Xbox X Series further specs revealed

I mean, that is a bit of a nothing number as how you count a FLOP varies a whole lot... However it does sound like it has big power coming. Not only on the GPU front, but CPU as well which is good as more than a couple console games get limited by CPU performance.

The question though, will be price. Big chip will cost big dollars. Is MS going to be willing to take a per-unit loss to try and stick it to Sony, or are they going to charge $500, $600 or more and risk low sales?
 
The rumor is that the higher end Series X will be $600 and the lower end will be $400 so you'll have options. MS may lower the price to $500 (assuming the rumors are even correct) depending on the what the final system specs of the PS5 are.
 
Those specs sound really good actually. No way it's "cheap" though, $600 is not out of the question.

I really like the backwards compat. Only trouble is, it's mostly PS games I want to go back to (I really hope Sony follows MS here).

Though I never played Riddick, I would go back for that. And that Panzer Dragoon game, Jet Set Radio and maybe a couple others from OG XB.
 
The rumor is that the higher end Series X will be $600 and the lower end will be $400 so you'll have options. MS may lower the price to $500 (assuming the rumors are even correct) depending on the what the final system specs of the PS5 are.

I dunno, I'm have serious doubts about the second Xbox rumor. It seems more likely that the 'second Xbox" is just the Xbox One X, since MS is so heavily pushing cross-gen stuff.
 
hopefully they spend some $$ actually paying developers to make some good exclusives...otherwise it won't matter
 
I dunno, I'm have serious doubts about the second Xbox rumor. It seems more likely that the 'second Xbox" is just the Xbox One X, since MS is so heavily pushing cross-gen stuff.

I don't think it's a rumor. I'm pretty sure they said they would be launching two new SKU's this generation. We just don't know the exact specs of the cheaper SKU yet.

Those specs sound really good actually. No way it's "cheap" though, $600 is not out of the question.

I really like the backwards compat. Only trouble is, it's mostly PS games I want to go back to (I really hope Sony follows MS here).

Though I never played Riddick, I would go back for that. And that Panzer Dragoon game, Jet Set Radio and maybe a couple others from OG XB.

Sony already announced the PS5 will be backwards compatible through all generations.
 
I don't think it's a rumor. I'm pretty sure they said they would be launching two new SKU's this generation. We just don't know the exact specs of the cheaper SKU yet.

They have not said anything about multiple SKUs. It has only ever been a rumor. The only thing they've talked about is Project Scarlett/Xbox Series X. The only other SKUs they've talked about is the Xbox One.
 
Indeed, if the PS4 wasn't backwards compatible for the PS3 I doubt the PS5 will be. PS4 to PS5 should be easy though.

If they do backward compatibility to older consoles, it will almost certainly be with emulation. It would be 100% possible to emulate the PS3 on PS5 hardware. I mean look at the Xbox 360 emulator on the Xbox One. It isn't easy, you need some talented people to write the code but it turns out money can buy those :). PS2 and PS1 would be very easy to emulate.

A hardware level compatibility setup is just unlikely because of cost and also possible licensing issues. For something as old as a PS1, sure you could do it for very little die space. Of course also because it is so simple emulation of it is extremely simple so why not do that. However a PS3 would take up a fair bit of die space that you wouldn't want to spend just on backward compatibility. While its chips are much less complex than modern ones, they are still enough transistors to make a huge dent in you transistor budget. Likewise having separate chips is doable, but costs extra and that is the last thing they want now.

So if it happens, count on it being via emulation. While it isn't no-cost to develop good emulation for older games, it is cheaper overall and has the benefit of being usable on future platforms.
 
Round-up of a few news links:

VideoCardZ - https://videocardz.com/newz/microsoft-confirms-xbox-series-x-feature-12-teraflops-amd-rdna-2-gpu


2020 High-End GPUs
NVIDIA TU102AMD Vega 20AMD Navi 10XBOX Series X GPU
Fabrication Node12nm Turing7nm GCN47nm RDNA17nm RDNA2
Unified Cores460838402560?
DeviceTITAN RTXRadeon VIIRadeon RX 5700 XTXBOX Series X
HDMI Support2.0b2.0b2.0b2.1
FP32 Max Compute

16.3 TFLOPs


13.4 TFLOPs


9.0 TFLOPs


12.0 TFLOPs


PC Gamer - https://www.pcgamer.com/on-paper-th...es-x-is-faster-than-a-geforce-rtx-2080-super/

Here's a rundown of graphics cards from both AMD and Nvidia in terms of TFLOPs:

  • GeForce RTX 2080 Ti (Turing TU102)—13.45 TFLOPs
  • Radeon RX Vega 64 (Vega 10)—12.66 TFLOPs
  • Xbox Series X (Navi - RDNA 2)—12 TFLOPs
  • GeForce RTX 2080 Super (Turing TU104)—11.15 TFLOPs
  • Radeon RX Vega 56 (Vega 10)—10.54 TFLOPs
  • GeForce RTX 2080 (Turing TU104)—10.07 TFLOPs
  • Radeon RX 5700 XT (Navi 10)—9.754 TFLOPs
  • GeForce RTX 2070 Super (Turing TU104)—9.062 TFLOPs
  • Radeon RX 5700 (Navi 10 XL)—7.949 TFLOPs
  • GeForce RTX 2070 (Turing TU106)—7.465 TFLOPs
  • GeForce RTX 2060 Super (Turing TU106)—7.181 TFLOPs
  • GeForce RTX 2060 (Turing TU106)—6.451 TFLOPs

Euro Gamer - https://www.eurogamer.net/articles/digitalfoundry-2020-xbox-series-x-power-play-analysis

Microsoft's messaging is so confident that there's almost the sense that the firm is throwing down the gauntlet to its main rival, Sony. I didn't anticipate that Microsoft or indeed Sony would resuscitate the teraflop as a measure of a console's power - principally because it's not an especially accurate way of expressing what a GPU is really capable of, especially when comparing architectures from two very different generations. I can only imagine that Microsoft is comfortable enough with a comparison with the last-gen enhanced machine that possibly under-sells its new machine, while at the same time challenging Sony to follow suit with its latest offering.
 
Sounds like a $600 console to me. And we thought Sony was going to have trouble selling at $500.

The rumor is that the higher end Series X will be $600 and the lower end will be $400 so you'll have options. MS may lower the price to $500

I am thinking the series X will have configurations for both $500 & $600 based on SSD capacity (like the iphone models)

Since Series S is meant as replacement for X1X & today X1X is discounted to $300, I think the Series S will also sell in the same range. Might go up for higher SSD capacity & might go down for SAD (series S All Digital) version
 
Like I said in another post, never been glader to be wrong.

I was in the camp of "Phil meant 2x performance not flops" VS xb1x because I'm being economical, but seeing confirmation of neogaf's "both are at 12tf give or take 10% with nextbox latest dev kit a bit better than ps5but still not close to final while ps5 is more polished" and "they are both around 2080-2080s in rt" makes me glad. Once the games get vrs and the like the new generation will look truly amazing.

Yes I prefer ps5 games but I have no issue with series x being slightly better, it means that everyone wins.
 
Recycle your PS4 and X-BOX one and save the environment.
I don't even expect this gen this year because of all the turmoil over in China.
 
Recycle your PS4 and X-BOX one and save the environment.
I don't even expect this gen this year because of all the turmoil over in China.


The word is that it will be released this year no matter what but availability will be constrained (remember the first months of the 360?...)
 
I'm dubious of the 12 TFLOPs claim because that seems expensive to put in a $500 console. Good on Microsoft if they did that but this is Microsoft and their ability to tell the truth is against their policy. So either this is going to be a $600 console and Microsoft don't care about the price or this 12 TFLOP calculation is baed on Variable Rate Shading (VRS) which is a feature that lowers the polygons and textures for objects in a distance, and what Microsoft is saying is that the Xbox Series X "FEELS" like 12 TFLOPs when in actuality it's more like 10 TFLOPs. I would certainly wait for the details of the GPU before agreeing with that number.
 
Hopefully the stupid thing will allow you to sit it on it's side.

I would advise to keep it vertical

Because hot air tends to move upwards, so the cooling should be more efficient that way
 
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Isnt there only 1 official way to count a teraflop? How close a GPU gets to that theoretical max depends on the bottlenecks the arch has and the code optimizations.

Texture units * raster operations * core clock = flops

No, there's the question of a FLOP doing what. What I mean is we have long since left the realm of having nothing but general purpose execution units, which execute all instructions in precisely the same cycle count. Now we have lots of specialized units for various tasks. When they quote their TFLOPS number, it is always in the most favourable conditions: All units fully supplied running whatever instructions give the best results. However that is not always possible in the real world. I don't just mean because people haven't coded for it, I mean because what you are doing just doesn't use that kind of math. A simple example is the FMA, fused multiply-accumulate instruction. Very popular in DSPs for years, now found in CPUs as well. You take two values, B and C, multiply them and add them to the accumulator A. As implemented in most DSPs, you do it in one cycle. So you get two floating point ops, one multiply one add, in a single cycle. That's great... if what you are doing is using that kind of math. However if it isn't, it is useless. If you are doing something that requires, say, multiplying A and B, dividing that result by C, and then adding it with D, you can't use a FMA instruction. Despite there being a multiply and an add, you can't change the order you do things in or you get a different result.

Also you can get different FLOP counts for different precisions. Often you'll see a doubling where if you get X FLOPS at double precision (64-bit) you get 2X FLOPS at single precision (32-bit) and 4X FLOPS at half precision (16-bit). Now that's great if what you are doing can use lower precision... but if it can't then it can be misleading.

Finally as an aside, in the case of GPUs they are usually talking about the shaders when talking about FLOPS, not the TMUs or ROPs.
 
I'm dubious of the 12 TFLOPs claim because that seems expensive to put in a $500 console. Good on Microsoft if they did that but this is Microsoft and their ability to tell the truth is against their policy. So either this is going to be a $600 console and Microsoft don't care about the price or this 12 TFLOP calculation is baed on Variable Rate Shading (VRS) which is a feature that lowers the polygons and textures for objects in a distance, and what Microsoft is saying is that the Xbox Series X "FEELS" like 12 TFLOPs when in actuality it's more like 10 TFLOPs. I would certainly wait for the details of the GPU before agreeing with that number.

Of course they're telling the truth about the number. However, TFlops aren't everything when it comes to performance. Remember, the Radeon 7 is 12.66 Teraflops but is soundly creamed in games by cards with less TFlops. Also, don't forget that MS is committed to buying several tens of millions of these. AMD likely isn't making a ton of profit per APU in order to keep prices down.
 
I've had Xbox / PS side by side with each other in my media center since 360 and PS3. But this is the first time where I might not, partly due to price and partly because I don't have time for the systems I have, let alone new ones.

While I'd like to be able to say the decision will be made on available games, features like backwards compatibility, size of existing library of compatible games, design of the UI (I've preferred MS' interface this entire time to Sony's bizarre crossbar thing), media capabilities, etc... it may actually just depend on physical dimensions.

My TV sits on a small open cabinet with two shelves underneath, and I don't think there's clearance on either one (about 9" and about 10") for a vertically placed game system that my own back of napkin math puts at around 11" tall. So it might be a really easy decision.
 
Of course they're telling the truth about the number.
Of course, I mean it isn't like consoles haven't lied about their specs in the past.
However, TFlops aren't everything when it comes to performance.
True but in terms of AMD GPU's running RDNA the 12 TFLOP value would make the Xbox Series X faster than a 5700 XT, which is only 9.754 TFLOPS. Unless RDNA2.0 goes up in TFLOPs but goes down in gaming performance, I'm inclined to believe the Xbox Series X is faster than a Ryzen 3700X with a 5700 XT.

AMD likely isn't making a ton of profit per APU in order to keep prices down.
That doesn't make sense as AMD isn't doing themselves any favors. Their customers do have a choice of either buying a Xbox or Playstation running their hardware or buying a AMD GPU. Wouldn't it be better for AMD to compete against Nvidia than to barely make a profit from the consoles? Something isn't adding up here.
 
Of course, I mean it isn't like consoles haven't lied about their specs in the past.

There is really little reason for them to lie about it. If they were lying, Sony would be able to call them out on it and anyone capable of digging further into specs would figure it out as well. If the TFlops weren't good, MS could ignore it and find some other, entirely meaningless, thing to boast about and make the system seem good. All in all it's a marketing bulletpoint that can be used or discarded as needed.

True but in terms of AMD GPU's running RDNA the 12 TFLOP value would make the Xbox Series X faster than a 5700 XT, which is only 9.754 TFLOPS. Unless RDNA2.0 goes up in TFLOPs but goes down in gaming performance, I'm inclined to believe the Xbox Series X is faster than a Ryzen 3700X with a 5700 XT.

Theoretically faster. There's a lot that can limit performance beyond just how many teraflops a GPU is capable of. That said, it really makes me wonder what RDNA 2 GPUs are going to end up being like.

That doesn't make sense as AMD isn't doing themselves any favors. Their customers do have a choice of either buying a Xbox or Playstation running their hardware or buying a AMD GPU. Wouldn't it be better for AMD to compete against Nvidia than to barely make a profit from the consoles? Something isn't adding up here.

Based on what I could find estimates were that Sony was paying all of $100 per chip for the PS4 APU with MS paying $110, on launch. That's not a lot for large semi-custom chips. When a company is committing to ordering several tens of millions of chips over a handful of years they get pretty big discounts because the total profit makes up for having less per-chip profit. As to the other part: Even if they're not making a ton of profit per-chip (at the outset) as long as there is demand for the consoles that will bring in hundreds of millions per year. In Q3 2016 AMD's enterprise, embedded, and semi-custom division (where console stuff is put under) brought in $835m, with AMD claiming a good chunk of that was from strong console demand at the time (and the impending launch of the PS4 Pro).

What makes you think they'd make more money focusing on GPUs in a market where they will need multiple years of successful, competitive, products in order to make a dent vs a market where they can own 2/3rds of the systems on the market? Despite Navi being fairly solid (despite some driver issues) they're still not making notable gains on Nvidia's stranglehold. It would be stupid to turn down potentially billions in revenue from consoles.
 
I would almost guarantee that there won't be PS3 compatibility, and if there was, it probably would be something like verifying the game disc and having you download whatever they use for PS Now. I don't think the hardware is quite fast enough for PS3 emulation.
 
I would almost guarantee that there won't be PS3 compatibility, and if there was, it probably would be something like verifying the game disc and having you download whatever they use for PS Now. I don't think the hardware is quite fast enough for PS3 emulation.

The XB1 emulates the 360. Emulating the Cell is probably a bit more complex, but I don't think it would be impossible.
 
The XB1 emulates the 360. Emulating the Cell is probably a bit more complex, but I don't think it would be impossible.
Considering there's a PS3 emulator called RPCS3 that can run on a weaker CPU than what the PS5 is getting, I would say yes. Same goes for the Xbox 360 as there's Xenia that also works on much weaker hardware than the Xbox X.
 
Considering there's a PS3 emulator called RPCS3 that can run on a weaker CPU than what the PS5 is getting, I would say yes. Same goes for the Xbox 360 as there's Xenia that also works on much weaker hardware than the Xbox X.

It only achieves a 50% playability rate though. I don't know enough about the project to know why that is.
 
Considering there's a PS3 emulator called RPCS3 that can run on a weaker CPU than what the PS5 is getting, I would say yes. Same goes for the Xbox 360 as there's Xenia that also works on much weaker hardware than the Xbox X.
Can't compare a emulator done by a small group on their free time to the company that made the console with hundreds of programmers available. Also Sony knows the PS3 hardware better then anyone else.
 
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Sony could absolutely make a PS3 emulator. Not that it would be easy per se, but they wrote the API and the made the chips, they have intimate knowledge of how it works.

Oh for sure, it just is a matter of what is the profit after the money and time spent on developing and maintaining it?
 
It is selling point that MS is pushing hard. So yea they kinda have to it also.

I just don't think it would translate into dollars. If someone has a bunch of old ps3 games, they aren't likely to buy an xbox instead of a ps5 due to lack of back compatibility or completely pass on the ps5. If the ps3 games are the only reason they are buying the system, likely that person isn't out there to pay into the psn network nor are they buying new games. Not really a customer worth spending time and money on.

Microsoft really pushed the kinect last time too as the xbox one advantage over ps4
 
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