is in financial hardship and Microsoft is flush with cash, they should have put the nail in the coffin and made Xbone 2x as powerful as it is today, charged $299 for it, eaten the losses, and put their only major competitor out of business.

This would have been the most rational course of action if they had anyone on the executive team capable of thinking long term. Once you have a monopoly on the living room, you're free to push all sorts of other value add options to recoup your losses, ie: video streaming subscriptions, VOD, OTT video, streaming music, selling music, xbox and xbox 360 emulation software and games, etc....
Click to expand...

They did have the monopoly in the living room. That's why they tried to fuck everybody over with the DRM and forced Kinect. Unfortunately for the shareholders, it didn't work out the way they planned.

They'll find new ways to fuck over their fans for more cash. They just have to play nice till this all blows over.;)
 
cdr_74_premium said:
I thought only the kinect-less version would get the 10% bonus.

That's what you get for not reading the article... hehe.
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Not really the case, all MSFT did was allow developers to use the 10% bandwidth they reserved for the kinect. So if a developer wants to dedicated bandwidth to the kinect they can they arent blocked from accessing that bandwidth. This doesn't necessarily follow that an xbox that has a kinect plugged in will lose performance vs one that has a kinect plugged in as this is entirely game dependent.

This is pretty typical for new consoles, they set the reserve for the console high and slowly whittle down what has to be kept in reserve as they update the console.
 
KillerFry said:
Hey, hey, hey! Don't shoot me! Hahaha.

It is actually kind of amazing it wasn't there to begin with. My guess would be that in order to have the voice commands enabled whether you're gaming or not - or even if the game makes no other use of the Kinect - they decided to always have it on, taking that bandwidth.

What I'm actually wondering is, if the developer turns off the Kinect functionality to get the extra bandwidth, does that mean all voice commands are off? Or will Kinect functionality be modular, so that they can turn off all visual processing and leave audio on... or... something like that... or...

... whatever... my XBone use right now consists of a glorified Bluray player, heh.
Click to expand...

I wasn't directing my anger at you, I was directing it at MS. I'm also agreeing with you. :cool:
 
Aren't dev kits always different from the commercial platform counterparts?
 
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